Toys R them: Inventors gather for chance to sell ideas to manufacturers

Friday, Sept. 7, 2001 | 11:24 a.m.

Ideas for new toys and games have to be simple yet special to catch the eye of the major toy manufacturers.

In a time when kids are glued to TV screens playing animated computer video games for hours on end, toymakers are in Las Vegas this week for the fifth annual Toy and Game Inventors Forum at Bally's with gadgets that stimulate something that computers sometimes fail to tickle -- a child's imagination.

"Unlike computers, our toy involves a little role playing for either a lone child playing with stuffed animals or a group of children," said Glenn Langlinais, who along with wife Liz invented the "Delivery Pizza Play Set," a large plastic old-fashioned pizza making machine.

"With a computer you get no exercise. With our toy, you make the pizza, put on the pizza guy delivery cap that comes with the set, put the pizza in its (pretend stay warm) pouch and ride off on your bike to deliver it to a friend. I believe it is marketable because we are coming full circle from the visual games of computers to the more interactive toys of the past."

Langlinais, 46, who has been in restaurant equipment sales for 22 years, and Liz, 41, of Lafayette, La., are two of about 150 inventors at the convention that runs through Saturday. They are trying to encourage toy and game manufacturers to market their ideas. The show is closed to the public.

Toymakers at the convention, such as Lothar Hemme of the 115-year-old Ravensburger toy company of Germany, makers of the "Amazing Labyrinth," says there is something to be said for those who believe "people are fed up" with computers.

"They want something a little more challenging," he said. "Of course, things like games have to be simple and not have rules that take hours to read and understand."

The Laglinaises, parents of five children ages 4-21, said their pizza toy machine can be played with for hours at a time and is durable enough to last for decades. Although they want to market it to the general public for $69 or less, their immediate target is businesses such as day care centers and children's hospitals.

Patrick Turner, a 48-year-old inventor who says he has "an 8-year-old's mentality," invents much smaller but more technological gadgets that sell for a couple bucks each, like balls that return when rolled away and kite strings on battery-operated devices that make wild designs when illuminated.

"I make little things for people with little money," Turner said, demonstrating in rapid succession dozens of hand-held toys he has invented in five years, including nine that are on the market. "I hope to sell nine more here."

The TGIF show is the brainchild of inventor Carol Rehtmeyer, who 12 years ago invented "Pretty, Pretty Princess," the Hasbro game that opened up the so-called girls games market. Today she runs Rehtmeyer Design and Licensing, a company that serves as an agent for other toy and game inventors.

"Toymakers do not meet with inventors -- they meet with agents," she said. "This convention allows us to give something back to the industry by having the inventors meet one-on-one with representatives of major toymakers like Hasbro, Mattel, Fisher Price and others."

Four of the five TGIFs have been held in Las Vegas, with some of the exhibits finding their way to America's toy shelves to become part of what is a $33 billion-a-year industry, Rehtmeyer said. Still, she admits the chance of an unknown inventor coming to her show with a prototype or idea that will become the next toy or game sensation is, "a little bit better than the chance of winning the lottery."

"A toymaker has to look at a potential new toy or game and say 'Wow, awesome, very cool.' The industry term is: 'Does it make you pee your pants?' " Rehtmeyer said.

Inventors pay $795 to attend the forum. Among the exhibits at their tables are toys as old as marbles -- 3 billion are sold worldwide each year -- and as new as solar gadgets.

"Our glass marbles are unusual in that they have ceramic animals inside," said Orlando Morroy of Sulphide BV, a Netherlands toymaker who is marketing his set of 12 "Winners" marbles in the United Kingdom and Australia at $4.99 for a pack of two.

"This is a new twist on an old product that people can relate to. I played with marbles, my son plays with marbles, my father played with marbles and my grandfather played with marbles."

Sergey Makhotkin, a resident of Escondido, Calif., by way of Moscow, markets "Amazing Solar Powered Tops and Necklaces," glittery $9.95 items that spin when sunlight hits them.

"These are educational toys for children from 2 to any age because they have no on-off switch and you can stare at them for hours," said Makhotkin, manager of Scientific Art. "The sound they make also keeps birds away from gardens, and some people buy them as cat toys, so they have other purposes."

As for the upcoming Christmas season, the slowed economy concerns toymakers like Hemme, but he says he is maintaining an optimism that people won't let their kids suffer just because money is a little tight. He predicts a big year for Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings licensed products.

Rehtmeyer agrees that there is optimism for Christmas sales despite reports of gloom and doom.

"The toy and game industry, though not recession-proof, does tend to do well even during Christmas seasons when things are tight," Rehtmeyer said. "In times when parents cannot afford to take a child to Disneyland or throw a big party, they feel guilty and buy their kid a toy."