#119: Barbie, Hot Wheels, Matchbox – Very Very Connected

Have you every heard of the Yukadoodle? It was parents favorite toy. No learn how that turned into Barbie. Dave Young: Welcome to the Empire Builders Podcast, teaching business owners the not so secret techniques that took famous businesses from Mom and Pop to major brands. Stephen Semple is a marketing consultant, story collector and storyteller. I’m Stephen’s sidekick and business partner, Dave Young. Before we get into today’s episode, a word from our sponsor, which is… Well it’s us, but we’re highlighting ads we’ve written and produced for our clients. So here’s one of those. [Tapper’s Jewelry Ad] Dave Young: Welcome to the Empire Builders Podcast. Dave Young here, alongside Stephen Semple. And Stephen just whispered in my ear, I have to admit because I’m a certain age, the triggering words, Barbie, Matchbox and Hot Wheels. Now the reason I’m triggered is it just brings back fights between me and my sisters. Stephen Semple: What, you were fighting over the Barbies? Dave Young: Not so much fighting over the Barbies, but fighting for space on the living room floor for playing with stuff. And maybe some heads got torn off some Barbie dolls. I don’t know. I can’t… Maybe some Hot Wheels or Matchbox cars were damaged in retaliation. Stephen Semple: Do you have any scars on your head from them hitting you? Dave Young: They would key my Matchbox cars. Stephen Semple: A lot of memories. Dave Young: Take me back to my childhood trauma. This is a therapy podcast, right? Stephen Semple: I was thinking about the other day, so I think we have to do part two of Tetris just to really get you into your hang socketing place. Dave Young: Sounds good. Stephen Semple: So we’re going to be doing something a little bit different because we’re talking about two companies and three products. And so this is going to become a two part episode, which is unusual for us. But when I was looking at these companies, the stories are so linked, I couldn’t figure out a way to break it apart. So I thought, you know what? We’re going to tell it as the best way to tell it. And I think that’s- Dave Young: Yeah. Stephen Semple: Looking at all three together. And the interesting thing is all three, Barbie, Matchbox and Hot Wheels, today are all part of Mattel, although Matchbox started as a competitor. But today they are all under the same umbrella. And Mattel today does like five and a half billion dollars in sales and has 33,000 employees around the world. And all three of these businesses basically started… for all three of these products, sorry, it’s two businesses, three products, started following World War II. And in North America, when we go back following World War II in North America, we had this baby boom as the troops returned from war and there was this GI Bill stimulating the economy, but it was very different in Europe following the war. They were rebuilding and recovering and in fact the economy was a mess. So the other part that’s interesting is, the origins of both of these businesses were quite different in terms of the economic environment. But first to California and Mattel. So Mattel was started by Elliot and Ruth Handler and a friend, Harold Matson. And the business started by making picture frames. They were manufacturing picture frames. And Ruth ran the business side and Elliot ran the creative side. Now keep in mind, this is following World War II. This is the late 1940s, early 1950s in manufacturing, and you’ve got a woman running it, which very, very out there for the time.