Word: toying
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...Mattel isn't about to give up on one of the industry's most enduring success stories. But it is breaking out the marketing Botox. To revitalize the line, the world's largest toy company is not only adding some edge to Barbie's nonthreatening image, it is pitching Barbie-branded merchandise to a wider customer base - adults - and ramping up its overseas sales efforts, starting with the potentially vast China market, by opening dedicated Barbie concept stores (think Nike Store, but exceedingly pink). (See pictures of China's wild side...
...deviating from script requires a trip to the retail district in downtown Shanghai. There, on March 6, the company plans to open a 38,000-sq.-ft. (3,500 sq m) House of Barbie - the first of its kind in the world. This is nothing like the Main Street toy shop of yesterday. To enter the eight-story showpiece space, customers pass through a pink neon-lit tube, where the prerecorded sound of giggling girls grows progressively - some might say demonically - louder. After registering for a Barbie passport, visitors can get their hair and nails done...
...might seem risky to open a new, untested store at a time when U.S. toy retailers are suffering (KB Toys, the second largest U.S. toy chain behind Toys "R" Us, filed for bankruptcy in December). But Mattel is opportunistically positioning itself to thrive, not merely survive, in a tough environment. Today, two-thirds of Barbie sales come from 150 foreign markets; international sales increased 12% in 2007, even as U.S. sales sagged by 15%. "What we're doing in Shanghai is an indication for the future of the Barbie brand," Dickson says. Mattel is already planning similar stores in Brazil...
KATIE MCCORMICK LELYVELD, press secretary for First Lady Michelle Obama, after a toy company introduced a line of dolls named Sweet Sasha and Marvelous Malia...
...Mattel, the company she founded, concurred. But Handler, a 5-ft. 2-in. (1.6 m) dynamo, was convinced there was a market for a mass-produced adult doll. Little girls aspired to be bigger girls, she reasoned. For years she pressed on, finally introducing the doll at the 1959 Toy Fair in New York City...