How to Succeed in Toy Design: Journey with Innovator Dan Klitsner

EP044_08-27-24_Dan Klitsner

Intro: [00:00:00] Welcome to Toy Business Unboxed, your gateway to the secrets of the toy industry. Here, Jason Hsieh, a toy entrepreneur and expert in the field. “Every product we develop is really inspired by some of the real life experience that we have with our son.” “60 percent of all toys last year were sold on Amazon.”

“Be passionate about it. Because it’s a road. It’s a journey.” “Like when you have an idea that you think is gonna somewhat change the world, make things better, I’d say go for it.“

Jason Hsieh: Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of Toy Business Unboxed. I’m your host, Jason Hsieh. Today, we have the pleasure of speaking with Dan. Legendary in industrial and toy designer and a mastermind behind some of the most beloved toys and games of our time, including the legendary Bop It, as you can [00:01:00] see in his background. And in this episode, we’re going to explore Dan’s incredible journey in the toy industry from starting his company to coming up with all the wonderful invention in the toy industry and also the mission behind Bop It for Good and some of the unique process when he does toy concept and toy design and also making a toy that everyone will enjoy.

Thank you so much for joining our podcast today, Dan. 

Dan Klitsner: Oh, thank you, Jason. That was a very nice buildup. I hope I can meet that expectation. 

Jason Hsieh: Man, but your toys is really well known because I’m pretty sure everyone in the toy industry know what Bop It is, is pretty much all the major retail store.

Dan Klitsner: Well, there’s funny, there’s Bop It with a B and then there’s Pop It with a P and we have both of them ironically. 

They’re very different, but yeah, what’s funny is that, Bop It, of course, people are tired of probably hearing me talk about it, but what’s funny is 26 years later. [00:02:00] Invented this thing called Pop It, which had nothing Pop It pro, which has nothing to do with bop it really. But it just happened that so you can say either and it’s okay. 

Jason Hsieh: Okay, cool. So can you share the story of the, let’s talk about the Bop it with a B first? 

Dan Klitsner: Bob, but with a B again, that I know, as I said, on different podcasts, I’ve told the story in different ways, I always try to think what’s, what’s something I haven’t maybe revealed or different way. I think what’s most interesting here for your podcast is about the business, a lot of different journeys that different creators have mine started, I think as an industrial designer, as you said, I fell in love with industrial design. When I fell out of love with engineering I was at, I was at university of California, Davis, and I hated it. And my father luckily sent away for a brochure. He heard about industrial design. I had no idea what it was. And I opened this catalog to art center and just, so that’s what I want to do. I want to do stuff, you know, I want to create, [00:03:00] I don’t want to engineer it. I want to come up with the ideas and design it and aesthetics.

So I just, there was no holding me back from that point. And I think I was very lucky that I found something in time, that I loved that I could put all my focus on. So that is really the beginning of my journey. And because of that, as I graduated and was working on different items, I had a lot of freelance clients. One of them was a company called Memrex and I was designing, remote controls like this is a, this is actually a, 

Jason Hsieh: Oh, whoa. 

Dan Klitsner: A prototype from 30 years ago, it’s pretty contemporary looking, but I designed these remotes that were you know, sort of a universal remote for adults at the same time. I was working on games and toys. For another client discovery toys. And I just had this idea. What if you made a remote control for kids that was more playful? And so that idea, I had a lot of ideas. One was this [00:04:00] thing called a couch potato. It was just looked like a potato, but it was a remote. Kind of fun. The other one was this silly one called a pizza, a remote by the slice.

Jason Hsieh: I like the pizza 

Dan Klitsner: humor was if a kid’s, playing, they’re going to have this on their table and it looks like an old piece of pizza, but it’s actually your TV remote. So that was, I thought a kid would like that. And so the company that licensed them was MGA. Which is very well known now for 

Jason Hsieh: Yes, yes, MGA, yes.

Dan Klitsner: Right, MGA, but this is early on Isaac, who is the the founder of it, came to my office, and he loved that idea. And I had one more idea for Emote, and it was called the Channel Bopper. And you were supposed to bop, channel up, channel down, right? I said, wouldn’t it be funny if a kid just got to hammer the table to change channels and you twisted for volume and you pulled for on up. And if you think that’s all you needed, no buttons, right? This was sort of this, this idea and the learning, I think I want to say [00:05:00] it’s, that I had heard sort of this mantra early on, which is watch the kid, not the toy. And that meant don’t you’re not really just, people aren’t supposed to look at the toy that’s supposed to look at what the toy makes the kid do.

And in this case, I applied that to this rather than just pushing buttons. I said, what could be more physical? So the idea of a remote control, the Genesis of Bapa was how to make a remote control that that was much more active. Right. And think of the analogy. So this was the channel bopper. They didn’t want to do it. It failed or didn’t really fail. It never got off the ground because they were so enamored with the remote control pizza, which I’ve, and that turned out to be fortunate. If they had said we love the channel bopper, bop it never would have happened. Because as, as, as what happened was this channel bopper, they didn’t want to do. I pitched it to a bunch of toy companies in my rounds of pitching other ideas said, this was, this [00:06:00] is so cool. It’s this remote control, but it’s a toy. Don’t you get it? And no one wanted to do it until, you know, paying attention. A few comments, people are going, maybe it’s not a remote. Maybe I said, Oh no, no. Of course it’s a remote, what are you crazy? What are you, you missed the point. You know, like you, you get arrogant and you think, Oh, I know what this is. So, it wasn’t until a company called Tiger Electronics called me saying, do you have any new ideas for handheld LCD games? 

And so that I happened to look over at this and thought, well, maybe that hammer could be a new innovation. But when I tried to put a screen in it, it wasn’t very good. Cause you were moving a hammer and you couldn’t, so through a long series of iterations, It became this game that told you what to do with audio, not with a screen and it, and it told you to do it instead of you deciding I’m going to bop to change channels, it just said, bop it, you know, twist it, pull it. And so if you look up the video of me at 27 [00:07:00] years ago, you’ll see me pitching this prototype with the soundtrack. And that, luckily, when I pitched it to Milton Bradley or Parker Brothers at the time, the guy there, Bill Dorman, who’s passed away since, but was a legendary toy executive, he saw it, lucky that’s the whole lesson here is the right person has to see your idea at the right company at the right time.

So that happened. And when he brought it in there, they got it and he had said, you know, we’re not doing these kinds of games, meaning electronic kind of game, but we should be. Oh, and and so they, that it just hit a really good timing. And there was a great designer in house named Bob Welch who did a, who really did a beautiful job translating it into this, which everyone who knows Bop It would see, you know, you can kind of see

Jason Hsieh: the original one. It’s very different. 

Dan Klitsner: But yeah, but it’s different, but see, it’s a very similar color scheme. [00:08:00] It’s got a purple Bop, purple, you know, everything’s kind of similar. And Bop It has two buttons on it, just like this. What’s interesting is like you took this and turned it sideways. So really that’s how it started. But isn’t it interesting that it was originally something kids were controlling a TV, but instead the toy is controlling the kids. 

Jason Hsieh: In a way, yeah, 

Dan Klitsner: it’s telling you and the commercial is it commands you obey. So the commercial is wait a minute before I command the TV and it obeys, but now it’s switched. So I just think it’s an interesting way to look at that. That’s maybe a new thing I’m adding to the story is when you look at the old commercial, it commands you obey. 

Jason Hsieh: Yeah. 

Dan Klitsner: Instead of I command the TV obeys, which is sort of 

Jason Hsieh: does it get sold to Hasbro later on? 

Dan Klitsner: It was licensed. Well, so the storyline is Parker brothers and Milton Bradley were both acquired by Hasbro. So this was, it was [00:09:00] actually went into Milton Bradley. They didn’t want to do it. And then Parker Brothers was the sister company. They, they did it through Parker Brothers, was launched as a Parker Brothers. Strangely, if you look two years later, the brand Milton Bradley appears on it. And then about a few years later, the brand Hasbro appears on it. So it’s just more about where, and Tiger, just to finish that loop, they didn’t think it was a good idea. So they kind of didn’t really pay much attention to it, but they were very surprised when it was a hit.

So that’s the soul stop Bop story. Again, a lot of people who are listening have probably heard me tell this. Multiple times in different ways, but I have to keep telling it. So I remember it cause I’m getting older now. It’s been so long, and that really launched a whole series of games that I then created that were really about combining electronics, industrial design and physical actions, which games like hyper dash and even perplexes and, other [00:10:00] versions that became sort of Bop It related, like a Tetris version and things like that. It was all about how do you physically. Would use your hands with electronic prompt. Very different than board games or with button pushing games.

Jason Hsieh: I guess everyone might be interested. How many total unit has been sold? I was looking online. It’s not a crazy number, but I want to hear from you. 

Dan Klitsner: Well, not as crazy as some products, you know, because it’s kind of been, It sold a couple million the first year, which is great, of course. And then it’s had up and down, but it’s nice because it’s sort of spread into the mini versions and we’ve done, all these. Later I created I always wanted to do characters, right? So the idea that you have this,

this character. Hi, score four, twist it, pull it, pull it. Your circuits must be malfunctioning. Score three. 

So this was a big deal. I tried to push this for. [00:11:00] Bop it to start. I’ll just switch off for a while. The voice. I think a sense of pride that this wasn’t just like, I guess if you want to offend me, you can come up and say, Hey, did you see that Hasbro did a Darth Vader version of Bop It? As if I wasn’t somehow Behind it. Cause a lot of people think an inventor does it. And then the toy company does a lot more. I said, well, they’ve been a great partner, but it literally took 10 years to convince them to do a character driven bop it in and we had to prototype it and do all the voices. And, you know, it was very, very extensive. And finally they did it. Now it’s a pretty big program. So there’s many versions when you ask that question, if you count all of these, Many, many licenses versions and all of the minis and all of the big difference. It’s probably as we don’t really know. We think it’s over 40 to 50 million bop its over the last 25 years, [00:12:00] 30 years. 

It’s still one of the number one games electronic games on sales every year. It’s got a great multi generational feel to it now because the kids that grew up with it are having kids. So that’s where you really get lucky when your game lasts long enough that the parents buy it for their own kids. So that’s what’s happening now. 

Jason Hsieh: I see. Very interesting. I guess go back to your origin story. When you first started this idea, what was the biggest challenge that you face when you try to bring it to the market?

Dan Klitsner: I think the biggest challenge it will put two things. One was you have a vision in your head and how do you prototype or share the experience to the degree that it will convince someone to do it? Because this especially was a mock up with a soundtrack. And I had to rely. And so some, although several companies before Parker brothers did like it there was a company called cap toys. He said, I love it. I love this game. This could be big. It’s just [00:13:00] not for us. And so that’s actually a favor. You’ll think you’re being rejected. It’s a challenge, but it’s really not. It’s a favor when the wrong company says That’s cool, but I don’t think we could do it justice. That’s really nice. So I don’t take that as a bad challenge.

Jason Hsieh: I guess the biggest question is because I talk to a lot of toy entrepreneur on the podcast. There’s two way to go, right? You can pitch the idea to the big toy company and hopefully they will take it or you just launch it yourself. I guess for you first, make that decision. Why do you decide to go with the licensing route instead of just launch it yourself? 

Dan Klitsner: I thought about it. I had, you know, when I first started, I was freelancing, creating games and toys for people, and I thought, Oh, I wonder what it takes to do your own. It just seemed very daunting and I’m not really good with a lot of logistics and paperwork and mark in the marketing. I’m a pure I love creating. I love industrial design. I love prototyping, I love the whole everything about that and I think i’m really good at it And I think [00:14:00] I’m really, I might have opinions on the rest, but I’m really bad at it. And I didn’t want to take that on, you know it was sort of a, it was, to me, it was more of a dream of having a product that had a Milton Bradley name on it. Because when I grew up playing games like that, I thought they were, the games meant so much to me growing up and they were how I bonded with my brother and my friends and my family.

And I remember really having a very warm feeling about Milton Bradley in particular. So the idea that I got to pitch ideas to these companies that I really idolized and loved their games, and that I might have a game that had their name on it. Yeah, it just, I just, that was my dream and it wasn’t to do my own product and I just wanted to do, I’ve done thousands and thousands of ideas. If I was trying to produce my own product, I would never, you know, Ever, like I’m trying to do now with sling it with my own game, it’s taking a huge amount of my energy and I love it, but I can’t [00:15:00] imagine having done that with all of these things I’ve created. It’s just too much. 

Jason Hsieh: Because there’s a supply chain, there’s prototyping, there’s marketing, there’s shipping, you go on and on and on, because I also run a toy manufacturing slash design company. 

Dan Klitsner: So, you know, but, but you’re building up, there’s huge advantages. If you do that, right, you can own it. You own the brand. I think right now when people ask me that question, I give them the same sort of answer that you might give, which is there’s two ways to go. Here’s the pros and cons. And then, I mean, most inventors will tell you that it’s really frustrating when you have a product, you have a partner and they drop it, of course, and you have nothing you can do about it. So that’s the biggest downside is lack of control. But the upside is you can create lots of relationships and do a lot of Ideas and that’s really, I’d say there’s not, neither is perfect, but I, I do envy people who start their own product and own it and get to do their own. 

Jason Hsieh: It’s a different type of [00:16:00] stress. That’s a very different type of stress. Now you need to come up with the money too. 

Dan Klitsner: Yeah. You come with the money and everyone sort of, you know, glosses over that part, Oh, and you’re like, well, it’s great. Unless you fail. And now you’ve failed. And I’ve tried a few other things where it’s a much bigger investment. And when it doesn’t work, boy, it really sets you back. But there’s a lot of in betweens maybe today. I think there’s more chances with social media to create something, kind of create a virtual company in a way, get a manufacturer behind you. But there’s also a lot more people doing it. So you’re competing with so many products today. Kind of like the TV networks, right? There used to be only a few, but now there’s so many options that every single one gets a much smaller market share. So I think that you’re getting a less big hits, less, but more spread. So those are all just some question about how do you actually make money doing this? And [00:17:00] one product might be one answer and one might be the other. 

Jason Hsieh: One of the key concepts is how do you determine that the toy concept that you’re working on is right idea at the right time. Do you have any tips or tricks on how to do that? 

Dan Klitsner: I think, yes, I do think it’s, like anyone would do in a business is being really educated on what’s working and what isn’t, but number one is the relationships with the people in the toy companies that you build trust with over many, many years. Cause you win if they win, right? If you bring them something great. At the right time they look good in their job because they brought in a great concept So I think it’s just keeping a really good dialogue with those very valuable contacts and I know someone listening who says well, how do I get those? I said well you just you just go, you go to things like I i’m on the board of people of play the chicago Toy and game conference. I think I told you about that’s has turned out to be one of the best ways for new inventors to meet people and to meet really, really high quality [00:18:00] people. 

Jason Hsieh: It just got acquired by Toy Association, right? Recently. 

Dan Klitsner: That’s correct. We were, we were we were waiting to announce that for quite some time and I’m very happy for Mary Cousin and just say it’s going to get better and better, but it is one of the number one ways I would suggest. Getting into this business in that way and getting extremely high caliber relationships very early.

Jason Hsieh: For sure. For sure. And I know you also have a nonprofit initiative called Bop It for good. Can you kind of talk about that initiative? 

Dan Klitsner: Love to, thank you. It’s something that my wife, Alicia, and I started. She wanted to do something momentous to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Bop it, of during the pandemic and now two years ago. And really felt like to me, I just felt grateful, you know, it was the true word of gratitude. How can you show gratitude for something where I know I’ve worked hard. I might have a little talent, but a lot of it is about being grateful for all the people that don’t maybe get credit that were incredibly [00:19:00] important to making something successful.

So that would be the toy, the people internal at a toy company. How could I sort of honor and say, thank you, Hasbro. Thank you, all the designers who’ve worked on Bop It over the years, all the marketers. How can I do a product that thanks the fans, the people that have supported it and loved it, and how can I do something that gives back in some way that is going to help a cause and the cause was, In a way, very easy. It was for years. I’ve known that people that are blind can play Bop it almost, or definitely equally well. And it’s one of the few games that is that levels the playing field between sighted and unsighted people. And that I’ve heard many stories over the years. And I thought, well, is there some way that we could give back and get involved?

And so we called Lighthouse for the blind in San Francisco. They were like, of course we know about, but of course we’d like to be involved and started this, this initiative to say we started to [00:20:00] sell this thing called the bop it button that I created on my own but not from Hasbro. I mean, I’ve got permission to do it as a philanthropic, product. And the idea was we would sell this button. And if you bought one in the button, meaning it’s a working game, it should say it’s a bop it game. It’s a single button bop it game 

Jason Hsieh: and have it on the screen for those people. 

Dan Klitsner: Oh, great. Thank you. There it is. I was looking for so that so that is happy 25th birthday, bop it. It says right there. And it shows that it’s kind of like the center of the, the button that was on the original and it’s actually turned, I have a theory or what evolved into this idea of how much good can you do with one button? 

Jason Hsieh: Okay. 

Dan Klitsner: Kind of think about it. Like as if you’re pressing a button and the idea. Is yeah, that’s the voice of Bob, but he saw there. So this is this great, that’s buddy Rubino. The idea of a button, one button Bob it started where I was actually working on a book [00:21:00] here. It is right here. I was working on a book that’s still not done because we got so sidetracked called Take this book and bop it and see this, this Velcro here, this was supposed to be where the button, the idea of a working button on the front of a book.

And so as I started to try to look into getting a button made, I realized, Oh, it could be a game. And if it was, it isn’t just a sound effect. And turned out that this game idea evolved into Bop It, Don’t Bop It, Do Bop It, Do Not Bop It, are the commands. So you get tripped up, and it’s got a lot, and, and then to honor all of the fans, I said, why don’t I put Easter eggs in this, where as you play, every hundred moves, it unlocks some sounds from the past. So, I went very deep into the archives of Bop It and found all these sounds from different models. I then worked with the discord group and with fans on my social media to decide which sounds should go into it that meant the most to them. 

So it was a way to get [00:22:00] involved. And then I auditioned on Tik TOK. I’m at an audition for people to audition, to be one of the guest voices on the bop it. So this was a way to think fans. And I did a big thing. It’s really funny. If you look up and see all these people auditioning on my Tik TOK and I picked the top six that were voted in those people. If you play this game, you’ll hear their voices pop in. And I honored my dad who was instrumental in getting me into this business. His voice is there. The guy, you know, a lot of people’s voices are in there, so it’s kind of fun to figure that out. And then this game, I also made it go to a million so no one can ever complain that it doesn’t go high enough, which people said was a complaint fans had about the original buffer.

So, so far, I think someone’s got to 9, 000, which takes, that’s about four hours straight. Somebody has done, but it’s really it’s one of the most entertaining bop it’s that you can play. And so I really felt good about it. And then on the box itself, if you, I don’t know if there’s a box in the website, it thanks all the [00:23:00] people there’s their names are on the box inside there. If you look, so that was showing that gratitude. And then the, the idea was that if you bought one, we would donate one to lighthouse for the blind. And what’s cool about that model is it wasn’t just for them to use. It was, they have an accessibility store. And because many people who are blind. Look for things there. It’s like, Hey, here’s a game you can play with your family. And many people are the only person blind in their family, but they want to play games with their together. Right. So the idea was you can now buy this. And so we, we could afford to make one and give one away and break even. So if I had you buy one for 20 and then we give one to lighthouse, they sell it for 20, so they make 20 profit because they have zero cost of goods. And we break even, so it was a really clever way, I thought, to create money that no one was doubting. I hate it when you give money to something and you go, well, how much of this money is [00:24:00] really going to that charity? 

Right? With all the administrative costs. And so this is very clear. When you pay 20, We give one to lighthouse when they sell it, they get the 20. So it gave everyone sort of a part to play. And we’re still doing it. It’s two years later. We still say anyone who buys one, we’ll continue to give one. So that really opened my eyes, so to speak to this idea of, Incorporating giving into products that you make. And I’d like to say what I came up with from that is this, this thought that I’d like to put out there, because not only was the gratitude that I had. You know, good. It’s not something I should do. It was something I wanted to do because when, you know, when you’re wanting to give someone a gift, cause you’re so trying to find the perfect birthday gift, cause you want them to know how much you care about them. There’s a lot of thought put into gratitude and I believe that when you put it into design, when you think about not just that I’m trying to problem solve, but I want to show gratitude to the user or the people that would have this.

I believe [00:25:00] that gratitude is the most powerful, inspiration for innovation. you will be more innovative if you think about designing or inventing things, because you’re holding yourself to a standard that how can I really make sure that the people at Hasbro know I was grateful or the people. Who are using this at lighthouse and I go for, well, be a really good designer. Make sure the box you eat every bit of innovation out of every little thing, because that way they know that you put the care. I hand illustrated the bop its. I did this. I, it was like a thank you card. And then, but I believe it made the product 10 times better because the energy behind it was how to thank all these people and make sure you didn’t come up with some crappy little thing. It was that I really wanted it to be perfect. So I really, it really made me feel like I will approach many of my products in the same way. Like imagine that you’re showing gratitude. Don’t just think, You’re trying to make money. So that [00:26:00] really changed my thinking. 

Jason Hsieh: Yeah, thank you for sharing that, just like I shared with you before, I am also working on a foundation myself called Sensory Inclusive Classroom Foundation, which we like to donate SensoryToy to our school district as well. So in many ways, thank you for doing that and contributing back to the community.

Dan Klitsner: Right. Well, it’s, I remember when we talked, it’ll be interesting to see if you can do the same, if you can find it. Some if they have a marketplace where they sell to their community, that’s, you could have the same model, which is very interesting where you take a certain amount and when you you know, because of cost of goods, you can sort of say, well, we can afford to break even.

That’s our contribution is that we’re donating time, but not necessarily the money, but by supplying them with goods to sell, they make money and, you know, your products get circulated. So yeah, I’d love to hear, yeah, 

Jason Hsieh: a lot of other companies that have done in the past there was a shoe company, I think it’s called Albert that they, well, [00:27:00] Tom’s shoes, Tom’s shoes, Tom’s shoes, 

Dan Klitsner: Tom’s shoes, but, and which is very Amazing. Like you read his book and stuff that he didn’t expect it to be so, so huge. But yeah, it’s a different part of it because they were letting you as the consumer buy shoes for someone with their help that who couldn’t afford shoes, which is wonderful. This is

Jason Hsieh: I think their model is similar to yours. You buy one and they will donate one to someone in need 

Dan Klitsner: They donate one who needs shoes but what I like is this other model where if you can donate if someone is already helping as an industry or a way to you find a non profit

Jason Hsieh: Oh, yeah. 

Dan Klitsner: Right. That sells something. If you’re able to supply them a product for free, then they make a hundred percent of the profit because otherwise you’re sort of, what happens when you can’t find someone? I mean, I, people like toys, you know, but I’m saying it’s not so much that Lighthouse needs more Bop Its, but they need the money from selling the Bop Its. And so that [00:28:00] was, that was a way to do it. So, but very similar, but it was a little twist to that, to that. 

Jason Hsieh: Yeah. Yeah. 

Dan Klitsner: But it was really, really obviously a very great success for me and for Alicia to know that we could do that and that we’re now trying to do more products like I’m doing with sling it where, because of that, we found out, okay, sling it as this game, you know, it’s target game where you sling this sausage shaped bean bag into these vertical slots, you wouldn’t think it had anything to do with being blind to helping people that are blind because it’s a, like a target game.

Well, because I was involved with lighthouse, I found that actually blind archery is very popular. There’s camps, where people go who they put a beeper inside the target. And so you can hear if you close your eyes, imagine hearing a beep and pulling an arrow back. And shooting at the beep and you can get pretty good at it, like zero really. And so we did it with this [00:29:00] yeah, that’s sling it. So you see, you’re slinging that, that beanbag. We did it at KUBA con. I put I became the beeper. I sat behind the sling it and made a beeping noise. I was like, beep, beep. And then, in fact, I had it on a microphone and, and everyone in the, in the convention was like, who is making that irritating noise? And so, but we had someone from lighthouse people were there playing it and they hit the first three shots. She threw dead center. 

And so we now are looking at selling when we sell a sling it, we’re like, Hey, we can, we’re looking to sell or give away. If you have vision impaired or blind person playing with you, we give away a beeper or a bop it button. You can set the button on a mode where it just, it makes the rhythm of the game. So if you set that at near the center, on the top of this game. Now you can play, game. So what I did, I had a tournament and what I did to drive the point [00:30:00] home and also make it fun was we did a tournament where one round, everyone had to be blindfolded when they played. And if you really think about it, when you tell toy inventors, this story, I can see their gears working like, huh. Maybe there’s a target game where you play blindfolded and that becomes like, it could, it, it, my same thought is it leads to more creativity when you, you know, when you.

You’re trying to solve a problem for someone who can’t see, but I’ll bet you at the end of the day, you, you create a new game for everybody, you know? 

Jason Hsieh: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I like that story. The way you try to create it for different uses as well. And I guess one of the questions sometimes I get from other toy inventor, which we’re entrepreneur is as part of your design process. I’m pretty sure you collaborate with a lot of other vendors or other people. 

Can you walk us through just on a high level. For example, for the new product you just invented, what does that process look like? How does it work? 

Dan Klitsner: Well, [00:31:00] that’s a great example. Yeah, collaboration. I put under the category of relationships again, where I say number one relationships and that relationship. With your toy companies is one thing but the relationships with your collaborators and your vendors and your Employees and your you know, whoever as you know, that’s sort of where where the priority should be.

So I would say This is a very kind of a cool story about how On sling it, it was inspired by the fact that I did perplexes, which is a pretty well known, I think it’s back there. One of the, the big sphere, see where my finger is. It’s a spherical maze of the balls. We’ve had it for 20 years, sold it to spin master eventually, but licensed it for many years. And we partnered with this great company that was run by these two guys that were making it in, in China and importing it. And they were, it was a different business model. When we ended up selling it together to spin master, we didn’t hear from each other for a couple of years. And then they called a few [00:32:00] years ago and said, Dan, love to work with you on something. We are doing backyard games now, backyard, wooden games, and we’ve got an Amazon store and do you happen to have any backyard wooden games? And I said, well, I’ve been working on this crazy thing where you sling a sausage into a slot, but it’s really fun, trust me. But it was during the pandemic and I built it out of wood.

The reason that, it was something I could do in my backyard. We weren’t going to the office love games like that. So anyway, we started working and they’ve become an amazing partner collaborator. My two partners, Gary and Brian, without saying anyone who knows us, you know, as we’re very close and, I’ve been together for 30 years. So we have a lot of history together and a lot of trust. But I’d say in this product, it was an amazing, but they asked and I had something and then they liked it, was very different than a normal toy company. It’s more like we’re building it like our own company together. So they’re that fulfillment partner that when I said in the beginning of this, I would [00:33:00] never do my own product again. This allowed me to take a product and sort of a hybrid where we’re making it selling it on Amazon. And, we’ll take that, hopefully get it. 

Jason Hsieh: Your partner also have a factory, right? In China?

Dan Klitsner: Well, they have the factory already. 

Jason Hsieh: Okay. 

Dan Klitsner: Or they, they work with the factory. So it, it allowed me to have a partner that knew, had all these relationships and connections. So I didn’t have to change my role as the creator, prototyper. 

Jason Hsieh: Do you have any game for kids with special needs that you’re working on that I can partner with? 

Dan Klitsner: You know, maybe I’ll have to look, there’s thousands literally in our archives and I’m sure there’s one we could, we should talk about that. But that is the idea for me having a manufacturing partner collaborator is very interesting and having control of that product. Where we might sell the goal is to sell a premium version on Amazon, do a bunch of fun events. We did an amazing thing at Gen Con. I was telling you about it. Punchbowl social, where [00:34:00] we had this tournament, I invited everyone. We played till three in the morning. So we’re trying to find ways. This product is really, really fun to market because you get to go to bars and beaches and parks and just play it. And people walk up to you and they say, what is that?

So that’s very different, it’s a game that I like to play personally and it’s fun with a group of adults. That’s why I don’t mind versus a kid’s toy where i’m trying to how am I, Where am I going to sell that versus an in person? But in terms of collaboration we also work with various like model builders or electronic specialists or 3d printing people like it’s I think anyone in this business. You got a really good Collaborations with people. And then the people in our shop, we have James, who’s this amazing builder maker, and he’s been with us now for over 10 years. We’re talking every day about, details of a product and I love that the magic happens in that conversation, when you’re trying to solve a problem together. So [00:35:00] yeah, if that answers collaboration is, is like still the number one priority. And I know that I have shared when I give my talk on how your idea will not succeed until everything is right. Is my acronym and the right. Was R was relationships, I is the innovation, T is the timing, and E is the execution. 

If you break those down into like the four legs of a table, I say your idea has to sit very firmly on a table that has these very strong legs in all four categories. So, when you start, you have to say the relationship, many people, I have this great idea. Oh, it’s perfect. But if you don’t have one of those legs, it falls over.

And so my advice, when people are asking sort of what you said in the beginning is make sure the four legs of your table are as strong as possible. If you want, you may have a pretty good idea, but, but when you really look at the other [00:36:00] elements, that’s kind of, I don’t think it’s executed quite right yet, or I don’t think the timing is right or I don’t, you probably like relationship and innovation, timing, execution. Innovation means I have an idea, but is it the most innovative form of that idea, or does it have enough innovation to stand out in the market 

Jason Hsieh: marketplace, 

Dan Klitsner: right? So you say, okay, it’s an idea, but the leg is this big. If I really work on it, I can improve it. It doesn’t mean you stop. It says I need to work on this. How can I add innovation? Keep at it anyway. Oh, I think I know who wants this product. I have a relationship with Hasbro and you show it to them and they say, no. Oh, who else? You know, so you better have a lot of relationships because then, and same thing, timing is a variable depending on which company.

So you think it’s a bad timing, but again, back to the relationships, you’ll find that it’s might be bad time for one company, but good time for a different one. Well, 

Jason Hsieh: I think those [00:37:00] four Foundation is also true if you’re going to launch it yourself, because you do need, you actually need more relationship. You’re going to launch it yourself. Now you need to talk to the factory, not to the freight forwarder, the lab, the marketing. You have a lot more people talking to the toy company. 

Dan Klitsner: And would you say, so here’s a question, maybe, how would you say this? When people give me that it isn’t Who, you know, it’s how you know them, how well you know them.

Jason Hsieh: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. That’s true. 

Dan Klitsner: It’s because you say, oh, I know this. I, I know, but have you built trust with them? How well do you know them? That’s, that’s the key to all of these things for, like you said, if you’re making your own product or an inventor. It’s rarely is it just, oh, I know a guy, you know, it’s like, I’ve been through a lot, we’ve had a lot of heart to heart with the relationship that. We’ve had failure together. We’ve had, you know, over time, you’re going to find that those relate it’s how well, you know, them is what counts. 

Jason Hsieh: And, and talk about the four. I like how you [00:38:00] break down the four elements of relationship, you know, in innovation time and execution in my business model, the last one is actually the most critical one, because you can have the best idea at the best time with the best relationship. If you do a bad job on creating the product, well, it’s just executing the market plan. Everything is going to collapse. 

Dan Klitsner: Well, you might say that every one of them is the most important, depending on, you know, because, because you can also have. Everything right. And then beautiful execution and a good price, but the timing sucks, or you didn’t have the right, you, you missed the window of, of the time. And, or you didn’t realize that some customer was the perfect customer. And somehow you didn’t know that, like you could, I think, but I would agree that execution is probably the most challenging for many people. Cause if you take into account. Manufacturing and pricing and all that stuff, but I love giving the example like people go. Oh, I had that idea. See that thing that Jason did that development. I [00:39:00] had that exact same idea. 

Jason Hsieh: I never did anything about it. 

Dan Klitsner: Well, or I’d say that it’s like, let’s say you were teaching a class. And you had, you know, 20 students and you said, today we’re going to do a developmental idea that helps such and such. And everyone would come up with an idea that could be described as almost the same idea, but they’d be 20 different executions or interpretations. And so, yeah, I always say when we, when you think, Think about it when you’re creating a new idea, you should cover some of those executions yourself. Don’t, don’t think that’s it. And then stop and not do, nah, I better try five more executions to sort of see what someone else might do with this idea. And that’s you talk to more inventors that I had this idea for 15 years and all of a sudden I made this one change and boom, it’s sold. 

Jason Hsieh: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think, I like, I think O4 is it.

Dan Klitsner: [00:40:00] And I’ve talked to a few people who say, Oh, I have an acronym that’s very similar and I can’t remember. They have one more thing they add. But I kind of like keeping him in four categories, but any of the, but that is I know you’re, you, so can I throw it back to you though, when you first started doing this, did you consider just coming up with ideas and licensing them, or did you always want to make them?

Jason Hsieh: I always want to make them myself, so I never really considered a licensing route because I’m more of a control freak out there and don’t know what’s going to happen. And I’m always entrepreneur at heart. I think starting like a whole business from scratch is what I enjoy. I enjoy the process. Like this, actually this month I’m launching another company. It’s a SaaS company. I’m in the middle of launching right now. I enjoy the process of coming up with the idea and launch it from scratch. And, you know, provide it to the clients and people I’m working with. And of course, nothing wrong with licensing the idea, but [00:41:00] the process is simple. It’s very different because you kind of like a lot of the step and I enjoy the learning all the step myself. So 

Dan Klitsner: that’s, well, the key is you said you’re doing, you enjoy it. So you’re going to put all that passion and all the energy 

Jason Hsieh: I have a little bit of advantage is I speak Chinese fluently. So talking to the factory is not a problem for me. 

Dan Klitsner: That is definitely an advantage in the relationship column. I just pretend. I don’t understand. See, yeah, that worked too. 

Jason Hsieh: Never let anyone know. 

Dan Klitsner: I speak fluent, perfect Chinese. They just don’t think I do. No, I don’t. I really don’t.

Jason Hsieh: It is a hidden advantage.

So as well, winding down today’s interview, thank you so much for sharing all the wonderful stories and your experience. One of the questions I ask all the guests at the end of the show is if you had to share just one piece of advice to someone that’s getting [00:42:00] started in the toy industry, what would that be?

Dan Klitsner: Yeah, it depends what state they’re in, if they have a year’s worth of padding to take chances with, or if they need to make money right away. 

My first advice for anyone would be try to get a job in a toy company of, if it’s design you’re interested in, marketing you’re interested in, what is you’re interested in, I’d go to a company you admire. I wish, I mean, I didn’t work internally, but I was working as a freelancer for discovery toys and other toy companies. Gulu bite. I was doing, I sort of understood a little bit more about them. But I think, really researching and finding someone you admire or products you admire and try to get a job there for a year or so, at least to really build, you’re going to be building relationships, you’re going to understand more how it works, to go in like, I want to do this and, and have no connections or anything would be hard. So that would be my advice. But that’s coming from a sense of loving design and loving being internal, or, well, it’s a different [00:43:00] market these days. You can just have a big idea and maybe you’re connected to a bunch of influencers and social media and it might be that you see an opportunity that’s so good.

You just want to do it and there’s a lot more resources out there than ever to try to just go for it But I would say, how do you sort of find? Well, you said what do you love? What part of the toy industry do you love and find a way to get exposed to that as soon as much as possible. If you said you love starting companies, you love that part. So you’re doing it. I love building stuff and creating it and having my hands on the thing. So I’m happiest when I’m doing that. Love the people of the toy industry, so I’m happy when I’m doing this or talking about it or helping people, but I’m not happy when I’m trying to do all the manufacturing side. It doesn’t work for me. Those are the best advice I could say is find the part of the industry you love. You like, yeah, get a me, get a job somewhere where you can get a mentor on whatever aspect. 

Jason Hsieh: When I [00:44:00] first started in 2016, I have zero experience in toy industry. I was in finance. I didn’t do anything in the toy industry. I just go straight in and start something and see how it goes. Well, you’re a risk taker. 

Dan Klitsner: You’re a unicorn. [ it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s, laughters] . There’s so many different ways because that’s the part, but that is what you loved. You love the risk taking and the entrepreneurial side.

But I’d say the one question I’d love to hear your thought on that would it be helpful to people listening to this. Is what is the biggest challenge in the toy industry today? What do you think is the biggest challenge? 

Jason Hsieh: I think it’s really keeping or getting kids attention. It’s so hard to get kids attention nowadays with YouTube, all the different channels online. How can you create a toy that actually captures the kids attention? and also captures parents attention, because parents are the ones that are actually buying it, not the kids, obviously.

Dan Klitsner: Right. 

Jason Hsieh: In today’s economy, with all the digital marketing, the attention is a new currency. If you can get people’s attention, [00:45:00] just look at Mr. Beast. Right? That’s how he makes his money, is attention. You get people’s attention, then you can provide whatever services or product to the people, because people now they like you, they trust you. They believe in whatever the product you make, you can create a hamburger, you can create a chocolate. That’s what Mr. Beast is. It doesn’t really matter. As long as people, you can believe if you can create a raven band of audience, then you can sell them any product as long as you build that relationship.

Dan Klitsner: The biggest challenge is, is attention. I like that. That’s a very, it’s always been the case for all marketing of every product, right? Commercial things. It’s good. But today I think you’re right. Is it’s just exponentially more difficult. But it is everything. And then I’m curious, cause I thought you might say, cost, pricing, because of what you’re doing. 

Jason Hsieh: No, that’s secondary. If you can get attention, then you can sell almost anything. You can sell a virtual coin, like, coin, if you want [00:46:00] to. You can sell anything, like a virtual, maybe a toy class. You can sell anything. I see people that sell classes to teach other people how to. All kinds of different ways that you can make, but if you can get people’s attention, I think that’s the hardest part, but that’s also an interesting part because social media almost level the playing field.

If I have a post that go viral on TikTok, I might have 1 million view, but so as Hasbro, which is like all the money they have, their post might go nowhere, right? So this is where you also have a level of feel. If you know how to be creative in creating content that can capture people’s attention and be an influencer in the toy space, which is something my team is working on, we’re not there yet. My sister actually is our marketing director. She’s also a small influencer. She has an Instagram account with 110, 000 followers in the kids arts and crafts space. She just create video with her, her daughter, my niece, [00:47:00] and it’s, it’s free for her to create all the content, but she get 110, 000 followers. It was unheard of. If you compare it to 2010, 20 years ago, can you get 10, 000 followers for free? No, no way. No way. 

Dan Klitsner: It’s interesting though. Cause it depends. I have half a million followers on Tik TOK and I had, I had a lot on Instagram, like. You know, where I just wasn’t focusing as much. And it was really interesting whether, well, that was during the pandemic and then I got busy with things. And so I stopped, I could probably have several million by now if I didn’t stop. But I wasn’t seeing a lot of results from that person. What it built was a lot of relationships because people wanted to know the inventor of Bop it. So I met a lot of people, a lot of very influential people. So that’s why I started.

I think that’s one of the key things people think about social media. It’s not about your relationship just with the followers, it’s really about your relationship with co creators or other creators that you you’re attracting people [00:48:00] That’s where I found some really really interesting relationships that i’ve still know the people today and so I think that’s you’re right. That’s where it’s going and building anything A sharing, you know, has become a whole new art form, how to share your ideas and do it in a way. So I’m trying to get back. I’ve been so busy on these projects. I just had to give up most of my social media time because it was taking a lot of time. But I did a lot of it. So maybe I’ll attempt to go back and we can do a collaboration. 

Jason Hsieh: Let me know if you have a sensory toys, I would love to collaborate. 

Where is the best place for our audience to find you?

Dan Klitsner: Well you can go to my Instagram is BopItInventor or TikTok or Twitter. I think everything is BopItInventor. Usually on Instagram if you send me a message, I’m pretty good at finding it eventually and answering it, it may take a bit of time. And I have a sling it, a play sling it Instagram, we’re not really, well, we’re hopefully that gets built, you know, separately for that product. But I’d say the most about an inventor [00:49:00] and or if you go to bop it for good, there’s an email, you can email there. And I usually am the one answering that or Alicia. So pretty simple to get rid of holding me those ways. And other than that I’m anxious to see what’s next the toy industry. I’m going to keep following your very informative podcasts and I know you’re working hard, so I’m hoping to see lots of success. 

Jason Hsieh: Thank you again for tuning into today’s episode in Toy Business Unbox Podcast. We hope you enjoy the conversation and find it insightful and inspiring. Faring. If you like what you have heard, be sure to subscribe to our podcast and your favorite platform so you never miss an episode. We really appreciate your support and would like for you to leave us a review and share the podcast with your friend and colleague. For more resources, tip and the on the latest update in the toy industry, visit our website toy-launch.com.

Join the conversation and connect with us on social media using the hashtag #ToyBusinessUnboxed. We’d love to hear your feedback and suggestion for future episode. Until next time. Keep innovating, [00:50:00] keep creating, keep bringing joys to toys. This is Jason Hsieh signing off on Toy Business Unboxed. I’ll see you in the next episode.