G.I. Joe – Will A Break Do It Good?

When I wrote “Hasbro Celebrates 50 Years of G.I. Joe . . . by killing the line?” last month there was a bit of tongue in cheek action involved in the title. Clearly “killing the line” is excessive and ridiculous, but that’s exactly what it feels like to many people when word comes out that:

“The G.I. Joe brand team at Hasbro has been dismantled and is working on other projects at Hasbro.”

– Hasbro Is NOT Attending the 2014 JoeCon, FNK.com

Now what this means is that the G.I. Joe toys announced at New York Toy Fair a few months ago (first posted here, pricing news posted here) are very likely the last of what we’ll see from Hasbro for the G.I. Joe series for the forseeable future. The problem with “forseeable future” is that none of us really know how far out that future is.

I know many G.I. Joe collectors are disturbed by the revelation that the line’s going to enter a dormant phase, but this isn’t the first time G.I. Joe has left store shelves . . . and it’s possible that the break will only strengthen the brand in the future.

Super Joe

The first — and only, as near as I can determine from research — big break in G.I. Joe’s life in retail stores happened shortly after the launch of the ill-fated Super Joe series in 1977 (see “Hasbro’s Super Joe” for a look back at the line). The line actually looks fairly neat from today, but back then it just couldn’t succeed and was the final nail in G.I. Joe’s coffin. In 1978 Hasbro’s Super Joe left shelves, and G.I. Joe did not return to the market until 1982.

How A Timeout in the late Seventies Improved G.I. Joe

The year’s between Super Joe and the G.I. Joe of the eighties provided Hasbro and the market with two very important things that helped the 1982 relaunch to succeed:

1. Retailers were able to forget the clogged shelves and poor showing of the G.I. Joe brand in the second half of the seventies.
   
2. Hasbro wasn’t forced to worry about compatibility with earlier toys and was free to start fresh, returning to G.I. Joe’s military roots and applying the branding and marketing lessons of Star Wars to their new line.

The result was a dramatic success on store shelves, almost instantly erasing the bad memories of Super Joe from the minds of retailers.

G.I. Joe’s 3.75-inch incarnation invaded the marketplace with all of the subtlety of a Sherman tank. The Marvel comic book proved very popular, and soon a daily animated series appeared in television syndication. By 1984, “G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero” was a $132 million brand, and the children of G.I. Joe’s first customers now had their own Movable Man of Action.

— GI Joe: The Complete Story of America’s Favorite Man of Action*

A Floundering Nineties

Two attempts to recover G.I. Joe’s success of the eighties — both in 1995 — are so obscure and such failures that they are relegated to a few short sentences in the G.I. Joe Wikipedia entry. After the close of the Real American Hero series in 1994 Hasbro kept pushing ahead, releasing both Sgt. Savage (see yojoe.com) and G.I. Joe Extreme (see yojoe.com) to stores in 1995.

Looking back twenty years I feel that Hasbro — and the G.I. Joe brand — would have been better served if Hasbro had skipped both of these lines and allowed the G.I. Joe brand to disappear from store shelves for a few years. The Sgt. Savage line was closest to the Real American Hero series, but all that meant was Hasbro extended a struggling brand’s life by a year and further cluttered shelves. How many of the toys in this line found their way to clearance shelves soon after it launched?

And G.I. Joe Extreme . . . well, this was clearly a product of the nineties. Even the title could have only existed in the mid-nineties, an era when the flash comic books and gimmicks had speculators buying far too many bad titles and the hype nearly brought down more comic publishers than anyone wants to imagine. Even the G.I. Joe Extreme (see yojoe.com) embraced the ridiculousness of the “Extreme” title!

On top of all of that there was no connection to the Real American Hero series, meaning G.I. Joe Extreme had to survive without the benefit of dragging along the most hardcore of the 3.75-inch scale collectors who were ready for more in 1995. History shows that G.I. Joe Extreme wasn’t capable of making it; the line died within the first year.

G.I. Joe and Retailers Today

In his editorial at Toy News International, “G.I. Joe is dead, long live G.I. Joe”, Jason Krause (theterrordrome.com) gets to the heart of the G.I. Joe at retail problems. You definitely want to read the entire post, but I want to highlight a specific thought that should be carefully considered by everyone at Hasbro:

. . . G.I. Joe can no longer find a foot hold in the retail market. We are in the 50th Anniversary of the G.I. Joe brand this year and the only retailer to carry what little product Hasbro is putting out, is Toys R Us. I’ve heard some say that this is still a good thing, but I don’t think it really is. It’s a last resort.

I agree with Jason. When only one major retailer in the US wants to carry G.I. Joe product then there’s a serious problem with the brand. I feel Hasbro needs to complete the 50th anniversary releases that are scheduled to hit ToysRUs (pics and news here) and then let G.I. Joe rest. Give the line time off and leave any toy support to the official club . . . until 2017.

2017 – A Real American Hero 35th Anniversary

2007’s 25th anniversary G.I. Joe action figure series (Amazon.com search*) did remarkably well, far better than Hasbro or retailers anticipated at the time. The G.I. Joe Wikipedia entry states:

Originally planned to consist of only two sets of five figures each (one G.I. Joe and one Cobra), the 25th Anniversary collection was well received by retailers and collectors and has since been expanded by Hasbro into a full-fledged toyline to run through 2009.

2017 will mark a decade since the 25th anniversary line was released, leaving enough time that major retailers — especially if Hasbro devotes significant marketing power to the initiative — should be persuaded to give G.I. Joe another shot. Hasbro will need to introduce some new tooling to really make this work, but the 25th anniversary figures (in general) still stand up today so a majority of their existing molds can be used for a 35th anniversary series.

Hint to Hasbro: If a 35th anniversary line blows the doors off retailers’ shelves and shocks everyone by performing amazingly well . . . then quit while you’re ahead. Remember: “Always leave them wanting more.” Walk away when sales are high and don’t drive the brand into the ground and onto clearance shelves.

2017 – G.I. Joe 3

Cinemablend suggests that a third G.I. Joe film could see release in 2016 or 2017 . . . and with the way the second film was delayed I would count on a later rather than earlier release of a new movie. But here’s where things get tough and I make a suggestion that Hasbro, Paramount, and every retailer on the planet will hate:

• Do not release any toys for a third G.I. Joe movie. Simply do not do it. None. Zero. I know this sounds like a weird idea, but the movie toys attempted to date did not perform as well as expected and is it really wise to once again drag the G.I. Joe brand through the muck of failure at retail?

G.I. Joe – Will A Break Do It Good?

I don’t know for certain, but I strongly suspect that Hasbro leaving G.I. Joe out of their catalog for a couple of years will only strengthen the brand. With the official club keeping the most dedicated of fans entertained then the G.I. Joe base is covered until the line can return to major retailers, and a few years off of the shelves means that when Hasbro’s designers return to G.I. Joe they’re likely to have some fantastic new ideas.

The G.I. Joe brand has a long and strong history of success, but it’s those moments of failure and desperate acts to reclaim shelf space that tells me the breaks are good for the line. Adventure Team, A Real American Hero, and 25th Anniversary all show that Hasbro can grow G.I. Joe to stronger sales . . . now it’s time for Hasbro to give the retailers time to forget the G.I. Joe Retaliation failure so that the brand can once again be seen as a toy series worthy of shelf space.

We’ll see you in 2017, Hasbro!