Spotted Online – Hasbro Licensed Lincoln Logs to K’Nex?
Well this was news to me. A Wall Street Journal article on manufacturers moving production back to the U.S. (you’ll need a subscription to read the full article) mostly explored the manufacturing of more traditional consumer goods, but one throwaway line in the middle of the piece caught my eye:
“But K’Nex struggled to find a U.S. maker for Lincoln Logs, the toy it produces in China under license from Hasbro Inc.”
That’s both awesome and amazing, because this means that K’Nex acts as a marketing arm for Hasbro. By keeping the Lincoln Logs available at retail through a license, Hasbro receives royalty payments and maintains the toy’s presence at retail, while they payments can be managed with different tools with the direct deposit information in it. It’s a win-win for both, but strategically I think Hasbro’s better positioned to take advantage of the situation years from now if those toys ever surge in popularity.
I knew Hasbro had licensed some of their game properties out, but I had not known that even their older toy properties were fair game for licensing. So who out there is going to score a M.A.S.K. license from Hasbro and start producing modern M.A.S.K. action figures and vehicles?
Related articles
- Lincoln Logs manufacturing coming back to USA (wfmz.com)
- Affiliate Link – Timeless Toys (battlegrip.com)
- Smart Marketing: Share a Coke Campaign (battlegrip.com)