Summary
Argos, the catalogue retailer owned by Home Retail Group, had bought the Chad Valley toy brand but had not met the sales targets it had set. Research showed mothers regarded Chad Valley on a par with own label and found the brand's pages within the Argos catalogue unappealing. These were redesigned and refined in successive catalogues, making it easier for readers to quickly identify specific toys, their features and benefits. Illustrations of children playing with the toys communicated product scale and created an emotive pull, while energetic copy was deployed to establish a greater sense of standout. Sales and toy market share increased, with almost 70% of the market share increase directly attributable to incremental sales of the Chad Valley brand. The design costs were recouped within four days.

Summary
This case describes how Estrela, a Brazilian toy manufacturer that peaked in mass popularity during the 1980s and early 1990s, used social media to reignite a nostalgic passion for its traditional toys, focusing here on the relaunch its iconic Ferrorama model trains. Research discovered an existing community of Ferrorama fanatics who were challenged to use the kits from their childhood to run a train 20km along a Christian Pilgrimage route in Spain; if successful, the President of Estrela pledged to relaunch Ferrorama. Social media connected fans in Brazil and abroad, who together were able to source enough track and complete the task. Ferrorama's community of fans doubled in size and the company honoured its pledge by relaunching the brand, which had many advanced orders and soon sold out. Afterwards, the company even re-released the original Ferrorama toy.

Summary
Plan Toys, a Thai toy manufacturing company, regularly donates toys in bulk to various children's charities but children with physical and mental disabilities were unable to fully use commercially made toys for ordinary children. The company had already tried unsuccessfully to develop toys for this group before inviting the mothers of disabled children to help redesign the required toys. Researchers, designers and child development consultants were also brought on board to help the mothers realise their ideas. The final, tested designs were unveiled on TV and in print and online. U$S67,000 was raised to produce 26,000 units, or 30% more than the initial objective. Mom-Made Toys also received over US$1.6m worth of free publicity for a campaign that cost nothing.

Summary
Famosa, Spain's leading domestic toy company, wanted to improve the effectiveness of its TV advertising for its Nenuco range of toys and to reduce its reliance on Christmas-based and other seasonal advertising. Targeting young girls and their parents, it created a year-round slot for Nenuco on Disney's channels, which turned the brand into an educational tool to help parents with their child's learning on a daily basis. Ten different 20-second spots were filmed with 10 different scenarios, where parents and children could see reflections of themselves. Brand affinity and engagement measures increased significantly as a result of the campaign.

Summary
With household ownership near universal, the challenge of maintaining Monopoly sales demands regular reinvention. Monopoly City was the most radical new variant yet. This posed a new challenge: how to communicate the benefits of a product that has to be tried to be truly understood. Hasbro and DDB-UK created 'Monopoly City Streets', an online, interactive, 'try before you buy' allowing people to play on any street in the world via Google Maps. It soon became one of the most popular games on the web with over five million unique visitors. This paper shows how this had a massive effect on sales, with the depth of engagement boosting traditional media.

Summary
To publicize Bongos, which are vouchers valid for a variety of travel packages, Weekendesk created the Great Escape. Focusing on young professionals who needed to get away from work to relax over the Christmas holiday, the campaign accepted applicants for 100 competitors who were to be locked in an office building. The first to escape was promised the award of a Bongo. The campaign sent press members a video simulating the competition prior to the event. It also relied on viral video, outdoor advertising, B-to-B mailings, and other media to publicize the stunt. 1,000 competitors applied, and 20,000 Bongos sold over Christmas.

Summary
Upon its original launch in 1996, the Tickle Me Elmo became a surprise success through a combination of word-of-mouth, celebrity enthusiasm and unexpected shortages. A campaign to celebrate the tenth anniversary of its launch faced a number of challenges, including lower viewing figures for Sesame Street (on which Elmo is a character), as well as a highly competitive market and retail environment. To try and create a 'buzz', the new unique features of the relaunched Elmo were promoted as a big, melodramatically kept secret. A nine-month campaign prefaced the 'Reveal Day', with TV and cinema communications showing how children could react to receiving the new toy. On 'Reveal Day', coverage was secured on national TV and media outlets, with 300,000 units sold on that day alone. In recognition, the Toy Industry Association named T.M.X. Elmo the 2006 Toy Of The Year.

Summary
Crayola was the most recognized brand name in children's art products, but as the twenty-first century dawned, the company that made Crayola—Binney & Smith of Easton, Pennsylvania (founded in 1885, a subsidiary of Hallmark since 1984)—grew more and more concerned that brand perception had boxed it into a corner. The public saw that Crayola had only crayons and markers, and for that reason 90 percent of its sales came during the late summer, when children were preparing to return to school. Furthermore, most new Crayola products were so overshadowed by the brand's two main items that sales in other areas were poor. Lastly, many viewed the line as old-fashioned, as even art supplies had moved into the electronic age.To correct this perception Binney & Smith turned to its advertising agency of record, Leo Burnett of Chicago. In response to the challenge, the agency devised an award-winning television campaign on a budget of less than $1 million. The campaign, which aired on television for three weeks in spring of 2003, was titled "Make Play." Two ads, "Night" and "Fin," highlighted the new Crayola products while showing that children could enjoy Crayola year-round.The campaign was effective enough to garner a 2004 Silver EFFIE Award. It also set the tone for future Crayola campaigns that emphasized the product line as being more diverse than simply crayons and markers.

Summary
Frustrated by the lack of educational toys, in 1995 Mike Wood, a California attorney, rewired a talking greeting card to help his son differentiate between phonetic sounds. Soon afterward Wood founded LeapFrog Enterprises, Inc., to fill what he considered a void in the $34 billion toy industry, which was dominated by the companies Mattel and Hasbro. While competitors focused on movie-licensed toys or one-hit products such as Beanie Babies, LeapFrog concentrated on high-quality educational toys. By 2001 LeapFrog had developed more than 100 products and recorded $222 million in sales. To codify its brand as the leading educational toymaker, LeapFrog released its "Learn Something New Every Day!" campaign.In 2002 LeapFrog provided an advertising budget of $20 million to Ackerman McQueen, Inc., an agency that had handled LeapFrog's marketing since 1995. Released in 2002, "Learn Something New Every Day!" distinctly targeted mothers, along with gift-giving neighbors and grandparents. The strategy differed from those of other toy manufacturers, which targeted children. The campaign's television spots featured children learning different disciplines, including Spanish, reading, and phonics. All spots ended with the tagline "Learn Something New Every Day" below a green LeapFrog logo. In addition to television spots, the campaign's media included print, direct mail, point of purchase, and online advertisements as well as public relations.Judges for the EFFIE Awards were so impressed with LeapFrog's sales jump and expanded brand awareness that they awarded the campaign the coveted Grand EFFIE Award in 2004. Between 2001 and 2002 LeapFrog sales skyrocketed 37 percent, brand awareness increased 21 percent, and the toymaker's electronic learning book, the LeapPad, held rank as the top-selling toy of 2002. "This is David and Goliath," Gene Dunkin, president of the New York American Marketing Association's Board of Directors, announced at the EFFIE Awards. "While the big agencies won lots of EFFIEs and are to be heartily congratulated, the big winner is a mid-size agency and a nine-year old startup that took the educational toy market by storm. Its success can be attributed in part to a smart advertising campaign that produced great results."

Summary
Fisher Price (part of Mattel) is a market leader in the field of toys for small children, which aims to create a new culture around playing and sustains the importance of educational toys for children's healthy growth. It identified paediatricians as the best target influencers, because they are credible opinion-makers, thanks to their work experience, and appreciate materials and toys that can embellish their office and are able to distract their small patients. An introductory kit (containing a branded box, recruiting letter, questionnaire and initiative poster) was delivered to an initial group of 5000 paediatricians, and a welcome kit was sent to the paediatricians who responded (containing a branded box and thank you letter, playing guides personalised with the paediatrician's name, toy sets for the paediatrician's office and a toy chest).