PlaymoFriends
General => News => Topic started by: Wesley Myers on July 31, 2013, 21:00:33
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http://www.toynews-online.biz/news/read/redan-reveals-new-playmobil-magazine/040624 (http://www.toynews-online.biz/news/read/redan-reveals-new-playmobil-magazine/040624)
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Surprised this wasn't on the PCC website, wait, no I'm not.
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Saw that someplace - not the PCC.
Of course, more expensive than the german variation...
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I don't think that's really new. Hasn't the Playmobil mag been available in the UK for a couple of years now?
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I THINK there was an issue available, but I'm not sure it was a "permanent thing"..
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My bet is that it'll be just like the UK version. I don't think I ever bothered reading them. They were pointless unless you were 5 years old.
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I do thing it is the same Playmobil Magazine but one is being produce in Shrewsbury by Redan Publishing about every six weeks. It is available from supermarkets and some newsagents. On the front is a Playmobil figure the price in the U.K. is £3.99.
The next issue number 5 is due out on the 23rd January. The stockist helpline is 01895433600. It will be on sale in Australia and New Zealand in March.
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On another thread..
The Playmobil magazine has a new issue out in the UK available at Tescos I believe. It is the dinosaur edition with the baby T-rex in it. I wasn't able to get a copy of the German version of that but now I have a contact in the UK sending me the Uk one. So soon I will have that baby T-rex, unique to the magazine.
Got one today from Tesco!
(http://i1287.photobucket.com/albums/a621/GrahamB2013/IMG_9265_zps343d94b6.jpg)
Redan publish this (www.redan.co.uk) and state it is aimed at boys aged 3 to 9, published 6-weekly, circulation 50,000, cover price £3.99, back issues available from them.
My bet is that it'll be just like the UK version. I don't think I ever bothered reading them. They were pointless unless you were 5 years old.
So you were right, flatcat, they are aimed at young children. I will just have to buy something else to read...
What is a shame is that they are aimed exclusively at boys, not even a girls' edition, or alternating boys' and girls', or (heaven help us) a co-educational one!
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Why do you say it's "aimed exclusively at boys?"
(btw, the "girls mag" is insulting - without really understanding german!)
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Why do you say it's "aimed exclusively at boys?"
I don't have it, but I'd guess that there aren't any girl characters in the stories (or they play a minimal role). Also, the cover is a typical boy theme - dinosaurs. :lol:
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It's so depressing that they bother to aim these magazines to either boys or girls.
The only magazine I bought weekly as a kid was a dinosaurs magazine (it was the Jurassic Park period :)) and wanted to be a paleontologist when I grew up.
Are they afraid that if they don't gender-brand their magazines, kids won't know what to pick? Or is it that they want to influence the parents or something?
And in the meantime, politicians complain that there aren't enough women in typically male jobs and visa versa. I wonder...
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It's so depressing that they bother to aim these magazines to either boys or girls.
Completely agree.
The "girls" one is downright offensive.
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Why do you say it's "aimed exclusively at boys?"
(btw, the "girls mag" is insulting - without really understanding german!)
I was quoting the publisher's website, but I added the word 'exclusively'.
My 8 year old daughter took the magazine to school today (Dad has 'retained' the baby T Rex ;D). She probably won't get teased about it because one of her friends (a boy) likes dinosaurs. But what if a boy took a "girl's" comic to school- would they get away with it? Unfortunately I think not.
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Saw this today (bbc.co.uk link):
Aiming toys at just boys or girls hurts economy (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-26064302)
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Great article, thanks for the link.
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In france there are two edition
Playmo_80
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Speaking of playmobil magazine, is there someone out there willing to start a co-op for it? Wink wink... :-X but seriously I could use 2 copies of the "next" issue... preferably in German.
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Saw this today (bbc.co.uk link):
Aiming toys at just boys or girls hurts economy (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-26064302)
I'd have to disagree with most of that article. They definitely do use a lot of blue and pink to differentiate packages for toys aimed at boys or girls, but some toys are neutrally labeled. Maybe other things are causing children (and parents) to only choose those toys. They make it seem as if the toy market is solely responsible for what they claim is happening though. They also make it seem as if this is a modern thing. Boys and girls have always played with (and done throughout their lives) different things than one another. They've also played and done a lot of the same things.
I most certainly do not mean to say that girls wouldn't like to play with building toys or other toys usually aimed at boy markets. I know girls that like those kinds of things (and aren't ashamed of it or anything). But I also don't find anything offensive about girls who like "girly" things. If everything from dolls to toy cars to playhouses to knights to building toys came in plain or totally neutral packaging, I'm not sure what would happen. It'd probably be more difficult to find what you're looking for in a store. :lol: But I suppose it does make sense for companies to package and market the items in ways that they believe will lead to the most interest in them. And I think, for the most part, the way different sorts of toys are organised works in that regard.
I don't mean to make anything of this, haha. :lol: I reckon I agree with all of you with the main point. As far as Playmobil goes, just adding some more girl figures to the "boy theme" sets and some more boy figures to the "girl theme" sets could go a long way for this! And GrahamB's daughter has the right idea. I don't think it'd work the other way around though. :-\ Dinosaurs (and even knights and pirates) are a lot more neutral than dress-up dolls.
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Great article.
I think gender separation of toys has gotten much worse.
At least in the US at major toy retailers they ALL seems to be separated by gender these days. TRU, Target, etc. all seem to have almost everything divided up into "blue" and "pink" aisles.
The manufacturers now make pink/purple versions of so many traditionally gender neutral toys - not just lego and playmobil but everything from basic toddler toys by Playskool and FP, to FP and Little Tikes sports stuff, to Leap Frog & Vtech electronic.
When I was a kid my sister and I had an electric train and dollhouse and the whole family spent hours working on both. Probably our favorite toys were plastic animals and plain wooden blocks - very gender neutral. Really the only toys I remember thinking of as "girl" toys were baby dolls and Barbie and as "boys" toys were GI Joe (I actually played with both.) Playmobil and Lego were completely gender neutral and everyone I knew played with and seemed to collect Star Wars figures.
I would have expected more progress toward gender neutrality over the past few decades. (Oh and don't even get me started on cultural/ethnic diversty - Playmobil is awful about this too.)
My best friend and I both have preschoolers, she a girl and I a boy, and we discuss this all the time - it can be a real struggle as a parent.
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I do not think it is the toy companies setting the example but them reacting to the market. In my opinion boys used to be in the drivers seat of life. Then for a brief moment there was a shift were half the drivers were boys and Girls. Today I think Girls are more and more in the drivers seat. Soon most toys will be geared to girls and boys will want to play with them to be accepted. It has more to do with the shift from patriarchal to matriarchal as societies shift from agriculture to information based economies. Just my 1/2 cent
What I find really interesting is the history of pink and blue
example article
http://forgottenhistoryblog.com/pink-wasnt-always-considered-a-feminine-color-and-blue-wasnt-always-masculine/
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Saw this today (bbc.co.uk link):
Aiming toys at just boys or girls hurts economy (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-26064302)
Thanks for the link, tahra - that is an excellent article. This section of the article explains the boy=blue and girl=pink problem very well:
" . . . This aggressive gender segregation is a consequence of big-company marketing tactics. As every successful marketeer knows, differentiation makes for greater profit margins and segmentation gives you a bigger overall market, so with three-year-old girls only being able to choose pink tricycles, then the manufacturer can charge more for that special girly shade of pink and the premium princess saddle. And of course, that trike cannot be handed over to a brother or nephew, ensuring further sales of blue bikes with Action Man handlebars. It has now got to the point where it is difficult to buy toys for girls, in particular, which are not pink, princess-primed and/or fairy-infused. . . "
I studied marketing in college as part of earning a management degree and I can assure you that this is exactly what goes on in the marketing departments of pretty much all corporations. It's not just about gender either - think Coke, diet coke, coke with lime, cherry coke, decaf coke, etc. where the different products appeal to different segments of consumers. The goal is to have as many different products as possible in the company's product line to appeal to as many different types of customers as possible so that the maximum amount of shelf space within the store is achieved and the consumer is urged to buy more and more. As we have seen, Playmobil has gone further and further down this path over the past few years. I wonder whether Playmobil toys would ever have made it to market at all 40 years ago if the decision had been left to the marketing department.
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Very true, it's funny 'cause just today on the radio they announced that Coca Cola is creating yet another 'product' buy selling pads to make your own Coca Cola drink at home (adding water).
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I saw that too, Birdie - it will be like the Keurig coffee machine, I think.
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What I find really interesting is the history of pink and blue
example article
http://forgottenhistoryblog.com/pink-wasnt-always-considered-a-feminine-color-and-blue-wasnt-always-masculine/
Very interesting.
But weither or not pink will once be associated again with boys, I will NEVER switch from blue jeans to pink ones! ;D
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Very interesting.
But weither or not pink will once be associated again with boys, I will NEVER switch from blue jeans to pink ones! ;D
watch out, did you see the costumes of the Olympics, the Germans especially 8-) maybe not pink but rainbows, puppies, ponies and kittens :rainbow: :cheerlead: :inlove: :bunny: :cloud9: :confetti: