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When the PCC was set up there were 5 of us representing collectors that attended. I am the only one still active here I think.
At the big meeting we had with the department heads and president, the collectors brought up the concept of Playmobil as a building system. Management at the time felt that the steps they had taken in that direction with System X showed that it wasn't viable. My opinion is that at the toy scale Playmobil is in, the parts are too big and you need too many to do anything creative. Serious collectors like many of us here do end up with that much stuff, but the average toy buyer who is trying to raise kids simply can't afford that. What Rasputin says about the large parts and parents is spot on, that is definitely one thing that was also said at the meeting.
I don't believe any of the Playmobil staff that were at that meeting are still with the company.
Their underlying problem is at the board of directors level, and the inability to stick to a management scheme.
The guy who was in when they developed Novelmore and the beginnings of Wiltopia clearly knew what they were doing, but they didn't give them enough time to make progress.
The collapse of their online storytelling videos due to mismanagement of their business relationship with the producers of them was also a huge error. It really led to collapse of support for Novelmore and the entire Ducklas fiasco since Duck on Call was supposed to be supported by a full video series. They were attempting to follow LEGO in having video series support for their lines like LEGO does with Ninjago. But then they messed up their relationship with the video makers; I suspect by trying to micromanage and holding back payments to them that caused them to go bankrupt. It's a huge error to make and hopefully whoever was really responsible for it is no longer with the company. Sadly as any of us who have been in the world of work knows, it's just as likely that the people who messed up are still there and the good people have all run for the exits seeing what's happening. Once that happens it is incredibly hard to reverse the trend and keep the best people.
The build-ability of playmobil has been talked in great length. When Playmobil started with stecks it was considered the golden years. The medieval, western and safari sets to this day are quite the collectors choice. Then slowly Playmobil went for systemX which in my opinion worked great for modern theme sets.
Then some paper pusher , sharp pencil numb nut decided to go for (as Tahra calls it “system y”) the modular, un-expandable hunk of junk that seemed to appease some lazy parents who were too concerned with no wanting to spend 30 minutes with their child and build a set. “Let’s dumb down the whole brand for a few lazy parents” was probably the marketing pitch.