Okay, here's a fun one. Toymaker Mattel is
putting the pedal to the metal when it's hot wheels
franchise is coming to new york city, the brand
is driving into new york days before the new york
auto show to reveal to fans around the world the
toy of vehicle at last year's winner of the hot
wheels Legends Tour. Well, joining me now is
Richard Dickson president and Ceo of Mattel. Richard,
it's great to see you. This was a 1969
Volvo, p 1800 that was declared last year's winner
. What will people at the auto show this year
get to see? Well, first off, you
know, this is part of the hot wheels legend
tour, Which is this extraordinary tour around the world
over 13 different countries, five continents, it's the
largest custom show, international toy toy show in the
world and it really speaks to the automotive enthusiasts around
the world, people who grew up with hot wheels
and now truly can create their own legendary car.
We get thousands of entries all over the world essentially
have this incredible lineup of expert judges that select the
car of the year, the one who wins and
then essentially We create a 164 scale of that car
that's put into the permanent collection of the hot wheels
died cast line. It's truly a legends tour with
legendary people for a legendary brand and its legends tour
kicking off next next week. Richard, I know
a lot of people excited about it and I know
your company, like many companies pivoting into digital,
more and more specifically in the N. F.
T. Space take us into the hot wheels.
N. F. T. Garage. What is
it like? What does it offer consumers? Well
first off Daniel at mattel were an I. P
. Driven high performing toy company and essentially we have
a huge portfolio of brands that are legendary essentially pop
culture conversations around the world. Hot wheels, barbie
fisher, price american girl, you know pictionary and
many many more Hot wheels is of course a legendary
brand. It's born in 1968 over 54 years old
. It's reaching new heights over a billion dollars of
sales just last year. In 2021 we sell over
500 million cars a year. It's an extraordinary brand
that touches many different lives and multigenerational and as we
look to the growth strategy of the brand, expanding
beyond toy into content, digital gaming, live events
and movies and television shows and of course as you
mentioned, N. F. T. S.
We had our second drop of N. F.
T. S. Recently it blew out we had
over 60,000 people lined up to buy just a very
limited assortment of N. F. T. S
that have done extraordinary well and it's a great indication
of the health and longevity of this incredible pop culture
iconic brand. So a full 360 degrees sweet richard
of course that you're rolling out for your hot wheels
brand here. What is the cost of one of
these N. F. T. S. Cost
ranges on the N. F. T. S
. We have very scarce in FTS, we've launched
our first collection called the garage series, Very limited
edition inspired by the original cars that we created back
in 1968. Those went for thousands of dollars each
. And in fact on the secondary market have been
commanding incredible prices. Then we drop the second series
more affordable but essentially ranging from low price, too
high price, lots of different variety. And obviously
in the secondary market we're experiencing incredible collector orientation,
both appealing to N. F. T. Collectors
as well as hot wheels collectors. So a dual
audience in fact exposed to the brand through NFC collectibility
as well as hot wheels collectibility. What is the
hot wheels or a mattel experience Richard look like in
the metaverse. Well as we extend our brands into
the digital universe, we've got various different executions,
digital gaming content, Short form long form N.
F. T. S. Of course on the
, on the lead of the N. F.
T. Evolution for our portfolio has been hot wheels
. We also have had done bobby in a limited
edition N. F. T. Collector with Beaumont
, an incredible fashion house with a limited edition apparel
collection and an N. F. T. That
sold for thousands of dollars. In fact, we
only had three N. F. T. S
. And we got over$50,000 for that uh three
N. F. T. S in literally minutes
. And as we continue to evolve our digital stuff
strategy across the portfolio, you're going to see more
interaction in digital content, digital gaming. The metaverse
Web three the dialogue continues as a story toy company
evolving as we said into an iP driven high performing
toy company. Absolutely well, certainly your company has
already been high performing the stock doing well, holding
up near its recent 52 week high and your company
actually posting its first ever billion dollar year of sales
in 2021. How have you been able to navigate
some of the issues that have been impacting every company
, Every industry out there, inflation, higher input
prices as well as supply chain issues. What are
some of the changes that you've made to combat those
factors? Well, thank you for acknowledging that health
success. It's obviously one that we take a lot
of great pride in its a company with legendary history
portfolio of strong brands around the world. And it's
really led by our mattel playbook. It's really about
identifying the purpose of every one of our brands driving
design led innovation, studying our consumers and applying innovation
to our toys and our marketing concepts connecting to culture
, pop cultural conversations relevant conversations relevant partnerships and of
course execution excellence in every front our commercial organization,
our supply chain organization, all the internal work that
goes into not only creating a toy but executing marketing
that toy and creating those meaningful memories with families around
the world. Here's another question for you, Richard
, I think a lot of families right now,
everywhere around the world trying to put together a budget
, a budget that has probably even had to be
flexible so far year today because of soaring persistent inflation
is mattel planning to raise prices this year. And
I asked her that families who are listening can budget
for toys for their Children this year. Yeah,
well we're all dealing with inflation. We're certainly not
singled out and in the context of the history around
inflation, it's really been on for a couple of
years now now this year is significant but through price
increases and actions as well as cost savings that are
happening at mattel, we intend on mitigating the impact
of inflation and over time in fact expanding margins in
the context of consumer connectivity. We take a lot
of time and interest ensuring that our consumers are getting
the right value and the innovation that they expect and
the quality and trust that they expect from mattel that
is essentially the most important part of how we manage
market and develop our toys and of course price value
relationships, working with our retailers and ensuring that our
brands are consistently delivered upon and continuing to grow.
I think as you look at what's successful brands and
toy brands in particular in this particular chapter are going
to be about nostalgic brands that have longevity. We're
generational in the context of our portfolio. We have
parents who grew up with our brands who have incredible
memories, cognitive social developmental skills that come with traditional
toy play and each one of our brands has representation
in people's lives that really do matter. And so
while we recognize there's a lot of challenges by a
chain and inflation, we take all these things into
consideration, ensure that our consumers are getting the best
value for our brands. So it sounds like Richard
though. Yes, like many companies price hikes will
be on the horizon for consumers this year, there's
definitely gonna be pricing uh and of course across our
portfolio, we do have price increases. That being
said as a company, we're balancing many of those
price increases with cost savings and ultimately trying to deliver
the best value that we can for the brands that
we offer to consumers through our retail partners. Okay
, Richard Dickson, president and Ceo of Mattel,
of course, a week before this hot wheels legends
tour kicks off Richard, we appreciate the time