Cheap and Collectible, This Year’s Hot Toy Is Squinkies

In the eight years since he founded Blip Toys, Mr. Nichols has had enough success with novelty items that he can get meetings with Target, Toys “R” Us and Wal-Mart. From Wal-Mart, he heard that vending-machine concepts were popular in its Japanese division, Seiyu.
Mr. Nichols researched the size of the industry. Vending machines sold billions of dollars of goods a year. That sparked the idea for the toys, squishy rubber characters about the size of a knuckle that come in plastic bubbles, like a vending-machine ring or toy would.

　「コレクティブ」で「安い」が秘訣だそう。子どもも楽しめるし、ママも満足。ママブロガーが売上に大きく貢献。そして、さらに営業現場では日本の自動販売機が……。