SYSK's 12 Days of Christmas… Toys: What Makes a Must-Have Christmas Toy?

Ever since Cabbage Patch Kids came along in 1983, there’s been an annual holiday frenzy around one particular toy – the must-have Christmas toy of the year. But what makes a toy a must-have toy? Josh and Chuck investigate (and kick off the holidays). See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:04Josh Clark?

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• 1:06Speaker 03

  Happy holidays, everybody. This is Chuck here with one of our episodes for our Stuff You Should Know 12 Days of Christmas Toys playlist. We decided to put this together, thought it'd be a fun little holiday idea to kind of gather up some of our toy-centric episodes and release them this December all packaged up. So here we are with, I think this is the first one, either the first or the second one on the list, and the episode title is "What Makes a Must-Have Christmas Toy." If you want to know, listen in and find out. Happy holidays, everybody.

• 1:43Speaker 04

  Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio's How Stuff Works.

• 1:52Josh Clark?

  Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant over there and there's Jerry over there and this is stuff you should know.

• 2:01Speaker 03

  Early Christmas edition.

• 2:04Josh Clark?

  Yeah, we're kicking it off early.

• 2:06Speaker 03

  Like the rest of the retail world.

• 2:09Josh Clark?

  Do you, uh, yeah, man, this year you could find Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas stuff in stores at the same time. Like it was just the most normal thing in the world.

• 2:19Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 2:20Josh Clark?

  But, um, you don't follow me on Twitter and you should.

• 2:23Speaker 03

  I'm not on Twitter.

• 2:24Josh Clark?

  Well, that's, I'm saying you should get on Twitter to follow me.

• 2:27Speaker 03

  No, thank you.

• 2:28Josh Clark?

  But at 7:30 in the morning on November 1st, the day after Halloween, I tweeted Merry Christmas and got a lot of hate back for it.

• 2:38Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah?

• 2:39Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 2:40Speaker 03

  What do you do on Twitter? Do you just poke people like that?

• 2:42Josh Clark?

  Yeah, pretty much. Just troll.

• 2:44Speaker 03

  I got you.

• 2:45Josh Clark?

  Yeah. Uh, well, that was my plug for Twitter. Oh, yeah, yeah. Here we go. So, uh, let's see, back in 1983, Chuck, you were...

• 2:55Speaker 03

  12.

• 2:57Josh Clark?

  Okay. I was seven. Um, you didn't have a Cabbage Patch Kid, did you?

• 3:03Speaker 03

  Well, there's a story there if you really want to know.

• 3:06Josh Clark?

  I think you've told it before, but let's have it.

• 3:09Speaker 03

  Well, we bought, uh, my sister, one of the very first, uh, little people is what they were called, before they were Cabbage Patch Kids.

• 3:17Josh Clark?

  That's right.

• 3:17Speaker 03

  In, uh, Helen, Georgia, when they were handmade by Xavier Roberts, who I recently learned stole that idea from a woman. And, uh, took it as his own and made millions of dollars off of her idea.

• 3:32Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 3:33Speaker 03

  So, I mean, I wanted to, maybe we'll do a short stuff about that. I wanted to do a full-length episode.

• 3:38Josh Clark?

  But we, I mean, we definitely talked about that because I think we have talked about like must-have toys of the past and, and maybe last year's or the year before's Christmas edition.

• 3:46Speaker 03

  Yeah. And we had, she got this doll, uh, its name was Chuck, um, which was kind of funny because that's my name.

• 3:52Josh Clark?

  That's so funny.

• 3:53Speaker 03

  And, uh, it was a big deal. I think it was like the number 70 something or 80 something made and now it's worth a lot of money.

• 3:59Josh Clark?

  Does she still have it?

• 4:00Speaker 03

  Uh huh.

• 4:01Josh Clark?

  Oh, that's great.

• 4:04Speaker 03

  And we'll finish with Cabbage Patch Kids and then I'll take issue with you. So go ahead.

• 4:09Josh Clark?

  Okay, I know what you're gonna take issue with.

• 4:11Speaker 03

  Oh, I don't know if you do know, but go ahead.

• 4:13Josh Clark?

  So let me, let me, let me start.

• 4:15Speaker 03

  All right.

• 4:15Josh Clark?

  So back in 1983, Cabbage Patch Kids were like the must have toy of the Christmas season.

• 4:23Speaker 03

  For sure.

• 4:24Josh Clark?

  And from what I can tell, they were the first must have Christmas toy ever. Now, that's not to say there weren't extraordinarily popular toys at around Christmas time. Before 1983, Star Wars very famously offered their Early Bird Certificate Package, which was basically an empty box that said at some point in the future, you will get Star Wars figures instead of this empty box.

• 4:53Speaker 03

  One of the great, great marketing gems of all time.

• 4:57Josh Clark?

  Yep. So that was a thing. All the way back in 1952, Mr. Potato Head was a hot toy that year. Robert the Robot was a hot toy in 1954. And when you say hot toys, it's tough to overstate that. Like, Robert the Robot had T-shirts in the 50s. I didn't even know people wore T-shirts in the 50s.

• 5:18Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 5:18Josh Clark?

  He was in a movie. Um, like, there was, these were big deal toys. But my premise is this, this is my thesis, okay? And this is my own, so I'll take the hit if it's wrong.

• 5:29Speaker 03

  Sure.

• 5:30Josh Clark?

  But that, in just the same way that there were hit movies like The Godfather or like Ben Hur, before Jaws came along, there wasn't such a thing as the summer blockbuster until Jaws came along and made the summer blockbuster a thing. There wasn't such a thing as the must have toy of Christmas until the Cabbage Patch Kid came along and made that a thing.

• 5:58Josh Clark?

  So what issue are you going to take? I can't take it any longer. You're driving me crazy.

• 6:02Speaker 03

  Well, I don't think it was. I don't think it was Cabbage Patch Kids that was the must have toy. The first must have toy. That's what I take issue with.

• 6:11Josh Clark?

  What was the first?

• 6:12Speaker 03

  Well, I don't know. I mean, I'm just speaking for my own lifespan and I definitely think Star Wars counts. Because if you can sell an empty box to a kid for Christmas, then that's a pretty strong position as a must have thing. And by the way, if you're listening, the reason they sold empty boxes is because they didn't know Star Wars was going to be a big thing. So Kenner didn't have as many of these made in the run up to the film release pre-Christmas. So they got caught with their pants down and they realized that there was a big demand, a huge demand.

• 6:45Josh Clark?

  Okay.

• 6:46Speaker 03

  They sold like 40 million of these?

• 6:49Josh Clark?

  No. Forty million boxes?

• 6:52Speaker 03

  I'm trying to. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 6:53Josh Clark?

  Okay.

• 6:54Speaker 03

  I don't know. Forty million Star Wars toys.

• 6:56Josh Clark?

  Okay.

• 6:57Speaker 03

  At that, inside of a year.

• 6:59Josh Clark?

  So, okay, yeah, I'm not surprised to hear that.

• 7:01Speaker 03

  And did you know that you can even buy these empty box kits on eBay now?

• 7:07Josh Clark?

  Oh, yeah, I'm sure.

• 7:08Speaker 03

  I saw one listed for 1,500 bucks.

• 7:10Josh Clark?

  I'm not at all surprised.

• 7:11Speaker 03

  And then, just very quickly, I also want to point out that the biggest, most in-demand toy of my young life was the Atari Pac-Man cartridge.

• 7:22Josh Clark?

  Oh, boy.

• 7:22Speaker 03

  And that was in 1982.

• 7:24Josh Clark?

  Okay.

• 7:24Speaker 03

  That sold seven million cartridges.

• 7:26Josh Clark?

  Okay, great, great. The numbers don't lie. That's a big, big number. Seven million, 40 million. You can toss big numbers out all day long. But let me ask you this.

• 7:35Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 7:35Josh Clark?

  For that empty box of Star Wars, for that Atari Pac-Man cartridge, did a woman have her leg broken because a crowd trying to get their hands on those things turned violent? Or, before you answer, in addition to that, did a department store manager in Charleston, West Virginia have to arm himself with a baseball bat to defend himself from his very customers who are trying to get to the Star Wars empty box or the Atari cartridge? I would guess that the answer is no.

• 8:03Speaker 03

  Well, I think human behaviors have changed over the years. I don't know.

• 8:10Josh Clark?

  From 1982 to 1983?

• 8:12Speaker 03

  Well, I guarantee I could find one violent incident about the Atari cartridge.

• 8:16Josh Clark?

  I'll bet you couldn't.

• 8:18Speaker 03

  Well, you know, there wasn't then because there was, they met the demand.

• 8:22Josh Clark?

  Okay, so that's a big part of it too, right? So there have been, well, let's just move on from this. The Cabbage Patch, Cabbage Patch Kids, if not were the first, which they were.

• 8:31Speaker 03

  Did you have one?

• 8:33Josh Clark?

  Yeah, yeah, Weber Dino.

• 8:34Speaker 03

  You had a Cabbage Patch Kid?

• 8:35Josh Clark?

  Yeah, I ended up taking his head off and giving him a mohawk as I grew older.

• 8:40Speaker 03

  Because, and not to be, not to be too like, gender binary here, but I, I didn't know a lot of boys that wanted the Cabbage Patch Kid.

• 8:49Josh Clark?

  What?

• 8:52Josh Clark?

  I've, I've always broken the mold, Chuck.

• 8:54Speaker 03

  Well, sure. No, I mean, there's nothing wrong with it. I, I grew up with William Wants a Doll on Free to Be You and Me, so I get it. But that's why I just don't know. I think a must-have, uh, Christmas toy would be one that everybody wants.

• 9:06Josh Clark?

  Yeah, as far as I knew, everybody wanted a Cabbage Patch Kid.

• 9:11Speaker 03

  All right, we'll just put this one to bed.

• 9:13Josh Clark?

  Okay, like a Cabbage Patch Kid with a mohawk.

• 9:16Speaker 03

  That you adopted.

• 9:17Josh Clark?

  Yep, so, um, right. Uh, well, that was a big thing. Uh, like, there was, there was some hallmarks to the idea of a must-have toy that were surrounding Cabbage Patch Kids. Violence is one.

• 9:28Speaker 03

  Right.

• 9:29Josh Clark?

  Um, there was a lot of buzz that was picked up by the media. And then one of the ways that that was generated was by, um, I think Kaliko, who owned Cabbage Patch Kids at the time, sent these dolls directly to reporters. That was a big one. Um, and the fact that there was not enough supply to meet the demand. These things kind of came together to make Cabbage Patch Kids a must-have Christmas toy. And this has been carried on as a tradition ever since then, ever since that very, very first time in 1983 with Cabbage Patch Kids. Uh, there were Nintendos that dominated back in 1988, uh, 1989, and 1990, three years in a row. Nintendo had three different products that were like the must-have Christmas toy.

• 10:12Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah. Um. That first game console, huge.

• 10:15Josh Clark?

  Oh dude.

• 10:15Speaker 03

  The Game Boy, huger, it felt like.

• 10:18Josh Clark?

  Mm-hmm.

• 10:19Speaker 03

  Uh, and then, of course, in 1990, possibly the best game, gaming system of all time. If you look at just relative to the time, uh, the Super Nintendo console.

• 10:29Josh Clark?

  I don't know, man. N64 was pretty great with Goldeneye.

• 10:32Speaker 03

  Oh, God, N64 was great.

• 10:34Josh Clark?

  Yeah, with Goldeneye. I mean, like, it would have been, you know, fine on its own, but the fact that Goldeneye existed was the thing that made N64 to me.

• 10:43Speaker 03

  That game blew my mind.

• 10:45Josh Clark?

  Yeah, it was great, especially the Battle Royale where you could play your friends. Oh, man, that was fun.

• 10:50Speaker 03

  Yeah, we called it hunt and chase.

• 10:52Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 10:52Speaker 03

  I used to get so mad.

• 10:54Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 10:54Speaker 03

  In those, like, that's the only time I ever got mad playing video games, because I don't do that thing where you play online and you can, you know, you can exact revenge on people. So I did not take it well when my friend snuck up behind me and shot me in the head.

• 11:06Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 11:08Josh Clark?

  Yeah, that was always a bummer. What about Tickle Meoma? That was a big one, thanks to Rosie O'Donnell.

• 11:13Speaker 03

  I was a little old for that.

• 11:15Josh Clark?

  Oh, really?

• 11:16Speaker 03

  I was in my mid twenties.

• 11:18Josh Clark?

  I had one.

• 11:20Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah? Well, you were late in high school.

• 11:22Josh Clark?

  Not really. Yeah, this was 1996. This was post-high school even. But this was such a craze that there was that characteristic violence where a Walmart employee was trampled while he was trying to restock the display, late at night, I believe. But he had a pulled hamstring, injuries to his back, his jaw, his knee, broken rib, a concussion. And it continues on. Like, I haven't read about any violence from Hatchimals, but from 2016 to 2018, they were the, if not one of, the top must-have toys of the year.

• 11:56Speaker 03

  I hate those things.

• 11:58Josh Clark?

  Hatchimals?

• 11:58Speaker 03

  Mm-hmm.

• 11:59Josh Clark?

  How come?

• 12:00Speaker 03

  Because you have to put it in a dish or a bowl that you eat out of, and you have to leave it there, and leave it there, and leave it there, and then it hatches into a garbage toy.

• 12:12Josh Clark?

  Really? Oh, so my experience is that it's, they're pretty, they're good.

• 12:17Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah?

• 12:18Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 12:19Speaker 03

  So you like your Hatchimal?

• 12:21Josh Clark?

  Yeah. Why are you talking, is it like animatronic?

• 12:25Speaker 03

  Huh?

• 12:26Josh Clark?

  Is it animatronic?

• 12:27Speaker 03

  I'm talking about Hatchimals, yeah.

• 12:29Josh Clark?

  It's, so, okay, so I don't know anything about the dish. I just, my experience is from my niece, and I don't remember any dish.

• 12:35Speaker 03

  Oh, wait, this isn't the, are we talking about two different things? This is the thing you put in water?

• 12:39Josh Clark?

  No, no, no.

• 12:40Speaker 03

  And it hatches from an egg?

• 12:41Josh Clark?

  Electrocute yourself when you touch it.

• 12:43Speaker 03

  Okay, maybe I'm thinking of something else.

• 12:45Josh Clark?

  This is like an animatronic thing that hatches from an egg, but like you have to like teach it and train it and raise it and like give it attention and everything. It's a bit like the Tamagotchi, but like an animatronic pet.

• 12:56Speaker 03

  Oh, I got you. No, I'm thinking of the thing that you, it's an egg that you put in water and after a few days it hatches into a garbage toy.

• 13:03Josh Clark?

  Yeah, no, that's, that's not this.

• 13:05Speaker 03

  Gotcha.

• 13:05Josh Clark?

  Hatchimals are much different.

• 13:06Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 13:07Josh Clark?

  So, so there is this tradition of a must-have Christmas toy. And you can find all you want about them every year because they're everywhere all the time and the media reports on this kind of stuff and they're on TV and there's ads and there's like social media stuff now. But there's like a really big question that doesn't have a lot of press associated with it and certainly no studies or anything that I could find. But there's a question, Chuck, like, how does a toy become a must-have Christmas toy?

• 13:37Speaker 03

  Well, let's take a break and we'll get to the bottom of it right after this.

• 13:52Speaker 05

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• 14:46Speaker 06

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• 15:57Josh Clark?

  That was quite a setup, huh?

• 15:58Speaker 03

  I think so.

• 16:01Josh Clark?

  So back in the day when you were shopping for Christmas, if you were a kid or a parent, it didn't matter.

• 16:06Speaker 03

  Right.

• 16:07Josh Clark?

  You knew exactly what to do. You knew exactly how to do it. There was no frills, no nothing. It was all just holiday joy and the goodness of the Christmas holiday season.

• 16:17Speaker 03

  That's right. That is correct. And you learned what you wanted, if you were a kid, from two things. Saturday morning cartoon commercials and whatever your catalog was. The Sears Wish Book is certainly one.

• 16:33Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 16:34Speaker 03

  Service merchandise catalog was another big one for us.

• 16:37Josh Clark?

  Yeah, there's a Montgomery Ward's catalog.

• 16:39Speaker 03

  Yeah, of course. And you put this together and you introduced me to a website called Wish Book Web.

• 16:48Speaker 03

  That might as well be called, um, time suck.com.

• 16:54Josh Clark?

  Yeah, it's pretty great, isn't it?

• 16:55Speaker 03

  Because someone has gone through and scanned, uh, is it just Sears Wishbooks?

• 17:01Josh Clark?

  No, no, it's Sears, JCPenney, and Montgomery Ward.

• 17:05Speaker 03

  Right.

• 17:05Josh Clark?

  And then I think there's the occasional, what store is that here or there?

• 17:09Speaker 03

  Right. They have scanned these entire wishbooks up to 1996.

• 17:14Josh Clark?

  Which, which everyone knows is the cutoff date for nostalgia.

• 17:18Speaker 03

  That's right. Uh, from the earliest days of 1933. And boy, let me tell you, dude, and I know you know this because you've done it. If you go through and spend a few minutes clicking through these things in the years where you were like six to 12, waves of nostalgia wash over you like, like John Hodgman would succumb to these waves.

• 17:39Josh Clark?

  Yeah, I know.

• 17:41Speaker 03

  It's amazing. I remember some specific pictures. I remembered the, I mean, the NFL section alone brought tears to my eyes and I forgot how much they hyped football back then.

• 17:54Josh Clark?

  You just can't stop crying.

• 17:56Speaker 03

  It was crazy. The, the clothes, the alarm clocks, the clock radios, the, the tech section. Um, it was just, it was off the charts for me looking through this. I almost did nothing else today.

• 18:07Josh Clark?

  Yeah, I know. It is. Wishbook Web is pretty awesome. Like, somebody went through and scanned every single page of these

• 18:14Speaker 03

  God's work.

• 18:14Josh Clark?

  Several hundred page each catalogs for decades worth of catalogs. It is, it is God's work.

• 18:21Speaker 03

  And just to get laughs by like, seeing the, the, the two four-year-olds posing in bathrobes. It's really, really funny.

• 18:31Josh Clark?

  Right. One of them's got like a pipe that blows bubbles.

• 18:33Speaker 03

  Oh my God, this is just amazing. What a great website.

• 18:36Josh Clark?

  So, so Wishbook Web has kind of preserved how you used to figure out what you wanted for Christmas, which was you go through these wishbooks or these catalogs or whatever, and then you'd tell your parents, you'd dog ear them, maybe drop some hints. It was the correct way. The 21st century has a kind of an updated version of that, but it still kind of follows the same general contours, right? Where there are lists still.

• 19:03Josh Clark?

  And like catalogs, but now it's not just department stores that have like the market cornered on them, like that's actually kind of gone away. It's very tough to find a department store catalog. I believe Myers still does that. I think they're kind of like a Midwestern Target.

• 19:19Speaker 03

  Oh, really?

• 19:20Josh Clark?

  Yeah, and they have a toy catalog that they put out still, I believe, to this year.

• 19:24Speaker 03

  Well, now you get the Restoration Hardware Christmas catalog.

• 19:28Josh Clark?

  Right, or Ikea.

• 19:29Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 19:30Josh Clark?

  But they, but there's lists everywhere and it seems like every retailer has one or all the major retailers have one. And depending on where it's coming from, it's, some are more trustworthy or above the boards or, or objective than others when saying like, these are the must have toys.

• 19:48Speaker 03

  Right.

• 19:49Josh Clark?

  Like on, on one end of the spectrum, you have like third-party websites and publications and organizations like The Spruce, or Toy Insider, or Toys, Tots, Pets and More. And they actually evaluate the toys when they make their lists.

• 20:05Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, these, it's just different now. And I don't think it's nostalgia, like thinking things were better back then, but it was, it seemed easier and better to let a kid sift through a catalog and pick out stuff than, I guess, what are you supposed to do today? Like, sit down with your kid at one of these websites and at, look at the top 20 hot toys and say, what do you want? Like, I don't, I don't know how it works these days.

• 20:30Josh Clark?

  I don't know. Maybe instead of like dog earring the pages, you send your parents links.

• 20:36Speaker 03

  I'm sure you do, actually.

• 20:37Josh Clark?

  You know?

• 20:38Speaker 03

  Yeah. But I mean, if your kids are too young to be on the internet, I'm not sure how to do it. Cause I could hand my four-year-old a catalog and say, pick out some stuff, it'd be great.

• 20:47Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 20:47Speaker 03

  But I'm not gonna say, hey, just log on to The Spruce and go, uh, scroll down until you find something you like.

• 20:54Josh Clark?

  Right. Stay out of their parents' section.

• 20:59Josh Clark?

  What do you, I mean, what do you do? You have a, you literally have a kid, Chuck. What do you do?

• 21:03Speaker 03

  I, I don't know. I mean, we buy, we just buy things that we think she might like.

• 21:08Josh Clark?

  So there's like a whole world out there of like lists and websites that show toys and stuff that she's unaware of?

• 21:16Speaker 03

  Oh, sure.

• 21:17Josh Clark?

  Oh, wow. She's got a big surprise ahead of her.

• 21:20Speaker 03

  I guess so.

• 21:21Josh Clark?

  That's great. I'm excited for her, actually.

• 21:24Speaker 03

  Yeah, but I mean, you definitely feel like you're sort of stabbing in the dark as to like, I mean, a parent can go through and look at those lists, but you know, kill me.

• 21:36Josh Clark?

  Well, a lot of people are excited about that kind of thing. They're like, good, this is, yeah, I don't have to like go to the store and stand there and be like, what are we getting here? You could go to some website or USA Today, or the Today Show, or whoever is partnering with some of these trusted sites like Toys Tots, Pets and More, or Toy Insider. And like, they kind of take a lot of the guesswork out of you. They're basically saying, these are what experts are saying your kid is going to want. If you go buy this, you will score a home run with your kid.

• 22:06Speaker 03

  Yeah, I think my problem is I don't know what is bought and what is real reviews. Because as you have dug up, and I didn't even know this, of course they do this. If you go on Amazon, they, you know, you can spend 2 million bucks as a retailer to be on their, you know, on their top list or whatever.

• 22:26Josh Clark?

  So, okay, yes. And what I saw though was that they, you spend that money to nominate them, to nominate your toy for their consideration to include on the list.

• 22:37Speaker 03

  Just for nomination?

• 22:39Josh Clark?

  I don't know how the process works, but yeah, I saw, I saw like the headline say, you pay 2 million for a slot, but if you read the finer print, it's saying you pay 2 million for them to even consider it. And then I guess, I don't know how they curate it. They actually kind of keep a closed lid on it. But it generated like 120 million dollars in revenue for Amazon just to be on their list of hot toys for the year.

• 23:03Speaker 03

  Walmart, they charge 10 grand a month per toy to be on their buyer's picks toy list.

• 23:11Speaker 03

  And like you point out here, they Walmart starts their list in August. And you've got to wonder, is that because they're making 10 grand a pop? Off of the stuff?

• 23:22Josh Clark?

  Per month?

• 23:22Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 23:23Josh Clark?

  Yeah, they released theirs in late August, before Labor Day even. And like, this isn't like a, hey, we think these toys are going to be hot this year. It's here's the hot list of holiday toys. And Target released theirs at the beginning of September. I think Bullseye is the name of their mascot, dog mascot. It's Buzz McKenzie, basically.

• 23:43Speaker 03

  Yeah, Bully Bullseye.

• 23:45Josh Clark?

  And I couldn't see if they charge for placement or how they compile it or anything like that. Which actually makes me suspect that they don't, because there's plenty of ink about Amazon and Walmart's lists and how they charge for them.

• 23:55Speaker 03

  Right.

• 23:56Josh Clark?

  And the fact that there's not one for Target makes me think either they're really keeping a lid on it, or else they actually don't charge for that. But so there's, there's kind of two lists where if you're a parent,

• 24:07Speaker 03

  Naughty and nice?

• 24:08Josh Clark?

  Yeah, you need to ask dogs and dog people and cat people.

• 24:11Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 24:11Josh Clark?

  You, you need to ask, where is this list coming from? And if it's coming from a third-party site, go look up the third-party site and they will tell you in their like about us section, how they determine what toys are what. And if you really want to get that information, that's fine. But even if Amazon or Walmart, or even if Target charges for placement on their lists, just the very fact that those things are on their lists is going to make them among the hot toys of the season. So it's like a self fulfilling or self paying prophecy.

• 24:42Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, I guess anytime you look up something on a major retailer website, those first few things are sponsored. And they say sponsored in little letters.

• 24:53Josh Clark?

  Oh, sometimes they don't.

• 24:54Speaker 03

  Oh, really?

• 24:55Josh Clark?

  Mm hmm.

• 24:56Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, sometimes it's kind of hard to discern

• 24:59Speaker 03

  whether or not you're looking at the, the real top thing or the sponsored thing.

• 25:02Josh Clark?

  Right. And I think like with the gift list in particular, I don't believe that they say that these are sponsored. I think it's just like, here's the hot list according to Amazon.

• 25:11Speaker 03

  Well, let's talk a bit about marketing in general around the holidays.

• 25:16Speaker 03

  That, you know, it's a, it's a science in a way, and they have found out through science that

• 25:22Speaker 03

  the happy people buy more. You are, not everyone's happy around the holidays, but they definitely, as marketers, play on the idea that you are happier around the holidays. And so you should be in the buying spirit. Definitely when you're talking about kids, that is the case. They pummel children with ads. There was one study here, University of Hertfordshire counted 100 ads in a three hour Saturday morning kids slot. Christmas time.

• 25:53Josh Clark?

  A hundred, a hundred in a three hour slot.

• 25:55Speaker 03

  That's a lot of ads.

• 25:56Josh Clark?

  It is. And then, of course, you know, children are on more than one screen these days. So they're also getting ads on, you know, when they're watching YouTube or whatever. Or just on kids websites, there's ads everywhere. I can't remember what episode we really kind of dove into that.

• 26:14Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 26:14Josh Clark?

  Advertising their children.

• 26:15Speaker 03

  Oh, man. I think it was about advertising for children, like.

• 26:18Josh Clark?

  Must have been.

• 26:19Speaker 03

  That was the sole, you know, goal.

• 26:21Josh Clark?

  So, so the, the idea is that just, just the holiday season itself puts most of us in a pretty good mood. And advertisers say, oh, well, if we release ads that are holiday themed, we'll be able to kind of tap into that goodwill and good mood. And make you nostalgic or, or feel good about things. And so by doing that, we'll be able to kind of tie our, our brand or our product to that holiday. That holiday sensation. And you'll say, oh, I do want to go buy that because it makes me think of being a kid at Christmas time. That's really basic stuff. I, I mean, like, that's everywhere. You can't get away from that in the holiday season. And there's not even necessarily anything wrong with it.

• 27:05Josh Clark?

  It's just, that's just basic marketing and advertising 101 when it comes to holiday advertising.

• 27:12Speaker 03

  Yeah. And the other thing we mentioned earlier in terms of marketing, and this is also marketing 101 is about scarcity. If you have a toy that there's a limited amount of, that is when you're going to find people trampling each other. To get there because people are motivated by fear. And if you know that a toy is a must have and there aren't many of them and they're going on sale at a certain time, it is frightening what a parent, some parents, might do to secure that toy.

• 27:42Josh Clark?

  Yes, so this is finally, we've reached the key ingredient, right? You've got lists of toys that are promoted and advertised and maybe even show up with their own articles in the media. Then you have the fact that we're already kind of primed to buy because it's the holiday season, we're in a good mood. But when you add that scarcity marketing, it ramps it up to a totally different level. And when you have a must have toy that is hard to find, like you said, people will do very crazy, violent, mean stuff to get it. And there's a lot of reasons why, even if you're not willing to like throw an elbow to get a toy, you might still be willing to camp out at 4:00 AM waiting for, you know,

• 28:22Josh Clark?

  a 24 hour retailer to restock their, their supply of this so you can buy it. That's unusual behavior. And the reason why it all comes down to scarcity marketing, the idea that we have a fear of missing out, a fear of social embarrassment, a fear of our kids not loving us as much as they could had we gotten them this toy. And that all of these things, the scarcity marketing is the real driver that kind of hypercharges must have toy frenzy.

• 28:55Speaker 03

  Yeah, and it's not, you know, just toys. You've seen everything from, you make a great point about Pappy Van Winkle whiskey.

• 29:02Josh Clark?

  Oh, I should say that's from Marketingland, a guy named Jacob Bodzgar.

• 29:06Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 29:07Josh Clark?

  Wrote an article on Marketingland where he cited that and the Disney Vault is really good examples.

• 29:11Speaker 03

  Yeah, Disney Vault is another great one. They were very famous for not just saying like, here's all the movies we've ever made that you can buy on VHS, all in one big package. They would release them every, every now and then, and you knew you had a limited time to get them. And I wasn't really hip to all this, but my dad and his wife were way into the Disney stuff. And, you know, they were adamant about making sure they filled out the entire collection and really kept up with when they were going to be released and what a big deal that was.

• 29:43Josh Clark?

  Yeah, that was a big one. And Bod's card makes the point like by making them limited and available also only for a limited time with years, sometimes a decade in between times when you can buy these things, it creates this like frenzy to go buy them. And it also makes them like a treasured part of that person's home. You know what I mean?

• 30:06Speaker 03

  Yeah. And you can also fake out the public a little bit and mislead them on the scarcity. Like you might have a lot of this stuff and just kind of lead the public to believe like, no, you better go get one right now because they may not be around next week.

• 30:19Josh Clark?

  Yeah, the people who made Hatchimals Spin Master Hatchimals were really hard to find in I think 2016, 17 and 18. And Spin Master was basically accused of purposefully using scarcity marketing. And for their part, they said, hey, we were totally caught off guard three years in a row by the, you know, the popularity of Hatchimals. And other people were like, that's, that's BS. You can totally ramp up production pretty fast. Another must have toy was Fingerlings. Remember them from like last year, the year before?

• 30:54Speaker 03

  No.

• 30:56Josh Clark?

  They were like little monkeys or sloths or dragons or whatever that would hang on to your finger. And they were little finger sized robots that would like blink and blow kisses and do all sorts of cute stuff.

• 31:07Speaker 03

  Terrifying.

• 31:08Josh Clark?

  They weren't. They were cute instead of uncanny because they weren't kind of cartoonish.

• 31:11Speaker 03

  The words finger sized robots together sound terrifying to me.

• 31:15Josh Clark?

  They would cut your throat while you slept. But they, they were, they were caught unaware, even though they really tried hard to make them hit through social media. They were still surprised when it actually happened. But they ramped up production. They brought a third factory in China online. They went from shipping via cargo boat to air transport to get supplies here faster. And they were able to ramp up and meet demand pretty quickly. So the idea that Hatchimals just couldn't possibly do that really smelled to a lot of people like they were purposefully using scarcity marketing.

• 31:47Speaker 03

  Yeah, scarcity. I mean, it's an interesting concept because you see it everywhere. You know, they're Restaurants that, you know, here in Atlanta, Holman and Finch had the Holman and Finch burger that

• 31:58Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 31:59Speaker 03

  Like, one day a week, like, we'll sell a hundred of them, starting at 10:00 PM on this night.

• 32:04Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 32:04Speaker 03

  And then everyone's like, "Oh, my God, what is in that burger?"

• 32:07Josh Clark?

  People would line up around the block.

• 32:09Speaker 03

  Yeah. Or, uh, this is a nice little tidbit here that you dug up about, uh, supermarket experiments.

• 32:17Josh Clark?

  Yeah, that's from a, uh, article from Market Watch by Mark Elwood.

• 32:20Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 32:21Josh Clark?

  He found that one.

• 32:21Speaker 03

  It's amazing. Even putting up a sign for soup that says, "Limit 12 per person," will make people be like, "Oh, I should, I should probably buy 12 of these."

• 32:31Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 32:31Speaker 03

  For whatever reason.

• 32:33Josh Clark?

  I only need one.

• 32:34Speaker 03

  Campbell's might, they might stop making their chicken noodle soup.

• 32:37Josh Clark?

  Right. Or, in this case, it was soup that was on sale, so who knows what the price is gonna go back to, you know?

• 32:42Speaker 03

  Well, that's true.

• 32:43Josh Clark?

  So, um, one of the other things that scarcity produces is this idea that there are haves and have-nots, right? So, it's the idea that you're fearful of missing out, or fearful of your kid not loving you, isn't enough. There's a whole other, um, cognitive bias of, of being a have-not, of being left out in the cold, which I guess is a fear of missing out. But there's also the benefit of being a have, where if you're talking about, like, a fingerling, which is a $15 toy, but people were crazy for those things, like, either last year or the year before. And, like, just about anybody can afford this $15 toy. So, even if you're, like, a have-not throughout the year, you're down on your luck, maybe you're unemployed, or

• 33:27Josh Clark?

  you're underemployed, um, things just aren't going your way, you could still camp out and wait for that late-night restocking of fingerlings and get your kid that toy.

• 33:39Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 33:39Josh Clark?

  And for that time, you are a have.

• 33:42Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 33:42Josh Clark?

  And maybe even somebody with a much higher social status than you couldn't get that fingerling, which makes it all the more sweet. And then let's also not forget, like we said, this is during the holiday season, so emotions, like, count extra. So, to be a have, when you're normally not, during the holiday season because you got a must-have toy, is exponentially, uh, increased.

• 34:04Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's a big deal, um, because it's, it- Even if it's just emotionally equal for a brief period of time, it can be a big deal for somebody.

• 34:16Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 34:17Speaker 03

  I'd say we take our final break here.

• 34:19Josh Clark?

  Same here.

• 34:20Speaker 03

  And then we come back and talk about the worst people, toy flippers, right after this.

• 34:38Speaker 04

  This mood check is brought to you by State Farm. Porque tu bienestar también merece protección. ¿Qué tal, mi gente? Honey German checking in contigo. Take a second. Literalmente, un momentico para ti. How's your corazón feeling today? If it's a little tired, a little oof, you're not alone. Have you eaten algo rico? Taken a deep breath? Maybe even turned off your phone for cinco minutitos? I promise, the memes will still be there. Sometimes self-care isn't candles and meditation. It's just saying no. It's drinking a little bit of agua. It's letting yourself rest sin pena. You don't have to prove anything today. Just be, breathe. Estás haciendo lo mejor que puedes. And yes, that's enough.

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• 36:12Speaker 06

  Learn more about how Cleveland Clinic and IBM are using AI and quantum computing to revolutionize biomedical research at ibm.com/smarttalks.

• 36:36Speaker 03

  All right, so I set up the worst people are toy flippers. Obviously, there's a lot of really, really bad people in the world, and I'm being somewhat hyperbolic. But I do think-

• 36:47Josh Clark?

  Somewhat.

• 36:47Speaker 03

  -the idea of buying, targeting and buying a lot of must-have toys to sell later for profit on eBay makes you a pretty rotten person.

• 36:59Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 36:59Speaker 03

  I'm gonna go ahead and lay that judgment down.

• 37:01Josh Clark?

  Some people do. I reserve judgment for the ones who do it professionally. I think if you are a person who is just trying to augment your, um, your own, like, holiday expenses, and, uh, you are foreseeing a lack of supply ahead of time, I say more power to you.

• 37:24Speaker 03

  Yeah, I'm not into it. I, I feel the same way about ticket scalpers.

• 37:29Josh Clark?

  Yeah. It's exactly, I mean, it's the same thing, basically.

• 37:32Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's, it's buying up a bunch of things, uh, sometimes, and this is completely gross and awful, uh, using bots-

• 37:41Josh Clark?

  Yeah, that's the pits.

• 37:43Speaker 03

  -to, uh, especially for concert tickets, like when bots buy up all the best concert tickets.

• 37:47Josh Clark?

  Especially our tickets.

• 37:49Speaker 03

  Yeah, exactly.

• 37:50Josh Clark?

  I don't think anybody uses bots on ours.

• 37:52Speaker 03

  Well, probably not. But, um, actually, Stuff You Should Know is, is, we've seen very few bad, uh, examples of people trying to overcharge for a sold-out show. More times than not, it's a fellow listener that's like, "Hey, just come along, you can sit next to me for face value," or I'll even give it to you.

• 38:11Josh Clark?

  Yeah, that happens quite a bit. And, uh, yeah, I mean, there's only been a couple where somebody's like, you know, "A million dollars," and of course, they didn't sell it.

• 38:19Speaker 03

  No.

• 38:20Josh Clark?

  Um, but yeah, we haven't run into that. Mostly, the problem is from, um, ticket outlets discharging ridiculous fees on top of our ticket price.

• 38:29Speaker 03

  Well, that makes us mad, and you all should know, we don't have control over that.

• 38:32Josh Clark?

  No.

• 38:33Speaker 03

  Um, we're the Eddie Vedder of podcasting.

• 38:35Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 38:36Speaker 03

  But, uh, if you ever find yourself in a situation where you got shut out of a Stuff You Should Know show, and your option is to not go, or to pay, like, a ridiculous amount, just send us an email, we'll put you on the list.

• 38:45Josh Clark?

  Oh, God, Chuck, wow, you just opened some floodgates.

• 38:49Speaker 03

  I mean, there's very few list spots, so it's not like, you know.

• 38:53Josh Clark?

  Right, now, you just started a must-have toy frenzy for the list. Look what you've done.

• 38:59Speaker 03

  Oh, let's get back to bots. These bots are so savvy that they can they can buy out, they can have hundreds of credit card numbers on file, because sometimes they'll have like a limit to how many things you can buy. They are all these shortcuts and ways to bypass all of these safeguards put into effect, including CAPTCHAs. They will hire foreign workers to sit around and type in the CAPTCHAs to get through security.

• 39:28Josh Clark?

  Which I mean, if there is anything that says holiday spirit more than that, I can't think of it.

• 39:34Speaker 03

  But these bots can can sometimes buy out something in the the second that it goes up online for a regular human being to say, oh, like, all right, they've released the tickets or the doll. Gone.

• 39:50Josh Clark?

  Because they they'll, so what they'll do is they'll go on to like retail websites and figure out what the unique ID is for the product that they're looking for.

• 39:57Speaker 03

  That's the real art.

• 39:58Josh Clark?

  It'll start, right. It'll start monitoring that page because people who build these pages will put them out and just won't, you know, kind of really open the curtain for hours ahead of time. So the bot will have the page targeted and just keep refreshing it hundreds of times a second.

• 40:13Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 40:14Josh Clark?

  Until that sale goes live. And they will have ordered scores of these things or dozens or hundreds, whatever, however many it can before you can even, if you're sitting there refreshing your browser, between the time it takes to refresh your page, they will have wiped the place out using these bots. And then if you're truly sophisticated, you probably have another set of bots who take your inventory and then put it up for sale at some exorbitant price on Amazon or eBay or Craigslist or something like that.

• 40:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, the worst people.

• 40:47Josh Clark?

  So like, you don't even have to do anything. You just stick your bots on it.

• 40:49Speaker 03

  Yeah, I stand by it, even for the the enterprising person who. I just, I don't know. I have a big problem with someone making money off of someone else's misfortune to not have been able to get that themselves. I don't think it makes someone scrappy or enterprising at all.

• 41:08Josh Clark?

  Hey, man, that's, that's fine.

• 41:10Speaker 03

  Yeah, I'll die on this hill.

• 41:12Josh Clark?

  Okay, that's fine. So if you are one of those people that Chuck hates and you want to be enterprising, there is a article written by Lisa Smith, it's on Investopedia, and it's called "The Guide to Reselling Toys at Christmas for Extra Money."

• 41:25Speaker 03

  Oh, God.

• 41:26Josh Clark?

  Which is very innocuous. Then, there's some tips, actually, that make a lot of sense if you want to do this. Do you want to go over them, or are you going to remain mute?

• 41:34Speaker 03

  You can go over them.

• 41:35Josh Clark?

  So, you could talk to parents if you wanted to, right Chuck? Yeah, that's right, Josh. Good idea. Because they know what kids want. You could talk to kids themselves, which makes sense. I mean, just go right to the horse's mouth. I've always said the same thing, Josh. You can talk to Santa. I thought this was pretty enterprising. Like, imagine if you are trying, so what you're trying to do here is to identify what toy you want to buy as early ahead of time as possible, so that you can have identified the hot season, the hot toy of the season, and bought them before the demand really struck. So you talk to mall Santas, hang out in stores, you can talk to cashiers, stock people, all

• 42:17Josh Clark?

  that stuff. Because not only will they know what toy you need to look out for, they'll know when these new supplies are coming in. Maybe slip them a Starbucks card or something like that with 10 bucks on it as a thank you. But be sure to deduct that from your bottom line.

• 42:31Speaker 03

  Sure. Bribery. Deduct that bribery.

• 42:34Josh Clark?

  Right. And then, you can actually hang out in chat rooms. There's entire websites that are dedicated to this kind of stuff that are, you know, that say, like, "Here's the toys we're looking for. I spotted some at this, you know, Walmart or whatever. This stock guy said that Walmart replenishes them on Thursdays at 10:00." There's a lot of stuff you can do if you really wanted to put the legwork in.

• 42:59Speaker 03

  Great. Or you could put all that energy into doing something worthwhile.

• 43:03Josh Clark?

  Right. I know what you're talking about. This is the like, the Michael Larson approach to the holidays. The man who got no whammies on Press Your Luck?

• 43:14Speaker 03

  Oh, I had no problem with him.

• 43:17Josh Clark?

  Okay, this is virtually the same thing.

• 43:19Speaker 03

  No, it's not.

• 43:20Josh Clark?

  It's somebody gaining the system.

• 43:22Speaker 03

  Because Michael Larson wasn't, uh, there wasn't some father who didn't have much money that, you know, overpaid for a doll to make his little girl happy at Christmas time. Michael Larson didn't do that.

• 43:35Josh Clark?

  Right. Uh, he would have though. I'm sure of it.

• 43:41Speaker 03

  Oh goodness.

• 43:42Josh Clark?

  So that's what you can do if you want to flip toys and ruin the holidays as far as Chuck's concerned.

• 43:47Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 43:49Josh Clark?

  And that is, that is a big part of the competition of people who will go buy out stocks. Like you're not really facing them nationwide unless you're talking about people who release bots onto websites or whatever, but they are out there and they do, they do actually create competition and help drive that frenzy even further. Because remember, what's behind must have toys is scarcity marketing. And if there are people out there actively contributing to the scarcity, that's a big deal.

• 44:14Speaker 03

  Here's what I want to hear from, I want to hear from, uh, some women listeners who, let's say you go on a,

• 44:23Speaker 03

  on a date from a dating app and you sit down across from your date and you're like, what do you do? And he goes, "I'm a toy flipper." And she's like, "What's that?" He goes, "You know, around Christmas time, I go out and I buy like tons of toys that I know little kids really, really want. And then I mark them up so I can make a lot of money off their parents who may not be able to afford it."

• 44:42Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 44:43Speaker 03

  And just tell me how that date goes from there.

• 44:45Josh Clark?

  Yeah. Does it have to be a man and a woman? Can it just be anybody?

• 44:50Speaker 03

  It can be anybody, but you know, I think the guy that does this is the guy that I just did that voice for.

• 44:56Josh Clark?

  Who's apparently from Jersey?

• 44:57Speaker 03

  Sure, they're all from Jersey.

• 44:59Josh Clark?

  Okay.

• 45:00Speaker 03

  And I love New Jersey.

• 45:02Josh Clark?

  So I feel like we've learned a lot here.

• 45:04Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 45:05Josh Clark?

  We've talked about, you know, how a toy becomes a must have toy of a season. Usually it has to do with some sort of some combination of of advertising and buzz marketing as long or as well as scarcity. The flippers get involved. I think, and I want to back this up, Chuck. There's not a lot of stuff out there on this. This all had to be brought together. This is kind of one of those rare stuff you should know theses.

• 45:32Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 45:32Josh Clark?

  About what makes a must have toy, a must have toy. But I think it's, I think it holds up.

• 45:37Speaker 03

  Should we talk about some of the, the big toys of this year?

• 45:41Josh Clark?

  Yes. So those lists that are out there.

• 45:44Speaker 03

  This helps me, actually.

• 45:45Josh Clark?

  We put a bunch of, well, that's the point. That's we're trying to help you and all of the toy flippers out there. So actually, this is for all the parents. This will help you get a drop on the toy flippers because I guarantee there are very few toy flippers listening to stuff you should know.

• 45:59Speaker 03

  No, because we have good people in our audience.

• 46:02Josh Clark?

  So the, all those lists that are out there now, we kind of compiled and cross referenced them. A number of them, lists from Target, Toys Tots, Pets and More. That's just one. Amazon, The Today Show, Toy Insider, The Spruce, Crazy Coupon Lady, who had a post about toy flipping. Walmart and New York Magazine. All of those lists we looked at and we found ones that appeared on at least a couple, if not more. And one of them, the first one, appeared on basically every single list that we saw.

• 46:36Speaker 03

  Yeah, this one, the Bloom Doll, B L U M E. Nothing to do with Arrested Development. But it is, this is something that, that my daughter might like. Apparently this is another, another thing you add water to.

• 46:50Speaker 03

  And it blooms. But this is, I don't think it hatches from an egg. I think this doll just like grows like a Chia Pet might.

• 46:57Josh Clark?

  Kind of, and like their hair that grows is, I can't tell, it looks like some sort of foam or styrofoam or something, but it takes different shapes like pineapples or cakes or something like that.

• 47:07Speaker 03

  So cute.

• 47:08Josh Clark?

  And there's, I think, 22 different versions. Yeah.

• 47:11Speaker 03

  Okay. Give me 10,000 of them and I'll walk it up.

• 47:15Josh Clark?

  Yeah. But they're also, yeah, they're super affordable too, so they're, they're probably going to be the hot must have Christmas toy of the year is Bloom Dolls.

• 47:24Speaker 03

  Hatchimals are still around?

• 47:26Josh Clark?

  Yeah, and there's one that's from How to Train Your Dragon, Toothless Dragon.

• 47:31Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 47:31Josh Clark?

  The baby dragon. They have a Hatchimal version of him.

• 47:35Speaker 03

  What else? Surely Barbie's on the list?

• 47:37Josh Clark?

  Yeah, Barbie has a dream plane.

• 47:39Speaker 03

  Whoa.

• 47:39Josh Clark?

  Which I saw on a couple of lists where, um, yeah, it's a plane for Barbie. There's like a snack cart and everything.

• 47:46Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 47:47Josh Clark?

  Comes with a dog that I guess lives on the plane.

• 47:49Speaker 03

  Great.

• 47:50Josh Clark?

  There's also LOL Surprise. Have you heard of that?

• 47:54Speaker 03

  No.

• 47:55Josh Clark?

  I hadn't heard of it either until we started researching this, but they're like a whole brand, um, and a lot of these, including Bloom Dolls and LOL Surprise, they tap into like this whole trend of unboxing. Do you remember when we talked about unboxing on YouTube? Where like people open toys?

• 48:14Speaker 03

  Yeah, because our good friend, uh, Joe Randazzo did, uh, his Lego Man unboxing videos that were still, to me, one of the funniest things I've ever seen.

• 48:22Josh Clark?

  Yes. Great plug, by the way. But they, they still do that, like they're still unboxing is a huge trend and that's worked its way into toys. So LOL Surprise is kind of based on that and there's like a whole line of dolls, but they're like into like DJ stuff and fashion and all that, but they also have surprise. And there's also a kid named, uh, Ryan's World. I don't think that's his last name, but that's his, his YouTube channel. And guarantee we talked about Ryan's World in that unboxing toys episode, but, um, he's got all sorts of toys that are, um, out where you're like, you just don't know what you're getting when you open the thing. It's just surprise, unboxing.

• 49:01Speaker 03

  Weird subgenre on YouTube of unboxing, or I remember we talked about the one where the lady's hands would just play with things.

• 49:09Josh Clark?

  Yeah, it was the, yeah, remember she was like Peppa Pig?

• 49:13Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's so interesting. Uh, I'd say the one on the list though, that I like, that, um, I usually look at the toys that I'm like, would I like to play this with my daughter? So that's important. I can't be bored out of my mind, you know?

• 49:26Josh Clark?

  Oh, yeah. Good point.

• 49:27Speaker 03

  Uh, and this Lego make your own movie kit looks pretty cool to me.

• 49:33Josh Clark?

  Yeah, I was kind of heartened to see that on, on a couple of lists, you know, because it's like this is-

• 49:37Speaker 03

  Stop motion movies you can make.

• 49:39Josh Clark?

  Yeah, it's thoughtful, it's inventive.

• 49:41Speaker 03

  I love it.

• 49:42Josh Clark?

  Yeah, where it's, it's, yeah, there's, they have a bunch of different stages and backgrounds and props, including a banana.

• 49:51Josh Clark?

  It's great. So you learn how to make, are you gonna get, get her that?

• 49:54Speaker 03

  I might.

• 49:55Josh Clark?

  I think you should.

• 49:56Speaker 03

  You wanna come over and make a movie?

• 49:58Josh Clark?

  Anytime, buddy.

• 49:59Speaker 03

  Alright.

• 49:59Josh Clark?

  Can we make a, um, a flaming hoop out of a coat hanger and do things with that too?

• 50:03Speaker 03

  Sure.

• 50:04Josh Clark?

  Okay. Um, and then the other one was the Fisher Price lincomoles, which are super cute, including the smooth move sloth.

• 50:12Speaker 03

  Hey, I'm down with Fisher Price.

• 50:14Josh Clark?

  Yep.

• 50:14Speaker 03

  That was my jam.

• 50:15Josh Clark?

  Sloths are huge, huge right now. Yeah, do you remember Playmobil?

• 50:19Speaker 03

  Playmobil?

• 50:20Josh Clark?

  Remember they were, they were like the vaguely European kind of, um, action people, but there was nothing like violent or military about them. They would explore or, um...

• 50:33Speaker 03

  I probably recognize them. I definitely know that name.

• 50:35Josh Clark?

  You, you've seen it a million times. Right when you see it, yeah, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll look it up and show it to you later, but it's, you'll see it and be like, yeah, of course.

• 50:43Speaker 03

  Oh, wait, I see him right there. Sure.

• 50:45Josh Clark?

  Yeah, there you go.

• 50:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, I was kind of a Fisher Price kid, but, um, you know, we still have some of that stuff that our daughter plays with that we had when we were kids, like the barn and the, uh, the boat. And, you know, it holds up.

• 50:59Josh Clark?

  Definitely does hold up. You got anything else?

• 51:02Speaker 03

  Got nothing else.

• 51:03Josh Clark?

  You gonna go buy a bunch of toys and flip them?

• 51:05Speaker 03

  I got nothing else, except for 20,000 Hatchimals in my garage.

• 51:08Josh Clark?

  Man, here's the other thing though, Chuck. Like, you're taking a risk, cause you gotta predict what the must have toy is, and if you, if you guess wrong, you got 20,000 Hatchimals that nobody wants.

• 51:18Speaker 03

  Hmm, boy, I'd love to see that happen in real life.

• 51:22Josh Clark?

  I guarantee it happens, so just keep an ear out.

• 51:25Speaker 03

  Alright.

• 51:26Josh Clark?

  Uh, if you wanna know more about the must have toys, there's basically nothing you can't know that we haven't already told you, so just, I guess, go get your, your kids some Christmas toys.

• 51:37Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 51:38Josh Clark?

  Is that a good way to sign off?

• 51:39Speaker 03

  That's great.

• 51:40Josh Clark?

  Okay. Since I said, uh, is this a good way to sign off, it's time for listener mail.

• 51:48Speaker 03

  I'm gonna call this from a teacher. We always like to shout out our teachers and their, their students. Hey, guys, just sending one of what I'm sure is among infinite thank you's that you receive. As a teacher who regularly references knowledge I gained from listening to your show in my class, my students unwittingly and I are eternally grateful for your work. They give a hearty laugh whenever I steal your character's tuk-tuk, the wise proto homo sapien, and erg, the folly prone genetic defect, to elucidate points about the evolution of early humans. I knew you wouldn't mind my poaching that. That's what you think, John.

• 52:27Josh Clark?

  You'll be hearing from our lawyers, John.

• 52:29Speaker 03

  You're the toy flipper of teachers. Just kidding. The reason I'm writing this is to say I think you should not be discouraged by any listener email you receive telling you to keep your opinions to yourself. My favorite episodes are the ones where either or both of you have such strong feelings about the subject that you can't help but go on a rant. Maybe it's just because I agree with every rant, but I feel like it is important to take a stand on issues that matter to you and admit that you're human beings with a real stake in the game. Thanks again. I'll keep listening as long as you keep podcasting. That is from John La Buschkin. So, thank you, Mr. La Buschkin, and hello to your students, Mr. La Buschkin's class.

• 53:11Josh Clark?

  Yeah. Hi, guys.

• 53:13Speaker 03

  You've got a cool teacher.

• 53:14Josh Clark?

  Yeah, he does sound pretty cool. He's doing God's work, teaching the next generation.

• 53:18Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 53:19Josh Clark?

  I hope he doesn't work in a public school, because he's gonna be like, "You can't say God's work." If you want to get in touch with us, like Mr. La Buschkin did, or if you're a toy flipper who has an argument against Chuck's argument, we want to hear from you.

• 53:33Speaker 03

  Bring it.

• 53:34Josh Clark?

  You can go on to stuffyoushouldknow.com and check out our social links. And you can also send us an email to [email protected].

• 53:46Speaker 04

  Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio's How Stuff Works. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

• 54:01Josh Clark?

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• 54:33Speaker 04

  She's been thinking about this sleepover all week, but I think about her food allergies all the time. Fortunately, her doctor prescribed Zolair, omalizumab. It's proven to significantly reduce allergic reactions if a food allergy accident happens.

• 54:46Speaker 06

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• 55:29Speaker 06

  This is an advertisement for Zolair paid for by Genentech and Novartis.

• 55:32Speaker 00

  This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human.