Creative Fold Team Visits Toy Fair 2025

This month, Edoardo and Jeremiah from our Creative Fold team attended the 119th annual New York Toy Fair. They joined thousands of attendees from nearly 100 countries to explore almost 850 exhibitor booths displaying tens of thousands of products spanning everything from billion-dollar global brands to emerging toy companies. [Stats from The Toy Association.]

For those who have never been, Toy Fair is everything you could imagine and more! I remember walking into my first Toy Fair wide-eyed, seeing people milling around in life-sized Ty Beanie Boo costumes, meeting inventors of iconic games from my childhood, seeing the Grumpy Cat, casually crossing paths with Seth Meyers in the hallway, and walking about a marathon’s worth around the massive Javits Center. 

I chatted with Edoardo and Jeremiah to hear about their Toy Fair experience. They talked about some major product trends like STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Mathematics) and MESH (Mental Emotional Social Health). One standout trend was child-safe toolkits with interchangeable tools that allow kids to actually cut cardboard or thin wood in a totally safe way using a vibrating mechanism. Read more about big 2025 trends in this recap from The Toy Association. 

Edoardo was thrilled to be back after a few-year hiatus. “There was lots of hugging!” he told me. It was his 17th Toy Fair but his very first with Creative Fold. He first attended while working for Polaroid at their small booth selling kid focused i-Zone Instant Cameras, then with ThinkFun, and then with North Star Games for almost ten years. He enjoyed seeing everything from the other side of the aisle as a consultant and product developer. He noticed a more open spirit at the fair, and that fewer companies had NDA-required booths. “IP that needed to be hidden was hidden, but it seemed to me at least that booths have opened up a bit more to share with everyone,” he told me. 

Edoardo was encouraged to see a boosted newcomer presence. In previous years, first-time exhibitors were placed in sort of an out-of-the-way place but this year the Launch Pad occupied a prominent location. “It was cool to see! There are a lot of people out there trying to break into this world. It’s so exciting! There are people there with one card game hoping to talk to retailers but also hoping to talk to people like us, to get advice and understand what they should do next. Those are the people we’re hoping to connect with. They’re putting big investment into getting those eyeballs and looking to find buyers for their products, which are all very good – most are beyond prototype stage. It was nice to see quite a few rows of newcomers,” Edoardo said.

As for Jeremiah, this was his first time at Toy Fair. “It was huge, bigger than I thought it would be. I have been to one industry show other than this, an aquarium related one. Compared to that, this was five times larger. It was BIG. So big it’s hard to find a singular theme out of the mass of everything,” he said. “As I was walking around I was expecting to see more of the types of companies we work with but then I’d see things like fantasy figurines and think, ‘Oh yeah, that counts, too!’ Like the active products – things you could peddle around on or ride on. Then there were wooden crafts, sticky goop things, and more. It’s just such a broad span of so many different types of play,” he shared. Edoardo chimed in, “That’s a good way to put it. ‘Play’ does not mean just one type.” 

One thing is for sure–the market is exploding with innovation. At many booths, people were talking about the robust competition. One vendor told Edoardo and Jeremiah, “There are just so many games out there. You can be on the top of the Amazon charts one year and then the next there are so many good games from other makers that yours is shoved down the charts. You just have to be pumping out good stuff constantly.” 

It’s not just newcomers encountering challenges with competition. A well-established game company said their future was uncertain because there are thousands of other hobby games out there. The online retail landscape is shifting strategies and muddling marketing plans. Edoardo added, “It’s not even just about securing retail shelf space because so many products are on Amazon now. And they’re all good games! So it’s really a question of how do you get above the fold?” 

(I would add this was a completely organic statement by Edoardo, though it sounds like a total plug for Creative Fold. How do you get above the fold?...With Creative Fold!)

Jeremiah mentioned that in some other industries it’s super cut throat between competitors. “But competition in Toy and Game is so spread out that it seems like no company is in super direct competition with one another. And everyone seems pretty civil,” he said. 

A big highlight for Jeremiah was seeing the new ThinkFun Friends line of three preschool-aged products debuting at Toy Fair. He played a big part in their design, playtesting, and project management. 

Edoardo and Jeremiah talked about how beneficial Toy Fair is for connecting with future clients, manufacturing partners, and possible collaborators. As a small company, Creative Fold relies heavily on organic, word-of-mouth marketing. There’s no better way to build our portfolio than by continued partnership with clients and industry friends. 

Toy Fair’s pizazz is certainly notable, but a big takeaway is the importance of relationship building. In a world pushing everything to be increasingly virtual and AI-powered, the opportunity to look someone in the face and say hello is unmatched. Toy Fair provides a place for connection within the expansiveness of the toy and game world. And at the end of the day, it’s about the people.