EXPORT AND NON-EXPORT MARKETS

Playmobil® products are distributed worldwide through different regional subsidiaries. The product range can vary from country to country. New releases or novelties are first introduced in Germany and the non-export market. A year later they are normally introduced into the export markets.

The cause of this one year delay for export markets is of a financial and logistic nature: 

Novelties usually contain some new parts, and to produce those new parts, Playmobil® needs to manufacture an injection mold first. Injection molds are basically negative forms of the items, and they are produced in various ways, the only constant is that they are very expensive. A new set like the new pirate ship easily contains dozens of new parts. Each year, Playmobil® invests some 8 to 10 million dollars in production of new molds. In 2000, some 363 new molds were produced for the novelties alone.

A novelty set is usually produced in massive quantities in a short time. After all, the shelves of many toy stores need to be filled with this new item, and there are no stocks to fall back on yet. During this first production run, new molds are used very intensively.

Once an item has been successfully introduced on the non-export market, it is produced regularly in smaller, quantities, just to re-fill depleted stocks. And as a consequence, the molds are used less intensively. The lifecycle of a novelty and a new mold is a bit steep. 

Now, to get back to our one year delay: If Playmobil® would release their full program of novelties worldwide at once, they would not need one, but two of ever new mold. The investment on molds would almost double, since it is never two for the price of one. A year after the new part is introduced, one of those two molds would become useless, since one mold would suffice to keep up with the production. In a way, it would be a lost investment.