You don't have to be interested in toys to find this book fascinating. Oppenheimer's study of Mattel offers abundant insights on the habits of corporate America, on one company's stunningly successful marketing, and tales of megalomanic, wack-a-doodle management executives. "Toy Monsters" provides plenty of food for thought--"food" less dangerous than Mattel's Incredible Edibles, an allegedly "sugar-free," additive-packed snack product cooked in molds modeled on the company's successful Creepy Crawler kit. Even though I played with these toys at the homes of friends (some of whom were children of Mattel employees) as a child in the mid-'60s, as a parent it's hard to believe that America's biggest toy company once marketed items using red-hot metal to "cook," unsupervised, either foul-smelling plastic insects, or disgusting "Edibles" (based on Aunt Jemima pancake mix and food coloring) that sickened a number of diabetic children before the toy was discontinued. And unfortunately, that's not Mattel's only dangerous product: the author names several, marketed across decades.
Elliot and Ruth Handler started their company in the mid-'50s with a partner who sold out relatively early on, but they became legendarily famous in 1959 with the introduction of the first incarnation of the Barbie fashion doll. The toy was based on a raunchy German sex mannequin named Bild-Lilli, displayed in a shop window and catching the eye of Ruth Handler's then-15-year-old daughter Barbara, for whom the doll was named. Less than a foot tall, Barbie boasts human-scale measurements of 39-18-34--just the feminine ideal of product manager Jack Ryan (who filed the nipples off Bild-Lilli's mold to better assuage American sensibilities). Ryan, a brilliant, unstable, bi-polar Yalie, burned through five marriages, leading a Hefneresque life while at Mattel, surgically altering several wives to more closely resemble his fantasies. One wife, said to be already stunningly beautiful, died of an anorexia-induced heart attack. Barbie's "boyfriend" was named after the Handlers' only son, Ken. Having an anatomically incorrect doll named after him while an adolescent must have been excruciating for Ken Handler, who would not allow his own children to play with the dolls. Oppenheimer handles the real-life Ken's story briefly and sensitively, noting only "another side" to marriage and parenthood in Ken's life. He died of AIDS in 1994, a story suppressed at the time as well as in his mother's autobiography. Oddly enough, shortly before Ken Handler's death, an "Earring Magic Ken" doll was released, complete with blonde highlights, purple shirt, lavender vest, charm necklace, and "diamond" earring, "giving him the look and feel of the Village People." Even nuttier--and more controversial--was the mid-'70s version of Barbie's nine-inch-high "younger sister," Skipper. "By a crank of her left arm... ["Growing Up"] Skipper sprouted little plastic breasts, her waist became slimmer... the packaging promised she'd grow 'slim and tall and curvy.'" The controversy over this risque 'tween was eclipsed when Ruth Handler was "indicted in 1978 by a federal grand jury on charges of conspiracy, mail fraud, and making false financial statements to the SEC." Her plea of "no contest--equal to a guilty plea" guaranteed Handler immunity from serving a prison term of 20 to 50 years. Her punishment was a slap on the wrist (community service and a fine of $57,000), but it ended her career at Mattel.
Our nation's current economic woes resound with distressing familiarity in Mattel's financial irregularities. In 1969, the Securities and Exchange Commission accused the company of releasing false earnings reports. This turned out to be true, but it's hardly Mattel's only clash with regulations.
"Toy Monster" is not a complete history of Mattel, but one theme that endures, say many former executives, is that the workplace is and was one in which "you had to watch your back. People are pitted against one another... [it's] a shark pond." In addition, executives seemed to endure a remarkable number of personal and/or job-related tragedies: Embittered, they are fired or resign, develop cancer, or watch helplessly as others take credit for their creations. To name just one human example, after Mattel disastrously declined the rights to create Star Wars figures, product designer Jack Sweet came up with the enormously successful He-Man line of action figures. Like others before and after him, Sweet eventually was forced out, "blacklisted" in the toy industry--and ended up driving a forklift for Home Depot AND surviving cancer, knowing that his creations grossed more than $1 billion for Mattel.
In two decades, ambitious Jill Barad rose through the ranks from product manager to CEO. "People who worked with Jill were afraid of her--afraid of disagreeing with her, afraid to say no to her," asserts a former head of worldwide Barbie management. By 1999, fashion-plate Barad was dogged by the company's "worst financial situation in years" and corporate irregularities; Mattel "eventually had to ante up a whopping $122 million to settle shareholder lawsuits for allegedly putting out misleading sales forecasts." Barad left Mattel with close to $50 million, including bonuses, pension, life and health insurance, a forgiven home loan, and 6.4 million stock options, a path that CNN's Stuart Varney called "paved with gold."
Since Barad left, her successor, former Kraft Foods executive Robert A. Eckert, has had to grapple not only with ongoing financial problems and up-and-coming toy competitors, but nagging and tragic safety issues. Mattel manufactures nearly all of its toys in China, and many contractors use lead-contaminated paint. In addition, some Mattel toys, such as the popular Polly Pocket line, contain minuscule magnets that can perforate intestines. At least one child died after ingesting Mattel magnets, and several more suffered agonizing injuries. Oppenheimer also gives an appalling description of our country's nearly toothless toy-safety regulations.
In just 250 pages, Oppenheimer touches on the highlights and lowlights of America's best-known toy company. Still, he's so good at what he does--especially given that Mattel absolutely refused to cooperate with the author in any way--that this book left me wanting more stories (good and bad), more anecdotes (ditto)... I hope other authors will follow the conscientious investigations and interviews that Oppenheimer gives us.
