Despite Barbie’s 50th Birthday, Mattel Still Posted Losses

It is Mattel’s fervent wish that their Barbie doll could turn 50 every single year. This is because their iconic doll had been all over the place during the first quarter of the year. It had been at a show during Fashion Week in the city of New York, to the Shanghai flagship store and resulted in the anniversary buzz which helped the United States sales of Barbie jump up during the first quarter.

The Best and the Worst

It was said that the fiftieth birthday of the Barbie doll had been the brightest spot for the entire company after a dismal holiday sales season in so many decades. This had also helped to mitigate a practically total sales drop of around fifteen percent during the first quarter. The sales of Barbie had been flagging down for years. The surprise that is attached to it had also helped to send the shares of Mattel Inc. rising up to fifteen whole percentages. Such is the strongest number which they have put up in the longest time – by at least seven years, according to Needham & Company’s analyst Sean McGowan. It was a really big anniversary for the entire company, and it was even mentioned that outside of that fact Barbie continues to do quite well. However, the other part of the picture is hardly as rosy as Mattel paints it. the largest United States toy maker experienced its shares falling down almost across all of their different product categories because of the strong dollar as well as cautious orders coming from stores which are still reeling from the sting caused by the dismal holiday sales.

Conservative Planning

Robert A. Eckert, the chief executive of the company, declined to give the specifics of the order for the holiday season this year. This was also because many retailers and toy makers all across the industry are now planning quite conservatively this year when it comes to sales. Eckert mentions that it is more important for them to chase the demand for the year should it decide to show up. This was preferable to get ahead and then ending up building extra inventory all across the entire supply chain. The biggest rival of Mattel, which is Hasbro Inc. also reported their own results last Monday. Many analysts say that they are looking to hear from the other toy company regarding toy orders for the biggest and most important season for them. A lot of retailers have decided that cutting back on their orders in order to clear inventory. This was because they saw the demand from many consumers dropping in the previous year. There were many stores that had to come up with discounted items so they can clear their overstock.