U.S. toy sales continued to fall in the first half of the year, with four major categories performing well

According to NPD Group's latest market tracker, total toy sales in the United States in the first half of this year rose a slight 2% to $11.4 billion, while sales fell 6% from a year earlier and average prices rose 8% to $11.30. In the January-April period, the average price was $11.17, up 7% from a year earlier, indicating that the inflation problem was still brewing in May and June.

The 2% growth in the first half of this year comes on top of the unexpectedly high growth the pandemic brought to the toy industry in 2020-2021. Juli Lennett, a U.S. toy industry consultant at NPD Group, said: "Although growth in the toy industry fell back to 2%, this is a good performance given that toys were one of only six of the 14 industries tracked by NPD to grow in the first half of the year, demonstrating the resilience of the U.S. toy industry in times of economic uncertainty."

In terms of category performance, in the first half of this year, only four categories, "Exploration & others", "plush", "building blocks" and "actionable dolls", achieved growth. Compared with the first four months of this year, the "infant/preschool" category showed less growth momentum and sales declined.

Plush led the way, surging 43% in the first half of the year. Top sellers included Squishmallows, which puts on Jazwares, Moose Toys' Magic Mixies, and Disney's plush Toys.

This was followed by a 28% increase in the "Discovery and Other" category, driven by the MLB, NBA, and NFL sports IP trading cards.

Funko Pop (Funko recently appointed a new head for the Far East to push into the Asia Pacific) boosted the "actives" category by 12%. "Sonic the Hedgehog 2" and "Jurassic World: Reign" spinoff dolls are also selling well.

Finally, the make-it-together set category grew by 8%, driven by strong sales at Lego, which featured Lego Star Wars, the Lego Creative Master collection, and the Lego Machine Group.

Overall, NPD says the U.S. toy industry has added about 16 million new consumers since 2019, most of whom have become regular consumers.