Toikido, the star of the February front cover of Toy World, continues to make a name for itself by leveraging disruptive, content-led IP.

CEO and founder Darran Garnham speaks to Rachael Simpson-Jones about why it’s so hard to pin down what Toikido does – and why it does it so well.

For many, 2022 was a year of challenges and tightened belts. For Toikido, however, it was one of exceptional growth. The team has grown from just two at the start of last year – founder and CEO Darran and CPO Jeff Hall – to 12 at the start of this year. The additional bodies are needed to handle Toikido’s rapidly expanding slate of own- and third-party IP, which continues to enjoy huge global success.

20m Among Us products have been sold in the past 18 months, distributed to more than 70 countries and over 100,000 stores, and Toikido has just agreed an extension to its current agreement with Among Us’ creator, Innersloth Games, that will run through to 2025. Gang Beasts, meanwhile, which launched in Q3 2022, is now distributed in more than 25 countries and 25,000 stores, and VeeFriends launched exclusively with 400 Macy stores across the US last year. More recently, Toikido has signed an exclusive master agreement for Bare Butt Boxing, with the first range due to hit retail in the middle of this year.

However, the big news is that this year sees the full 360-degree launch of Toikido’s very first own-IP, Piñata Smashlings. With a Roblox Game coming out in June, as well as an animated series following in 2024, the foundations for the brand are very strong. Licensing deals have been agreed in Toys, Apparel, Homewares and Publishing with more to come. On top of all this, PMI International has been named official toy manufacturing partner and Character Options is on board as distributor.

One of the most interesting things about Toikido is that it politely refuses to be pigeonholed. As Darran says: “If you were to ask me what Toikido’s mission statement is, I’d tell you that’s a really good question. We’re still trying to work it out ourselves. We don’t want a mission statement to hold us back, because we operate at the speed of culture.”

Piñata Smashlings, according to Darran, will be what makes people ‘sit up and take notice’ of what Toikido is capable of. “Later this year, we’ll also be revealing another string to our bow that will make people think ‘Wow, are they doing that as well?’,” finishes Darran cryptically. “We can’t wait for what comes next.”

To find out more, read the full article, which appeared in the February edition of Toy World, here.