Preshow Christmas Toys & Games at Centre International de Deauville

Inter­view with Jean-Luc Garni­er, Preshow Dir­ect­or at INFOPRO DIGITAL.

The Preshow Toy Fair

Jean-Luc Garni­er is the organ­izer of the Salon du Preshow du jou­et, which was held last week in Deau­ville at the CID Pal­ais des con­grès de Deau­ville, the Hôtel Bar­rière Le Roy­al, the Casino Bar­rière, the Fran­cis­caines and the Novotel.

The Toy Preshow is a very spe­cial event, as it is totally private and secret. Set up in closed show­rooms and boxes, oper­at­ors present the strategies and new toy col­lec­tions that will be released for Christ­mas 2024.

A Christmas fair for professionals in CID Deauville

Choos­ing CID Deau­ville to organ­ise a trade show means opt­ing for a pres­ti­gi­ous set­ting in the heart of the mag­ni­fi­cent sea­side resort, offer­ing mod­ern facil­it­ies, top-of-the-range ser­vices and excep­tion­al logist­ic­al expert­ise, guar­an­tee­ing the suc­cess and repu­ta­tion of your event with par­ti­cipants and exhib­it­ors alike.

The show is aimed at large-scale con­sumers: large food retail­ers (GSA) such as Auchan, Car­re­four, Sys­tème U, Leclerc and large spe­cial­ist retail­ers (GSS), and toy spe­cial­ists such as Joué Club and La Grande Récré. E‑commerce plat­forms and depart­ment stores are also present, unlike major oper­at­ors such as LEGO, Mat­tel or Play­mobil, which are too large entit­ies and have their own showrooms.

Being a pre-show event, it is the first phase in which man­u­fac­tur­ers present to buy­ers the products that will be offered to con­sumers in a year’s time, before pre-selec­tion in Janu­ary and nego­ti­ations in February.

This year’s 19^th edi­tion attrac­ted 132 exhib­it­ors and 400 buy­ers. Cre­ated 20 years ago by Bruno Bokanoswski, the show wel­comed 30 exhib­it­ors and around 100 buyers.

Toy trends

Bruno Bokanowski, toy mar­ket spe­cial­ist at Infopro Digit­al and edit­or­i­al dir­ect­or of the Revue du Jou­et presents the 5 toy trends:

• 1^st: inter­act­ive elec­tron­ic products such as Fin­ger­lings and Bitzee or with the relaunch of Furby and Tamagotchi.
• 2^nd: board games and puzzles, as con­sumers have regained a taste for them fol­low­ing Cov­id-19. This is a highly cre­at­ive mar­ket, with over 1,000 games pub­lished every year in France. They are the lead­ers in board game creation.
• 3^rd: products based on movie licenses and series. These include gam­ing applic­a­tions (horror/ Among us/ Super Mario…), Net­flix TV series (Stranger Things, The Lady’s Game…) and manga such as Naruto or One Piece. France is second only to Japan in manga con­sump­tion. These licenses work very well, and even bet­ter on oth­er media than films.
• 4^th: pur­chases made by people over the age of 12. Many adults, also known as “Kid­ults”, buy toys for their own con­sump­tion, such as LEG­Os from licenses like Star Wars, or car con­struc­tions like the Lam­borghini, Fer­rari or Porsche 911. This trend is very import­ant for brands, as they need to be able to com­pensate for the drop in pur­chases for chil­dren due to the fall­ing birth rate in France over the last 5–6 years. Fans and col­lect­ors are there­fore a pri­or­ity market.
• 5^th: the eco­lo­gic­al lever remains in the trend, but is nev­er­the­less held back by the demands of chil­dren. Toys are a chil­dren’s pre­scrip­tion mar­ket, with chil­dren mak­ing their lists and par­ents buy­ing what their chil­dren want.

Christmas a few figures

The aver­age Christ­mas bas­ket: 150 to 160 euros are spent per child by the whole family.

The aver­age annu­al expendit­ure is 224 euros per child, includ­ing occa­sions such as Christ­mas, birth­days and toy purchases.

On aver­age, 5 to 6 toys are giv­en per fam­ily at Christmas.