cottsdale, Arizona – Brand Vending Products has developed over 25 individual collectibles under various brands such as Sea Mania and Pet Friends, selling 50 million units worldwide since the launch in 2006. From June 2010 the line will be rebranded as Sqwishland and each capsule will contain a fortune cookie style secret code that will unlock that particular character in Sqwishland and with it open games, interaction and a world of fun.
“In 2006 we never would have thought these soft little animal figurines would become so desirable” says Brand Vending Products CEO Dax Logue. “Our company traditionally worked with novelty items that would sell around two million pieces in a year’s time”. Logue says “we knew something was different when this figurine series reached the two year mark and we were still sold out and backorders continued to grow”.
Logue said “The popularity of the line of “squishy” characters was evident as YouTube videos of kids “Squishy” collections began to surface”. Logue began to monitor the collector created videos and began to see a trend. “When you see eight year olds taking the initiative to make pretty darn good home grown movies, it doesn’t take much of an imagination to come up with an idea like an internet game” said Logue.
The craze of online gaming has surged in recent years driven by huge investment by Disney with Club Penguin and Ganz with WebKinz. Logue said that “ the massive cost of development of quality online gaming systems has prevented most entrepreneurs from jumping on the band wagon, however we felt that the opportunity to make a fundamental change to the delivery system of game codes into kids hands was so great, we decided to make the investment and reposition our line”.
“The key differences between traditionally distributed products and Sqwishland is the price point and its broad distribution” said Logue. “Whereas most web enriched products sell for $15 or more, a Sqwishland collectible retails for just $0.50. This makes it incredibly affordable to create collections and provides kids with access to feature rich gaming and social content for a fraction of the price of other web enabled alternatives.”
The advent of Sqwishland is set to deliver huge benefits to the operators who distribute the bulk vending products in local and regional markets. “We have always relied on Operators to distribute our products so when we set about building Sqwishland a key focus was on how to drive kids back to vending machines and buy more Sqwishes. In doing so we knew this would increase sales and further cement the partnerships we enjoy with our operators”.
In the game there will be a powerful software feature called Sqwishfinder. Sqwishfinder will allow Operators to enter the locations of their vending machines and the various Sqwishland series they are vending through a simple management tool. For the collector this database of local vending machines will enable them to find the closest vending location with their favorite Sqwishland game character and included code.
With an established distribution network, and a highly desirable collectable figurine line, Logue knows that kids all over the world will want to play Sqwishland. “Children between the ages of six and sixteen will now have a community to go to, meet and play with other Sqwishland character enthusiasts,” starting June 1st 2010 at Sqwishland.com
