Toys are certainly worth investing in, there is no doubt that toys are one of the most important components of human life, and they are an indispensable part of human daily life.

In fact, as early as ancient times, toys have appeared in human life. Although the word "toy" appeared very early in ancient documents, for a long time in ancient China, it can even be said that it was not used to refer to children's toys, but to refer specifically to the favorite objects of adults to play.

For example, the "Taiping Guangji", which was written in the Northern Song Dynasty, mentions "toys" When I told a story of tomb robbery from an evil sect: it was said that in the Tang Dynasty, Lu Yanxu, a minor official in Xuzhou, inadvertently excavated an ancient tomb in the Qin Dynasty, which was a coffin, and when I opened it, there was a young woman's body inside, the body of the woman in the Qin Dynasty had not yet rotted in the Tang Dynasty, and there were burial objects such as the golden hairpin mirror beside the woman, Lu Yanxu took these women's supplies such as hairpins and mirrors as his own, and it didn't take long for Lu Yanxu to meet a very angry woman in his dream to hold him accountable: Why did you take my toys！

Okay, it's a bit ridiculous to say that it's a dream or something, but it's not hard to see from this story that in ancient times, toys were more for adults than children.

So when did "toy" begin to mean children's toys?

It was about the Southern Song Dynasty.

It was mentioned in the book "Menglianglu" that there were many merchants selling "four-season toys" on the streets of Hangzhou, the capital of the Southern Song Dynasty at that time. In the Ming and Qing dynasties, the term "children's toys" officially appeared in the literature, and there was finally a clear distinction between children's toys and adult playthings.

Although the word toy appeared in the era of children's toys relatively late, but the toys in the history of our country did not appear late at all, and we can even say that they appeared very early and have a very complete variety.

From the point of view of archaeological discoveries, the oldest toys unearthed in China are about the pottery piglets and wood carved small fish unearthed in the Hemudu ruins in China, the pottery pig is 6 cm long, and the wooden fish is 8 cm long, these two small things are the products made by our ancestors 7000 years ago. Later researchers speculated that these two items were either toys for children to play with, or small props for sacrifices. In addition, Hemudu has also unearthed similar pottery sheep, pottery oxen, as well as miniature pottery pots, pottery plates and the like, these gadgets are not only distinctive, but also have a high level of craftsmanship, they come together, just like a set of toys used by children playing house games 7,000 years ago.

With animals and utensils, to the Longshan culture period 4000 years ago, there have been pottery dolls with pottery birds, pottery dogs to play with, pottery people unearthed in Tianmen, and even dolls designed with labor actions, and the unearthed pottery dolls have obvious finger marks and press traces, which can be said to be the originator of clay dolls in later generations in China.

Of course, the prehistoric dolls had to play house games, and in addition to pottery animals and pottery figures, they also needed a mini hut. This thing is also there, the site of the big dun unearthed a 6000-year-old mini pottery hut, this hut is about 8 centimeters high, square spire shape, three sides of the window and one side of the door, and the wall also has a dog pattern pattern on the guard. Later researchers speculated that the miniature pottery house was likely a children's toy.

There is another major category of toys produced in prehistory, that is, sound toys. For example, in Shaanxi Banpo ruins, Zhejiang Hemudu ruins and many other unearthed pottery, whistles and the like, these are also the tools or musical instruments used by people in ancient times to make sounds, used for production, life and entertainment, and are also toys for ancient children; This kind of pottery ringball is a ceramic ball-like structure, the outside is decorated with patterns, the inside is hollow, equipped with projectiles or stone grains, and it will make a rustling sound when rolling, and its principle and effect are similar to modern children's toys and sticks. These ancient objects with sound functions belong to children's toys 5,000 years ago, and later scholars speculate that such objects were used for children to play with on the one hand, and also had the function of musical instruments on the other.

There is also a large category of prehistoric toys, that is, children's game toys, that is, toys used by ancient human children when making games. Among them, the most diverse and common is the spinning top. Archaeologists have appeared dozens of 5,000-year-old wooden, ceramic and even stone spinning tops in Hemudu, Tianluo Mountain and many Longshan cultural sites, and their configuration is basically the same as that of modern children's spinning tops. There is also a class of children's educational toys, which also appeared in prehistoric times. This is the Shaanxi Jiangzhai site unearthed pottery double ring, this children's toy is inferred to be 6000 years ago products, its structure is two six centimeters diameter pottery ring set together, but also preserved obvious traces of play, is the ancestor of the ancient nine rings of toys in later generations.

Of course, at that time, the ring toys could not be disassembled like modern toys, and the technology could not reach the level of modern technology at all, and it was too far and too far behind.

However, the implication of this is very clear.

Toys, very early on!

Toys have become an important part of human life since ancient times.

Toys have been valued by humans for thousands of years.

So to this day, toys are still very important and have investment value, after all, as long as human beings continue to develop, there will be no lack of toys and existence.

And Zhou Fangyuan has seen a data on the Internet before - he himself was a little unlearned before he was reborn, but like many similar people, he likes to read all kinds of things on the Internet, which is very messy, but sometimes he will see some very strange articles for some reason.

According to the forecast, in 2010, the global toy market sales will reach 86.3 billion US dollars, North America and Europe are still the world's two largest toy consumption regions, but also the world's two largest toy import regions. 1/3 of the imported toys in the United States, 2/3 of the toys imported from the European Union are Chinese products, and more than 2/3 of the products in the global market come from China, which is an out-and-out toy manufacturing country.

The average annual growth rate of the toy manufacturing industry was 17.41%, and by 2010, the industry's sales revenue exceeded 100 billion yuan, creating a profit of 4.142 billion yuan.

By the end of 2010, there will be 1,899 enterprises above designated size in the toy manufacturing industry, with total assets of 67.583 billion yuan and 673,500 employees.

With the appreciation of soft sister currency, the rise in raw material prices, rising labor costs, and increasingly stringent foreign quality certification, the production costs of foundry enterprises have risen sharply. The decline in the profits of foundry enterprises has led to the overall profit level of the industry at a low level.

In addition to being related to consumption habits and cultural customs, toy consumption is also directly related to economic income.

Economic prosperity and the improvement of living standards have gradually increased the demand for toy consumption, and the current level of toy consumption in China is still low, and the future development space is broad.

In the first three quarters of 2013, China's toy exports were 18.157 billion US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 30.3%. Among them, the export of traditional ordinary toys was 8.43 billion US dollars, an increase of 6.4% year-on-year, and the export amount was not bad, but the number of product exports was indeed not satisfactory, and most products declined to varying degrees.

It looks a little confusing, but these data show that China is actually the largest toy exporter in the world.

However, it is a pity that China is a big country with toys, but it is not a strong country with toys.

Although the production is huge, and toy products are exported all over the world, there is no brand that can be used, and there is nothing that can be obtained by itself.

In contrast, Lego is actually the configuration that a toy powerhouse should have.

It's like the United States, there are many well-known toy companies in the world, and the occasional reading is very famous, and it is the kind that enjoys a good reputation all over the world. Maybe their products are also OEM in my country's factories, but it doesn't matter, consumers look at the brand, look at the company to which the toy belongs, not just look at the place of origin.

This is the relationship between strong and big, it is not enough to be big, but also strong to be able to stand.

At this point, there is still a certain gap in China, especially among the people, and toy manufacturers themselves must have some ambitions.

The overall development trend of China's toy manufacturing industry is indeed good.

From the perspective of the proportion of the total industrial output value of the toy industry in the national economy, from 2009 to 2013, the proportion of the total industrial output value of the industry in GDP was relatively stable, hovering around 0.3%. Overall, despite the huge export volume of the toy industry, its share in the national economy is still not high.

However, the problem is that China is a big toy producer, but it is not a toy production power.

The lack of large-scale toy manufacturers, lack of toy development talents, and lack of brand effect are the biggest problems. Although China's toys are exported in large quantities, 75% of the world's toys are produced in China, but these toys basically enter the international market in the form of OEM. Among the 8,000 toy manufacturers in the country, 3,000 have obtained export licenses, but more than seventy percent of the toys exported are processed with supplied materials or samples, that is, working for foreign brands. Therefore, it is a top priority for China's toy industry to improve the production technology of China's toy industry, take the initiative to occupy the commanding heights of the world's toy industry, enhance the core competitiveness of China's toy industry, and build its own brand of China's toy industry.

With the recovery of China's economic development, the consumption expenditure of urban and rural residents, the expenditure on toys will become larger and larger.

There are about 360 million children under the age of 16, accounting for about 20 per cent of the population. Children's consumption has accounted for about 30% of total household expenditure, and the total monthly consumption of children aged 0-12 in the country exceeds 3.5 billion yuan. However, the per capita annual toy consumption of children and adolescents under the age of 14 in China is only 20-30 yuan, which is far lower than the average annual toy consumption of Asian children of 13 US dollars and the average annual toy consumption of children in the world of 34 US dollars. If China's toy consumption reaches the Asian average, the market size is expected to exceed 30 billion yuan.

At present, many industries have national brands, but plush toys do not have a national brand, at present, China's plush toys, most of them are of poor quality, low price, not into a series, lack of consumer trust, there is a big market gap in high-quality plush toys.

Of course, when I say this, I don't mean that Zhou Fangyuan is ready to be a savior again.

He has been involved in enough industries, the toy industry, he doesn't have the effort, and he doesn't have the energy. His purpose is only to invest, and anyone with a discerning eye can see such a large market, if he can get a piece of the pie, it is a good thing.

Let him create a brand from scratch? Regardless of whether he can do it, it is said that the effort and effort required to do it are unimaginable to ordinary people. And having said that, Zhou Fangyuan has no experience at all in this regard, he can rely on the memories of his previous life to do a lot of things, for example, the best thing he has done at present is to talk about the development of Yuanfang Group and become a new large group in China. But that's all, he is not familiar with the field of toys and does not know much, so he can't grasp some important weather vanes of the toy industry very well.

Just know some well-known companies, and also know which ones will be more famous in the future.

Lego is a good example, in Zhou Fangyuan's memory, Lego would later become the world's largest toy manufacturer, and the second and third together are not its opponents.

So investing in Lego is definitely a right choice, besides, there are so many IPs under your hands, whether it is Huaxia or Meiguo, whether it is film and television or games. In the ecological closed loop, it is necessary for all kinds of industries to be able to cooperate with each other in order to form an ecological closed loop. Such a ring is a fist, and a clenched fist is naturally more powerful than a finger alone, there is no doubt about it.

In the past, most of the industries that Zhou Fangyuan invested in or entered were virtual products, and in terms of industry, most of them were mainly agricultural, food and catering, which did not help Internet companies much.

Yuanfang Group has not promoted various figures and peripherals related to its IP, but these figurines and peripherals basically exist in the form of outsourcing, and Yuanfang Group does not have its own factory. Lego, of course, can't be simply divided into a category of figure peripherals, its cards are much larger than those foundries, but then again, if Lego can really join the array of the distant group, then its product itself, can indeed exist in the form of peripherals, which is a great improvement for the strategic layout of the distant group, although it cannot be said to be a great improvement, but it must also be beneficial.

Thinking of this, Zhou Fangyuan made up his mind, and he was not ready to let go of Lego. But now, it seems that the group's funds are a little unhanded? Well, let's wait and see.