The Toy Association has announced that Toy Fair 2021 has been canceled despite having already been delayed.
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The 2021 edition of Toy Fair was originally scheduled to take place from Feb. 13, 2021 to Feb. 16, 2021. In Oct. of 2020 The Toy Association announced that its annual trade show would move to May 1 to May 4, 2021 due to the ongoing pandemic. It warned exhibitors and attendees however, that it could still be canceled.
This week that became official as Toy Fair 2021 was canceled and it was announced that Toy Fair 2022 will take place from Feb. 19, 2022 to Feb. 22, 2022.
“Our foremost consideration is the health and well-being of the global toy and play community and setting a clear path forward,” said Steve Pasierb, president & CEO of The Toy Association. “We want to provide our exhibitors, retail buyers, and the larger toy and play community with certainty on important destination shows and the ability to take advantage of immediate opportunities through our year-round buying and selling platform.”
While large buyers such as Walmart or Amazon meet privately with toy companies, Toy Fair is an essential part of the year for smaller and independent toy sellers. As the show always runs from Saturday to Tuesday for instance, it is an annual tradition to see Amish and Mennonite buyers arriving on Monday to buy wooden toys for their gift shops.
And working in reverse order, the Toy Fair is also an essential part of small manufactures’ calendar as it is how they find new buyers that may not have heard of them yet.
The Toy Association is trying to put together more virtual opportunities for this year, but the lack of a Toy Fair is going to make it very difficult for some companies come the 2021 holiday shopping season.
