Jenny Faw is an artist, product designer and consultant who was born in Kansas and now resides in Rhode Island. Many of the items Jenny designs are playthings and she is heavily inspired by colors, nature, flowers, sunshine and the sky.
For more than two decades Jenny has created top-selling items for the infant and children’s market, especially in the “home furnishing” categories. Her creations have been sold at household-name stores such as Target, Babies ”R” Us, Buy Buy Baby, Bed Bath and Beyond among others.
Jenny recently co-founded a company called Dibzy that is focused on bringing some of the most innovative toys to the market.
Meagan Meehan (MM): How did you get inspired to design toys?
MM: What prompted you to start Dibzy and why was that name chosen?
MM: Does Dibzy accept ideas from outside inventors? If so, what is the process like?
MM: How many toys have you invented or placed on the market through your company? Which are your favorites and why?
JF: Toy Fair 2016 was our first! We met many manufacturers at this show, most were eager to learn more about Dibzy and welcomed the opportunity to have Dibzy vet product submissions and get them market ready before presenting them. We placed toys from Dibzy inventors Jeff Stock and Louise White with Fat Brain Toy and Alex Brands. These toys launched at the Nuremberg Toy Fair and were very well received. A happy consequence was that many of the manufacturers we met with at NYC Toy Fair had seen and admired those toys in Nuremberg, so Dibzy was even more popular this year. Having some success under our belt has helped open doors and gotten requests for pitches from some of the major toy manufacturers.
MM: Do you prefer to design/promote toys for a specific gender or age range?
MM: What’s the best part of being a game designer/company owner?
JF: I love being a co-founder of Dibzy for a few reasons. My colleagues and co-founders are the best in the industry and dear friends so we have a solid foundation of trust and have each other’s back. I am at the point in my career where the “give back” aspect is important to me. It has been a joy to help inventors- new and seasoned- make their product idea and pitch the best it can be. It is rewarding to see growth and success, not to mention seeing Dibzy products at trade fairs and on the shelves!
MM: What advice can you offer to aspiring designers?
JF: There is so much information available on the internet these days, that ambitious designers can really get ahead with by doing research anytime, anywhere. Here are the four things we practice and ask every inventor in our Dibzy community to get in the habit of doing:
1) Stay current! Pop culture, popular blogs, what’s trending on YouTube and movie releases directly reflect what’s happening in the Toy Industry.
2) Subscribe to industry newsletters, join industry and LinkedIn groups, go to networking events, communicate with other inventors and industry experts. One example; Dibzy joined Women in Toys. That opened up a wonderful network, provided us with many great networking events and access to a wealth of industry inside information.
3) Educate yourself. If you have an idea, study the competition, know what popular price points are for like items, do google searches to see if your idea has already been done, google “best sellers” in your category, study product lines of the major brands and make sure you convey the concept clearly.
4) Be persistent and don’t take rejection personally.
MM: What’s next for you? Is there anything else you would like to mention?
JF: One of our long-term goals is to place collections of Dibzy Brand products at retail. These items would be under the Dibzy brand and would feature each individual inventor’s name and showcase link. Millennial consumers like to know the story behind the products they buy.
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To learn more about Dibzy, visit their official website, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram.
Great interview. I undersrand the concept of your business now and certainly wish you well.
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