What Should I Do with the Rest of My Life_ - Bruce Frankel [109]
In 2005, Microsoft hired Nell and moved her and Myrna to Seattle. Since arriving there, Myrna has been steadily building her business. Restless to improve her toy, she designed a reflective cylinder that eliminated the paper cup. And goaded by a new friend from a business networking group in Seattle, Myrna began a six-month struggle to find a new, more felicitous and memorable name for her product. She was stymied until one night she went to an outdoor showing of her favorite movie, Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (Myrna’s car keys even dangle from a Roger Rabbit key chain.) “That night, I dreamed about the Acme Suck-O-Lux vacuum cleaner scene [in which Roger Rabbit’s face gets sucked into a vacuum cleaner]. When I woke up, I had the new name: Morph-O-Scope!” she said. She also added a new tagline, “Brain-powered play. No batteries needed.”
Myrna’s rejuvenated toy received fresh acclaim. Bernie DeKoven, the games-loving maven, gave her products a Major Fun Award and waxed ecstatic about Myrna’s kits and anamorphic products. In addition to being affordable, they made an esoteric, mathematically based Renaissance art form accessible to children. “It’s a unique contribution to the game world. It’s a wonderful play experience that challenges a child’s brain. It goes way beyond a coloring book.”
And when Myrna asked the Toy Man Product Guide to update her product image in its online review, she was informed that while she already had the Toy Man Seal of Approval, the guide’s policy required her to submit her latest version for an entirely new review. As a result of the evaluators’ report, the Toy Man awarded her Morph-O-Scope kit its highest honor, an Award of Excellence—her nineteenth national toy award since turning sixty. At the start of 2009, The Toy Man Product Guide gave Myrna’s Sports of All Sorts kit, containing 32 pages of sports images to color, both an E-Choice Award, for its high potential for causing cognitive and critical skill growth, and the Award of Excellence. The Reverend G. W. Fisher, who founded the product guide to publish credible and unbiased reports on toys’ safety, educational value, and capacity to engage children, said the kit is “a unique, innovative toy, with long-term effects. It’s something that engages, from children to adults.” He was fascinated, too, to see that when his evaluators tested the product in New York City, Yonkers, and Las Vegas, even reclusive children were stimulated to interact with others as they played with Myrna’s kit. “People in this industry are so blind. They say, ‘It’s not a name I recognize,’ so they don’t pay attention. But the potential value is astounding. Stores could sell this in a heartbeat. It’s one hundred percent child-safe, even eco-conscious. Once it hits the tipping point, this thing will scream, and companies will wonder why they didn’t buy it. The potential is unlimited.”
Amazon.com began carrying Ooz & Oz products on its website in 2006. Over a one-year period, ending in the spring of 2008, sales increased eightfold. The company’s actual sales figures remain a closely held secret. Myrna shared only that she has sold thousands of kits. But by August 2008, she had sold out of all product. And, in the midst of the deepening national recession, she faced a critical decision. Should she, at last, pull the plug on her dream or manufacture again?
She weighed the financial risks against the vision to which she has clung for twenty years. While there is always guesswork in economics, Myrna felt confident enough to plow forward. She developed yet another new product, prepared for discussions with Wal-Mart and toysrus.com, and, in 2009, placed an order with a Texas factory to begin manufacturing ten thousand Morph-O-Scope kits.
Still, I’ve wondered more than once why, after all this time, she is still willing to risk her time and money, including her retirement fund, betting on her mirror toys.
“Becoming educated in business and applying that knowledge to my passion may well prove to have been a sounder investment of time, money, and effort than my