S-Point : the near fatal adventure of Schleich.

:) :)

Big congratulations Susanne.

This puzzles vehicles are magestic

Puzzles is other of my hobbies......please see: http://www.collectorsquest.com/collection/3109/puzzlesriddles


And I need time to show more pictures....

Wow! Fernando, your collection of puzzels is wonderful

My fingers itch to try making them

Didn´t saw them before... Great adition, Susanne! I like them so colourfull... Congrats :)

Fascinating figurines, Susanne - thanks for posting photos... :)

schmidtchenschleich wrote:

The Idea came from Schleich.
But produced from other.
Like the Farmer figurines 13412, 13413... from the manufacture ARI.
Ore the Coralle fishes from Maya and Borges. They are all marked Schleich.
They all produced fore some years for Schleich and then they produced the same figurines without the marking Schleich in their own names.

This is also true of the plush dinosaur line from 1994. These were made by the American stuffed toy maker Gund. They can be found here in the USA with "Gund" tags, but also, of course, in EU with "Schleich" tags.....

In my big book of schleich it says the company produced them in 1982. its success was elusive. were they too expensive, too mplicated, or jusco unequal to competition? nobody at schleich had a clue so this was the failure of the s point congrats and hope this helps

pipi6 wrote:

In my big book of schleich it says the company produced them in 1982. its success was elusive. were they too expensive, too mplicated, or jusco unequal to competition? nobody at schleich had a clue so this was the failure of the s point congrats and hope this helps

Thankyou VERY much for your info, Pipi

I also got some information. Just have to get it translated.
It seems that these models almost caused Schleich to go bankrupt, because their investments were so huge, and, as you say, the success was very limited .

A while ago I got some funny, old Schleich cars and an aeroplane.
* look here*

Nobody seemed to know much about them, so I asked Thomas01, who is an expert in the really old Schleich products.
He kindly sent me several photoes and articles about them, and he has also helped me understand the German writing, has corrected some mistakes I made, and added important data ;-)

From the book ”Anywhere`s a playground” I understand, that in the early 1980s Schleich decided to develop a completely new product range in order to become independent of the ”Licence products”.

From 1982 till 1985 they invested several million Deutsche Mark in the devalopment of machines, moulds and tools for this new product : The S-point !
Further, during `84 they spent enormous sums building up stock in order to meet the expected demand for this great new toy.

In the early ´80s, a million D-Mark was an awful lot of money.

It is worth to notice that the designers was ”team Micklitz”.
Klaus Mickliz is now designing for the present brand name, Mic-o-mic.

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The thickness of the material, and the desired quality ( no grates, completely uniform surface), made it very hard to produce, but the company ”Bun-Plast” had the technology required.

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They also spent a lot on marketing and promotion.


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In February 1985 the great day arrived, and S-Point was introduced on the toy fair in Nürnberg. Everyone was exited, and even more large sums were invested in marketing material
Invitations were sent out

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Dealers were offered to ask for samples :

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A huge success was expected

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Herman Schneider, the successful manager of Schleich since 1976, presenting S-point at the Fair, - proud and confident !

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The produch was prised for the idea behind the concept

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Nobody suspected the the dramatic consequences the S-Point would have for Schleich.

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The marked failed completely ! None of the expected succes came.

Perhaps the product was too expensive ? Or the competition too well established ?
With the enormous investments in S-Point, Schleich was in serious problems.
And then the market for the Smurfs collapsed !

In January 1987 Schleich was declared Bankrupt !

The product S-point, which we barely know today, cold have put an end to Schleich, - and there wouldn`t have been an STS today :-o

However, through hard work from employees, leaders and supplyers and other business partners, Schleich rose from the ruins, - but that is another story ;-)

As we know, Mic-o-mic is now making and selling the models.
About 30 years have passed, but Klaus Mickliz, who was one of the original designers for Schleich, is still designing them.

Even if many of the models made by Schleich are still being produced, Mic-o-mic never mentions a word about the dramatic background of their toys

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How interesting! It´s a pity I don´t understand German. But anyway thank you Susanne!

I quite like the S-point products! Thanks for sharing!

wow thanx for all the information

Thankyou friends
I am happy you find it interesting

SyLoBe wrote:

How interesting! It´s a pity I don´t understand German. But anyway thank you Susanne!

I tried to write a little of the most essential in English, I think it would be horribly booring if I translated it all

Thanks for the wonderful photos and information. You are our old Schleich investigator.

aandmkw wrote:

Thanks for the wonderful photos and information. You are our old Schleich investigator.

Ohhh, thankyou

There are many who know a lot more than I do

Thank you for posting this fascinating topic, Susanne. Great "sleuthing" resulting in a most interesting story... :)

It is a nice looking toy, it might have done a little better if teach vehicle was a single color instead of the mixed. Hard to say, there are many of these building systems that have been tried and few done really well except for LEGO

Thank you very much Susanne, for taking the time to gather this information together! It's very interesting!

I am thrilled that you find it interesting
I did take many, many hours, and I almost gave up, - but then Thomas01 voluntered to come to my rescue and helped me understand the most difficult of the German passages

That is so interesting!!!! Thanks for the wonderful article Susanne!

thank you for this history lesson!

Tiermann wrote:

It is a nice looking toy, it might have done a little better if teach vehicle was a single color instead of the mixed. Hard to say, there are many of these building systems that have been tried and few done really well except for LEGO

i was thinking the same thing. i wonder what test marketing they did? it looks harder to put together than Legos, so it would not be appropriate for very small children, but the multi- primary colors and the round edges make it look "baby-ish" which would be a turn-off for older children. and all those lovely small edible pieces would concern parents.
funny how legos are just as edible, but it seems to be so accepted that Legos will be eaten that it's not a concern.


in any event, never a good idea to try to go head to head with Lego.

Mastiffcat wrote:

....i wonder what test marketing they did? it looks harder to put together than Legos, so it would not be appropriate for very small children, but the multi- primary colors and the round edges make it look "baby-ish" which would be a turn-off for older children. and all those lovely small edible pieces would concern parents.
funny how legos are just as edible, but it seems to be so accepted that Legos will be eaten that it's not a concern.


in any event, never a good idea to try to go head to head with Lego.

Yes, Lego and others were very strong then .

They did tests with children, and the result was very promising.

Perhaps the market wasn`t ready for that kind of design, - Moc-o-mic is doing very well with exactly the same concept and many of the same models these days.

Or perhaps they were too expensive. Perhaps they tried to gain their investments back too fast...and looking at the box I got mine in..WOW! it must ahve been expensive

:) :)

Thanks susanne, interesting history

Schleich: animals..smurfs....puzzles

Very nice products.

Yesterday I got some Schleich s - point tiles.

http://www.ebay.de/itm/Raritat-70ern-Schleich-Modelle-Bausatze-Ersatzteile-Sammler-selten-/260991894855?pt=Figuren&hash=item3cc4544547

This tiles I got. I think I can build one of two cars with this pieces, but I don`t know how.
Has someone an instrucktion for S - Point Cars? Or do someone know where I can get S - Point instrucktions or more informations? (I know the Threads here in the forum)
I hope you can help me.
Thanks!

I will try to look through my boxes and see if any of them have instructions.

Is the s point a company?