Hasbro
Hasbro is the owner of the Transformers brand in most markets beyond the Japanese, where it is owned by TakaraTomy.
History
Hasbro was originally founded in 1923 as "Hassenfeld Brothers" by brothers Henry and Helal Hassenfeld from Rhode Island. The company originally sold textile remnants, but soon moved into manufacturing pencil boxes and school supplies.
In 1952, Hasbro first rose to fame with the release of a toy named Mr. Potato Head, which is still very popular today.
In 1964, Hasbro had an even greater success with the original G.I. Joe toy designed by Don Levine, which caused Hassenfeld Bros. to grow to be one of the largest toy companies in the USA. In 1968, the company would change its name to "Hasbro Industries, Inc."
Through a series of importing licenses and spin-offs, G.I. Joe would ultimately lead to the Microman and Diaclone toylines by Japanese toymaker Takara, which in turn would lead to Hasbro's release of the original Transformers toyline in 1984.
In 1984, Hasbro would also buy out a competing toy company named Milton Bradley (MB), which whould result in the merged company briefly assuming the name "Hasbro Bradley, Inc." After the merger was completed, the company changed its name into simply "Hasbro, Inc." Milton Bradley's European facilities would also be used to manufacture the initial wave of Transformers toys to be released in Europe before the merger was completed. (See also: Generation 1 Europe (toyline).)
In 1995, Hasbro transferred control of the Transformers franchise to its Kenner subsidiary, then phased out the Kenner brand in 2000.
Hasbro today
Employees
- Alfred J. Verrecchia, President and Chief Executive Officer
- Brian Goldner, President Toy
Boy's Toys
- Vickie Stratford, Design Project Manager (Boy's Toys)
- Joe Kyde, Designer (Boy's Toys, Exclusive Division)
Transformers Brand
- Greg Lombardo, Director of Marketing
- Aaron Archer, Design Director
- Eric Siebenaler, Lead Designer
- Jared Wade, Designer
- William Rawley, Designer
Relationship with fandom
Fandom's relationship with Hasbro is as paradoxical and confusing as our relationships with our Parents. They are an incredible source of joy and happiness, as well as the focal point of rage and blame for pretty much everyone in the Transformers community. To much of the fandom, Hasbro's actual involvement in the Transformers franchise is rarely acknowledged when not negative. Many view their activities to subsist entirely of:
- Slapping fans in the face.
- Getting things all wrong.
- Screwing up Takara's toys.
- Being Lazy.
- Trying to make money.
- Ruining everything forever.
When they found the time to create and maintain a successful, celebrated franchise that was the basis of twenty years of obsession and happiness for the exact same fans is unknown.
It should be noted, however, that most of Hasbro's success is down to the inherently successful brands it holds, more than their efforts to keep them float. A similiar phenomenon can be seen by the fact that Marvel manages to stay afloat despite the MU being rather, er, rubbish these days.
Hasbro have indeed made some rather barmy decisions in the past. Some of Hasbro's genuine crimes that certain people like to ignore included:
- Treating Europe like rubbish. Hasbro USA decides exactly what Hasbro Europe can and can't sell. Charging twice as much for product, and generally paltry distribution. Europe never recieved much of the Classics line, the Beast Wars re-issues, most Alternators and Titaniums. Of course, once Israel or some place gets some crappy Protoform figure first, the Americans just have it SO UNFAIR.
- Scrapping all three collector lines indefinitely in and around the same time period(Classics, Titaniums, Alternators). It should be noted that while Classics is returning, there is still a period of over a year with essentially no collector product apart from Masterpiece Starscream.
- The sizes and accuracy of Transformers Movie toys. Characters like Brawl, Bonecrusher that should be much larger recieved deluxes, and large characters like Starscream and Blackout only recieved Voyagers. Arcee is very much out of scale. Brawl recieved a Leader toy eventually, but is not really a notable enough character in the movie to warrant this. Scale has always been an issue for Transformers toys. Megatron's colour scheme is very inaccurate and has put a lot of people off the figure - it doesn't capture the gritty, metallic feel of the movie model. The Robot Replica looks like it's made from foam. While the sizes can be somewhat excusable since Decepticons don't sell as well, giving Brawl a leader and deluxe as opposed to a Voyager(the in between size) is questionable, and many of the Deco choices(Ratchet in the movie is a more golden colour, Jazz suffers from very flat, boring grey plastic) are lackluster.
- Using translucent, detail swallowing plastics where Matte plastics should be used. For instance, Classics Starscream, especially in the face. Even alternators suffer from this - on the inside legs, cheap looking grey plastic is used. Transformers also tend to be lax on paint apps compared to other lines with a large collector base.
Plastic colour choices can also be questionable, often using pink-ish red plastics(Classics Optimus Prime) and sometimes giving decent moulds bright, gaudy colours(Voyager Ratchet, some Energon toys), or colours that don't match up with their paint(Classics Optimus Prime, Classics Bumblebee, a few Cybertron toys)- but if you complain about these, you're a sad McFarlane humping Goth kid who wants EVERYTHING IN BLACK.
- As a sidenote, Raising the price of Marvel Legends, while reducing the paint apps, articulation, and average size, AND removing the comic. This essentially confirms that Hasbro "could" make better figures for the money they're charging, which is a point of worry for some people.
Hasbro's decisions are very often mercilessly defended by certain individuals within the fanbase, and it can be difficult to express any distaste when Hasbro gets something wrong. Many would criticise them for not taking a stronger stance against some decisions made regarding the Transformers movie which made certain aspects of the brand less recognisable, and divided the fanbase.
Fiction
Timelines Descent into Evil comic
The Decepticon Flamewar collects Hasbro memorabilia.
