Discovery Toys is a

multi-level marketing Multi-level marketing (MLM), also called network marketing or pyramid selling, is a controversial marketing strategy for the sale of products or services in which the revenue of the MLM company is derived from a non-salaried workforce selling th ...

company specializing in educational toys. Its products are sold in the U.S. and Canada, and its headquarters are in

Livermore, California Livermore (formerly Livermorès, Livermore Ranch, and Nottingham) is a city in Alameda County, California. With a 2020 population of 87,955, Livermore is the most populous city in the Tri-Valley. It is located on the eastern edge of Californi ...

. The company was purchased by

Avon Products Avon Products, Inc. or simply known as Avon, is an American-British multinational cosmetics, skin care, fragrance and personal care company, based in London. It sells directly to the public. Avon had annual sales of $9.1 billion worldwide in 20 ...

in 1997 and became a wholly owned subsidiary of Eos International in 2001.

History

Discovery Toys was founded as a multi-level marketing company in 1978 by Lane Nemeth, a former daycare director, with a $5,000 family loan. Lane, a mother from the

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17t ...

bay area, started the company when she was unable to find educational toys for your own kids. According to Nemeth, the company had 2,500 sales "consultants" in 1982 and had reached $4.6 million in revenue the previous year. Ms. Nemeth grew the company to a $100 million in annual revenue by 1997 then sold the company to Avon who sold it in 2002 to a private equity group. Discovery Toys was acquired by and became a wholly owned subsidiary of Eos International, Inc. in July 2001. One of the company's top selling toys is Marbleworks. Released in 1982, it consists of colorful, sloped, plastic half-pipes of different designs. The individual pieces interlock, creating a track on which

marbles A marble is a small spherical object often made from glass, clay, steel, plastic, or agate. They vary in size, and most commonly are about in diameter. These toys can be used for a variety of games called ''marbles'', as well being placed in mar ...

are run. Marbleworks was included in Discovery's product line when Discovery Toys expanded into

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...

in 2003.

References

External links

Discovery Toys
Multi-level marketing companies Toy companies of the United States 1978 establishments in California Companies based in Livermore, California American companies established in 1978 Toy companies established in 1978 {{Toy-company-stub