FEATURE/TOY WISHES 2002 Holiday Preview; Exclusive Event to Offer First Look at 'Must Have' Toys for Holiday 2002

Business Wire, Sept 30, 2002

Business Editors/Feature Editors

FEATURE...

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 30, 2002

Debut of the "Hot Dozen," Over 100 of the Hottest Toys on Display

Industry Experts On Hand for Interviews

TOY WISHES Magazine, the celebrated resource guide designed to put the fun back in toy shopping, will kick-off the holiday toy-buying season with the first-ever TOY WISHES Holiday Preview on October 8th at the International Toy Center in New York City.

TOY WISHES co-publishers Jim Silver and Gareb Shamus, publisher of The Toy Book, the industry's leading trade magazine, and chairman of Wizard Entertainment, the leading publishers of consumer magazines covering comic books, action figures and anime, respectively, created the event to coincide with the publication of its 4th holiday issue. In addition, the event was designed to showcase the most exciting and innovative toys hitting the market for holiday 2002.

Silver and Shamus will be joined by Christopher Byrne, a member of the Toy Wishes editorial board who is recognized as The Toy Guy(TM), to announce the Toy Wishes Holiday 2002 "Hot Dozen," a coveted list of the twelve toys predicted to be the top sellers of the season.

All of the toys were selected from among the more than 150,000 new toys introduced each year.

In addition to the debut of the "Hot Dozen," the TOY WISHES 2002 Holiday Preview will offer an exclusive first-look at the "All Stars", the coolest toys and games in over twenty different categories. Within each of those categories one toy is selected in each of the following classes: Hot Prospect, Great New Innovation, Classic, Neo-Classic, or Collectible Edition. More than 100 toys will be displayed and demonstrated.

Toy Wishes Holiday 2002 features over 500 toy reviews, informative toy safety articles and tips on how and where to shop - making it the most comprehensive issue yet. With Toy Wishes in hand, astute parents, grandparents and other gift givers can get a head start finding the season's most coveted toys.

In addition to a ballot for the People's Choice Toy of the Year (T.O.T.Y.) Award sponsored by the Toy Industry Association (and only found in Toy Wishes), kids will find exciting sweepstakes from Disney, Mattel, Namco, Nickelodeon and Toysrus.com spotlighting some of the hottest properties including Disney(TM) Princesses, Barbie(TM), Pac-Man(C), Spongebob Squarepants(TM), Harry Potter(TM) and He-Man(R).

Gift givers who frequent Zany Brainy and FAO Schwarz will receive a free issue of Toy Wishes Holiday 2002 when they make a purchase of thirty dollars or more, while supplies last.

Toy Wishes retails for $4.99 and can be found anywhere magazines are sold. For more information about Toy Wishes, check out the web site at www.toywishes.com.

--30--JK/ny csm

    CONTACT: Litzky Public Relations
             Josslynne Lingard, 201/222-9118, ext. 14
             jlingard@litzkypr.com

    KEYWORD: NEW YORK
    INDUSTRY KEYWORD: RETAIL CONSUMER/HOUSEHOLD ELECTRONIC
GAMES/MULTIMEDIA PRODUCT
    SOURCE: Toy Wishes