Japanese toymakers now see senior citizens as their most dynamic market. Nearly 22 million Japanese–17.4 percent of the population–are over 65, and that number is expected to top 25 percent by 2020. Three million senior citizens live alone, and 1.55 million Japanese are senile (their numbers are also expected to grow rapidly). This aging population presents a huge “silver market”–estimated at 50 trillion yen ($416 billion)–for everything from beds to cosmetics to home-care nurses and helpers.
Major industries such as electronics, construction and foodstuffs have already began developing products tailored to old folks: robots to help out around the house, homes that have no steps or stairs and healthy, oil-free foods. The toy industry wants a piece of the action. “There is a great potential,” says Yoshinori Haga, an official at Bandai, the biggest toymaker in Japan. “Toys can be used for entertainment, to give the old people nostalgic feelings or to be a companion for those who live alone.”
Indeed, playthings are not just for fun anymore. Toshimitsu Musha, president of the Brain Functions Lab near Tokyo, argues that playing with toys can help human brains stay active and sharp. While researching Alzheimer’s disease, Musha found that art therapy such as painting and claywork helped to prevent the brains of Alzheimer’s patients from deteriorating. “What works best for the elderly is something that they enjoy, where they have to use their brain and which requires concentration from 30 minutes to one hour,” he says.
Designers have a range of products in the pipeline. Last year Takara, another major toymaker, introduced e-kara, a microphone-size karaoke machine, and Popila, a slowed-down videogame involving bouncing balls, which is meant to help improve reflexes. A company called Epoch says its jigsaw puzzles can help old folks stay nimble of mind, while the Kawada Co., known for its educational building blocks, claims its products do the same.
Toymakers are also hoping that the pet robots that have recently become popular can be marketed to seniors, who increasingly are living alone as nuclear families come to dominate Japa-nese society. Tomy has introduced a high-tech, talking Dog.com and this fall will release memoni, a robot with artificial intelligence that can carry on limited conversations. Bandai is selling a catlike robot that responds to the human touch and stops moving when it gets upset about something. What has most surprised Bandai is the response to a series of its cuddly high-tech dolls, Primopuel, which nod, sing and talk. A company spokesman says that the dolls’ original target audience was young women living alone, but that the most eager customers seem to be senior citizens buying the toys as companions.
Toymakers still face a critical problem, though: the average household savings among seniors is 24 million yen ($200,000), almost double that of a working household, but they are far more cautious about what they buy than teens. The key may be appealing to a younger generation, who every year are stumped for gift ideas before September’s Respect for the Aged Day. In the end, teens may have to jump-start this trend, too.
