Toys ?R? Us Stocking Wordigo

Fayetteville entrepreneur Philip Zweig has a dream of hitting it big with his literary board game Wordigo. And as of June 12, he may be one step closer.

Zweig got an order from retailer Toys ‘R’ Us for about 400 games that day. The company wants to put Wordigo in its top 50 U.S. stores, he said. Toys ‘R’ Us has 587 stores in the U.S.

The gamer had a nice nod last year when Barnes & Noble Booksellers ordered 4,000 copies for 550 of its top stores for the holiday season. But B&N dropped Wordigo despite good sales in its Arkansas stores. B&N sales elsewhere were “so-so,” Zweig said.

Wordigo has been available on Toys ‘R’ Us’ Web site, but this will be the first time it has made it on to the shelves. The game is also now available as a computer game through www.wordigo.com.

Zweig started selling the game in late 2003, and he estimates he has sold 22,000 copies. At an average price of $24.95 each, that’s almost $550,000 in revenue, though he reinvests his profits.

According to the Toy Industry Association Inc., total annual sales in the U.S. for games and puzzles in 2005 were $2.4 billion, down 9 percent from $2.6 billion in 2004. Total toy industry sales were down 4 percent from $22.1 billion in 2004 to $21.3 billion last year.