Tuesday, March 5, 2013

Happy Birthday, Hula Hoop!

Happy Birthday to the Hula Hoop!  It turned 50 today.  The hula hoop actually dates back to the around 1300, when hooping came to Great Britain.  Homemade versions of the toy became very popular. In the early 1800s, British sailors first witnessed hula dancing in the Hawaiian Islands. Hula dancing and hooping look somewhat similar and the name "hula hoop" came together.

The hula hoop was made popular in the US when a couple of gents formed a company called the Wham-O company.  They started the company in their garage in Los Angeles in 1948.  One of their first inventions was the 'wham-o" which was a sling shot used to train falcons and hawks (it slung meat at the birds and the sound it made when it hit the target was "wham-o" so that became the name of their company)  That is just weird and creepy - a marketing nightmare in today's world, I would think.

In 1957, an Australian visiting California told them that in his home country, children twirled bamboo hoops around their wasits in gym class, so they invented a plastic prototype and when they saw how well accepted it was they trademarked the Hula Hoop name and started manufacturing the toy in 1958 and received a patent for it on March 5, 1963.  Twenty-five million Wham-O hula hoops were sold for $1.98 in the first two months of production and 100 million orders followed.  By the end of 1958 the company had made $45 million in profits.  

Still one of the best toys on the market!!!

No comments:

Post a Comment