Discovery Toys


Discovery Toys is a multi-level marketing company specializing in educational toys. Its products are sold in the U.S. and Canada, and its headquarters are in Livermore, California.

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. 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 are run. Marbleworks was included in Discovery's product line when Discovery Toys expanded into China in 2003.