FACTSHEET

By putting toy cocktails in the hands of kids, MGA Miniverse “Happy Hour” model cocktails play reckless games with kids’ lives. By teaching youth that alcohol is a toy, these collectibles threaten to create endless ripples of harm, starting young and lasting well into adulthood.

What are MGA “Happy Hour” Toys?

• Plastic-wrapped, baseball-sized clamshells containing a doll house-sized DIY “cocktail.”
  • Balls contain plastic glass, clear resin “drink,” and accoutrements
  • Explicitly labeled as cocktails, e.g. “espresso martini,” “blue
    Hawaiian,” “lavender gin and tonic”
  • Shells are opaque and contain randomly selected “cocktail,”
    generating a collector incentive akin to Pokemon cards,
    baseball cards, or gacha balls
  • Toys are at the same scale as MGA’s Bratz dolls, encouraging youth to work drinks into
    everyday play

• “21+” warnings on wrapping are ineffective, insufficient, and unenforced
  • Store employees are not trained to card
  • Labeling is small and unobtrusive
  • Non-21+ Miniverse balls are sold with identical scale and branding

• MGA Miniverse includes dozens of other lines, all of which are plainly meant for kids.
  • Branding includes Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Hershey’s
  • One of the top selling current brands, being awarded “Top Selling Toy” by marketing
    research firm Circana
  • History of negligence—Miniverse products subject to major recall for toxic
    components in June 2024

What are the risks from alcohol-themed toys?

• Playing with toys is not just distraction—it’s a form of learning.
  • Toy alcoholic beverages directly teach youth that there is nothing wrong with
    a child or teenager having fun with a cocktail—establishes a “social norm”
  • By making alcoholic beverage into a toy, youth start expecting the same
    sense of fun from real alcoholic beverages

• These toys shape kids’ attitudes just like youth-oriented alcohol marketing.
  • Study after study has found that alcohol marketing makes kids more likely to
    say they want to drink, and drink excessively once they start
  • California middle-schoolers who owned alcohol-themed personal items were
    3x as likely to have ever drank, and 1.5x as likely to be active drinkers from
    real alcoholic beverages

• Kids who start drinking earlier tend to suffer more harms from alcohol.
  • Alcohol hurts school performance, trouble with peers, and is associated with criminal justice system involvement
  • Risk of sexual assault and violence, including teenage intimate partner violence
  • Leading preventable causes of underage death—accidental injuries, homicide, suicide, and over dose—are all heavily influenced by alcohol
  • The younger someone starts drinking, the more likely they are to drink excessively as adults
  • Kids who start drinking before 15 years old are more than 3x as likely to drink excessively

• Industry targeting of youth is a notorious, well-known tactic.
  • Alcohol industry uses tobacco industry playbook—major tobacco companies and major alcohol companies share the same owners
  • Tobacco leaders openly admitted that youth sales keep the industry alive
  • Toy and candy versions of adult products are sparking kids’ interest in using them
  • Kids who start drinking before 15 years old are more than 3x as likely to drink excessively as adults

What can the community do about it?

• Contact retailers and tell them to remove products from shelves.
• Contact manufacturer MGA Entertainment and tell them to pull this product.
• Make sure your kids know: no one should sell them alcohol as a toy.

For more information, please contact Alcohol Justice at advocacy@alcoholjustice.org.