Transcript

SYSK's 12 Days of Christmas… Toys: How Hot Wheels Work | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

From Stuff You Should Know · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 42 min · 8,160 words · 236 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "SYSK's 12 Days of Christmas… Toys: How Hot Wheels Work | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW", an episode of Stuff You Should Know published December 15, 2025 (42 min, about 8,160 words). It mentions 76 people, works and ideas, including Hot Wheels, Matchbox, minimum wage, Amy Lynn Bradley, James Taylor.

What this episode is about

This content explores the fascinating mechanics behind Hot Wheels toys, emphasizing their nostalgic value and cultural impact during childhood. It highlights the significance of collecting, the different conditions of toys, and the joy they bring to both children and adult enthusiasts alike.

Key takeaways

  • Hot Wheels, since 1968, outsold Detroit's big four, becoming the planet's top vehicle manufacturer—a fraction of the cost!
  • G.I. Joe: from epic 12-inch heroes to today's plastic warriors—a toy army's evolution over decades.
  • The real fight isn't Cobra vs. G.I. Joe, but big dolls vs. small—nostalgia wins every time.
  • Sad face: when a kid's Hot Wheels article is all zing, no classic car cool—I feel ya.
  • Lego vs. Hot Wheels: who reigns in the tire count? Plastic wheels might just steal the show!

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 5:00: Hot Wheels, Detroit automakers, Franco Harris, How Hot Wheels Work
  2. – 10:00: Hot Wheels, Amy Lynn Bradley, Chevy Camaro, Chevy Corvette
  3. – 15:00: Hot Wheels, Matchbox, Spectra Flame, Hawthorne, California
  4. – 20:00: Hot Wheels, Matchbox, KB Toys, licensing
  5. – 25:00: Hot Wheels, Oldsmobile 442, Chevy Citation, Jason Singleton
  6. – 30:00: Hot Wheels, Matchbox, Little Red Express truck, 3D printer
  7. – 35:00: Hot Wheels, Beach Bomb, Cheetah, Python
  8. – 40:00: minimum wage, James Taylor, Hot Wheels, cost of living calculations
  9. – 41:59: Squarespace, No Kid Hungry, No Kid Hungry

Notable quotes from "SYSK's 12 Days of Christmas… Toys: How Hot Wheels Work | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"

  • Pleased to introduce to you an episode that I liked quite a bit because when I was a kid, I love me some Hot Wheels.
    about Hot Wheels · at
  • By the time Hot Wheels came around, Matchbox was already there and had established a market and Mattel said, Let's get in on that.
    about Matchbox · at
  • They did that was by making these things far more functional than the Matchboxes were, the Matchbox cars were.
    about Matchbox cars · at
  • Yeah. And one of the cooler ones for me was the Oldsmobile 442.
    about Oldsmobile 442 · at
  • One of my favorite Hot Wheels though was the Little Red Express truck.
    about Little Red Express truck · at
  • We'll talk about in a minute, but the most valuable regular hot wheel is the, the 68 Beach Bomb, which was a VW bus in hot pink that had real surfboards sticking out of the back of it.
    about Beach Bomb · at
  • Yeah, that's a good one. That one weirdly had James Taylor in it when he was young and like on drugs and cool. Were they apologizing to France?
    about James Taylor · at
  • I'm going to call this minimum wage argument, not argument, proposal.
    about minimum wage · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Amy Lynn Bradley — Person · 4 mentions · first at
    And he had a as the story goes had a designer which we'll talk about in a second called Harry Bradley.
  • James Taylor — Person · 3 mentions · first at
  • Josh Malcolm Clark — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant and Jerry.
  • Franco Harris — Person · 1 mention · first at
    I did a report on Franco Harris when elementary school cuz he was a the football player. Yeah. I don't know why I did on Franco Harris. Yeah.
  • Kurt Christensen — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Old Kurt Christensen is not going to be happy about this.
  • Elliot Handler — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Been around since 1968. And anybody who's heard the Barbie trademark podcast will recognize the name Elliot Handler.
  • Ruth Handler — Person · 1 mention · first at
    That's Ruth Handler, the inventor of Barbie trademarks husband.
  • Marty Croft — Person · 1 mention · first at
  • Micah Kitchen — Person · 1 mention · first at
    It's like the for Micah kitchen of cars.
  • Jason Singleton — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Only muscle car in the youth group and years like two years ago I my brother I was talking about this dude Jason Singleton. I was Whatever happened to him? He's Oh, he still…
  • Howard Reese — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Designs, who's the guy who did the first 16, he was a GM designer originally, in his footsteps followed Howard Reese and then after that, Larry Wood and they those are some of like the legendary Hot Wheels designers.
  • Larry Wood — Person · 1 mention · first at
    16, he was a GM designer originally, in his footsteps followed Howard Reese and then after that, Larry Wood and they those are some of like the legendary Hot Wheels designers.
  • Boba Fett — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Like there was some recall, but they're Oh, but you want that one because the Boba Fett's rocket really shot out before kids started choking on them, right? Or catching on fire.
  • Tom Hardy — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah, Tom Hardy. But it's the same director from all the MadMax series. So it's Oh, really?
  • Joe Prohaskca — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Live on minimum wage and certainly not meant to support a family. That is from Joe Prohaskca in Reno, Nevada.
  • Buddy Holly — Person · 1 mention
  • Joshua Mi Bane — Person · 1 mention
  • Little Chuck — Person · 1 mention
  • Yumi — Person · 1 mention

Books & papers

  • How Hot Wheels Work — Book · 1 mention · first at
    And so this is that episode, How Hot Wheels Work. Pretty interesting story.
  • LA magazine — Book · 1 mention · first at
    Something $75,000 in 2000. Yeah. And it has since sold again in 2011 I saw in like LA magazine for like 125,000.
  • How Homelessness Works — Book · 1 mention · first at
    Listen to how homelessness works from quite a few years ago. And you guys commented that part of the problem was that low minimum wage in comparison to cost of renting a two-bedroom apartment.

Companies & orgs

Products & tech

  • Hot Wheels — Product · 35 mentions · first at
  • Matchbox cars — Product · 2 mentions · first at
  • Spectra Flame — Product · 2 mentions · first at
    They painted them originally in Spectra Flame which was very shiny and sparkly and expensive. and I don't think we said that all Hot Wheels are built at 164th scale.
  • Oldsmobile 442 — Product · 2 mentions · first at
  • Little Red Express truck — Product · 2 mentions · first at
  • Beach Bomb — Product · 2 mentions · first at
  • Python — Product · 2 mentions · first at
    Worth a lot more. if there was something that where they adjusted the design, like for example, the Python was originally called the Cheetah.
  • Cheetah — Product · 2 mentions · first at
    Something that where they adjusted the design, like for example, the Python was originally called the Cheetah.
  • kung fu grip — Product · 1 mention · first at
    No, but how could you say oh, that one that's 10 in tall and has real clothes and fuzzy hair and the kung fu grip is inferior to this little plastic thing.
  • Chevy Camaro — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Including apparently he got his hands on the first one, by the way, that came out was a Chevy Camaro.
  • Chevy Corvette — Product · 1 mention · first at
    The second one that came out was the Chevy Corvette, of course.
  • Redline Racing Slicks — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Okay. So, for the first couple years, like they were really putting a lot into these things. the tires were Redline Racing Slicks.
  • Chevy Citation — Product · 1 mention · first at
  • Toyota Mini Trek — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah. They had one that was one of my favorites, actually. It was a Toyota Mini Trek, which is a like a station wagon camper. And it even said painted on the side, good time camper that you could get in your Happy Meal, which if I.
  • Trapper Keeper — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Tell your parents to buy you this. You can't function correctly without this trapper keeper, so go get it.
  • Tonka trucks — Product · 1 mention · first at
    I was always into Tonka trucks. I thought Tonka was great. They were obviously much bigger, but those were like construction vehicles, like dump trucks and stuff like that. And still.
  • Volvo dump truck — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Like construction vehicles, like dump trucks and stuff like that. And still today, that Volvo dump truck, the giant one.
  • 3D printer — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Tape measure and stuff like that. You're going to Photoshop designs and you're going to even get a 3D printer to maybe do your prototype.
  • VW bus — Product · 1 mention · first at
    We'll talk about in a minute, but the most valuable regular hot wheel is the, the 68 Beach Bomb, which was a VW bus in hot pink that had real surfboards sticking out of the back of it.
  • Mongoose — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah. I guess like a 1970 mongoose or Cobra are worth about 10 grand these days. and a lot of them, just like with any collector's item, you'll see if there was just a few of them.
  • Audi 8 — Product · 1 mention
  • Cobra — Product · 1 mention
  • Volkswagen — Product · 1 mention

Concepts & topics

  • minimum wage — Concept · 6 mentions · first at
  • industrial espionage — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Through the cafeteria door. But that's called industrial espionage.
  • licensing — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    They have licensing with DC and Marvel this year. Fast and the Furious. I know they had a line.
  • supply and demand — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    But like you said, it's all about scarcity and supply and demand.
  • trademark law — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    That people who make counterfeit toys come up with to try to skirt trademark law maybe or something. Or else they just fully don't understand the toy and what its allure is, so…
  • cost of living calculations — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    But as far as I know, the cost of living calculations are really out of date.
  • 1:64 scale — Concept · 1 mention
  • computer-aided design — Concept · 1 mention
  • die-cast — Concept · 1 mention
  • marketing to children — Concept · 1 mention
  • prototyping — Concept · 1 mention

Places & events

  • Hawthorne, California — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Only lasted till 1970. And they, sadly, a lot of that had to do with the fact that they moved them from Hawthorne, California to Hong Kong.
  • Malaysia — Place · 1 mention · first at
    When that Happy Meal thing happened. And also the same year they moved from Hong Kong to Malaysia. and it said that's when they added their economy cars. So, that must have coincided with the citation.
  • Peterson Automotive Museum — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah. It's really cool. And if you go to the Peterson Automotive Museum in LA Oh yeah, they have a really cool exhibit there that I haven't been to in person, but I.
  • Toledo, Ohio — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Of Hot Wheels on the planet, you would have to build a time machine and go back to 1987 to my hometown of Toledo, Ohio.
  • Reno, Nevada — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Live on minimum wage and certainly not meant to support a family. That is from Joe Prohaskca in Reno, Nevada.
  • La Brea Tar Pits — Place · 1 mention

Sponsors

  • Squarespace — Sponsor · 2 mentions · first at
    Hey friends, just want to let you know our friends at Squarespace have partnered with the dude Jeff Bridges in a really cool thing called www.dreamingwithff.com.
  • No Kid Hungry — Sponsor · 1 mention · first at
    It's really neat. And he's also the face of No Kid Hungry, which is a great charity group you should look into. So check out ww.dreamingwith.com dreamingwithjff.com and see what the dude in Squarespace.
  • Dreaming with Jeff — Sponsor · 1 mention

Full transcript with timestamps

Hey everybody, Chuck here for another one of our uh Christmas ccentric episodes with our 12 days of Christmas toys playlist. And today I'm very pleased to introduce to you an episode that I liked quite a bit because when I was a kid, I love me some Hot Wheels. And so this is that episode, How Hot Wheels Work. Pretty interesting story. Hope you guys enjoy it.

Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from how stuffuffs.com. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant and Jerry.

You know that just sounded like what? Like that's what happens. Like you're having a nightmare and Yumi wakes you up in the middle of the night and you just goes, "Hey, welcome to the podcast." And then she slaps you across the face real hard.

Mhm. Mhm. That's true. Yeah. That is what that sounded like. That's what it sounded like. It

was pretty accurate. I don't know what got into me. Uh, you were just supercharged about this topic. That was terrible. What?

Supercharged. I don't get it. It's like a supercharged engine. Oh, I I didn't even think about that.

Oh, good. Well, that makes me feel a little better. Yeah. Um, you know, Jerry, by the way, before when I told her what we were doing, said, "Oh my gosh, that was my favorite toy when I was a kid."

Nice. Hot Wheels are pretty great. Yeah. I I had a quite a collection and I don't know where they are today.

Oh, really? They're missing, huh? Yeah. I don't know if they were thrown out or if uh if uh my brother has them or they're in my mom's attic or what cuz I'm kind of curious if I have any valuables.

You need to find them. Yeah. They could be apparently as far as Hot Wheels collectors go, they could be in mint condition all the way down to beater condition.

Oh, is that how they rank them? Yeah. Uh mine would be beaters cuz I played with them like crazy.

That's good. I mean, that's what they're for. Sure. You know, and there's value for a beater, too. Like some people apparently harvest them for parts to to rebuild like a, you know, a new Frankenstein model.

Oh, really? Yeah. That's pretty neat. There's a lot of stuff you can do with them.

Yeah. And we should thank the fifth grader who wrote this article, too. Sad face.

I complained about that out loud to Holly. I was like, this article actually says sad face like as a sentence.

Yeah, I know. Had issues. I'm glad you said something. Yeah. What if it was a fifth grader?

Your feelings are all hurt. I think your feelings are hurt either way now. Sad face.

So, uh, we're talking about Hot Wheels today. I had a couple. Um, my favorite toy was G.I. Joe, but I I appreciated Hot Wheels.

Yeah, I had G.I. Joe, too. We should do a G.I. Joe episode sometime. I had the older ones, though. You probably had

the huge ones. Yeah. Yeah. No, I had the real ones. Yeah. Oh yeah, I don't that's fighting words,

man. The ones that I had were so awesome. They were like there was a huge vast collection of all of them. There was like Cobra. The Cobra didn't exist when you were collecting G.I. Joes.

No, but how could you say like, oh, that one that's 10 in tall and has real clothes and fuzzy hair and the kung fu grip is inferior to this little plastic thing.

I think you just said it all. The fuzzy hair says it right there. I don't really mean that, Chuck. I I don't have a dog in that fight. Like, if you like the big GI Joes, that's cool. I got no problems.

Yeah. Um, as a quick side note, I have to tell this story. Okay. When uh you know how I used to do book reports and you would have to have a visual aid.

Yeah. Um, I might have told this before. If I do, I apologize. I don't recognize it.

Um, I did a report on Franco Harris when elementary school cuz he was a the football player. Yeah. Uh I don't know why I did on Franco Harris. Yeah.

But um I got my mom to make me a little Pittsburgh Steelers uniform for my GI Joe because he looked like Franco Harris.

Nice. Yeah. And that was my visual aid. You still have it? No, of course not. We had the GI Joes, but I think the Steelers uniform is gone bye-bye.

That's sad. Yeah. You know, I'm sure your mom put a lot of work into that. Now I feel guilty.

Uh so Chuck, I have a question for you. Yes. Did you know that the number one vehicle manufacturer on the planet is in fact Hot Wheels? I did. It It kind of It's astounding until you stop and think about it.

Sure. Like apparently since 1968 when Hot Wheels were first introduced, more than 4 billion Hot Wheels have been produced. That's more than the big four Detroit automakers combined. You're like, "Wow." And then you think, "Oh, yeah. It costs a minute fraction of the cost to build a Hot Wheels than it does a normal car.

Yeah. Plus also, it's not like you're gonna go, I want this uh Buick Cutless Supreme in every color it comes in,

right? You know, with a Hot Wheels, you can do that. Yeah. What's the the Lego stat is they're the biggest manufacturer of tires?

Yeah, they're Yeah. I wonder though, do these not count as tires because they're plastic? to count as wheels?

I don't know, man. Because four billion times four, that's 16 billion tires. That's a really great question.

I might have to challenge Lego. Or maybe just look up how many tires they manufacture.

Old Kurt Christensen is not going to be happy about this. Who was that? The founder of Lego.

Oh, remember? Oh, yeah. That's right. I thought you were saying old. No. Remember? Yeah.

So, um, let's talk about the history of this stuff. Huh. Okay. So, Hot Wheels, like I said, have been around since 1968. And anybody who's heard the Barbie trademark podcast will recognize the name Elliot Handler. That's Ruth Handler, the inventor of Barbie trademarks husband.

Sure. Um, and Elliot apparently saw a real chance to muscle in on an already extent market by a company called Tao that had a line of miniature metal cars, diecast cars is what they're called. Yeah. Called Matchbox cars.

That's right. By the time Hot Wheels came around, Matchbox was already there and had established a market and Mattel said, "Let's get in on that."

Yeah. And the rumor is that uh he saw his grandchildren playing with them and said uh they kind of stink. I can make these better and cooler.

Right. And he had a um as the story goes had a designer um which we'll talk about in a second called Harry Bradley.

Sure. And he had a hot rod and Elliot was in the parking lot one day and said, "Man, those are some Hot Wheels you got there."

And and apparently if you go look look at the old original commercials for Hot Wheels,

do they say that? That's how Well, that's how they pronounce it. Hot Wheels. Oh, instead of Hot Wheels.

Yeah. The emphasis is on the hot. It sounds awkward. They're like, "Race your Hot Wheels. You can You can race them. Just go buy some Hot Wheels." That's what they That's how they say it. Collect all your Hot Wheels.

Yeah. But that makes more sense in the context of a sentence. It does. But having been raised,

right? Right. You know, post the Infinity Hot Wheels is wrong. Yeah, Hot Wheels. Hot Wheels.

Now I'm trying to picture the guy in the parking lot saying, "Those are some Hot Wheels you got on your there." You'd say, "Hot Wheels you got there." You know?

Yeah. Oh boy. We can sure waste some time. We sure can. Uh but the first uh 1968 is like you said when the first line came out of 16 Hot Wheels, they were sold initially for 59 cent a piece. Yeah. Um, and like you said, the guy whose car originally inspired the name Hot Wheels, um, was Harry Bradley, and he was the designer of that first 16 cars. They were also called, um, California Customs Miniatures was that first original 16 group of Hot Wheels um, that were released in 1968. So, and Harry Bradley designed them all, including apparently he got his hands on um the first one, by the way, that came out was a Chevy Camaro.

The second one that came out was the Chevy Corvette, of course. And apparently the Chevy Corvette came out before the actual Corvette came out.

Yeah, the 69 Corvette that is. So, Harry Bradley was an old hand in not just miniature car design, but car design in general. He was an old GM designer and I guess he had connections still at GM and probably under the table in a possibly illegal way got his hands on the blueprints for the Corvette that hadn't been released yet and Hot Wheels beat GM to the punch in releasing the 1968 Corvette.

Yeah. 69. Um, thank you. That's all right. The uh Yeah, as the lore goes, he supposedly knew that the cafeteria door was unlocked, so he snuck in. Mhm.

Uh through the cafeteria door. But that's called industrial espionage. Yeah, that sounds like a story, like just lore.

Okay. But maybe so maybe he committed industrial espionage. Yeah. Um so like you said, the the those were the two of the first 16 in that original lineup, uh that original collection, which if you have any of those,

yeah, you're doing okay. Yeah. you got some money that you're sitting on cuz I mean like they went all out on those that original line.

Oh yeah. Like there were bushings to the suspension. Yeah. Um and the I mean the chassis um it had suspension like shocks like you could press them down and it would bounce back.

I had some of those. I don't know think they were from 68 but when did they quit making those? It said up until uh

77 was when they stopped making the um Oh, no. 70 is when the suspension got an overhaul.

Okay. So, for the first couple years, like they were really putting a lot into these things. Um the tires were Redline Racing Slicks.

Yeah. Um and the things the the whole reason they went to so much trouble is because they really wanted to destroy their competitor Matchbox. And one of the ways they did that was by making these things far more functional um than the Matchboxes were, the Matchbox cars were. So they they really could race. Yeah.

And if you put a Matchbox car up against a comparable Hot Wheels, say the same model car. Yeah.

Um the Hot Wheels will destroy it every time in the head-to-head race, as we saw on the internet.

Yeah. A guy did that, of course. Uh he took a two Volkswagens and two Audi 8s I think

and uh one Matchbox and one Hot Wheel and he said they won by at least a car length uh every time he tried.

Right. And this was no loop-de-loop or anything. This was just the straight race,

right? Um they painted them originally in Spectra Flame which was very shiny and sparkly and expensive. Um and I don't think we said that all Hot Wheels are built at 164th scale.

Yeah, that's a big point. But not necessarily all Matchbot cars. They kind of vary here and there,

right? Um, but like you said, uh, that Spectra Flame and the Redline tires, uh, didn't only lasted till 77 and the suspension only lasted till 1970. And they, sadly, a lot of that had to do with the fact that they moved them from Hawthorne, California to Hong Kong.

Yeah. And uh, like any product, you're like, hey, you can make it for half as much if you make it in China. So, let's move let's ship the operations overseas.

Well, not only that, it's the Spectra Flame paint is pretty expensive. It's awesome. It looks great. Yeah. But it's pretty expensive. So, um with with any collector's item, as they started to downgrade the components and the parts and the the manufacturing, Yeah. and ultimately the final product, all that did was make the original stuff all the more valuable today

because there's fewer and fewer of them as the years go on, proportionately speaking. Yeah, they had actual axles like you know it was like a real they were designed by car designers

uh and they were made apparently to reach 200 scale miles per hour. Yeah, that's pretty cool.

That's way cool. Yeah. Remember like uh in the cockroach episode we talked about how they're the fastest animal on the planet relatively speaking.

Uhhuh. Pretty neat stuff. Yeah. Um so Chuck, right out of the gate, Mattel had a hit on its hands.

Oh yes. Um they released them in 1968. By 1970, Hot Wheels was a uh Saturday morning cartoon.

Yeah. In the vein of like Dune Buggy and Scooby-Doo and all those guys. Hannah Barbara.

Dune Buggy or Speed Buggy. Speed Buggy. Yeah. Remember Speed Buggy? Yeah. It was like a a Dune Buggy that could talk and it was basically

Wonder Bug. No, it's Speed Buggy. Okay. Um Wonderug if you took Shaggy and put some like racing goggles on him.

Yeah. and then turned Scooby-Doo into a speed a dune buggy. Yeah, that's speed buggy.

Oh, was that a cartoon? Yeah, they went around solving mysteries and stuff like that.

Yeah, Wonder Bug was uh I think that was live action. Oh, this was a cartoon. Said Marty Croft.

This is exactly like Scooby-Doo by the people who did Scooby-Doo, using the same people who did the voices for Scooby-Doo. It it just vaguely changed the characters. Hot Wheels was virtually the same thing except it was about racing clubs. There were the bad guys and the good guys. And

do you know what this proves? What is the 1970s the dune buggy was a very popular thing?

Mhm. You remember seeing those on the road? Mhm. Like I used to see them all the time. Not all the time, but in the 70s it was a common thing.

Yeah. You don't see them anymore. Very rarely. Nope. No Gremlins, no yugos, no no Wonderbugs.

You know, I like Gremlins. Do you? Uh they're okay. For me though, the kudigra of car design is the AMC Pacer.

Yeah. It's like the for Micah kitchen of cars. Yeah. It's beautiful in all the weirdest ways.

So much window. That would be my sought after uh Hot Wheels. If I had a Hot Wheels that I if I just could have one Hot Wheel.

Yeah. It would I don't know if that would be it, but I'd be happy with that one.

Now, do they have that as a Hot Wheel? Oh, yeah. Okay. And if you look up AMC Gremlin Hot Wheels,

they went to town on those. They had some with like the the intakes like sticking out of the hood and um just all sorts of just awesome different variations like indie car gremlins and stuff like that.

Yeah, because and that raises a pretty good point. Hot Wheels has always been about the the racing design. Like they've designed them to look like racing cars, but they've also manufactured them to actually be able to win a race. like we talked about with Matchbox.

Yeah. And one of the differences uh that is one of the main differences between the Matchbox and the Hot Wheel is they were just much more interested in being sportier. Like you could get you could get a Matchbox like a delivery truck,

right? You know, they they had they had and but the Matchboxes looked more real. They they all were about looking realistic and not necessarily performance.

Yeah. Um and hey, if you want a bread truck, you can get a bread truck, right? Exactly. But you can't get a bread truck hot wheel,

right? You know, uh we'll talk more about all of this jam right after this. You want to go ahead and talk about some of the other differences between Matchbox and Hot Wheel? Yeah, sure.

Since we're at it, um, Matchbox or I'm sorry, Hot Wheel is the one that is more likely to have uh branded versions.

Oh, man. And do they ever like the Ghostbusters Ectomobile, right? Um, or even more than that, like they have a a deal with Eminem Mars for 2015. Oh, they do.

So, they have like a Twix trucks and a Skittles van and like all this stuff. They have licensing with DC and Marvel this year. Fast and the Furious. I know they had a line.

Yeah. So, they they're really big time into branded and a lot of times they'll have like a store will just have exclusives

access to an exclusive line of Skittles cars or something like that that you can only get at KB Toys.

Yeah, I think they have a NASCAR deal, too, if I'm not mistaken. I would not be surprised. Uh, and the Hot Wheels usually have a little bit um wider a longer axle and wider wheels um because it's just cooler if that wheel sticks out from the body a little bit, you know.

Well, plus also supposedly, and we'll talk about this a little more, when you shrink a car down to scale, it looks a little weird.

Yeah, you might as well go ahead and bring that up. Okay. It looks weird. You can't just shrink it and have it in the same proportion and have it look normal,

right? like it'll be as far as like shrinking a car down by scale. It will be in the exact same proportion, but it it's just off a little bit. Like so what they do to make a Hot Wheels raceable is they expand the wheel well a little more.

Yeah. They break it out a little bit. Yeah. Which is why the wheels stick out some on a on a Hot Wheels but not on a Matchbox.

That's right. Because matchboxes are all about realism. To heck with how it looks as long as it's real.

Uh the um one of the my favorite ones and I had one of these that they mentioned this article was the Red Baron.

Mhm. The the person who wrote this said it was an inexplicable an inexplicably cool helmet over the cockpit. Um I don't know about inexplicable. It was just the roof of the car

was a helmet, right? Um but I looked it up again today and I was like, "Oh yeah, I had that thing." But it was uh It wasn't a Nazi helmet per se, but it was that shape of the helmet,

right? Uh like the US soldiers have that shape now, you know, where it's cut lower around the ears,

right? Instead of just a straight, you know, like the World War II helmet, right?

But the Nazis used those first, you know, cuz it's a better design uh for war. And it also had a a black iron cross on the side of it.

Well, hence the Red Baron, right? Yeah. But it was it's easy now as an adult to look and say, "Hm, that looks like a little Nazi hot rod."

Yeah. But the Red Baron was World War I. He was pre-Nazi Germany. Yeah. And it was also, I think, at the time just like looked like the biker gang.

Sure. Uh would wear like those helmet with the iron cross. Yeah. And all of it was Southern California hot rod culture is what gave rise to Hot Wheels. So it makes sense.

Yeah. I don't I don't think there was any like uh surreptitious uh intent. Yeah. Um, so like I said, right out of the gate, Hot Wheels was a hit. They had a cartoon within a year or so of the first 16 being released.

Sure. Um, the second release they had, uh, I think 22 new cars. Yeah. 33 total.

And then, um, the third year they they had another they released 33 after that, right?

Oh, no. Yeah, I'm sorry. 33 by 1970. So, they did 16, 24, and then 33. And all of them came in like different colors, right? So, like I said, if you had one, that didn't mean you had them all. You wanted to collect them all.

So, kids were going crazy for it. And another way that Mattel very wisely targeted children was to get in with fast food.

Yeah. Uh in 1970, the first Hot Wheels came out as a toy at Jack in the Boxes. Oh, really?

Yeah. The big one though, the one that like put them over the top was in 1983 when kids who were uh lucky enough to be taken to McDonald's for dinner,

the happy meal to get a Exactly. Hot Wheel, which is what they called them at the time, uh were could get one of 14 Hot Wheels. Yeah.

In 1983. And they had some cool ones. They had a Chevy Citation. Did they really?

Yeah. They had one that was one of my favorites, actually. It was a um Toyota Mini Trek, which is a like a station wagon camper. And it even said painted on the side, good time camper that you could get in your Happy Meal, which if I could have one Hot Wheel, it would probably be that.

You know what they were doing now that I look back through my adult eyes? Like snorting pot?

No, they were giving you a bunch of crappy ones because you wanted to keep coming back to get the cool one.

Yeah, probably. You're like, "Ah, I got a citation." I'm like, "Can I go back because I want to get the hot rod?"

Right. That's exactly what they were doing. Sure, man. I feel so like manipulated.

What did you think they were doing with Happy Meals? Well, I mean, I know it was all manipulation to get you to try and own all of them,

right? But they should have been all cool ones, but you can't do that because the the regular kid might be like, "No, I got I got the cool one. I'm fine." But if you get this the citation,

right, you feel jipped off and you really want to go back and get one of the hot rods.

Yeah. It it's My eyes are wide open, my friend. Well, that's why our friends down under in Australia have like outlawed marketing directly to children, which I think is a fantastic move.

Oh, really? Yeah. That's so unfair to market directly to children. It's just it almost literally is like taking candy from a baby,

right? Like kids aren't sophisticated enough to psychologically defend themselves from being like bombarded with by adults to say, "Go tell your parents to buy you this. You can't function correctly without this trapper keeper, so go get it."

The trapper keeper. Yeah. What uh did they make a law? Yeah. Really? Yeah. It's a big one. Very progressive law. I think all countries should adopt. Um, well, in 1983, I agree wholeheartedly, by the way, in 1983 is when that Happy Meal thing happened. And also the same year they moved from Hong Kong to Malaysia. Um, and it and it said that's when they added their economy cars. So, that must have coincided with the citation.

Yeah, the citation, man. One of the most disappointing Happy Meal toys you could possibly get.

Yeah, because it reminded you of your dad who drove a Citation, right? who was always mad.

Yeah. Oh dear. So, uh, Chuckers. Yes. After 1983, not a lot happened. Hot Wheels just kept going on, expanding more and more and more.

Sure. Um, I think they had another Happy Meals joint in ' 91 or something like that. Um,

and uh, in 1995 they said, "We need to we need to do something big." And they did. They released something called a treasure hunt series which was a purposefully limited release car series of cars.

Yeah. Um I think they they did uh 12 models at 10,000 each originally and and hence the name treasure hunt. They were hard to find.

Yeah. And one of the cooler ones for me uh was the Oldsmobile 442. Yeah. The thing is neat. a dude at my uh church had an a 442 and it was just awesome, man. He was he had like the only muscle car in the youth group and um years like two years ago I my brother I was talking about uh this dude Jason Singleton. I was like, "Whatever happened to him?" He's like, "Oh, he still lives in so and so." And he went and you know what, dude? I went, "No." He went, "He still got it."

Oh, yeah. Why would you get rid of it? He still he still has the car. I went to his Facebook page and it is like the center of his life. I'm sure

it's his baby. I mean, he's had that thing since like 1986 and just it's juiced up and he used to scare the daylights out of me in that thing. But it was also exhilarating, you know, to be riding with him and he, you know, like 200 feet of drag. He would lay like power breaking and he would get like four sets of tires a year,

right? He'd be in the passenger seat going save me Jesus. Yeah. Yeah, I was very scared cuz I was, you know, I didn't flirt with the wild side back then.

No, the Oldsmobile 442 is as close as you got, huh? Yep. It was exhilarating. And then, uh, so that was 1995. This treasure hunt thing kind of went

um, it didn't go exactly as planned. Mattel was like, "Oh, we could make even more money if we

put these into wider release." Yeah. So, the original 10,000 releases were redone again and again and again. So, Treasure Hunt kind of became common place.

Sure. But it was a good idea and it tapped into this whole idea of collecting. Like Mattel was like, "We know you're out there and we're going to design these just for you." Yeah. And we'll talk more about collectors. Um but just to kind of button up the history of Hot Wheels, it all came full circle in 1996 when um Mattel bought Tao and hence Hot Wheels bought Matchbox.

So they're all owned by Mattel at this point. Yes. All right. We'll get to the uh design and collecting right after this. So, back then, if you wanted to do a smaller version of a larger car and scale it down, um you didn't have computer AED design and stuff, sometimes you might have had a blueprint, which helped, but sometimes you just had to get out there in the parking lot with a tape measure. Yeah.

And just take uh some measurements and then um you know, be good at math, right? basically.

And like like we said, Harry Bradley, who's the daddy of the Hot Wheels designs, who's the guy who did the first 16, um he was a GM designer originally, uh in his footsteps followed Howard Reese and then after that, Larry Wood and they those are some of like the legendary Hot Wheels designers.

That's the Mount Rushmore of Hot Wheels pretty much. Yeah. Um and yeah, they would just literally go out and and measure these things. And that was one way that Hot Wheels were born. Another way was that, and this definitely differentiates Hot Wheels from Matchbox, is that there are Hot Wheels that only exist in the Hot Wheels world.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They they are called the fantasy cars. Like they're just the designers imagination come to life,

right? Whereas Matchbox only, I believe, has uh red trucks. Exactly. Well, they only have cars that are based on real cars, right?

Right. Hot Wheels has a whole fantasy line. It's interesting that they're owned by the same company still and they just have kept that distinction.

Yeah. You know, I guess some people are Matchbox kids and some kids are Hot Wheels kids. I had both, I think.

I had a bread truck. Is that why you keep going to the bread truck? Well, no, I didn't have a bread truck, but I do remember having a couple of like weird utility type vehicles.

Uh that I don't remember. They were probably gifts or stocking stuffers or something. I don't think I like sought it out.

I was always into Tonka trucks. I thought Tonka was great. They were obviously much bigger, but those were like construction vehicles, like dump trucks and stuff like that. And still today, um that Volvo dump truck, the giant one.

Yeah. Um with the huge wheels, I think is one of the coolest vehicles ever created. Yeah,

I think I had one of those when I was a kid. I didn't have a lot of Tonka stuff.

Um, one of my favorite Hot Wheels though was the Little Red Express truck. I don't remember that.

If you saw it, you might it might ring a bell. It was basically uh can't remember what kind of truck it was. I think it was a Dodge, but it was just a cool red stepside pickup truck and it had the two uh the two vertical mufflers on each side that went up above the truck.

I think I know what you're talking about. Yeah. Yeah. It's really cool. And if you go to the um the uh Peterson Automotive Museum in LA

Oh yeah, they have a really cool exhibit there that I haven't been to in person, but I was looking at it online. Permanent exhibit where they have the real life versions of the Hot Wheel cars and they have a little red express truck, a full size one. Yeah. And I saw it and I was like whoa.

Did you just die from nostalgia? Might have teared up a little bit at the desk. Um, but they have, you know, the the gussied up Corvettes with the big chrome engines coming out of the hood. And

do they have the 442? Uh, I don't know if they have the 442, but I'm They will when your friend dies.

Yeah, I bet it's in his will. I'll go straight to the museum. Yeah. Uh, I'm going to go to this thing though at some point. I don't know on this next LA trip or not, but um it's right there near the Labraa Tarpits, I think.

Oh, yeah. So, I want to go check it out. I've been there. Yeah, it's neat. It is neat. Uh but back to the design, these days you're not going to need a tape measure and stuff like that. You're going to Photoshop uh designs and you're going to even get a 3D printer to maybe do your prototype.

That had to have helped them tremendously. Oh, yeah. Because, you know, with if you're designing real life cars and you have a 3D printer, that's pretty handy. But with Hot Wheels, like you can print out pretty much exactly what it's going to look like. Sure. And once they have the um the uh prototype done, they'll make a they'll make a mold out of it and then inject it with molten metal under tremendous pressure.

Yeah. And that's why it's called diecast. You create a dye that you cast all of the ensuing ones from.

Yeah. And I think they're made with less metal than they used to be. Um but they they still have metal components right?

Oh, yeah. I haven't seen a new one in a while. I haven't either, but I'm almost positive they do. And apparently they're still about like a dollar.

Oh, really? Yeah. I was on the Hot Wheels collector site today and like they kept making reference to about a dollar. So So just what's called the mainline.

Yeah. The ones that they make on mass, the citation. Exactly. Um I'll bet if you got your hands on that 1983 citation, it'd be worth a few bucks. You're right.

Um but they kept referring to the the mainline stuff. So about a dollar. Well, they've just kept making their manufacturing cheaper and cheaper, so they've maintained that cost, I guess.

Yeah. Uh, so as far as collecting goes, uh, the most valuable, and that is not, um, this crazy one made out of diamonds for the 40th anniversary, uh, which we'll talk about in a minute, but the most valuable regular hot wheel is the, uh, the 68 Beach Bomb, which was a VW bus in hot pink that had um, real surfboards sticking out of the back of it.

Yeah. Originally, um, they only released, I think, 25 of them like that. There were a couple of problems. It was difficult to manufacture them with the surfboards sticking out of the back, even though it was more realistic.

Sure. And it also um was terrible on like a loop-de-loop track. Yeah. Cuz I guess the surfboards would either weigh them down or it would get stuck.

Yeah. So, they they only made just a few of these things. the the beach bomb that was the highest selling um the Hot Wheels ever was a pink one. They made even fewer of those because apparently a lot of boys were like, "I'm not playing with some pink van even if it does have cool surfboards sticking out of the back."

So the thing sold for like I think 70 something $75,000 in 2000. Yeah. And it has since sold again in 2011 I saw in like LA magazine for like 125,000.

Yeah. It's a lot of money for a tiny little car. Yeah, it is. And that's the highest one ever apparently. Um by a long shot, too.

Yeah. Um I mean I've seen others that were worth like uh 10 grand and stuff like I think one of those 442 originals is like 10 grand.

Yeah. I guess like a 1970 mongoose or Cobra are worth about 10 grand these days. Um, and a lot of them, just like with any collector's item, um, you'll see if there was just a few of them made, obviously they're going to be worth a lot more. Um, if there was something that where they adjusted the design, like for example, the uh, Python was originally called the Cheetah.

Yeah. And then they found out that a real life executive with real life lawyers at GM owned the name Cheetah.

Yeah. Because apparently GM executives just own names for cars that could potentially be used

like every anast animal name. Right. Exactly. Uh so they changed it to the the Python, but they're they that was after they'd started manufacturing the cheetah. So there's some out there that say cheetah.

Yeah. Uh stamped on the bottom. And if you have one of those, it's worth 10 grand.

Yeah. It's funny to think about. It's the same with Star Wars. Like sometimes the the mistake ones are the ones that are super valuable because

like there was some recall, but they're like, "Oh, but you want that one because the uh Boba Fett's rocket really shot out before kids started choking on them,

right? Or catching on fire." Yeah. And that's the one you want. Yeah. But like you said, it's all about scarcity and supply and demand.

Dude, this whole thing has reminded me of um a really great gallery I put together about hilarious knockoff toys.

Oh, that's a good one. Yeah. Go to stuffyougenc.com and look that up. It's pretty awesome. There's some really strange interpretations of beloved toys, including Star Wars toys, that people

who make counterfeit toys come up with to try to skirt trademark law maybe or something. Or else they just fully don't understand the toy and what its allure is, so they just make it in this weird interpretation. It's pretty hilarious stuff.

Yeah, it's a good one. We'll post that again. Okay. Um, and then I did mention the diamond studded one. I always think these things are just ridiculous, but um, like to take any like the diamond studded bra was worth, you know.

Oh, yeah. I forgot million bucks. I just always think it's kind of dumb. But they did make a 40th anniversary in uh edition in 19 I'm sorry in 2008 with uh 2700 little diamonds and rubies for tail lights and uh black diamonds for the tires and all that stuff. 18 karat white gold body. But um it's worth 140 or it cost $140,000 to put together. But I'm sure you know

it's goddy. It's a gaudy Hot Wheels. Yeah. The car is cool. It looks like Mad Max's car. Oh, you got Is that a picture of it? Yeah, I don't think I saw that.

Can you identify that car? Uh, what is that? It looks familiar. It does look familiar to me.

Sort of like a Delorean, but I don't think it is. I don't think so either. No, man. That new Mad Max looks good, though.

Oh, they're remaking Mad Max. Well, there's a a new reboot, I guess, is what they call it these days.

Cool. Who's in it? Um, what's his face? Uh, that played uh Bane. Um, who's that guy? Tom uh Tom, what's his face?

Hu? No, not Tom Hston. But uh it looks it's the same director. Tom Hardy. Yeah, Tom Hardy. But it's the same director from all the MadMax series. So it's

Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. And it just looks the whole It's supposed to be just like one long intense chase battle.

Yeah. Sounds a lot like a Mad Max movie. Yep. That's what you want. Have you ever seen Vanishing Point?

Uh I think so. What is that? It was like uh man, I can't remember the car, but the car was basically the star. It was one long car chase from like

I think um Colorado to California. Yeah, I remember that. That's a good one from the 70s.

Yeah, two-lane black top, too. Challenger. That's another Challenger. The car. Yeah,

I haven't seen that one. Yeah, that's a good one. That one weirdly had uh James Taylor in it

when he was young and like on drugs and cool. Were they apologizing to France? No, I don't know what the deal was.

Did you hear about that? No. So that whole Charlie Hebdo um like solidarity march, the US sent like Yeah.

I think the assistant deputy in charge of the USDA or something like that. Um so to apologize, John Kerry had um James Taylor go to France to perform You've Got a Friend.

Shut up. For the French government. Yeah. Just talk about embarrassing. I know. Isn't it?

Send Guns and Roses or something at least like Well, not send guns Guns and Roses from 1988.

I I would like Guns and Roses, man. Oo. Uh, one more thing about collecting. If you wanted to be the coolest collector of Hot Wheels on the planet, you would have to build a time machine and go back to 1987 to my hometown of Toledo, Ohio.

Oh, yeah. which is where the first ever Hot Wheels convention, collector's convention was held. I really wish I would have gone to that because I was there at the time.

What year was it? 87. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I can't believe we sent James Taylor. I'm still just like,

yeah, I can't focus on anything. Well, if you want to know more about James Taylor or Hot Wheels or just about anything there is in the universe, you can type it into the search bar at houseuffworks.com. And uh since I said search bar, it's time for listener mail.

Uh I'm going to call this um minimum wage argument, not argument, proposal. All right.

Uh listen to how homelessness works from quite a few years ago. And you guys commented that part of the problem was that low minimum wage in comparison to cost of renting a two-bedroom apartment. Uh you'd have to work something like 87 per hours uh 87 hours per week to afford it. With the implication we need to raise minimum wage. Uh after hearing this, a clear solution occurred to me. I think uh disagreements on raising minimum wage as a result was simple misunderstanding. Uh on the raise side, people believe this wage should be set at a level that would allow someone to raise a few children and live a modest but reasonably comfortable level or at least a safe level. On the don't raise it side, people believe minimum wage is just a starting point for working. Uh like for teenagers at their summer job or after school. Uh this side believes workers should uh were never intended to and should not expect to be able to

support a family that pays minimum wage. Uh so here's my solution. Since we're a democracy here, let's just decide what it is supposed to accomplish and then set it at the appropriate level to do that. If we decide as a nation that someone should be able to raise a family, rent a two-bedroom apartment while earning a wage, minimum wage, let's just figure out what that would cost and set the wage there. or figure in rent, clothing, food, uh, utilities, transportation, etc. Let's say it's 27 grand per year, then set it at that rate. On the other hand, if we as a nation decide that minimum wage is just a starting point and not meant to support a family, it's intended for people with no work history or experience and low to no marketable skills, and we need to set minimum wage at a relatively low level and let the market uh, the free market will ultimately determine the wage for entry- level workers. and workers historically

have been able to increase compensation by gaining skills and good work history. Uh with this settled, any argument about setting minimum wage at a living wage would be mistaken because we all just decided that people are not meant to live on minimum wage and certainly not meant to support a family. That is from Joe Prohaskca in uh Reno, Nevada. And uh interesting. I look forward to seeing the rebuttal emails.

Yeah, I love that kind of stuff. Yeah, it's a great proposal. I mean, I I think that is what it's based on.

Sure. But as far as I know, the cost of living calculations are really out of date.

Yeah. And take a lot of stuff into account that doesn't really apply any longer.

Plus, regardless of what you think it should or should not be, the fact is adults with two kids are still going to be working these jobs. It's not just going to be teenagers looking to advance. But it would be nice to to put that issue to bed to say like this is what we're trying to achieve or this is not what we're trying to achieve,

right? At the very least to get everybody talking. Yeah. Cuz should some teenager at his first job make like 14 bucks an hour?

I don't know. I don't know if that's sending the right message either. I don't know.

I don't know. We'll leave it up to you guys, our dear listeners. When I started working, it was like three bucks an hour or something. It was ridiculously low.

That is ridiculously low. Yeah. Uh, if you want to let us know how you feel about Joe's proposal, was it Joe?

I believe it was Joe. Reno Joe. Reno Joe. Uh, you can tweet to us at syskodcast. You can post it on facebook.com/stuffyou should know. You can put it in an email at stuffpodcast@ousstuffworks.com. And, uh, just for kicks, you can hang around our home on the web, stuffyous knowow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit house stuffworks.com.

Hey friends, just want to let you know our friends at Squarespace have partnered with the dude Jeff Bridges in a really cool thing called www.dreamingwithff.com. And this is something Jeff Bridges actually came up with. It's a project where he has his friends in various locations around LA with these cool relaxing sounds and guided meditations and stories designed to lull you asleep. It's really neat. And he's also the face of No Kid Hungry, which is a great charity group you should look into. So check out ww.dreamingwith.com dreamingwithjff.com and uh see what the dude in Squarespace has going

Questions about this episode

What is "SYSK's 12 Days of Christmas… Toys: How Hot Wheels Work | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW" about?

This content explores the fascinating mechanics behind Hot Wheels toys, emphasizing their nostalgic value and cultural impact during childhood. It highlights the significance of collecting, the different conditions of toys, and the joy they bring to both children and adult enthusiasts alike.

What is mentioned in this Stuff You Should Know episode?

76 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Hot Wheels, Matchbox, minimum wage, Amy Lynn Bradley, James Taylor, Matchbox cars. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "SYSK's 12 Days of Christmas… Toys: How Hot Wheels Work | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"?

The episode runs 42 min; the transcript is about 8,160 words in 236 timestamped sections.

More from Stuff You Should Know

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated December 15, 2025.