Hall Of Fame
2022
Marlene & Charles Gabris
Marlene and Charles Gabris are celebrating 40 years in the toy business in the Sacramento/Folsom area this year. They have two BrainyZoo Toys locations: one located in the Folsom Premium Outlets and the other in the Historic District of Folsom. Marlene and Charles immigrated from South Africa in December 1979. Six months later their son David was born. Marlene, who has a degree & background in social work, became frustrated when she realized it was very difficult to find good quality educational toys for her son. That is when inspiration struck, and fulfilling this desire to encourage children’s development through toys became her passion. Marlene and Charles opened their home based toy business in 1982. Selling from their garage, their first customers were family, friends, and pre-schools till they opened their first toy store in 1984. Charles, who supported the family with his job as a computer programmer, started working alongside Marlene full-time when their second son, Marc, was born. Over the span of forty years, Marlene and Charles opened multiple stores in Sacramento and surrounding areas including a candy & stuff a bear store. They have hosted many fundraisers and events such as Neighborhood Toy Store Day. Always by Marlene’s side, Charles is forever ready for another trip to a toy show, and is even open to crazy ideas like the one that led them to open another toy store on Black Friday 2020; during Covid. Their two sons, David and Marc, have become Realtors but still help in the family business when needed with ideas, lease negotiations, and marketing. Marlene is one of the founding members of The Good Toy Group and also members of ASTRA. Their stores have been voted Best Toy Store in the Sacramento area by Style Magazine and KCRA3 TV for many consecutive years.
Date of Toy Retirement: Still Active
Stephanie Sala
Stephanie grew up in the industry since when her father was a toy designer and had his own toy company, Hoopla, which he eventually sold to Manhattan Toy. Sala started Five Little Monkeys in October of 2001 in Albany, CA and have since grown to 6 Bay Area locations. She started out in 2001 in an 840 square foot store thinking she would open a toy store and run it for a year then go on to Graduate School. 20+ years later, Stephanie has grown to 6 brick and mortar stores plus an online store and warehouse, all based in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Awards:
2019 WTHRA Toy Retailer of the Year
2016 ASTRA Toy Retailer of the Year
2010 Alameda County Woman Entrepreneur of the Year
Served on the Good Toy Group Board for 6 years
Served on the Good Toy Group Product Selection Committee for 8 years
Won numerous local “Best Toy Store” awards
Date of Toy Retirement: Still Active
Brian Turtle
Brian Turtle had a rather unorthodox and accidental entry into the Toy Industry. In January of 1994, he was a 20-year-old college kid in the town of Reading, Pennsylvania. That January, while snowed in and watching Footloose _on TV, he and his two pals came up what would eventually become known as _The Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. This movie-trivia type game of connecting actors from one movie to the next snowballed across campus and across the country, getting national recognition as they appeared on TV and Radio shows like Dateline NBC, The Jon Stewart Show and the Howard Stern Show (to name a few). By 1996, the game had inspired a best-selling paperback book (‘still shaking his head over that one!) which led them to the toy industry as the board game version of The Six Degrees… was the first product launched by Endless Games. Originally founded by industry veterans Mike Gasser (formerly of the Games Gang – makers of Pictionary, Balderdash, and others) and Kevin McNulty (also of the Games Gang, and Selchow & Righter – makers of Scrabble _and _Trivial Pursuit), Endless Games took a chance on this game and invited Turtle and his buddies to be “Demo Boys” at the New York Toy Fair in 1997. Once in the door, Turtle decided to stay a while, and was a part of Endless Games from that first Toy Fair, through the sale of the company 25 years later in 2021.
Because it was just Mike, Kevin and Brian for the first few years of starting Endless, they all “wore many hats” to keep things running. While Brian's title was National Sales Manager, a typical day normally involved much more than sales and management. I got to utilize all facets of my marketing degree by working on PR; writing copy for game rules, website and catalogs; developing new products with licensors and inventors; sourcing materials with factories; managing graphic artists on package and game design; and trying to be the best partner possible to the amazing reps and customers to get the products on store shelves.
In 2009, they developed the first true in-house hit with our Name 5 game. That led to more product development and started a separate licensing/development business called 3 By 5 LLC (Because there were 3 of us, and the first game was Name 5). Turtle was named company President and maintained that role until we sold 3 By 5 as a part of the sale of Endless Games.
Awards:
Brian often jokingly says "I’ve led a rather 'Forrest-Gumpish' life." He earned the Heroism medal from the Boy Scouts of America as a young boy after helping to rescue his family – and Spanish foreign exchange student – from our burning house during a fire in 1985. When he needed a little more discipline in his life during college, he joined the Army National Guard and was the Distinguished Honor Graduate of the US Army Finance School in 1995, and later earned “Soldier of the Year” honors in ’97. He was a POP (People of Play) person of the Week this past year, and have had the honor of being the host/emcee of the annual ASTRA Toy Industry Lip Sync Battle for the past 5 years. One of the biggest highlights of Turtle's career may have been when he was asked to host a panel of celebrities – including Kevin Bacon – to commemorate 20 years of the Six Degrees game at the South By Southwest (SXSW) conference in Austin TX in 2014.
Date of Toy Retirement or Still Active: Still Active