P-O-P People to Watch: Ricardo Solar, Mattel

Title: Senior Director of Strategic Sales Planning, Mattel, El Segundo, CAAge: 39Education: National Autonomous University, Mexico (BA, Industrial Design); Technological Institute of Monterrey, Mexico Why he's one to watch: Leads development of Mattel's in-store displays, category management, account planning and retail promotions; collaborating with Wal-Mart on its future toy department Ricardo Solar has literally moved up the ranks at Mattel -- from Mexico to Miami to El Segundo, CA (the global headquarters). Joining the Mexico office in 1998 as a senior manager for boys' brands like Hot Wheels and Tyco, he now oversees all brand merchandising in the U.S. market -- currently collaborating on Wal-Mart's toy department of the future, an example of how far he's climbed.As senior director of strategic sales planning, Solar's team is responsible for category management, visual merchandising, account planning and retail promotions. He cites his best work as store-within-store concept shops and totally redesigned toy departments -- hence, working with Wal-Mart's merchandising and marketing teams to develop a new toy department that he says "brings excitement to the category and facilitates the experience to moms." His road to Mattel began 13 years ago, when he opened a design shop with college buddies in Mexico. "A very romantic idea, which was probably best labeled as a non-profit cause," he jokes. The shop worked mostly for children's science museums, creating interactive and educational exhibits based on physics principles, biology and more.Then a friend tapped Solar to join his strategic merchandising agency, introducing him to P-O-P. "In retrospect, this made a lot of sense, because P-O-P has the same needs as a kids' museum: lots of interaction, education and good design with high-resistance materials to survive constant abuse."Mattel later stepped in, and soon, he opened the company's trade marketing department in Mexico, where he dramatically increased the brand's P-O-P investment. His success relocated him to Miami, Mattel's Latin America office, where he opened trade marketing departments in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Venezuela. "With my team, we did the first multiple, pan-regional merchandising and promotional programs that helped reduce our inventories after Christmas and promoted sales of new products in non-seasonal periods." Promoted to California, Solar quickly adjusted. "In the U.S., analytics plays a more important role and areas like category management and account planning needed more of my attention," he says. "You just can't come out with an idea and think that it will be executed in a couple of months in all stores. In Latin America, the biggest retailer has no more than 400 stores. In the U.S., stores are counted in thousands and budgets are in the millions."Solar says Mattel has upped its display investment, too, and in response to the recent Information Resources data that claimed a dip in overall display activity, he says, "I'm aware of the recent trends on clean-store policies, but I believe that high touch is still a critical component to drive sales and every time that we invest at the point of purchase, we see a lift. Sometimes, I see that these things are cyclical. Today they may want the stores to look clean, and tomorrow they may want to go back to brand statements and interactivity."

P-O-P People to Watch: Ricardo Solar, Mattel

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