Garage time
Most of the German toy manufacturers of the 1930s were located in the Nürnberg (more commonly known as Nuremberg these days) area, and the largest German toy fair, Internationale Spielwarenmesse, is still held annually in the city, drawing manufacturers and attendees from all over the world.
Of those Nuremberg-based firms, Tipp & Company a.k.a. Tipp&Co, TippCo or TCO, was a prominent manufacturer of tin plate toys, and we covered one of its products in the last edition of VW Toys.
Though it existed before WWII, after the war it was under new management and, by the end of 1948, its main product lines were toy motorcycles and scooters, cars, commercial vehicles, transporters, toy aeroplanes, filling stations, track sets and accessories. It was a bright and colourful product line, with high quality lithographed toys.
Plastic not so fantastic
By 1968, however, things had changed dramatically in the toy marketplace and, to keep up, Tipp&Co switched its production line
