Empire Toys Vehicles for 8″-12″and Beyond

Empire Toys (a division of Carolina Industries) was involved in all kinds of cool toys (among other plastic items for holiday decorations and more)! Some of their better known items dates back to the 1970s. They made toys that were add-ons to other major (and knockoff) brands. Items were molded in all kinds of plastic colors to reflect the theme of the toy, while sharing the same molds. Toys were themed in attempts to link them to other toy lines as “must haves”. The accessories were many and shared among the different models, never failing to offer plenty of variety and sometimes scaled in and out of lines. In any case, these beauties are very collectible, loose or boxed and can require significant space to display.

Helicopters

The helicopters (sometimes referred on the boxes as just “copters”) all shared the same basic design. Each model was in different colors and they used both superhero and non-superhero models. the stickers came in the box on a sheet that would be applied by the child who owned it 9or perhaps his parents). The front windshields lifted up and technically you could pretty much get any action figure up to 12″ inside. the bases were nothing more than cheap brittle plastic that the body of the helicopter basically rested on, barely clipping on and typically if you put too much pressure on them they would break. The slew of accessories sure made them fun, but I am still trying to figure out how Hulk or Spiderman would ever need or use this…love the 1970s!!

Old Ad for Megos and Empire Batman Helicopter

Vans

Vans were made ..well why not? Everyone needs a way to get around, right? They followed the same type of process: reusing molds in various colors to fit a theme. Something to note on all of these toys is that they typically had a photo on the front and an illustration on the back of the box. In some instances, they did use a painting for the front of the box. The one difference is the Volkswagen Camper which actually has some different parts even though the base design is the same.

Jeeps

Again, the same idea behind these but the variety was more vast. Empire Toys added military and more themes into their jeep toys. The jeep boxes show the most wide use of other toy manufacturers dolls as model on their boxes.