Source: Fortune
Summary
A Harris Poll survey found that 80% of U.S. adults engaged in playful activities for their own enjoyment in the past year, with millennials and Gen Z spending significant amounts on blind boxes and other nostalgic items. The trend, called “kidulting,” reflects a desire for physical, tangible experiences and a shift away from screen-based entertainment. Libby Rodney of The Harris Poll described the blind box economy as a “physical lotto ticket” that offers joy and self-care. Older millennials, despite limited free time, spend more on hobbies than any other generation, according to Bank of America data.
Our Reading
The numbers tell one story.
Older millennials spend more on hobbies than any other group.
Blind boxes and toys are a form of self-care for many.
Nostalgia drives a significant portion of consumer spending.
The trend reflects a shift away from screen-based entertainment.
The blind box economy is the claw machine scaled to a generation.
Author: Evan Null
The nostalgia hook
Nostalgia is a big draw for millennials, the Harris survey found. Among millennials, 87% say they feel more emotionally connected to a brand when it taps into their childhood memories, and 86% appreciate it when brands make adult versions of things they loved as kids. Asked what makes a product feel designed for adults rather than kids, 39% of Americans picked “nostalgic references adults understand.”
A separate Harris survey for printing company Quad, released Oct. 14, found 68% of Americans collect at least one type of physical item, including toys and figures (26%) and trading cards (22%). The top reason was nostalgia, cited by 46%.
The toy industry has rebuilt itself around the grown-up buyer. Adult-only households accounted for 55% of U.S. toy sales in the first half of 2026, according to Circana, and that segment grew 16% through June. “At a demographic level, the toy industry’s growth continues to be fueled increasingly by older consumers,” Circana said, as reported by Retail Dive. Wall Street sees it in earnings, too. Hasbro reported Tuesday that revenue at Wizards of the Coast, home of Magic: The Gathering, rose 31% in the third quarter, and that Magic topped $600 million in quarterly revenue for the first time.
Even Toys “R” Us, which liquidated its U.S. stores in 2018 after a 2017 bankruptcy filing, plans to open 120 new standalone stores this holiday season.
Something to hold
The third draw is physical. After a decade of living through their phones, consumers want things they can touch. In the Quad survey, 84% of Americans said owning physical items feels more satisfying than owning digital ones, and 80% said they’re drawn to real-world experiences that don’t revolve around screens. Seventy-five percent said a simpler relationship with technology feels like a lifestyle upgrade, not a sacrifice.
Ernesto Pagano, global sector leader for media at Boston Consulting Group, sees the same shift in his firm’s research. “There is now a social stigma about spending too much time on screens,” he told Fortune. A recent BCG report led by Pagano estimates that “location-based entertainment,” the category that includes theme parks, has the highest revenue yield of any type of media, averaging $3.47 per hour of consumer time, about nine times video’s 39 cents.
BCG also asked consumers which media they regretted spending time on, he said. Many named social media and gaming. “What you find is they don’t regret the experiences.”
Rodney said she thinks collecting is partly about proving you exist offline. Younger consumers, she said, “are just collecting things because they want to showcase that they have a physical presence in the world.”
The stigma fades
Adults playing with toys used to be a punchline. Rodney pointed to The 40-Year-Old Virgin, the 2005 comedy whose hero’s action-figure collection was the joke. That was “basically making fun of kidulting,” she said. “Whereas now kidulting is mainstream. It’s cool.”
Some embarrassment lingers. Forty-nine percent of Americans, and 60% of millennials, sometimes feel judged for enjoying things considered childish. But only 12% say embarrassment stops them from spending more.
Critics see something darker. Author Keith Hayward, a University of Copenhagen criminologist, argued in his 2024 book Infantilised: How Our Culture Killed Adulthood that Western culture has stopped people from growing up. Rodney rejected the premise. “The idea that people can be multidimensional and have careers, mortgages and families and still want to play with Legos and go to theme parks isn’t a horrible thing,” she said. “There’s just so many more ways to adult in this world than we’ve ever imagined.”
There are daunting economics behind the retreat. The median first-time homebuyer in the U.S. is now 40, the oldest on record, and first-time buyers made up just 21% of purchases, a record low, according to the National Association of Realtors’ 2025 Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers. Fifty-one percent of millennials told Harris they’d rather spend on kidult things than save the money. Among everyone who plays, 46% said affordability makes them more likely to buy, second only to relaxation.
