Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Steven Coleman. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alright, Steven thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

Honey Bomb Toys grew out of a passion for art of all kinds since I was a child. Ive always been drawn to creating in any medium I could get my hands on and as I grew up, I knew I wanted to make it a main part of my life. The normal things took over my time, family, mortgage, 9-5 to pay the bills, but I always had it in the back of my mind that I wanted to turn my art into more than just a hobby and it really took off for me personally once I switched from 2d art on paper over to 3d design. I’m self taught, which I think works for me better than being school taught. I learned the process a piece at a time. If I had a design I was bringing to life and didn’t know how to get to the next step, I’d learn that little piece and over the course of about 9 months Ive hit a stage where anything I’m wanting to do, I’m able too.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

At Honey Bomb Toys I make collectible toys, designed, produced, painted, packaged and shipped all under one roof. The toys and collectibles are mostly parody and humorous, something to make you smile. Drawing inspiration from pop culture or niche markets, I’m trying to put a smile on people faces and generally just put out something thats cool to have on your shelf of desk. The business is as new to me as it is to the world. Its 100% driven by myself from concept, design and finished product, but that wouldn’t be possible without the support of my wife and kids. Their feedback on works in progress, constructive criticism and ability to work schedules around what this business needs to take care of is invaluable. My work is mainly about bringing joy to other people, I’m not solving any major world issues or providing a product that fixes something that’s broken, but I’m aiming to make people smile and laugh and generally just be a little happier when they get something from Honey Bomb Toys. I know the kinds of things that I personally am in to when it comes to collectible toys, vinyl toys, pop culture art, and I generally try to focus on the same types of things that I as a consumer would enjoy. If like something, surely there is someone else out there that likes the same.

We’d really appreciate if you could talk to us about how you figured out the manufacturing process.

Manufacturing of all the products Honey Bomb Toys sells is done in house by myself. When I started I had absolutely no idea how to manufacture a collectible toy. I knew that creatively I could design them on paper but that was all I had. I had to learn every step one at a time. I knew I had to take it from paper to 3d, this was the biggest hurdle. I didn’t want to pay someone else to do that for me. One reason was due to the cost, but the main reason was that I felt that if someone else 3d designed my Ideas that they would lose the feel I was trying to convey in them. Its really interesting how every artist puts their spin on something without even trying, and being done by someone else, something as small as an arm bent one way or a lip or nose at a slightly different angle puts an entirely different spin on how it all looks. So I taught myself how to 3d design in Blender. It started slow, just in my spare time but then became all consuming with how much I was enjoying it. When I start a new project, it overtakes my mind with how much I want to just work on it until its finished. It never feels like work, its always enjoyable.
After I had the 3d design down, I need to take it from the computer to reality. I taught myself the 3d printing world and all that comes with it. There is a lot of trial and error in this area, more than I thought there would be. Next came the packaging. At first I would ship everything in just the standard brown cardboard box with bubble wrap, but I felt something was missing. I wanted people to feel like they were receiving a real product when they bought it, not just something tossed in a box with a shipping label slapped onto it. This lead me to learn Photoshop so that I could design the images and then I had to learn how to make the actual boxes the products would come in. This felt like completion to me, it felt like a real product, something that would be on the shelves in stores, which is what I aspire to achieve one day.

How’d you think through whether to sell directly on your own site or through a platform like Amazon, Etsy, Cratejoy, etc.

All sales for Honey Bomb Toys are currently run through Etsy which is linked in the main website.
Etsy was the natural choice when I first started as I knew nothing about shipping, postal fees and deadlines and it has held strong for me thus far. The vibe on Etsy is nice, all my clientele are very honest and open, and if there has ever been any type of problem, Ive felt nothing but love from people on finding a solution.
In fact, when I first started, I received some of the best advice ever from a client who was not entirely happy with his purchase, He himself was small business owner and instead of just leaving a bad review, took the time to offer up advice on production value, and how important it is to keep in touch and update clients on every step of the process in their order. His advice was invaluable and I really feel like the company took a turn for the better after I took in the constructive criticism and made it work for me.
I have plans to branch out into Amazon and other platforms soon and am looking forward to the new doors that will open when that day comes.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.honeybombtoys.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/honey.bomb.toys/
• Twitter: https://x.com/Honeybombtoys
• Other: www.etsy.com/shop/honeybombtoysTikTok: honey.bomb.toys