In the hot seat: we meet Hot Wheels' design boss

500 million Hot Wheels are made each year...

The cars might be miniature but the fun isn't, thanks to a playful attitude

Is designing miniature toy cars the best job in the world? “There’s no maybe about it,” says Hot Wheels’ creative chief, Craig Callum. “In the toy design world, we create fun for kids.

We’re thinking on a daily basis about what would a kid love, what would make a kid happy and what would develop them. Working with all that in mind is really rewarding. There’s nothing on earth that kids’ laughter isn’t the medicine for.”

Callum channels the playful attitude that sparked Hot Wheels into life. Launched in 1968 as the brainchild of Elliot Handler (whose wife Ruth brought Barbie dolls to market), the very first example was a blue custom Chevrolet Camaro, part of the original ‘sweet sixteen’ line-up rich in muscular American flair. 

The portfolio is now far more diverse: a typical range contains about 450 cars, around half of them fresh that year, always split between manufacturer-licensed real models and wackier Hot Wheels Originals, which envisage everything from pie-in-the-sky supercars to wheeled toilets. “Still with the proportions of a pick-up truck, though,” grins Callum.

So how does a young man from Sandy, Bedfordshire, end up designing toys of the future at Mattel’s Californian headquarters?

Callum’s love for cars started aged five during the school run in his mum’s Citroën 2CV: “A bunch of students were hanging out the roof of a 2CV alongside, cheering and laughing when they saw us. I was like: ‘Wow, cars can create this kind of reaction in people.’”

He was soon sketching cars of his own. “I’d design wacky hotels on wheels with helicopter pads, things like that. Mum said: ‘You could be a car designer.’ I knew straight away that’s what I wanted to do.”

After an automotive design course at Coventry University, Callum worked on full-scale vehicles for several years until a job offer from Lego (a childhood love of his, alongside Matchbox and Hot Wheels) arrived.

After nine years there, during which time he introduced the Speed Champions line, Callum moved to the US to work as Hot Wheels’ design manager in late 2022, his eclectic collection of classic cars slowly following him over.

He enjoys early access to new sports cars and supercars – an essential privilege when Mattel’s own design process takes 12-18 months and its toys launch in close alignment with the products to which they pay tribute.

Piecing together a Hot Wheels car isn’t simply a case of shrinking a real one down to a 1:64-scale mould; the design team must dig deeply into the character of the car they’re making to successfully work its proportions around their stock wheel sizes, all while keeping the end product irresistibly affordable.

“Making a perfectly accurate 1:64-scale car for $1 is a big challenge,” affirms Callum.

The designers increasingly utilise AI and 3D printing, the latter quickly popping a metal die-cast prototype into their palms, ready for rigorous testing on those iconic orange tracks. “We make sure they’re capable of doing a loop-the-loop so we know they’re all totally capable on track,” says Callum.

"It’s not always tough work, then. “All designers are striving to hold on to that five-year-old’s joy and creativity,” he smiles. “We’re trying to not grow up as much as possible.”

Still, the company around him must mature as the push for sustainability amplifies. “I think the most sustainable thing we can do is produce a toy that lasts forever and is handed through generations.

"But we’re naturally looking at materials and their recyclability. Our packaging team is really on that, too. At Matchbox [another Mattel toy car brand], the packaging is already changing, and that’s coming to our suppliers soon.”

Callum will be a judge on this year’s Hot Wheels Legends Tour when it rolls into the UK in August, allowing folks with custom cars to compete for theirs to be turned into a toy sold worldwide. “I always love this leg of that tour,” he says, “because I think the UK just gets it. It brings really refined designs.”

Callum’s full-size car collection includes an array of hot rods and the 1970s Mini he’s had since passing his test aged 17. Is there a temptation to sneak those into a blister pack?

“I’m holding out for as long as possible before I force my cars into the range. Our Legends designs are all much better anyway! I would be doing them an injustice if I compared the work they do on their cars to my own.”