Polistil S.p.A. (initially called Politoys) is an Italian toy brand and former manufacturing company headquartered in Milan, with production center in Chiari, near Brescia. Polistil specialized in die-cast and plastic scale model vehicles of all sizes.
There is a new site about the world of toys and his History of Polistil Factory: "Quelli della Polistil" on www.quellidellapolistil.it
The company also made toy and model tanks, dolls, robots and TV tie-ins. After a 33-year span, and a collaboration with Tonka, Polistil went out of business in 1993, but now is a brand under the May Cheong Group (owner of the brand Maisto), along with the name of former competitor Bburago. Traditionally, the principal Italian competitors to Polistil were Mercury, Mebetoys, and the shorter run Ediltoys.
History
The origins of Politoys as a company are somewhat unclear. The company began as "Politoys APS" about 1960, and started production of 100 plastic cars in 1:41 scale (Sinclair 1979, pp. 387–388). Some of these were contemporary cars and some were veteran vehicles – like an Alfa racing car from the late 'teens and an 1899 French Gobron Brillie (Smeed 1980, p. 35). As the 1960s progressed, some models were produced in fiberglass – tougher than the plastic and less prone to warping. Following trends set by fellow Italian trailblazer Mercury, and Corgi Toys, Dinky Toys, Norev, and Solido, the company changed over to diecast metal vehicles in 1964 or 1965 (Rixon 2005, p. 36, Sinclair 1979, p. 387). About 1970, the company name was changed to Polistil, possibly because of the similarity with the name of the British Palitoy (Breithaupt No Date; Force 1992, 208–209). Still, some early toy boxes had the names 'APS', 'Polistil'. 'Politoys', and 'Policar' all on the box simultaneously (as seen on the blue Penny series boxes and in that order).
The company's main research and design center was in Milan. Larger toys for children were produced here, including large trucks and dolls. Most vehicles were made at the Chiari, Brescia manufacturing center which focused on the production of diecast vehicles (Polistil 1975).
Whereas more collector driven lines such as Rio Models or Brumm made the same models sometimes for decades, David Sinclair says that Polistil was more likely to confront market trends more directly – changing model lines every two or three years (Sinclair 1979, p. 387). As seen below, Polistil kept track of its vehicle lines using sets of capital letters followed by numbers, and not the use of series of numbers only.
M-Series
Most, but not all, of Polistil's lines were prefaced with letters: CE, RJ, S, MS, etc., but the company did not start with the beginning of the alphabet. With Politoys’ diecast 1:43 scale M-Series starting 1965, the company arguably became one of the most respected names of the decade in accurately diecast vehicles along with French Solido, fellow Italian Mebetoys and German Schuco (Rixon 2005, p. 80). Dinky and Corgi were also strong competitors and Politoys never matched their success in the United States nor did they produce as wide a range of models as those two leaders in the field.
Politoys’ 1:43 scale diecast M-Series line was introduced in 1965. The company had previously focused on plastic. The M series were precisely detailed with a wide range of offerings. Sixteen vehicles were introduced in the first year, with numbers starting at 500. The cars had many moving parts (normally 2 doors, hood and trunk opened) and the engines and even undercarriage had good detail. Plastic seats almost always tilted forward, and on some models they were covered with a fuzzy material that imitated velour.
Though companies like Corgi claimed to have the first model with all opening features in their 1963 Chrysler Ghia L6.4, Politoys M was the first diecast line where (for a time) all apertures opened on every model ! (Politoys 1968; Rixon 2005, p. 79; Gardiner and O'Neill 1996, pp. 72–73). This contrasted with Dinky and Corgi which tended towards the "toy" market with gimmicks and TV and movie vehicles. Politoys, however, went for consistent realism.