On the 30 of January 1995, the United States filed an antitrust suit against Playmobil USA, Inc. At the time, it was alleged that Playmobil USA, Inc. had been engaging in price fixing and conspiracy to do so. Within its market structure, it was stated that Playmobil USA, Inc. willingly and knowingly participated in these acts and the Final Judgment punishes the company justly in the eye of the law.
	Playmobil USA, Inc. is the domestic distributor of toys manufactured in Germany by the Playmobil company. To simplify things, I will refer to Playmobil USA, Inc as “Playmobil,” please note that this does not infer any responsibility by the German company in the anti-trust case. Playmobil, upon importing toys, would send the toys to retailers. Small ma-and-pa toy stores and large chains alike carried these poseable figurines and their playsets. The US Department of Justice alleges that, in order to keep prices high, Playmobil would publish “Suggested” Retail Price and harass and punish dealers that would not comply.
	Instances described are not limited to harassing contact and allowing local competition to sell the toys in manners to punish the infringing retailers. This act is known as price fixing and is generally understood to be per se illegal. Although not individually charged because of the coercion impressed upon them by Playmobil, the retailers are mentioned as co-conspirators who are also responsible in the price fixing. Playmobil did not produce a defense, but the economist may assume that the company 
engaged in price fixing to encourage the value of the product to remain high. If retailers were allowed to mark prices as they felt, it may become impossible to sell new units at the desired retail price.
	Both aspects of this market are dealing with monopolistically competitive terms. The retailer market is of this nature because small specialized toy shops may compete successfully alongside large chains due to the wide variety of product on the market. This creates a situation where there may be demand outside what is offered by large stores and allows small stores to compete with a similar (but not substitute) product. This philosophy translates to Playmobil who is creating a toy that has many similar, but not identical competitors. In today’s market, toy retailers range from big box stores such as Wal-Mart and Target to specialty toy discount stores like Toys R Us all the way down to Larson’s Toys and Games on Lane Ave in Columbus (an excellent example of a specialty toy store surviving among the larger retailers). Examples of similar products to Playmobil are produced by many major companies, Hasbro, Fisher-Price, and smaller companies such as Kubrick create figurines with playsets as well.
