It was a combination of soccer, Hasbro Inc. and Bryant University that brought Meghan Gamboa to Rhode Island, where she now works as co-founder and senior vice president of marketing and retail sales for Ageless Innovation LLC in Pawtucket.
She mostly focused on the Ageless Innovation brand called Joy for All, which makes animatronic cats and dogs marketed as a way to bring comfort and companionship to the elderly without the fuss of owning a real pet. The Joy for All cat can purr, meow, close its eyes, open its mouth, turn its head and more. The dog barks, wags its tail and has a “heartbeat” you can feel.
Research has shown that Joy for All’s animals can help combat what has become an epidemic of loneliness among the elderly, which has been accentuated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Clinically validated evidence also indicates positive effects for those suffering from dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.
“It’s not just a stuffed toy,” Gamboa said. “It’s important for us to have videos so people can see what they can do.”
Gamboa, 41, grew up in Pepperell, Mass., and attended Bryant because she was offered a scholarship, based in part on her soccer skills. But what won her over about Bryant was the university’s internship program at Hasbro, the toy and entertainment giant based in Pawtucket.
“Hasbro seemed like it would be a fun place to work,” she said. “You’re dealing with iconic toys and brands you grew up with. It just sounded like fun – and it was.”
Gamboa started working at Hasbro while still attending Bryant, assigned to the company’s on-site testing center.
She was at Hasbro for 16 years, eventually reaching the level of senior director of U.S. marketing for franchises and new brands, including My Little Pony and Littlest Pet Shop. One of her projects was FurReal Friends, a line of electronic robotic animals.
In 2015, Hasbro executive Ted Fischer noticed that some animatronic toys were being purchased for grandparents, and the company researched the phenomenon. Hasbro recruited people in their 70s and 80s, brought them to Hasbro’s Fun Lab, and watched them play with the toys.
Among other things, Gamboa says, seniors were looking for an enhanced level of realism in the toy pets. The cat whiskers had to be tapered; the animals should have paw pads. While the dogs will respond to a voice by turning their heads and wagging their tales, cats do not because, well, they’re cats.
By 2018, Fischer bought the Joy for All brand from Hasbro in a friendly management spinoff and started Ageless Innovation. A few members of the team at Hasbro who were responsible for Joy for All joined Fischer.
Gamboa had left Hasbro in 2017 to spend more time with her children, but then she heard from Fischer about this new opportunity. “I jumped right back in,” she said. “Best decision I ever made.”
The company now has nine employees, although Gamboa believes the company will be hiring more employees soon.
Gamboa’s duties now include brokering agreements with retail outlets and managing relationships with retailers such as Amazon.com Inc., Walmart Inc., CVS Health Corp. and Walgreens Co.
The development continues on Joy for All’s offerings.
Besides a dog and cat, the company has developed an animatronic bird, the Walker Squawker, which attaches to a walker with a magnetic strip.
The product was the brainchild of a woman in her 90s who is the mother of one of Gamboa’s Hasbro colleagues. She used a walker herself and thought it would be nice to have something to remind her to use it. The bird – either a cardinal or a bluebird – sings as the walker is used.
Gamboa is keeping mum about future upgrades to the animatronics but says her vision is that the company’s Joy for All products should always function primarily as pet companions for the elderly.
Could the animals talk? They could, Gamboa says, but that would run counter to the intention of the products.
“For me, it would feel insincere for them to talk as a cat or a dog,” she said. “It wouldn’t seem realistic if they talked.”
That adherence to realism has paid off so far. The company, which does not disclose revenue figures, sells products in more than 40 countries. Ageless Innovation has a warehouse in the United Kingdom to serve its European customers and another in the U.S.
The global reach of the company keeps Gamboa busy.
She wakes up to whatever’s happening in Europe, then checks in with the East Coast and follows the time zones to the West Coast. Like any executive, Gamboa has to worry about inflation, supply chain issues such as a shortage of cargo ships, and disruptions in China that could affect production.
At home, she has two children and her husband, Pablo, whom she met at Bryant. And of course, they have three cats and two dogs.
Gamboa says her work at Ageless Innovation is fulfilling.
“I hope to be doing this a lot longer,” she said. “We’re just at the beginning of the ways we can bring fun and joy and happiness to older adults.”
