Kids and “kids at heart” have lost someone that shaped many of their childhoods, as Playmobil founder Horst Brandstaetter died on June 3 at the age of 81.
The Bavarian native launched the popular range of plastic toys in the 1970s.
Geobra Brandstaetter Stiftung, which Brandstaetter owned, announced his passing without further detail.
He joined the family firm, then run by two of his uncles, in 1952.
According to the company, some 2.8 billion of the figures, including knights, cowboys, farm animals and dinosaurs, have been produced since then.