Two competitors and a storefront in Uptown Chandler.

YoYoFactory was started by people who already played the toy for a living. A business profile published by Visit Chandler, the tourism office of Chandler, Arizona, in June 2020 says the company was founded in 2004 by Benjamin “Benny” McPhee and Hans “YoHans” Van Dan Elzen, two yo-yo professionals who had won national and international competitions. The same profile places the company in Uptown Chandler, where it says YoYoFactory runs a retail storefront as well as its online store, and it invites readers to visit the shop both to buy yo-yos and to learn tricks. The profile presents the company’s work as part of a renewed interest in what it calls a century-old pastime.

The company’s own website, read in October 2026, gives its YoYo Team a page of its own next to the shop, with a separate section for team tricks and a blog.

The company’s name is written as one word, YoYoFactory, and on its website it uses the shorter form “YoYo” throughout its product names and collections, from beginner yo-yos to its titanium models. The Visit Chandler profile describes the yo-yos as works of art that blend functional technology with play, and it notes that the company makes several lines of both plastic and metal yo-yos.

A starburst system and a national tour.

The product most closely tied to the name is the F.A.S.T. 201. New Atlas, in a report by Mike Hanlon dated 20 February 2005, described it as “Hasbro’s new F.A.S.T. 201 Yoyo” and said Van Dan Elzen performed at the launch of a national United States tour introducing it, the F.A.S.T. 201 All Stars Tour, with an event at Toys “R” Us in Times Square, New York. The report explained the name: F.A.S.T. stands for Fully Active Starburst Technology, which it called a patented return system with a starburst inside that lets players adjust the yo-yo from beginner to advanced.

The same report described the tour as a travelling programme of professional demonstrators teaching tricks in several cities and inviting children to take a “F.A.S.T. Challenge”, with a trick book packed with each yo-yo and regional championships for those who mastered the set. The report said the yo-yo could be set to help children learn popular tricks such as “Walk the Dog”, “The Break-Away” and “The Skyrocket”, and that the trick book invited them to race against the clock or against their friends.

The yo-yo is still sold under the company’s own name. YoYoFactory’s website, read in October 2026, lists the “YoYoFactory F.A.S.T. 201 YoYo” as a starter yo-yo featuring Fully Active Starburst Technology, now marked as a registered trademark, with three adjustable response levels that players can move from beginner-friendly play to intermediate tricks as their skills grow.

The same idea of a yo-yo that grows with the player runs through the company’s newer entry-level models. Its website describes the Spinstar as part of “a brand new line of responsive entry-level yo-yos”, built around a Starburst response and a transaxle system that the company says need minimal maintenance. The Arrow, according to its product page, starts out responsive for learning the basics and then converts to unresponsive play with an upgrade bearing included in the pack, so that a beginner can move on to finger spins and longer combinations without buying a second yo-yo.

Design and documentation.

Kites and yo-yos are among the simplest objects in the toy trade: a frame and a sail on a line, or two halves joined by an axle and a string. Yet the names behind them range from small workshops and specialist shops to companies that sell through toy chains, sports retailers and their own websites, and some have changed hands more than once along the way.

These are toys that are meant to be performed. Kites are flown in public, on beaches, fields and at festivals, and yo-yos are thrown in front of friends, teachers and contest judges, so their brands often travel through demonstrations, events and the people who use them as much as through packaging. Colour, a clear name and a recognisable shape do much of the work when the product is seen in motion or at a distance.

Each guide separates what independent, dated sources record from what the company says about itself — who started it, who owns it now, where its products are designed and made and how its look has developed — and marks plainly what rests only on the company’s own word.

Dials, metals and a sorted range.

Adjustment runs through the range. The Visit Chandler profile singles out the Velocity, which it says includes a dial that lets players tune the yo-yo. YoYoFactory’s own product page, read in October 2026, describes the Velocity as having “Adjust-O-Matic Dials”, which the company says are patented, and says the dial switches it between classic responsive play and unresponsive settings used for more advanced tricks.

Players’ names are part of the product line. The company’s shop, read in October 2026, presents the Shutter as the signature model of the player Gentry Stein, made from 6061 aluminium, and lists a Shutter Wide Angle that it says was introduced at the 2017 World Yo-Yo Contest. Other models in the same shop are labelled as signature yo-yos or made “for” named team members, including the Thrive for Togo Katsuda, the Prevail for Katie Thompson and the Cartesia for Kento Noda. The shop also carries sponsorship and competitor registration for the Arizona State YoYo Contest, a contest held in the company’s home state.

The company’s shop is organised the way players talk about yo-yos rather than by age or price alone. Its website sorts the range into beginner, intermediate and pro yo-yos; by material, into plastic, metal, titanium and wood; and by style of play, into responsive, unresponsive, looping, finger-spin, classic and modern.

For a design guide, YoYoFactory shows how a brand built by players can make technical features its identity: a starburst system turned into an acronym, a dial turned into a product name, and a shop arranged in the terms its users already speak. Compare the older yo-yo name in our Duncan brand guidelines and the stunt-kite maker in our HQ Kites brand guidelines. For this guide we use starburst blue, dial orange and string lime with a sans, an unofficial interpretation; no product or logo is reproduced.

Keep YoYoFactory’s identity on hand — save it to a board in the Made Good inspiration library.