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Brio Trains

Article by

Dave Pecota

BRIO AB

If there is one toy company that has become synonymous with wooden train sets world-wide … it is BRIO.  This well-known Swedish company began making toys in 1907 and started selling “miniature railway” sets in 1957 (primarily for the European marketplace).

From the start, the BRIO sets had many similarities to the train sets made by Skaneateles Handicrafters.  The trains were virtually the same size ... round-head metal tacks were used to attach the wooden wheels ... and metal hook-eye couplers were used to link the trains.

More importantly however, each company’s hardwood track looked nearly identical, except for the connectors.  SH used a straight-cut connector design … BRIO used the now-familiar “peg and hole” design.  Each company’s trains could run happily on either type of track.  You just couldn’t directly connect SH and BRIO track together.  BRIO’s design actually provided more lateral “play” in the track, which allowed more track layout flexibility.

The two companies also differed in the “finish” they applied to their trains.  SH used a bees-wax coating on natural wood ... BRIO used glossy, multi-layer lacquer paints.

By 1964, BRIO customers could choose to buy trains with either hook-eye couplers or “floating” flat-disk magnetic couplers (an important innovation for these little train sets).  In 1974, BRIO received a US patent for “fixed” magnetic couplers which are secured by round-head metal tacks ... today’s most commonly used wood train coupler design.  And in 1977, BRIO opened the doors on its US subsidiary BRIO Corporation, in Milwaukee WI.

Pictured here are two vintage BRIO trains (ca. 1960’s) showing the two early coupler designs and the peg and hole track.  Also pictured is a personal favorite of the author … a box-cab engine with tiny pantographs on the cab roof (ca. 1978).  The unusual low-roof passenger cars may have only been available in this set.

Wooden railway sets became one of BRIO’s most successful product lines, and have been in continuous production for over 50 years.  The BRIO-style peg and hole track connector is probably today’s most widely used wooden track connector design.  One can also conclude that the parallel and sustained sales successes of the SH sets in the US and the BRIO sets in Europe, probably ensured future wooden train set compatibility world-wide.