
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, November 3, 1995                   TAG: 9511030083
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: IRVINE, CALIF.                                 LENGTH: Short

NEW 'POG' INVESTORS TRY TO SAVE THE GAME

Investors have agreed in principle to rescue the maker of the ``POG'' cap- flipping game from bankruptcy, its founder said Thursday.

Alan Rypinski, who made his World POG Federation a winner in marketing the kids' game, said his stake in the company will fall from 78 percent to ``something less than 50 percent.''

The deal is subject to approval by creditors, including two vendors who recently filed suit to collect more than $250,000.

``This is something I've fought with all my soul,'' Rypinski said Wednesday. ``But we're in a spot, and this is the only way to get out of it. ... I'm taking the biggest haircut of all.''

Rypinski would not identify the new investors, but said they could take control as early as next week.

Beginning in 1993, World POG negotiated exclusive rights to the name ``POG'' from the Hawaiian dairy whose caps first were used in the game.

The game, which took off in Hawaii in 1992, was called pog because the caps came from a popular Hawaiian drink containing passion fruit, orange and guava.

The company then fought off legal challenges to its brand name.

Last year, World POG was hit by slumping sales and a flood of cheaper imitations, Rypinski said. Inventory swelled in anticipation of Christmas orders that never came.

by CNB