James Moore: Barbie gives her boss the cold shoulder

Outlook: It is not only because of the increasingly dated dolls

It isn’t only Page Three’s pneumatic blondes that are falling out of favour. Barbie is also on the slide and, after a fifth quarterly decline in sales, Mattel’s chief executive, Bryan Stockton, has paid the price.

It is not only because of the increasingly dated dolls. Stockton’s problem is that he has failed to find a replacement that found favour with today’s children.

In part, that is down to the proliferation of electronic toys, but it is also thanks to a Disney film which, while not without critics, offers more positive role models than Barbie, and which has found favour with many as parents as children. Mr Stockton has, in effect, been Frozen out. It’s a chill wind that blows.