Originally gaining popularity in 1970 through a sponsorship of Al Unser's Indy 500 winning car, Johnny Lightning cars were produced from 1969-1971 to compete with Mattel's Hot Wheels brand by the Topper Corporation. In 1971, the Topper Corporation was liquidated and Johnny Lightning cars were no longer produced until 1994 when the Playing Mantis Corporation created reproductions of the original series. The Playing Mantis is now a part of the RC2 Corporation which also owns Ertl.
When the Topper Corporation originally released Johnny Lightning cars, they were able to compete with Hot Wheels for two reasons. They aggressively marketed Johnny Lightning as a much faster car and they would include a "White Lightning" version of each release. These were the same cars with different colors, options, or badging. The White Lightning cars were hard to find as they only accounted for approximately 1% of the total production run and were randomly shipped with the normal versions. These cars have become a Holy Grail in the diecast collecting world and were the original "hunt cars" or "chase cars".