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toys in store but it’s great to keep up-to-date with what’s happening so that I can advise shoppers of new products hitting the big shops this year. It took us a long time to get the right mix of
products; for me, the number one thing to do is keep up-to-date and the most important thing is to know what your customers like and want. My customers love wooden toys and unique and unusual toys and gifts. We will do lots of research, and we may post out some pictures of products we may get in to see what reaction we get. My favourite section in the shop is the play food and kitchen area, and I am hoping to transform the area into a market section in the
next couple of months. We have a special play table in store with a
train set, kettle and breakfast set for children to play with. We have lots of toys out so that parents and grandparents can see how amazing the toys are. The kids are great, and by having the table and bits out parents can enjoy browsing the shop while their kids have fun. For us, this year’s all about letting local people know we are here and increasing the website traffi c. Growth is key for us this year, and increasing brand awareness. We have just launched our Birthday Club and we hope to fi nish off our play sections in store by decorating
the shop more for the children. We’re hoping to hold special events and we’re inviting children’s authors in for story time. I want to create a toy shop in which kids can enjoy being kids, use their imagination, go crazy and have fun; that’s what it’s all about. I love hearing them play, sometimes my shop is a supermarket, other times it’s a pirate ship, and some pretend it’s a castle. It will be the shop’s fi rst birthday on 12th October, so with six months to go I can’t wait to see what happens. We have already been so surprised with the reaction so far, I just can’t wait to share all of our secret plans later on in the year.
Michael Cleary owner, JKC Toymaster, Nenagh,
Co. Tipperary, Ireland We’re a family-run business which was established in 1947 by J K Cleary. We’re based in the high street in Nenagh, which is a market town in mid-west Ireland about 20 miles from Limerick. We became a member of Toymaster in 1994. We have around 4,000 square feet dedicated to our newsagent business at the front, with around 600-700 square feet of our toys and nursery section at the back of the store.
I was born in the premises so I’ve always been a part of the business, and we were formerly a restaurant and B&B on one side. In 2004 my sister and I took over and we run the shop with my wife, so there are three of us here full time with seven part time members of staff. We’re in a small, active community of 7,500 local people, about 60-70% of which we would know personally as being repeat customers. A big part of our business comes from our Christmas savings club, and we use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube and a very active website to reach out to our target market. We use social media more to get people through the doors rather than to sell to them. We’re quite strategic in how we target our market as it’s quite diffi cult to engage with young couples aged 25-35 with a child who’s walking, as they don’t tend to listen to local radio or read the local press, and we’ve found that Facebook is that particular group’s preferred method of communication. We carry many ranges but we specialise in a few areas, namely nursery products and educational toys. We stock a lot of farm-related products, so things like Britains and Bruder, and Berg Go Karts which are a big part of our business. Other big ones for us are Lego, Bigjigs and jigsaws. In the Summer we have a big
26 Toyworld
outdoor trade on lines from Plum and TP outdoor equipment. We do well on all Fisher- Price, LeapFrog, VTech, Golden Bear, our FOB range, Ben10, Power Rangers, Spiderman, Turtles, Nerf which is a big category for us, Bladez helicopters, and Nikko. For girls we do well with Bratz, Baby Born and Annabel, Moshi, Doc McStuffi ns, and My Little Pony which is making quite a good comeback. We fi nd that kitchens and doll’s houses sell well all year, and Sylvanian has begun to take off now that Epoch has given it the kick it needs. Character Options lines are doing well. In terms of jigsaws we stock most of the top ones, so Ravensburger, and Orchard Toys which has been a winner this year already, and our ranges from Galt, Green Board Games and Discovery World are all selling well. Ty has been good the last few years and the Rainbow Loom is great. Lego is selling phenomenally well, in
particular with the City range, Duplo and Technic. Star Wars doesn’t sell here so much, but Juniors is really good and the Minifi gures from the Lego Movie have already sold out and we have more stock on the way. We run an event one Saturday every month, for example on our games days we’ll get the
tables out with Pop-up Pirate and Topsy Turtle etc, we’ll have a face painter in and take photos, and last year we ran an Easter Egg hunt which we will do again this year. We also have Lego tables with prizes for the best models made. That covers the fi rst fi ve months of year before we start ramping up for Q4. We had a good year last year, so far this year
it’s been pretty much fl at but the Lego Movie has driven sales up slightly year on year, and the good weather is helping. So long as the weather holds up we’ll be looking to sell a lot of pools, trampolines and slides this Summer. Ireland has stopped getting worse, and
we’re selling well under the 20-Euro price point mostly on birthday presents. There are a lot of ranges which are so big that you risk becoming overstocked, so it’s all about getting the right mix for your store. And so long as we sell enough and make enough, and get the right product at the right price, then I see business going well this year.
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