A kid’s happiness is not easy business

RIGA - There are around 30 Internet shops which specialize in children’s goods, including toys, and several hundred toy shops in Latvia. The crisis hit them as much as other retailers and sales have dropped about 20 percent. Now the situation is slightly improving.

“In 2010 we had some 15 percent decrease. Now we see the trend that middle-level customers have disappeared. We sell mainly cheap products, or expensive stuff, such as high quality feeding chairs, car chairs and baby carriages,” said  the client manager of e-baby.lv, Iveta Kokarevica, to The Baltic Times.

Regarding the decrease in demand, prices weren’t reduced dramatically. “We have goods with which prices even increased last year. This depends mainly on our wholesalers from whom we get our goods,” says Kokarevica.
The shop works with both local and international suppliers, which supply toys and other children’s goods, from Germany, the U.S., Spain, Italy. “We try not to take goods from China as we position ourselves as a quality children’s goods ‘e-shop.’ We try to attract clients not by low prices, but by offering them something others do not offer. However, the prices in an Internet shop are lower than in ordinary shops – for some products this is 10 percent, and for others – even 30 or 40 percent,” she continues.

Locally produced toys are still a rare phenomena on toy shop shelves. However, some of the manufacturers already have a long history and successful business. “Almost all we produce goes to export. We have some 5 percent of goods for the local market. In the rich years before the crisis, the local market share was 10 percent,” said the marketing and sales manager of Varis Toys, Evija Tirele, to The Baltic Times.

The company is a family business founded in 1988 by 3 family members and has been producing a variety of wood products, such as wood panels, furniture parts and complete solid wood furniture pieces, mostly for export to Denmark, Germany, Finland, Japan, Russia and other countries.

During 2000 the head of the creative department invented and patented the children’s construction set VARIS, which in the Latvian language has the meaning of a smart, brave and capable boy. In the last 10 years, besides the VARIS, other products such as VARIS Town Builder 107, VARIS Architect, and VARIS Marble Run have entered the market. All of these are produced in a factory in the Burtnieku area, in north Latvia.

Last year Varis Toys were included in the TOP 100 best toys worldwide, according to the industry book Toy Design.
“We are fully oriented to export markets. In 2010, despite the crisis, we had a 20 percent increase in our turnover. We have niche product toys – ecological, high quality, educational toys. They are in demand abroad, but Latvia is a very small market with a low buying attitude. The price for our toys starts from 2.50 lats (3.57 euros) and ends at 60 lats for big sets,” says Tirele.

Varis Toys are promoted at two of the biggest annual exhibitions – the eco products exhibition Biofach, and toys exhibition Spielwarenmesse, both organized in Germany. Tirele says the expenses for participation pays off “Now we want to orient more on eco markets such as Japan. We have high competition with such well-known brands as Kubo Pro and Haba on international markets, but we made it happen – top brand sellers now also buy our products,” she says.