What's New in December 2022?
Small Business Saturday was our biggest day yet! Big thanks to everyone for shopping with us.
[I'm gonna have Sage type something here about the new art installation by the Yarn Bombers and about Crafters Community Nights...]
We now carry Swivel Snaps creativity kits. As the name suggests, you swivel and snap the pieces together to make big clunky creations. The pieces are super solid. We'll be featuring them in one of the Playcades for the rest of December (or until they sell out).
Swivel Snaps are in the yellow Playcade
We also now carry Airforts. They're made out of a super light-weight material that easily velcros to a box fan. When you turn on the fan the fort inflates, and then you can climb inside! We don't have the space to have one always inflated, but we have a deflated one on display that can be blown up on demand.
We have two styles: Cabin Playhouse and Cottage Playhouse
On the lower level we have Bounce-A-Marble on display. Unlike most marble runs, this set doesn't pose a choking hazard to kids under 3. It's also super solid, so parents (and toy store owners) don't have to put it back together whenever it gets knocked over.
A very colorful photo.
Sage and I have owned a copy of Bounce Party for a year now, and now we have them for sale in the store. It's a super fun dexterity game where you race to bounce balls into a grid in the shape denoted by the card. It's on display in the tabletop/board game section this month.
A copy will cost you a whopping $9.95.
Premise: You're a chicken who has to cross a 10-lane highway
Today is the third and final 'First Fridays' of 2022. We'll be raffling off a couple of toys, and select items will be on sale. We'll also be open until 9pm. As always, participants receive a passport and collect stamps from the businesses they visit. If you get 10 stamps, you receive a $10 gift certificate from the business of your choosing!
It's a lot of fun.
Here's two photos I meant to post last month. Our newly expanded Toy Tower and our Kiddie Ride.
'57 Chevrolet Bel Air Kiddie Ride and 47 compartments filled with Stocking Stuffers
Lastly, here are our Holiday Hours...
- Christmas Eve: 10am to 4pm
- Christmas Day: Closed
- New Years Eve: 10am to 4pm
- New Years Day: Closed
Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and thank your for your support!
~David
What's New in November 2022?
Oh man, way too much is new. We've been getting tons of shipments this past month, and we're just gonna keep on getting more. We had to rearrange the store to make room for another book display and another toy tower.
I took a bunch of updated pictures of the store, so for this month, I'm just posting those. Please stay tuned on our Facebook/Instagram for more day-to-day updates, and I hope to see you all during Black Friday and Alton's Small Business Saturday!
Goofy Novelties, Plastica Animals, Toddler Playsets, and Wooden Food
Wooden Puzzles, Wooden Train Sets, and Toddler Building Sets (Our Pranks are in the background)
Vehicle Rollmatz, Baby Toys, and one of the Book Racks.
A huge mess of plastic figurines (with special guest Gumby). Hot Wheels sized cars in the background.
Squishee Animals and Beany Animals including Cats vs. Pickles, Dogs vs. Squirls, and Sock Monkey
One of our book racks and our 1000 piece Puzzle Displays
Wooden Rubberband Guns, and a whole mess of Fidgets & Sensory Toys
Stickers, Kawaii Figurines, Stickers, Smencils, Stickers, and Stickers
The Keychain Rack, Crazy Aaron's Thinking Putty, Kinetic Dough, and some Diecast Vehicles
All kinds of vehicles! You can kind of see our Placemats rack in the background left
Outdoor games, Board Games, and Tabletop Games
More Tabletop Games and Outdoor Toys.
Kids puzzles and 2000 piece puzzles. Wooden Puzzles and Speed Cubes are in the background
Some arts & crafts, Tutti Frutti modeling dough, and our yarn selection
A mix of arts & crafts and henna, and charm bracelets. Blue Q bags are in the foreground
A bunch of plush toys
More plush toys. Sticker activity books are in the background right.
The aforementioned Sticker Activity Books. Also pictured are Blo-Pens and Colorforms.
Some random crafty activities and the ever-popular Plush Crush displays
Lava Lamps, Kaleidoscope Glasses, Color Timers, Ooze Tubes, and Terrariums
Old School Stuff! Spud Guns, Stretch Armstrong, Wooly Willy, Yo-Yos, Paddleballs, etc.
I still gotta add pictures of the Toy Towers, the front display case, the Bel Air Kiddie Ride, the Playcade, our new Air Forts, and the lower display. But for now, I'm posting this.
~David
What's New in October 2022?
I'm a little late posting this month, and that's because we've been stocking up for the holidays. Here's a small bit of what's new...
We re-upped on Mad Mattr, the world's most satisfying kinetic dough! Last time they were out of the big bags, so we got the pods. This time they were out of the pods, so we got the big bags. They released a couple of groovy new "Jewel Tone" colors. Also in compounds news, we got a bunch of the new Crazy Aaron's thinking putties (but I forgot to take a picture).
Miracle Snow, Water Marbles, Drizzl, Mad Mattr, and Slimy Gloop
We got some new toys for toddlers. Pictured here we have the ever-popular Bumpie Ball, a fun magnetic wooden fishing set, some very cool wooden stacking robots, and a deluxe stick-on-the-bathtub-wall waterwheel set.
Bumpie Ball, Fishing Set, Stacking Robots, Water Works
We also got a whole mess of wooden puzzles for younger kids...
We have just about every size you could want now
We have a whole bunch of new random mini stuff for older kids and adults. Highlights include a tiny working record player, a wacky inflatable arm-flailing tube man, lucky cats, a whole mess of very cute dog and cat figurines, and some licensed stuff like Pusheen, Gudatama, Aggretsuko, Fortenite, Bob's Burgers, Harry Potter, and Sesame Street.
Dig that spinning rack
Our 1000pc Puzzles
- It's gluten free (unlike Play-Doh or Crayola Modeling Dough)
- It's scented
- It's made in Canada
- It's super affordable
- They have pretty much any set you can think of
We've got Dinosaurs, Outer Space, Ice Cream, Rainbows & Unicorns, Burgers, Hot Rods, Cupcakes, and Popsicles
We've got some new Sticko stickers. They're very tiny, and very cute.
Jungle Animals, Cats, Llamas, Dogs, Unicorns, Pandas, and Dinosaurs
Four awesome games
I play piano myself, so I'm extremely picky when it comes to toy keyboards. So many keyboards are out-of-tune, or you can play only 1 key at a time, or there's no customizability. The Powerstar Keytar, on the other hand, is awesome. 4 different sounds, polyphony, and in-tune. Best of all it has a vibrato button, so you can play super funky licks.
So cool.
There's a bunch of other new stuff I didn't take pictures of; like new board games, a sumi calligraphy set, a potato gun, super cute pencil sharpeners, a ton of keychains, kids cameras, miniature babies, and rubber ducks. We also still have a bunch of shipments on their way, and a bunch of orders to place, so stay tuned!
~David
What's New in September 2022?
We have a lot of new stuff, and there's no way I can cover it all. Here are four things...
When we started this business, we didn't know how hard it would be to find an affordable doll company. And trust us, we gave it the college try. We looked through well over 300 catalogs this past year. All we ever found were very boutique-y (expensive) dolls, or dolls similar to American Girl (or Target's knock-off 'My Generation' line). Either way, not what we're about.
Well, we finally found a supplier! We now carry Steffi Love and Evi Love. To start off we just got the 'Pet Friends' editions, because everyone loves pets. If you own any Barbie or Kelly vehicles/houses/accessories, Steffi and Evi are compatible.
Evi Love comes with a pet cat, dog, or rabbit.
When we opened, we had to order A LOT of Douglas plushies to get our swank display shelf. As a result, we'd been coasting on our opening order for the past 13 months. We finally re-upped! In addition to a lot of cute new animals, we finally got some more Sassy Saks.
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Pictured: Douglas Plushies with aforementioned swank display shelf
I've been wanting to order these Mini Winchester Rubber Band Rifles for a long time, but the company had been out of stock due to those pesky material shortages. We finally have them, and they are AWESOME! They're super accurate, great quality, and made in the USA.
Cap guns, rubber band guns, slingshots, and spinner target
Cats vs. Pickles continues to be beloved, and now the company has added Dogs vs. Squirls to the line. Also, both Cats vs. Pickles and Dogs vs. Squirls now come in a 'Chonk' size (they're a little bigger). If you don't know what these are, they're bags that have a mystery beanie plushie in them. It can be a cat/pickle or a dog/squirrel. They're very very cute.
Cats are scared of Pickles, but Pickles just want love <3
In the Playcade this month we have...
- My Soft World Farm playset - Ages 1+, 28 foam pieces, the barn acts as a carrying case
- Daruma Otoshi - Classic Japanese skill toy. Smack the bottom piece, but don't tip Daruma over
- Zoob BuilderZ - Awesome building set using ball joints and swiveling plastic pieces
- PicassoTiles Magnetic Tiles - Build structures with magnets. Some sets are LEGO compatible.
In the games area we have...
- Klask 2-Player & 4-Player - Score goals while dodging the evil marshmallows
- Super Mario Fire Stadium - Hit the spinner targets to defeat Bowser in this 1-on-1 pinball game
- Super Stadium Baseball - Two-player mechanical baseball game. One of my favorites.
- Robot Hammer Battle - Another one of my favorites. Knock your opponent's block off.
On the large display we have...
- Straw Construction - Build massive complicated structures out of simple components
- The Marble Run - Whenever I remove this from the display, kids get upset. So, it's still up
I ain't gonna take pictures of everything, but we now have Dragon Hand Puppets, Stretch Armstrong, Mini RC Monster Trucks, new Wooden Puzzles, Pokemon Fusion Strike & Chilling Reign cards, a bunch of new Enamel Pins, and bunch of new novelty & fidget toys. You can see those on our social media.
Lastly, Advantage News readers declared us the area's favorite Family Fun Center! We're pretty thrilled. Big thanks to everyone who voted for us. It's very fun having a toy store in Alton.
Aw shucks.
Hope to see y'all soon!
~David
Funky Planet 1-Year Anniversary Sale!
Our one year anniversary is Saturday 7/22/22. Big thanks to everyone who has supported us thus far.
To celebrate, we put together a massive clearance section. Items are anywhere from 20% off to 50% off. I wish I could post a picture, but since the prices are so ridiculously low, some of the manufacturers might get mad at me. To give you an idea, here are some extremely blurry pictures.
Board games are 20-30% off. All things slime are 30-50% off.
Puzzles are 20% off. Popper fidgets are 30-50% off. Select keychains are 75% off.
Out with the old in with the new! The sooner these toys & gifts sell, the sooner I can place some orders with some of the new companies I found. I'm very excited.
Also, on Saturday we'll be giving out donuts. So be sure to get in on that action.
Hope to see you soon!
~David