|  Experimenting
with New Markets: Science Toys Bubble Over with Teachers, Parents
By Pennie Hoover
May 1, 2003
Specialty
Stores Strive to Survive
This
submarine style sea monkey habitat available from Educational
Insights
retails for $23.50 |
Atamian
believes the market is contracting with the rise of discount stores,
combined with several high profile bankruptcies and smaller retailers
being unable to weather the recession.
“Actually
for every retailer we have lost, two more retailers have found us,”
said Elenco’s Coda, confirming a growing demand for educational
play kits even in a tight market.
Major
discounters tend to carry established sellers and proven brands,
but higher-end, more specialized products need an outlet as well.
Zany Brainy, which tries to keep a foot in both markets, describes
its customer base as children from preschool age to Tweens. The
store’s clientele is mostly white-collar professionals with
young children.
Science
on the Web is Hot
The
largest retailer of science toys on the Web, einsteins-emporium.com,
stocks a variety of products that appeal to all ages. “95%
of what we sell is not available in retail stores,” claimed
owner Marvin Broyhill. Broyhill’s experience before this web-based
business was in advertising, and he compares e-stores with mail
order. “When you have a large market on a national and international
scale--but it’s too diluted to support a local retail location--
that is when mail order and web commerce work.”
With
this strategy, Broyhill finds the largest market is in more advanced
products that appeal to high school and college students, and even
professionals. While the business has seen more focus on price in
the last year, Broyhill still finds that parents care about quality.
“Where we used to sell telescopes in the $500 to $1000 range,
we now sell more in the $100 to $200 range,” Broyhill said.
“But people don’t want the $39.95 special that they
know won’t work or last.”
BACK
Writer's
Bio: Pennie, a graduate of Indiana University School of
Journalism, is a freelance writer and lives with her husband and
three children in Visalia, CA.
|
