So, the schools have finally broken up and kids have started that glorious six-week stretch of freedom and fun we all remember fondly from our youth. Of course, to coincide with the school holidays, the marvellous weather we’ve been enjoying has turned into a more typical British summer – sometimes, the scripts just write themselves.
According to my iPhone weather app, it picks up a bit next week – although this app has been causing some controversy with attractions and other popular kids’ day out destinations, due to its tendency to feature a ‘rain’ symbol on a day even if there is only a faint chance of rain for an hour or so during the whole day. Attraction owners feel this is putting off some visitors, who are assuming it will be raining all day rather than just a brief shower. You can see why that would be frustrating, especially for businesses that have to turn a profit in their peak six months’ trading between April and September.
Many of these attractions have great shops to entice visitors to spend on toys and other ranges as part of their day out, so for them, the next six weeks are very much their ‘Christmas’. For mainstream toy retailers, hopefully the fact that there are kids around that need to be entertained means they can continue to tick over nicely, before things step up a gear in the autumn.
We’re already seeing a big upswing in the number of ‘new product launch’ press releases we’re receiving: this week’s newsflashes have been dominated by new product stories, rather than general news. And there are undoubtedly some great new lines coming through – not necessarily all huge headline grabbers, but very solid introductions that will definitely drive sales.
In days of yore, we would all have been anticipating the launch of the Argos catalogue any day now – stock would have been brought in to coincide with its arrival, and marketing campaigns put in place in the hope of prompting a mini-surge in sales when the catalogue went live, so Argos buyers would increase their orders. When the catalogue was discontinued, this flurry of early marketing activity largely went with it.
But what’s this I hear… the (slight) return of an Argos toy-focused catalogue this year? Of course, this will be a very different beast to the legendary doorstop of old, but it’s a start, and I hope it’s a successful move in the right direction. With the new Argos Sainsbury’s buying structure bedding in – with separate buying teams once again – it feels like Argos is taking tangible, positive steps to address the gradual decline it has experienced in recent years.
Read the Rest here.
