Let's see if the customers respond...

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

As part of our Summer toys assortment this year, we're carrying Step 2 toys.

They're big, expensive things like a sandbox with a cover, a playhouse, a kids picnic table with an umbrella, and so forth.

So why are we focusing on such expensive shit when the economy is poor? Because on our customer service surveys, one of the questions is "Are there any products/brand names you didn't find that you'd like to see in our stores?" And evidently a lot of people said they wanted these damn Step 2 toys.

My guess is they go over like a lead balloon and we sell very few of them until they go on clearance. I'll have to revisit this in July or so when we get rid of the summer stuff.

[Kogarashi]

On the other hand, I will vouch for the fact that the Step 2 toys are rather nice. We picked up a play kitchen for our daughter on clearance, and the University housing office bought several of the yard toys (including all three you mentioned above) for the apartment complex courtyards. The only problem with the sandboxes was that all the children in the apartments thought it way more fun to scoop out the sand and dump it elsewhere (like the water table, or in the kitchen set the office put outside, or just all over the grass....). Otherwise, they're actually nice toys.

Problem being, they still probably won't sell as much as corporate would like.