Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Ready for the New Year?

We are!  We're sad to say good bye to 2011 (we had a most glorious year!), but we're excited to see what 2012 is going to bring.  And by this we don't mean the end of the world.  Based on how much our sales have increased year after year, we're going to be waaaaay too busy selling toys, wrapping toys, filling in toys, etc., to have the world end on us.  There's just no way we can fit that in during the holidays.  Which means we need to do some serious reordering so that we can continue to be a successful business.  So keeping this in mind, we're going to be doing the gift show circuit for the next two months or so, and we would love suggestions from you guys!  What did you love?  What did you not love (really, tell us... we can't test everything out, so we're relying on YOU to let us know what didn't meet your expectations)? And what awesome new toys/games would you recommend?  One of our customers last year recommended Rubbabu toys right before we went to the Los Angeles Gift Show.  We found it there, and it's been one of our biggest hits of the year.  And as fond as we are of telling the Rubbabu-suggestion story, it's almost a year old and needs to be replaced with a new suggestion story. 

As you can imagine, this means the next month we may be out of some of our regular items while we wait for reorders to come in, but we do still have a ton of stuff for all ages and interests.  As fate would have it, we got our Hexbug order in yesterday and NOT before Christmas like we had hoped, but that means we are well-stocked in Hexbugs now so come in and check them out.  We're also getting our Valentine's Day items in now.  Some items like our stuffed animals and jewelry are already out on the sales floor, but the rest like the Valentine's Day cards will be out the first week of January. 

Saturday, December 24, 2011

The Twelve Days of Landis' Labyrinth

On the last day of Christmas my best friend gave to me:
Twelve Bop-Its bopping,
Eleven Squinkies squishing,
Ten Risks-a-playing,
Nine Beyblades spinning,
Eight sets-o'-Lego,
Seven Jacks-a-picking
Six Balls-a-bouncing
FIVE AAaaART KITS!
Four Thomas Trains
Three Green Toys
Two Blue Kazoos
And a Calico Critter Tree House!

And with that, we wish you all a Merry Christmas and Happy Chanukah!  Thank you for a most successful holiday season, for supporting a local independent store, and for letting us see what our walls actually look like without merchandise covering them.  But never fear, we will be hitting up the toy/gift fairs soon to bring your favorite toys and games back, and to find some really cool new ones, too.  We will be closed on Christmas Day, but back open again December 26th.  And don't worry, we still have a great selection of gifts for Chanukah, as well as a few dreidels and other goodies. 

Happy Holidays from all of us at Landis' Labyrinth!


P.S. Let us know what your favorite gifts were this year (we're nosy like that)!

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

And not to think that we've forgotton about Chanukah!

Because we certainly haven't!  We have musical dreidels, wooden dreidels, make-your-own dreidels, and Chanukah gelt all in stock (though our supply of gelt is already getting low), as well as a few other Chanukah items.  We have dreidel molds for making your own edible dreidels, a kid's cookbook of Chanukah treats, Chanukah stickers, a set-of-crayons-shaped menorah, menorah candles, and a Chanukah jack-in-a-box, which plays the song, I Have a Little Dreidel.  As for actual gifts for Chanukah, we certainly have a full shop of them (just check out the previous post to get an idea).  We also do have Chanukah gift bags/wrap available, though sadly not the beautiful ones we've had the past two years (the company discontinued them), so we're your one-stop shop for all your children's Chanukah items!  Happy Chanukah!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

See, we aren't kidding!  And what you most likely can't make out from this photo is the huge amount of Thomas the Tank Engine trains and sets we have in stock just waiting to be wrapped and enjoyed by a locomotive enthusiast.

Sooooo, in case you haven't noticed, not only does is look a lot like Christmas, in little over a week it will be Christmas.  We've been noticing that a lot of customers have been coming to us for those very basic, classic, everyone-should-have-one toys that the bigger shops are out of (I'm looking at you, Target).  I'm talking Slinkys, Magic 8 Balls, Mr. Potato Head, Play-Doh, Balsa-Wood Planes, Jump Ropes, etc, etc, all of which we currently have.  These toys make great stocking stuffers and are always a hit with both parents and kids.  For a bigger classic toy, we have Classic Fisher Price Toys, such as the Two-Tone TV, that just about everyone we've talked with had when they were a kid.  We also have an enormous selection of board games.  Just to give you an idea, we have Mouse Trap (another hard to find game), Connect 4, Monopoly, Guess Who?, Chinese Checkers, Cribbage and Dominoes, 4 Player Mancala (which I still need to buy for myself), Apples to Apples, Risk, and waaaaay more.  I can't name them all, but we have a nice variety of ThinkFun Games (Chocolate Fix, Pathwords, Cartoon It, Zingo) which are great for those of you who love solving puzzles and/or want a 1-player only game.  We also have Blue Orange Games, again, one of our favorite companies, which include Spot It, Tell Tale, Trigger (all perfect stocking stuffers), as well as some games for the below 5 set that are fun for the whole family (and are made from wood, so if you're avoiding plastics, consider these!).  And of course, Lego Games, which doubles both as a building toy and a game, so you've got the best of both worlds!

Speaking of Lego, with the exception of a few backorders that may or may not come in this month, that's it for our Lego Shipments til March.  Lego has very strict guidelines regarding when we place orders, hence why the long break in between shipments.  But don't worry, we still have tons in stock, including Alien Conquest (my personal favorite), Star Wars, Harry Potter, and more!  Be sure to grab them now before they are gone, since they do have a tendency to sell out this time of year.

Oh, and guess what else we have a ton of?  BEYBLADES!!!!!!!!!!!!!  We just received a shipment in, and we have (hopefully) enough to get us through the holidays.  These are the hot toy this year, so definitely check them out.  Another item that's been a big hit for us?  Crazy Aaron's Thinking Putty, including the Thinking Creatures putty set.  Another awesome stocking stuffer and classroom Secret Santa gift.

"But my little girl doesn't like Beyblades", you say. "Have you nothing for her?!?"  We certainly do!  We have a full selection of baby dolls from Corolle (one of the best makers of baby dolls), as well as Littlest Pet Shop, Barbie, Squinkies, and of course, Calico Critters!  We are also expecting more Barbies and other Mattel items in any day now.  We also of course have art kits galore, and a spinner full of Scratch and Sketch Books for both girls and boys that are always a shop favorite.

We're still getting more shipments in, so come in and see what we have.  Besides what I've mentioned above, we're expecting more Kids' Watches back in (yay!), Hex Bugs (possibly even bigger yay!),  and more 3D Bookmarks from Bookmark Trenz.  There are so many more things that we have in our shop that I can't possibly list them all here, so please come in or give us a call and we'll let you know if we have the toy you're looking for!  And don't forget, we offer complimentary gift wrapping (gift bags with tissue and a bow) on gifts over $10, so keep that in mind when shopping for your gifts this holiday season!