The Biz: The Grapevine

A dependable baby carrier is an essential piece of gear that helps parents keep their baby close and secure while they go about their daily activities. Baby carriers also give parents great flexibility, because they are able to take their baby on hikes, walks and other activities, where a stroller would be cumbersome or hard to maneuver. Baby carriers are lightweight and easy to just grab and go. There is one problem though with having just a carrier — there is nowhere for a baby to sit securely if one takes it off. One mother’s desire to simplify her life by combining two useful products in a new and creative way led to the birth of Onya Baby.

In 2003, two enterprising women created an interior design firm with the goal to successfully combine the ideals of modernism with comfort and livability. Then, in 2010 they launched SPI Baby, a kid’s furniture and accessories line based on the same principle. Think of modern design that is highly sophisticated and lots of fun. This is furniture that is designed to play many different roles so that the buyer is investing in pieces that will be kept for years and reused as the family expands.

The after-Christmas season often includes looking for batteries in every size and searching for missing parts and assembly instructions. Help your customers simplify creative playtimes with Wikki Stix, designed to mimic the olden days of art projects with yarn and glue, only with less mess and more success. Easy to stick on and peel off, there are no mistakes with Wikki Stix. Because they come in a wide range of colors and can be cut to almost any size, Wikki Stix appeal equally to boys and girls, and span a wide range of ages, from 3 to 103! They are perfect for quiet, independent play, or interaction with others.

Elephants and piggies and lions, oh my! With the intense marketing and popularity of animal-shaped pillows, smaller companies selling plush critters might not get the attention they deserve. What if you could offer your customers an affordable and unique alternative to over-commercialized toys? And what if that offering also happened to help animals everywhere, lining cages instead of just pockets? Tell your customers it is, in fact, hip to be square by offering them Zooklz, the square animals with attitude.