Saturday 11/ 9 Support Your Local Neighborhood Toy Stores

*I received products courtesy of ASTRA for this review; all thoughts and opinions are my own.

The Woo Hoo Factor: Your Neighborhood Toy Store Day

This Saturday, November 9, is the 4th Annual Neighborhood Toy Store Day, a day to celebrate and support our local neighborhood toy stores.

Participating stores will host in-store events for families (like activities, crafts, live performances and/or discounts).

Visit yourneighborhoodtoystore.org to search for a participating store near you and be sure to enter for a chance to win $250 in prizes or a grand prize vacation package. The “I heart my neighborhood toy store” sweepstake goes through November 8th.

Neighborhood Toy Store Day is sponsored by the non-profit ASTRA, the American Specialty Toy Retailing Association. ASTRA brings specialty toy manufactures, independent toy stores and toy buyers together to help encourage “smart” play and local toy shopping.

Our family received a couple toys that ASTRA has rated their Best Toys for Kids 2013 award: The Air-Stream Machine by Thames & Kosmos and RingStix Lite by RingStix-System Enterprises LLC. You can see pictures of the RingStix at my Instagram page here.

The Air-Stream Machine includes a blower motor, soft-blade fan, additional building parts and a full-color 32 page experiment manual. Recommended for ages 8 and up. My husband put this model together but there were a couple other creative options and they didn’t all need the air bag.

The RingStix look like a lot of fun, it is recommended for ages 6 and up. I think it takes a bit of coordination though. My seven year old decided they’d make great guns 🙂 .

You can find many quality toys in many local neighborhood stores and what a great way to support your own community! Our boys have a favorite “local neighborhood” toy store that features lots and lots of Legos.

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2 Comments

Tracy on November 8, 2013 at 10:31 pm

Unfortunately there are no stores in our area participating according to their website. The toy store I was referring too in secret is Sir Troy’s Toys in North Canton. For me to mention it in the post could have been misleading since they are apparently not participating (no activities, etc).

I think I did find one in Akron though.

Brandi on November 8, 2013 at 8:21 am

I was expecting more information from this post. You make no mention of any local toy stores except for your “favorite local neighborhood store”. The intent may be to get us to go to the website, but when I input my zip code, only one store appeared and I have no idea where that city is. I think it would be a great community service to list out a few for local readers as they aren’t well known.

Tracy on November 8, 2013 at 10:31 pm

Unfortunately there are no stores in our area participating according to their website. The toy store I was referring too in secret is Sir Troy’s Toys in North Canton. For me to mention it in the post could have been misleading since they are apparently not participating (no activities, etc).

I think I did find one in Akron though.
Brandi on November 8, 2013 at 8:21 am

I was expecting more information from this post. You make no mention of any local toy stores except for your “favorite local neighborhood store”. The intent may be to get us to go to the website, but when I input my zip code, only one store appeared and I have no idea where that city is. I think it would be a great community service to list out a few for local readers as they aren’t well known.