AnotherSuperman forKids
By Xia Yuanyuan
Few men have come across their eureka moment while changing nappies and preparing infant formula, but that’s what makes Xu Shu a superman, or, to be more precise, the founder of ToySuperman.
When he had a baby two years ago, the then 31-year-old went through all the ordeals parents undergo, especially trying to keep her amused with the toys she wanted without going bankrupt.
Xu found that Chinese parents were generally spending about 2,000-3,000 yuan ($305-$458) every year on buying toys for their children. It was a no-win situation because despite spending all that money, the toys were often discarded within months or even weeks with the child losing interest and moving on to another new toy.
While most parents accepted this stoically, it gave Xu Shu a brainwave. Why not rent out toys, he thought, and that’s how his online-to-offline toy rental business was born last year.
ToySuperman.com is a site that allows parents to rent toys for their children at a fraction of the price they would have to pay to buy them by using its eponymous phone app. “This way, parents can reduce the amount of money they waste buying toys that become outdated. Renting toys would also mean a house uncluttered by piles of unused toys and therefore, more space,” Xu outlined the advantages.
Huge market potential
Living in Beijing as a stay-at-home mother, 32-yearold Xiao Yuan is happy with the newly emerged toy rental business. For her, buying a plaything for a child is not a simple thing. If it’s a boy, the popular toys are cars with remote control, robots and model planes. If it’s a girl, then Barbie dolls are mandatory. Plus there are the teaching aid toys different varieties for different age groups. “Sometimes it makes me go crazy trying to choose a toy for my son,” Xiao said. “It’s easier to just rent the toys he likes.”
Today’s kids have a “loving the new, loathing the old” kind of mindset and their interest in a new toy wanes just after seven to 10 days. Then those discarded toys pile up in a corner, just taking up space.
That’s not all. “The price of toys today is no joke,” Xiao told ChinAfrica. “Some high-quality toys can cost anything from hundreds to thousands of yuan. The prices of some imported brands such as American Fisher-Price are totally scary!”
The Chinese toy market has huge potential. According to a survey by Euromonitor International, the London-based strategic market researcher, retail sales in the Chinese toy market reached 74.4 billion yuan ($11.3 billion) in 2014. The agency estimates the figure will touch 100 billion yuan ($15.2 billion) in 2017.
The number of toy consumers is large and growing. Euromonitor said by 2013, the number of major toy customers who were less than 14 years old was 220 million on the Chinese mainland alone. Besides, with the Chinese Government changing its family planning policy, a family can have a second child now. It means every year, there will be an extra 5 million newborns, who would be potential consumers.
Seeing the vast potential for future development, in March 2016, dozens of investors offered nearly 10 million yuan ($1.52 million) to ToySuperman to support its development.
How the business works
ToySuperman currently has a small office in Beijing. The staff accept online orders and direct the transport staff to deliver the toys from the warehouse to consumers.
ToySuperman now has a collection of over 2,000 pieces of toys in more than 500 categories. From small items such as puzzles and building blocks to larger pieces such as rocking horses and trampolines, it has most, if not all, the toys parents look for children till the age of six years. Eighty percent of these are imported because Xu thinks imported toys have better quality and higher wear-and-tear resistance.
The most attractive thing about ToySuperman is the affordable rental, which, on average, is below 10 yuan ($1.5) per day.
“I once wanted to buy a multi-function table by [American] Hape Toys for children to learn numbers and characters, but the price was more than 4,000 yuan ($610), and I gave up the idea as soon as I saw the price,” said Li Mengmeng, a 35-year-old mother, who is working as a nurse in a hospital in Beijing.
“However, at ToySuperman, you can rent it for only 28.5 yuan ($4.35) per day.”
Xu says parents enjoy the benefit of lower costs by co-sharing. “ToySuperman provides parents a platform to maximize their access to toys, eases financial stress and releases space for a family,” he said.
According to a survey by Spain’s University of Cadiz, plastic waste accounts for 88 percent of the rubbish found floating on seas worldwide. A part of it comes from toys. “The recycling of toys goes with the green, low carbon consumption concept,” Xu said. “What’s more, when kids play with rented toys, they are told to handle them carefully as they would have to share them with other kids. In this way, children can be imbibed with a sense of sharing from an early age.”
One parental concern about shared toys is the safety aspect. Xu said ToySuperman takes a very strict approach to disinfecting the toys once they are returned by a user to guarantee they are clean and safe to use. After being cleaned rigorously, the toys are stored in the warehouse that Xu says is disinfected as well. “The cleanliness and safety of our toys is guaranteed,” he said.
For the toy rental industry, Xu thinks the marketing has to be a little different. “We stress emotion marketing since toys are not just cold plastics but the means to bring happiness to youngsters,” he said. CA
Renting toys online is convenient and cheaper
