My niece and nephew live in Whistler, British Columbia, which is a small city and considered "rural" (meaning "expensive") by many delivery services, including Canada Post.
I was looking for an Activity Toy for my niece and a Toolbox for my nephew.
Toys "R" Us
I started at toysrus.ca, looking for Lite Brite, a Hasbro classic that I had as a child. They had refills but did not have the basic toy available. Eventually, I selected another activity toy and a Toolbox, only to learn that shipping on a $14.99 Toolbox was $22.52.
toysrus.ca
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Chapters/Indigo
Frustrated, I went to chapters.ca (aka Indigo). Using the advanced search tool on their website, I searched for an "Activity Toy" for "6-8 Year Old Kids". While my years in the toy industry make me more knowledgeable and pickier about product categories than the average consumer, it was disheartening to see items like "Baby's First Blocks", Beyblade, and Nerf Supersoaker are listed as "Activity Toys" for "6-8 Year Old Kids".
chapters.indigo.ca
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I browsed through dozens of pages, eventually finding an Activity Toy suitable for my niece and a Toolbox for my nephew. Shipping from Chapters/Indigo was free because my order was over $25.00, and I did a Google search for coupons to get an additional $5.00 discount.
While the experience was painful, I was satisfied with my purchase.
Walmart and Amazon
As I started this blog post, I thought to check out walmart.ca. They do sell toys online and appear to have reasonable shipping charges, though I didn't complete an order to be sure. It's unfortunate that amazon.ca doesn't carry toys, as amazon.com is a great place for US consumers to buy toys.
Hopefully, Canadian online retailers will get their act together to enhance the toy buying experience for consumers. For the first time in many years, I even paid retail for toys, but reminisce fondly about having easy access to "the employee store".
And I hope the kids like the toys!
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