Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Girl Power: Finding a path in Ketchum

Child’s play


By PAT MURPHY
Express Staff Writer

The diminutive Carol Knight paved the way for female retail entrepreneurs in the Wood River Valley, starting her successful business here in 1978. Photo by David N. Seelig

How Carol Knight has been keeping the valley young for over 30 years.

Life for Carol Knight, a grownup, really is child's play. Once she arrives at work and until she leaves, Knight is in a fantasyland. Hers is a life every child in the Wood River Valley could easily envy. And why not?

Knight owns The Toy Store, the oldest, most enduring toy retailer in the valley. From floor to ceiling, the Toy Store is a small wonderland of playthings fit to dazzle and entice everyone from toddlers to pre-teen girls and boys.

Starting on little more than help from family and friends (and volunteer sweat labor), Knight launched her business 31 years ago following her migration to the valley from Red Wing, Minn.

The more remarkable part of the story of a business that has flourished for so many years is that it came about more by accident than plan.

Knight was a teacher in Red Wing, on the bank of the upper reaches of the Mississippi River. She and fellow teacher Connie Nelson (now Johnson, business manager of the Idaho Mountain Express), decided "there was more to life than Red Wing," and opted for a three-month tour of Europe before making their way to the Wood River Valley in 1975 for a Sun Valley skiing fling.

The road to becoming the valley's mistress of toys developed slowly. Knight went to work for Sun Valley Co. as a household maid, a stopgap living while she pleaded with the personnel department for a position that could use her teaching background.

A job with a property management company followed, which led to running Edgar's Place, a day care center, where a parent suggested the valley needed a toy store.

As they say, the rest is history.

Knight and a partner in the founding of the business, Nancy Harakay, introduced themselves to valley families and children by appearing at birthday parties as Minnie the clown and the Wiz.

After she opened the Toy Store in Ketchum in 1978 (the store in Hailey followed in 2006), Knight elevated her visibility with an annual doll buggy parade and teddy bear's tea party for the tyke set.

At 5 feet 2 inches, Knight seems a perfect living metaphor for the toys she works among.

Inevitably, children who were early habitués of her stores are now returning as parents with their own children to shop, prompting the Toy Store's marketing slogan, "We Know Toys, We Know Children, And Now We Know Your Children's Children."

Though Knight's inventory is barren of electronic gadgets, the impossibly uncountable thousands of toys on the shelves don't miss many tastes. Even a few Raggedy Ann stuffed dolls are available, something that today's great-great-grandparents may have had in 1915.

One surprise awaiting grownups that might've played with Duncan yo-yos in their youth is today's new-fangled version. It's known as a "performance" yo-yo, designed with glitter and an internal mechanism that keeps it spinning longer for more tricks. It even comes with a tutorial CD.

As much joy as there is, she says, in seeing the delight of children with new toys and seeing a new generation arrive, Knight knows disappointment, too. Sometimes she must tell a child the toy she wants isn't available.

"We cannot stock every toy," Knight said.

However, new playthings are always on the way: Knight and 16-year-employee Joni Stark can be often be found unloading large boxes of new delights.

The most dramatic change in toys, she says, is where they're made. She estimates that at least 90 percent come from China, Thailand and India. Recently, however she has begun stocking "green" merchandise, especially for infants.

To Knight, there's nothing frivolous about toys.

"Most toys are educational in one way or another," she explains. "Fitting pieces together, playing a game, following directions."

Halloween demands from adults prompted Knight to add an adjoining costume room to outfit those fun-loving grownups who still want to act like kids now and then.




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