ArabianFranchise.com

Toon Kidz, the Bangalore-based kids’ brand that retails apparel, toys, games, accessories and stationery, has plans to take the number of stores to at least 200 in India by mid-2010, along with 50 EBOs in the Far East and the GCC countries. The company, which recently opened its maiden store in New Delhi, presently has 30 stores operating in India, out of which 17 are franchised.

“For this year we have fixed a target of 100 outlets in the major tier I and II cities. The funding for the expansion will be mostly made by our franchise partners, while we will put money on brand promotion and brand building,” said Vineet Mishra, regional manager – north, Toon Kidz .

Beside kids apparels and accessories, Toon Kidz is now planning to launch its own range of chocolates by the end of this year that would be sold through its exchlusive retail outlets. “We will probably be launching the chocolate range around Christmas or New Year. While the production of the chocolate will be outsourced, the range will be made available with our own brand name,” Mishra added.

The chocolates range would be available under the company’s private label and the range would include chocolate and assorted toffees in various flavours and those would be sold across the company’s outlets along with its apparel, accessories, footwear and PC games ranges, said Mishra.

Toon Kidz is also a licensee manufacturer of apparels based on characters from kids TV channels — Cartoon Network, Pogo and Space Toon.

Office Depot Inc., a successful and flourishing global supplier of office products, played its unique and exciting ‘Win Your Steps’ game at The Avenues Mall inviting all kids visiting the mall to enjoy an evening filled with fun, entertainment and great prizes out of the new Office Depot Back To School collection.

Children of all age groups gathered around the big and colorful playing field waiting for their turn to throw the dice and ‘Win their Steps’ to reach the final grand prize. Throughout the game, all participating kids could win colorful Office Depot items of the new collection.

“We are very happy to celebrate our first Back To School collection in Kuwait with these children,” said John Moore, Business Director of Office Depot in the Middle East. “Caring for kids and bringing fun and excitement to them, this is what we we’re aiming for and this is what we achieved. The event clearly reflects the spirit of the Back to School campaign. Fun and entertainment are part of our commitment to taking care of students’ back to school needs”, he added.
“Kids will certainly love the great assortment of trendy, ‘must-have’ fashionable products at Office Depot and parents will love Office Depot because it is a one-stop shopping destination for all school supplies and offering great value for money.”

From kindergarten to high school and even college, the newly launched Office Depot flagship store located at The Avenues Mall is the one stop shop for everything needed for a successful school year. As part of the Office Depot motto ‘Taking Care of You for School’ the brand is introducing a product line that’s stylish and fashionable. Office Depot has all the items on the school lists, and the cool, fun and trendy products that students want for heading back to the classroom.

This year’s Back To School highlights and trends include a wide range of backpacks, pencil cases and complete Back To School sets. The collection offers special designs of Disney characters (Barcode Kitties, Hannah Montana, High School Musical 3, Camp Rock, Transformers, Wolverine, Ice Age 3, Princess, Cars, Winnieh the Pooh and Mickey Mouse) as well as products of other brands such as Dora the Explorer, Chipie, Airness, Palladium and Esprit. Colorful notebooks, hard cover books, files and folders and a variety of pens and pencils, writing tools featuring Office Depot brands like niceday, foray and Office Depot as well as renown international brands such as Bic, papermate, charpie, Crayola are also available, making shopping at Office Depot an easy and convenient ‘Back To School’ shopping experience.