It is equally likely that you remember the excitement of saving all your pocket money until you had enough to go to the toy shop and buy the latest item on your wish list, or that you recall queuing among a long line of fidgeting children waiting to see Father Christmas.
And it is the happiness and excitement associated with these memories which, for many people, comes to the fore again when, in adulthood, they return to the toyshop which shaped so many of those childhood dreams.
‘Toys are tactile and coming into a toyshop is still a real experience,’ reflected Bambola Toymaster owner John Testori. ‘I remember a couple of years ago, a guy came into the shop with his family, and he just wanted to spend some time looking around and reliving his childhood memories. He had lived in Jersey as a child before moving to Australia and he just wanted those 15 minutes of nostalgia. I think most of us feel a certain amount of nostalgia towards our favourite childhood toy shop.’
For John, this sense of nostalgia is particularly poignant, as he has been surrounded by toys throughout his life. It was his father – known to customers and staff as Mr T – who originally founded Bambola 60 years ago.
‘It all started on 12 August 1961 when my father set up the business,’ explained John. ‘Up until that point, he was a cocktail barman and I have never known what made him change careers.’
Drawing on the family’s Italian roots, the name Bambola means doll in Italian and Mr T sourced much of his original stock from the southern European country.
‘The advantage of buying product from Italy was that it brought something different to the Island,’ said John. ‘The shop was full of large display dolls and electric ride-on vehicles which might seem common place now but, at the time, were very avant-garde.’
Another distinguishing feature, which many Islanders still ask about, was the motorised turntable carousel on the ground floor of The Parade shop.
‘It was like a big tiered cake,’ smiled John, ‘and it was driven by a washing-machine motor and a bicycle wheel. My godfather engineered it and it was a lovely feature in the 60s, 70s and 80s but it took up a huge amount of space and, as the market became more competitive and there was pressure to merchandise our products in a more retail-friendly way, it was no longer practical to keep it.’
While the showpiece made way for expanded product lines, the mechanism for it remains in the shop’s cellar.
Having traded from The Parade premises since the first day of the business, Christmas 2021 will be the last festive season that Bambola spends at the address, as John is planning to expand the business’s second store, in Don Street, and trade from one location from autumn 2022.
‘We will be sorry to leave this property, as it has a huge amount of history attached to it and is our original store,’ said John. ‘However, we just feel that the time is right to bring everything together and, as we own the property in Don Street, there is great scope to extend that and create areas dedicated to different ages and interests.’
While it might seem strange, given the tendency to associate toy shops with children, one of those areas is likely to cater for teenagers and adults.
‘One of the trends we saw emerge during the Covid pandemic was a huge increase in adults coming into the store to buy things for themselves,’ John explained. ‘Lego already had a strong adult fan base – although that doubled during the lockdown – and we also saw a huge demand for plastic model kits and jigsaw puzzles. Increasingly, this is a multi-generational industry, and we really do cater for everything from birth to retirement. We have two and three generations of the same family coming in, and they all find something.’
Having joined the business when he was 15, John has developed both an encyclopaedic knowledge of the toy industry and strong relationships with the store’s customers.
‘I left Victoria College when I was 14,’ he recalled. ‘At the end of the summer term, my history teacher wanted me to redo a history project and I didn’t want to do it so I left school. In the first week of September, dad suggested that I work at the shop until I found a job. I’m still looking for that proper job.’
Having worked alongside his father for 14 years, John and his wife, Sharon, then bought the business.
And John’s foray into the world of retail is one shared by many of the store’s seven-strong team who, between them, have worked at Bambola for 105 years.
‘Our staff longevity is something I’m really proud of and it’s something which really enhances our customer service as each team member has accrued so much knowledge during their time with the business,’ he said. ‘It’s very unusual in retail for staff to stay with one business for so long and I think it says a lot about our approach and ethos.’
One of those who has been with the business for a number of years is Amanda Goddard.
‘I started as a Saturday girl and have been here for 14 years, working my way up to the role of business manager,’ she said. ‘There is a strong focus on career development here, with many of the team having obtained their City and Guilds retail qualifications at Highlands. In fact one of our team members, Ulrika Sanguy, was the student of the year.’
‘It’s important to show that there are really good careers to be had in retail,’ added John. ‘So many people think of it as a last resort but we are all here because we want to be. Our industry is great fun. It’s definitely a case of work hard, play hard.’
While every day brings its challenges, the pandemic was a particularly worrying time for John.
‘We were very vulnerable during Covid. It was one of the hardest times for steering the business that I can recall,’ he said. ‘For the first time ever, I rushed my accounts through to the accountant because I was worried that I might need to go cap in hand to the bank to ask for help. Luckily, though, that didn’t happen.’
Indeed, worrying though the situation was, it was a catalyst for positive change within the business.
‘We changed our approach completely,’ John added. ‘Amanda bullied me into going online and we used Shopify to launch our own website, which helped us to continue trading when the shop was closed. Customers still wanted our products so we processed all the orders placed in the morning and then delivered the items in the afternoons.
‘It was actually quite heart-warming because we were grateful for their support and they were grateful that we were getting their items to them. I think, in a way, lockdown showed people what they could lose if they didn’t support local retailers.’
But it was not just the team’s approach to selling which changed as a result of the pandemic, as the traditional buying methods also disappeared.
‘Normally we go to big toy fairs in London and Harrogate, all of which have been cancelled for the past couple of years,’ John explained. ‘There are usually half a million or more products at those fairs, of which we look at 30,000 to 40,000 products and then make our selections. Carrying out that process over Zoom has been a lot harder and a lot more time-consuming.’
And it is not just the lack of trade shows which is impacting the buying and delivery process.
‘Getting the products is hard at the moment,’ he said. ‘Nearly all the toys come from China and getting containers out of China is both difficult and very expensive now. Toymaster [a buying group which Bambola joined 32 years ago] approached a logistics partner to arrange for a container to be shipped from China to the UK for the end of September and were told that they would be lucky to get it for the end of December.’
While this is causing some concern about stock levels for Christmas, John was quick to reassure people that the shelves would not be empty at that time.
‘We are struggling to build our warehouse stock to the level we would like but we are adjusting our delivery schedules and bringing deliveries in as soon as possible,’ he said. ‘I do think that it will be harder to get some of the most sought-after items but there will be plenty of choice.
‘Having joined Toymaster 32 years ago has really helped the business as it has brought us together with other independently owned retailers to boost our buying power. Now we are on the Toymaster selection committee as well, which means that Amanda and I can have much greater input in the products chosen, which helps us to get the toys which are in highest demand in the Island.’
