ToyLearn is an exciting start-up company that has developed a line of educational tools for children that are fun and engaging. The company has been founded by the husband and wife team of David and Jen Funster and is registered as an Ohio S-Corp. ToyLearn will be profitable by the end of year one and will have a steep increase in sales for the first several years.
ToyLearn is initially offering three different educational toys. The first is NumberToy, a fun toy that teaches children number skills. The second product is LetterToy which as the name hints, helps children quickly conquer the alphabet. The third product is PhonicToy, a device that resembles a mini PC and teaches phonic and math skills. While all the products are educational tools that develop core skills within the youngster users, they are fun to play with, thereby encouraging tots to use them often. New products are currently in development by the in-house department.
ToyLearn has identified three keys to success that are instrumental in the sustainability of the business. Number one is the need to develop creative, educational, engaging toys. The second key is to adopt strict financial controls. The last last key to success is the need to listen to customer, effectively creating a feedback mechanism for product improvement.
ToyLearn has identified two customer segments that it will go after. The first group is individual customers. These are parents or grandparents who are purchasing the product for their child. The segment is growing at 8% per year and currently has 3,354,430 perspective customers. The second market segment that will be addressed is wholesale purchasers, typically organizations that are purchasing the products for their clients to use. These organizations are typically some sort of care center or nursery/pre school. The segment is growing annually at 10% with 702,335 possible customers.
The likelihood of success of ToyLearn is ensured by its strong management team, lead by David and Jen Funster. David, in charge of the product engineering, graduated from the University of Rochester with an Engineering Degree. After school David went to work for HP in their product development department for a number of years. After HP, David moved to Nintendo working in game development. These experiences, in addition to his education has provided David with valuable skills to use to help ToyLearn gain market penetration based on the quality of its products. Jen, the other half of the management team, received her Masters of Education from Case Western Reserve University. Jen brings extensive experience in educational tool development to ToyLearn.
ToyLearn has conservatively forecasted sales of £367,000 in year two. The yearly sales will rise to £475,000 in year three. ToyLearn is destined to succeed due to a combination of seasoned management, excellent product development, and the insight to recognize a wonderful market opportunity.
1.1 Objectives
- Create a profitable company.
- Develop innovative, educational toys.
- Improve the learning curve for children through the use of interactive toys.
1.2 Mission
It is ToyLearn's mission to make the highest quality educational toys available. The more children that learn basic functions from our toys, the more successful we are.
1.3 Keys to Success
- Develop creative, educational, engaging toys.
- Adopt strict financial controls.
- Listen carefully to the customers.
