It's Not Mean to be Green, the Musical! - Win Tix!

This Sunday marks the world premiere of "It's Not Mean to be Green, the Musical" at the duPont Theater in Wilmington.

We couldn't be more excited for our friends Jamie Kleman and Barbara Slavin and all the people who made the play possible.

We're awfully proud of our part in the creation of this musical and we can't wait to attend Sunday's showing of the play.

If you haven't heard me tell the story before, here it is again. When we first opened, our friend Gayle Lafferty suggested we contact a friend of hers who had written a children's book. Turns out her friend is Jamie Kleman and the book is 'It's Not Mean to be Green.' Jamie was gracious enough to show up and do a reading at our store before our official opening date.

Early in 2009, I met with Barbara Slavin, who was then the manager of the duPont Theater children's series about scheduling cross-promotions with YoYo Joe's. Barbara ran down the projected schedule for 2009-2010 and when she got to April, she mentioned that they were hoping to do their own production of a play with an environmental theme for Earth Day. I suggested she contact Jamie and gave Barbara a copy of Jamie's book.

Turns out, they hit it off and the play was born! I like to think that they were destined to meet anyway, but I am thrilled that I could have played a part in something like this happening.

So, we bought tickets to the show this Sunday and we got some extras to give away. I know it's last minute, but we have several packs of four tix available for the show on Sunday. The show is at 3 pm at the duPont Theater. You can win one of a couple ways. Either comment below that you're interested or check out our twitter feed at twitter.com/yoyojoe and 'reweet' our It's Not Mean to be Green ticket tweet.

Hope to see you on Sunday!!

Pancakes + Play + Delaware Children's Museum + YoYo Joe's Toys & Fun = FUN

We were thrilled when our friends at the Delaware Children's Museum asked us to sponsor their first D@D (Dads at the Delaware Children's Museum) Event - the Pancakes & Play Breakfast, which was held today at the Delaware Riverfront Market.

My son, Ethan, and I showed up around 8:30 and brought with us one of our favorite in-store demo units - the marble run - as well as a box of yo-yos to give out to kids.

The doors opened at 9 am, and soon we were mobbed with kids. Most of the kids were a bit young to yo-yo, but we fitted them with custom string length yo-yos and it was awesome to see the looks on their faces after we helped them with their first throws.

We got to meet both co-chairs of the D@D - Delaware Lt. Governor Matt Denn & Khary Dewitt and their children.

The event was sold out and our pals at the DCM seemed quite happy with

the turnout. It was the first event where they actually sold memberships to the museum (we joined on day one - yay!). To join the DCM, click here.

We have a close relationship to the Delaware Children's Museum and anticipate working with them on cross-promotional activities. We've discussed monthly versions of our popular Yo-Yo Club at the DCM.

Thanks to Julie, Paige and Traci and all the wonderful people at the Delaware Children's Museum for letting us be a part of this awesome event.

Time for Spring Training at YoYo Joe's!

We have started receiving our shipments from orders we places at the 2010 New York International Toy Fair. Among the first of them? Kaskey Kids action figures. Baseball Guys, Football Guys and Soccer Guys. Each set comes with enough players to field two teams, plus a playmat and more.

Play Ball!

Toy Fair 2010

We're headed off to the 2010 New York International Toy Fair tomorrow. While in New York, we'll be checking out hundreds of booths with thousands of toys. It's always a blast digging through the new toys to find ones we think will be winners each year.
We're also headed to the ASTRA (American Specialty Toy Retailing Association) party Sunday night as well as the annual YoYo Nation Happy Hour on Monday night.
Check out my tweets from ToyFair by following my Twitter feed at twitter.com/yoyojoe or for general tweets from Toy Fair, look for the hash tag #toyfairNY.

Check us out, we're a 'Favorite Place!'

We're a number!

Google has just started a program called 'Favorite Places' in which they sent out stickers with a little pixelated QR code on it. QR codes are quite popular in Japan, but are just getting a foothold here in the US. You can download an app for your cell phone that will allow you to scan the QR code (take a picture of it) and it will take you immediately to YoYo Joe's Google Local page with info on our hours, reviews, YouTube videos and more.
Google initially sent out the stickers to about 100,000 businesses, based on how popular their Google Local page was.
I downloaded an app for my iphone and tried it out. It did work (on the 3rd try) - how cool is that?
If you wanna try it, here is our QR code for our Google Local page:

The Red Vest

I first posted this entry last year, but I decided to repost it for this year. Happy Holidays!

For as long back as I can remember, each Christmas Eve my father would go to work wearing a fuzzy red vest.

At first, when I was young, I would see him head off to work wearing the vest. When I was older, and working at Mitchell's, I'd see him arrive at work wearing with the same vest. It was a tradition of his. It's certainly not a particularly spectacular vest, but it was something I looked forward to. One of those signs that Christmas really had arrived.

I called him today to ask him about that vest. He told me that he and his brother (my uncle Jack) both got the vests the same year - about 45 years ago - from a sales rep that they bought Christmas stockings from. The vest is made of the same material that the traditional red Christmas stockings are made out of. He remembers the company's name as 'Renock Corp.' They loved their sales rep, and bought lots and lots of stockings and ornaments from them. Sadly, Jack's vest wore out quickly. My father's suffered a tear one year, to be repaired by an employee. If you shopped on Christmas Eve at Mitchell's anytime over the past 45 years, you probably saw my dad sporting his vest.

UPDATE - My brother Tom found the picture at the top of the page. It was one that my sister Kris had e-mailed him years ago. The pic shows not only my dad sporting his vest, but my brother Tom and me also wearing red vests. I think my mom made those, as I remembered them after I saw the pic. Yes, that's me in the back, next to my dad and Kris. My other sister, Wendy and Tom are in the front.

The pic at the bottom is the vest vintage 2008.

Joe on 'The 10! Show' on Friday

Three or so weeks after our first appearance on NBC10's 'The 10! Show,' we were surprised to hear from them again. They asked Joe to come up to be on Friday's show and highlight some cool last minute toys. Joe showed off the Sandwich Stacking Game from Melissa & Doug, the Hexbug Nano, the Quadrilla Musical set and the brand new Rockboard Scooter. The Scooter is awesome. Joe was just happy to not wreck while riding the scooter...

Check it out: