Happy Child, Healthy Profit

A wayward child running through a store damaging displays, grabbing merchandise with grubby hands and coming to grief with a fixture – it’s every retailer’s nightmare. Now an Australian company has developed a solution to this problem, creating children’s play panels for retail and commercial environments to help reduce occupational health and safety risks and increase sales.

Child Friendly Solutions director Michelle Barraclough says the play panels boost sales by keeping customers in the store longer.

“One of our clients, Esprit, found that women who shop with their children tend not to try anything on or make a purchase, because children run under the changeroom door while the mother’s half naked, and you know, it’s just impossible,” says Barraclough.

The panels are designed to be mounted on a wall, column or the back of a changeroom door.

For retailers with enough space, three panels can be formed into a freestanding centre.

“We’ve found with Esprit that the kids don’t want to leave the play panel, so Mum says ‘Oh okay, two more minutes’, and she’ll start browsing. It’s surprising the number of extra sales they make.”

Barraclough says CFS’s survey last November of 288 parents found that one in five had been injured in retail environments, mainly because they had been unoccupied – “everything from children running into hooks, to shelves falling on them”.

Many accidents had been caused by children playing around with stock. “In these situations the parent isn’t liable, the retailer is. Whenever anyone is on your premises, the WorkCover Act says you are liable for any injury.”

Barraclough says some retailers offer a box of toys for children, but this can do more harm than good. “Not only do you have choking hazards for kids, but tripping hazards. The play panels significantly reduce those risks.”

All play attachments are fixed and the panels conform to Australian Toy Standards. Companies using the panels include Centro Shopping Centres, Doors Plus, Esprit, Kitchen Connection, Spotlight Stores, Toyota and Westfield Shopping Centres.