Parents choose to rent new year toys for kids

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, January 27, 2004

Parents choose to rent new year toys for kids

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Chinese children might not receive their own new toys during the coming lunar New Year festival, but they will have more choices to play with a variety of toys, rented instead of bought by their parents.

"I used to buy my daughter new toys for the new year, but this year I plan to rent toys for her," a lady surnamed Wang said.

Wang and her four-year-old daughter were selecting toys in a toy-leasing store in Changchun, capital of northeast China's Jilinprovince.

More and more Chinese parents preferred to rent toys for children because it costs less money while allowing more choices for children, according to Wang Zhi, clerk of a local toy-leasing chain.

Wang's colleague, a woman clerk surnamed Duan, said the store has over 1,000 kinds of toys, suitable for infants of four or fivemonths and youngsters aged above 17 as well. Some toys for talent development have a wide range of adaptability for not only children, but adults.

The Xingji Baobei, or Interstellar Babies, where Wang and Duan work, is a local big toy-leasing chain that took the lead in starting the toy leasing business in Changchun and currently owns six outlets.

According to clerks, toys for rent were all made of nontoxic materials and subject to disinfection after each renting.

As the Spring Festival, the biggest event of the year for Chinese, is in full swing, toy leasing businesses are booming in major Chinese cities. In Beijing and Shanghai, toy leasing stores are not new and the number of toy leasing shops is rising in anticipation of a potentially big and lucrative market.

According to the clerks in the Changchun store, over 300 toys in their store alone have been leased during this best business period of the year.

Despite the holiday boom, Wang Zhi said, "Toy leasing is after all a new business. Few people know about it and some parents are unlikely to choose to give their children rented toys."

Source: Xinhua

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