Santa Claus’s sleigh was much lighter when Don McGreevy began working in his family’s toy shop in Westport more than 50 years ago. The elves at the North Pole workshop certainly hadn’t heard of Moana or Squishmallows, Pokémon or Peppa Pig when Don’s father Jack died suddenly in 1970 and, as the eldest in the family, it fell to him to take over the running of the shop with his mother.
Jack had gradually expanded the grocery, hardware, tobacconist, stationery and home-made ice-cream emporium established by his grandfather in 1904, to stock toys too.
“Yes, there were toys in the shop from about the 1940s but toys in those days weren’t like the toys of today,” says Don McGreevy.
“The selection was much more limited and simple with Dinky cars and toy soldiers and little dolls and teddy bears. There were Meccano sets too, I think. Then my parents opened the upstairs of the shop in the 1960s and I always remember how Christmas stockings took off. They were made in China and filled with little toys, with a game of snakes and ladders on the cardboard on the back.”
By the time he took over in 1970, the children’s letters to Santa were getting longer and by then typically included dolls’ prams and pushchairs, as well as tea sets and train sets, Lego and spinning tops.
“About a decade later with Christmas becoming more commercialised, Musgraves [wholesalers] established a franchise called Supertoys and here in Co Mayo we joined two other shops, Hanleys and Smyths. Smyths is now the biggest toyshop chain in Europe. After Smyths went out on their own, we decided to patent our own brand, Toysdirect, in the 1990s,” explains Don.
Ironically, it was the challenges of the Covid pandemic that provided the opportunity for Don’s son, Donard, a fourth-generation member of the McGreevy family, to embrace the potential dividends of this patented brand as businesses were forced to close down due to restrictions.
Donard explains: “As usual I would have pre-ordered a lot of our stock in March [2020] for the Christmas season, and was naturally really worried. I came home to my wife Laura one day and said, ‘What are we going to do?’ She was seven months pregnant and we were going to have to close. She suggested we start selling online, and within the space of a week we had set up our website. So after maternity leave she left her job and now works full-time with the business.”
He says tractors and trailers and other farmyard toys are a big speciality and are often purchased by visitors who have spotted them during their holidays in Westport.
It’s tough work competing with the multiples, but dealing with our community on a day-to-day basis makes it worthwhile
— Sean McGillicuddy
“To offset the challenges from the big chains, we offer our customers brands that are not sold in the larger retailers, like Bruder, Siku and Britain tractors and Bigjigs wooden toys. This means we have something different to offer. We also joined the Toymaster buying group in 2021, as it offers us better discounts than the larger toy suppliers,” McGreevy explains.
The pandemic ultimately proved to be a catalyst for a move from Dublin back home to Listowel, Co Kerry, for Seán McGillicuddy. The former actor and maths and English teacher is also the fourth-generation member running the family business, now comprising a toy shop and a hobby shop.
Interestingly, the fact that his partner went into labour when he was on the set of Vikings back in 2018 also helped to decide their move back home.
“We were living in an apartment in Dublin with no balcony, and both being from Kerry we were drawn back to our communities and the wild nature on our doorsteps,” McGillicuddy explains.
It had never been on Sean’s “radar” to run the family business, but after the tragic death of his brother Owen and his father’s passing in 2021, he gradually became more involved.
His natural creativity led to the opening of a second shop in 2023 called The Hobby Space.
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“Boys are moving out of toys to PlayStations and games by the age of 12, whilst girls tend to last longer with arts and crafts. The majority of parents want to keep their children away from electronic devices for as long as possible, so we like to stock play-centred and sensory toys whilst The Hobby Space focuses on ‘geek culture’, with lots of trading cards, models and board games,” he says.
McGillicuddy believes the traditional “personal touch” is key to the survival of his family’s shops.
“We know the majority of our customers, or we get to know them, and they are loyal – they trust us. We run a deposit club which also helps to support families, but mostly we have history behind us with 125 years in business, so generations of families continue to shop with us,” he says.
“It’s tough work competing with the multiples, but dealing with our community on a day-to-day basis makes it worthwhile.”
Over in Co Waterford, Pat Murphy treasures the fact that his family shops in Dungarvan and Youghal regularly sell toys to parents who first came into the shop as children themselves.
Murphy’s cross-generational retail story evolved from his great-grandaunt’s bakery a century ago to grocery and dry goods such as the big sacks of Odlums flour used to bake soda bread until the 1970s.
[ Dangerous toys made outside EU sold online within the blocOpens in new window ]
His parents, Frank and Kathleen, are still involved with the shops.
“I think the first big toy crazes around then and into the 1980s were Sindy, as opposed to Barbie, Cabbage Patch dolls and hula hoops – they were the fidget spinners of their day,” recalls Murphy.
He clearly remembers how the Star Wars movies were among the first to create toy figures.
“That is a big part of the industry now with so many figures from the big blockbuster cartoons,” Murphy adds.
From a business perspective, the impact of Brexit and the increased overheads still reverberate for him.
“But Christmas has its own momentum and is almost an economy of its own. Everything in our world is so experiential now and Christmas is the centre of that.”
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