Monday, December 18, 2006
12:21 AM

~~ A mini guild to toys lover out there ~~

Chinatown Shopping Centre aka CSC, is a place for all toys enthusiasm to go and rot or let their "greens" filled wallet be drain by shop keepers. there offer a small varities of toy shops and flea markets, (note that the flea markets only open on sunday). even thought CSC maybe a hang out place for toy lovers alike, but it is so much smaller compared to the old Clarke Quay Satay Club House there. ever since Ministry of Sound invaded the place and made it into a dance club, the place was haunted by ah bengs, ah lians and music lovers around, no more young and innocent kids and adult there anymore.


still i think CSC is a pseudo toy place to go, the shop owners there are out to cheat people's money and most are not friendly at all, they only act sweet and courteous infront of you because of the rolls of money in your pockets they saw. so to play safe and not allowing scammers to cheat your money on buying toys at any places, here are some of the basic examples to do.

1. search for local auction websites, they usually offer slightly below market price because of the competitions in there. (advice, don't be a fool to place a bid on the items you think is cheap, try looking through the entire auctions for similar item before placing any bid.)

2. try to find out more toy shops in singapore that selling the toys you are looking for, because different shop has different specialty. example are, some may sell similar items cheap while others selling it expensive because the shop may not be importing the specify toy massively.

3. try not to go to pseudo toy shop like *"@tion City" to get specify toys like, Kubricks or 1/6th action figures. the shops are now moving out of those hardcore toys and changing into a japanese act-cute gifts shops, so the price for those toy may be slightly higher then average, besides you cannot ask for a discount too.

4. never be shy on asking for a discount for the toys you buy, even though you just buying one cheap toy, shop owners usually mark-up their toy prices up to two or three times higher than stock prices vary on size of toy to cover up their shop expenditures.

(* - refers to a shop of the same articulation, i cannot be too acurrate as there is an infringement of shop name law being applied here.)


so my final words for all toy enthusiasms, be smart and be sharp on buying toys, they may bring back your childhood memories but a burned hole in your pocket is an undeniable fact, so enjoy buying.



~Viva La Jouets~