Orchard Toys – great British games and puzzles from a great British toy manufacturer
Orchard Toys – great British games and puzzles from a great British toy manufacturer
Orchard Toys - fun and engaging children's games and jigsaws
Orchard Toys have long been one of our most popular brands here at Giddy Goat Toys and we can see why our customers love it. The company is now over 40 years old and is still one of the most innovative toy manufacturers and leading UK toy brands, producing a fantastic selection of jigsaws and puzzles which has netted them over 50 Toy Industry Awards in recent years.
Orchard Toys have a reputation for their excellent design and service. They work with an educational advisor who ensures that whilst the products are still great fun, they incorporate skills from key stages of the National Curriculum.
Orchard Toys are also committed to reducing the impact of their products on the environment. They reuse and recycle to improve waste management and use environmentally responsible products where possible and they actively seek to reduce emissions. What’s also great is that Orchard Toys are designed and manufactured in the UK - originally based in Nottingham, they now produce their toys from a purpose-built factory in Norfolk.
We have a really great range of their products available in our Didsbury shop or available online at www.giddygoattoys.co.uk, including the ever popular Shopping List which is one of our biggest selling games and the Giant Road Map Jigsaw which enables little ones to build a play mat of their own and then use as a road for their cars. My little boy absolutely loves it – it’s easily the toy he plays the most with! It’s great because all of the pieces fit together and he can design a different road layout every time he plays with it.
It’s also great for imaginative play as he usually gets out his Playmobil figures to create a little town. It can also be connected with the 15 piece Giant Town jigsaw puzzle to create an even bigger play area with lots and lots of possible layouts.
Another of our best selling Orchard Toys products is the Greedy Gorilla game. It's a matching game in which children have to find six different foods to make a healthy game. Take it in turns to turn over a card to try to complete your meal and as well as the healthy food pieces there are also a number of junk food cards - children then post these into the Greedy Gorilla's mouth which makes him burp! Of course children love to hear the gorilla burping and this helps to reinforce which foods are healthy and which aren't.
I’ve recently tried and tested one of Orchard Toys newest games and come to the conclusion that after 40 years, Orchard Toys games are still as exciting as ever. I had our two nieces (aged 4 and 5) over in the Easter holidays and myself and my three year old son really enjoyed playing Post Box Game with them. Whilst Orchard have in the past had a few lines that appealed to children under 3, they were mainly jigsaws and so I was really happy to see that the Post Box Game is suitable for children of two years and up. It’s a brilliant first play game which helps children learn colours and develop hand-eye co-ordination. The game can be made slightly harder for older children and turned into a memory game (we played by the ‘harder rules’ as all the kids were over 3.)
The more basic aim of the game is for children to post the envelope that they’ve picked into the matching coloured post box. As we played with the more difficult rules the children all had to pick a letter box each and the winner was the child who had correctly picked all 4 of their matching coloured envelopes and posted them into their post box. It obviously went down well as we played it again and again for the next hour! It was great that my 3 year old had just as much of a chance of winning as the older two and he felt like he was really competing with them.
To view our full range of Orchard Toys games and jigsaw puzzles call into our Didsbury shop or shop online at www.giddygoattoys.co.uk
By Rachel Hall, Giddy Goat Toys