November the 23rd, 2023 – The Croatian company CircuitMess finally has its products on shelves here in Croatia, as well as in neighbouring Slovenia.
As Josipa Ban/Poslovni Dnevnik writes, the Croatian company CircuitMess, a successful domestic manufacturer of educational do-it-yourself toys, has finally conquered the shelves of local retail chains. Since last week, the new line of CircuitMess products, which includes eleven different educational sets, is available in Croatian and Slovenian toy shops.
The line, which was recently presented for the first time at the toy fair across the pond in New York, where it was awarded as the best in the “Powerfully playful” category, can now be purchased in Konzum, Lidl, Spar, Kaufland, Müller, Lidl, Plodine and more.
In addition, as pointed out by Albert Gajšak, the co-founder and director of the Croatian company CircuitMess, this is also their most affordable product line. The recommended retail price of this group of eleven toys ranges from 17 to 45 euros.
Their experience with Wallmart started the ball rolling
Gajšak explained that the expansion of their sales channel from online to physical stores was prompted by the experience with the American Walmart, the world’s largest retail chain, they entered their stores last year.
“Until then, our sales were mainly based on Kickstarter campaigns and on our own web shop. However, after entering Walmart, we saw that being present in physical store can be very profitable for a company. In addition, it’s important for marketing and the further promotion of the brand,” Gajšak stated.
Learning from this particular experience, the Croatian company CircuitMess decided to enable the physical sale of their products right here in Croatia and in neighbouring Slovenia. However, this also required the adjustment of their chosen products. In particular, according to the director of CircuitMess, the new line of STEM toys had to have their prices adjusted, and now they’re significantly more affordable.
“Until now, we’ve made products that are relatively expensive and cost more than 100 euros, but we realised that this doesn’t do very well in physical stores,” he stated, adding that this enterprise’s experience with Walmart taught them that a physical store requires a different kind of engagement than online sales asks for.
The manufacturer, Gajšak revealed, must really be involved in the sale process, as well as the positioning and marketing of their product. In a physical store, as opposed to online, packaging is also extremely important, so they had to take that into account with their new product line.
The new line, the products from which are interconnected and can be combined in different ways, will be available in both Croatian and Slovenian stores until Christmas, that is, until stocks run out. As for their placement, Gajšak noted, they hired Talent Show as an exclusive distributor.
The Croatian company CircuitMess will be present at the Spielwarenmesse toy fair in 2024
According to Gajšak, the plan is to expand this sales channel to other European markets. As such, CircuitMess will be present world’s largest toy fair “Spielwarenmesse” in Nuremberg in January next year. There, he hopes, he will be able to arrange the opening up of other markets for this successful domestic enterprise.
In addition, according to Gajšak, their cooperation with Walmart is set to continue. Their current plan is to market their new line in Walmart as well. “Negotiations are ongoing,” he revealed. In addition to all of the above, the company is currently running a Kickstarter campaign to raise money for a product they’re working on in collaboration with the American company Geek Club. This regards NASA’s Perseverance Space Rover, for which they already collected half a million dollars from almost 2,500 people by the end of last week.
Collaboration with Geek Club
Gajšak attributes the extraordinary success enjoyed by the Croatian company CircuitMess to, among other things, their cooperation with Geek Club. “Although I honestly wasn’t overly enthusiastic about cooperation with another startup at first, I ended up realising that its a great way to achieve better results,” Gajšak pointed out, adding that Perseverance Space Rovers should be delivered to customers during May or June next year.
In addition, CircuitMess should also achieve revenue growth in 2023, which doubled in 2022 and amounted to around 2.1 million euros.
