is a set of different interesting things: beads, stickers, books, pencils, puzzles, cars, dolls, travel finds that will help parents when traveling with their baby. The main idea of the project creators: time is priceless, and you shouldn’t waste it on shopping trips when you can go to the website, fill out an application in a minute and receive an individual set. After all, many people don’t have time to assemble such boxes themselves, and some don’t know what a child is interested in at a certain age.
Anna Maslennikova, author of the project: “The box is not a magic wand; small children still need to be looked after. For some reason, many people think that with Korobochka you can forget about the child. Until the age of three, I leave information to everyone that they need to stay close to the child. And yes, it’s hardest with the little ones, because children have their own moods, so the Box contains a lot of elements specifically so that the child is definitely interested in something. When people ask me at what age it can be used, I answer that it can be used from 5-6 months.”
The set is assembled based on three main parameters:
– age (from 0 to 13 years)
- floor
– place of use.
There are three different sets, differing in the number and cost of elements, so that everyone can choose the most suitable Box in terms of cost and travel duration.
You can order the set on the website. After completing the application, project staff contact the client and send a short questionnaire with questions about the child’s preferences.
The cost of the box is from 1,400 to 2,500 rubles.
I came up with a project journalist and mother Anna Maslennikova: “As our son got older, it became harder to keep him entertained on planes. Aeroflot gives out toys from the age of three, and my son was 9 months old. Yes, boxes with toys for development have existed for a long time and successfully. It’s funny, but I found out about their existence after I decided to take my son’s shoebox and put something in there that could simply distract him.The idea came after an unsuccessful Moscow-Israel flight. Dima's husband, an entrepreneur, said that the idea was great and we should take it on.
I wrote on social networks that I needed mothers with experience traveling with children, gathered about 15 people and interviewed everyone. And then I made a list of things that experienced mothers use. I added my life hacks and passed the Box around for testing. They wrote to me that it worked, and that it didn’t, and I corrected everything at the same time.
Now I continue to travel, bringing the Box to other countries (Israel, America, Georgia, Italy, Norway). Recently they have expanded throughout Russia, there were deliveries to Vladivostok, Arkhangelsk, Yekaterinburg, Kaliningrad, and in parallel with Moscow there are orders from St. Petersburg. Given a choice, the child will definitely put down the iPad for an hour and study the contents of the Box.”
A newborn requires from its parents special living conditions in which it will be comfortable and cozy. Immediately after the baby is born, you can buy a sling for him in the MyMal online store. It will allow the baby to remain in close contact with mom even when she has a lot to do. As soon as the little one learns to sit, you can buy him a kangaroo backpack. Thanks to him, mothers and fathers will be able to live in the usual rhythm of life, and their child will discover a new world together with their parents.
A car bottle warmer will allow parents to feed their baby milk from a bottle or nutritional mixture. It is very convenient, does not require filling the container with water and connects to the cigarette lighter socket. As soon as complementary feeding starts, you can take a baby thermos with you for food on the road. Thanks to it, your baby will always be satisfied with healthy and carefully prepared food at the optimal temperature.
So that you can always conveniently take your baby with you on a visit, a clinic or pharmacy must buy a cradle and baby carrier. It has a hard bottom and strong sides and is therefore perfect for a baby's fragile back.
Traveling with a one year old or older
If you decide to take your baby with you on a bike ride through parks and squares, nothing could be easier; children’s bike seats will provide the necessary level of comfort and safety for your child. They have a high back and protective sides and footrests.
If your whole family and your baby are going on an overnight camping trip or just spending the whole day in the park, don’t forget to buy a children’s tent. Together with a children's sleeping bag for sleep, it will provide the little one with strong and bright dreams. fresh air. Thanks to the dense fabric and mosquito net, insects will not be able to disturb your child's sleep.
And in order not to forget anything and to develop independence and responsibility in the baby, he should definitely buy a children's backpack. You can put everything you need for travel and schoolwork in it.
Traveling with a child by car
To ensure that all the necessary items for caring for your little one are always at hand while driving, you should buy a children's organizer for the car. And the more pockets and compartments there are, the better, each item will have its own place. So that the question of finding a toilet does not take parents by surprise, children's travel potties with special replacement bags were invented.
What is Activity Kit and how is it useful?
Activity Kit is a compact travel set of various games and tasks for children. Most importantly, it should be convenient for use when traveling with a child, which means:
- Easily fits in a bag, backpack, suitcase
- items must be safe and not dirty
- parts should be light in weight
Things to consider when creating a kit:
1. Age of the child
Figure out exactly how you will use certain items. Will the entertainment and developmental activities you have planned be appropriate for the child’s age?
2. Interests and hobbies
Children have favorite characters or activities. So, for a nature lover, a set of young naturalist with a magnifying glass is suitable, for a traveler - binoculars, a map and a compass, and for an artist - a set of pencils and an album for drawing in nature. And of course, waiting for a flight at the airport becomes much more interesting in the company of robots, cars, fairies, the Paw Patrol or the Smurfs.
3. Travel method
The size and scope of your set depends on how you plan to travel with your baby - by car, on a train, on a plane, or on a camping trip. For some, a mini-set of a sensory box in a container or cards in a photo album that can easily fit in a backpack is suitable. And someone will collect a whole box of all sorts of items, which they will place in a car or in the side compartment of a suitcase.
4. Destination
Sea, mountains, forests, different countries, road trip - for each voyage you can select thematic tasks. For example, cards with city attractions or road, forest and sea “finds”.
How to make an Activity Kit
If you look closely, most of the things you need to create an Activity Kit can be found at home. For example, there is useful application small Kinder toys, forgotten stickers, extra markers and other trinkets. 
For the set you will need:
- stationery folder with a zipper or a button - for storing the entire set of tasks;
- thin photo album size 10x15 - for cards, paper assignments;
- stationery zip envelopes - for games, books and cards;
- small plastic containers - for packaging toys, healthy snacks, stationery.
This cheerful yellow A4 folder can hold the following games and tasks for little travelers:
- drawing set
- set with plasticine
- mini sensory box (as recommended by Maria Montessori)
- a set of word games for the road (instructions for parents)
- healthy snack set
- educational tasks and cards
- road find
- bag for travel “treasures”
- outdoor play set.
Activity Kit. Examples of educational games in transport
DRAWING SET
Drawing while traveling is twice as interesting! You can find so many unusual things - new cities, houses, monuments, beautiful landscapes, sights. To bring home a collection of “travel” masterpieces by a little artist, you need to prepare a convenient drawing set in advance.
You will need:
- mini-kits for drawing - compact pencils, felt-tip pens, wax crayons;
- a small notebook with white sheets - preferably with a thick cover, to make it easier to draw on your lap.
To pack this set you can choose to use: pocket Plastic container, a stationery zip bag, or tie pencils with strings to a notebook so they don’t get lost in transport. 
SET WITH PLASTICINE
Three lessons at once:
- constructor
- simple modeling for kids
- plasticineography
You will need:
- mini container
- plasticine stack
- pieces of plasticine (you can first cut the plasticine into cubes or roll it into balls)
- toothpicks (can be secured to the lid of the container with tape so as not to lose).
Plasticine construction set
To make a simple road construction set from plasticine, you just need to connect toothpicks with plasticine cubes. You can collect and study various shapes at the same time: rhombus, square, rectangle, triangle. Or design three-dimensional figures- houses, fences, cubes. 
Simple modeling for kids
From the same small squares of plasticine you can sculpt the simplest figures with your child.
1. Butterfly 
2. Ladybug 
3. Rainbow caterpillar 
4. Bee 
Plasticineography, or drawing with plasticine
Some simple options this creativity for children:
- on paper templates you can glue plasticine to create a whole picture (chicken, flower, cloud, sun, etc.);
- smear pieces of plasticine over the drawing with your fingers;
- twist the spirals and flagella and glue them to the picture.
When planning a trip, put in your photo album in advance printed templates for plasticine printing or coloring books with contours on which the child can stick plasticine. 
MINI TOUCH BOX
Mini-worlds in boxes are a win-win games for almost all occasions. For example, this is not the first time that the camping “world of dinosaurs” has traveled with us. You can create such a box on any theme - fairies, knights, princesses, pirates, Indians, butterflies, gnomes, cars, animals - depending on what your child is interested in and what toys you have in your arsenal. 
IN in this case to create the box I used:
- Mojo Dinosaur Mini Figures;
- kinetic sand (can be replaced with modeling dough or homemade plasticine);
- pompoms and mini Christmas tree
- decorative stones
- background (I cut out a picture of the sky from a children's magazine and glued it to the lid of the container with double-sided tape);
- pocket plastic container.
Toys from Kinder surprises, Lego figures and other children's construction sets, or figurines of animals, birds, insects, and sea inhabitants are suitable for a sensory box.
BAG FOR “TRAVEL” TREASURES
As usually happens after a trip: “Maaam, where is my car-shaped stone that I found on the shore.” Or it could be a souvenir from an excursion, a candy wrapper with some “special picture” and other children’s “treasures” that accumulate during the trip and then magically disappear somewhere. To keep all this stuff, take a small bag with you. 
At the same time, on the way back you can play with the whole family "Guessing Game"- each participant puts his hand in the bag and tries to determine by touch what kind of object he got!
Developmental tasks and cards 
SET OF WORD GAMES FOR THE ROAD
Many developmental benefits for a child are hidden in the good old “verbal” games, which did not let our parents get bored on the road even when there were no tablets and gadgets.
What are the advantages of such games for children:
- memory training
- vocabulary replenishment
- development of logic, observation and imagination
- the good mood that appears in a child when he plays with his parents
- and most importantly, they don’t take up much space
To make this cheat sheet for parents easy to store on the go, you need to make holes with a hole punch, seal the top with wide transparent tape to prevent it from getting dirty, and attach it to a keychain ring. 
ROAD MAZE
The playing field “Road Labyrinth” is a very convenient and compact game for traveling. You can draw it by hand or cut out a suitable picture from a children's magazine with a road and houses. 
PUZZLES
It's very easy to make a puzzle for the road. It is enough to cut sheets of colored cardboard into different parts, as in the photo above. You can pack it together with other “occupations” in a photo album. 
ROAD "FINDER"
“Nakhodilka” is a form with “travel” pictures that you need to look for with your child on the road. And then mark your observations in the boxes. Thanks to this task, the child:
- trains observation and memory
- develops a craving for research activities and logical thinking
- broadens the mind
- replenishes vocabulary
TIC-TIC-TOE GAME
A childhood favorite and a simple game to entertain your child on the go. I think everyone knows the rules perfectly well! You can draw the playing field by hand or print our ready-made template and take it with you on your trip.
Activity Kit. Examples of outdoor games
In addition to accessories for educational activities, the Activity Kit can hide several items that will not take up much space, but will be useful for entertaining in an open space:
- children's watch
- children's camera: kids can take a toy camera, older children can take a real one. For example, a shockproof model or an inexpensive point-and-shoot camera that will teach a child to take photographs and notice interesting things around him. Then from these photos you can create a Travel Book about your trip
- compass
- small flashlight: allows you to come up with a lot of games for your child. For example, arrange a shadow theater on the wall
- binoculars or telescope
- bubble
- air balloons.
Mini-books and ready-made children's kits for travelers
This summer we went by car to a family camp in Greece. Before leaving, I thoroughly prepared, picked up a collection of word games, and also put together a travel chest full of interesting activities for the child.
I'll tell you what I packed and how much it was used on the road. I’ll say right away that we don’t get seasick at all. Maybe the dynamic gymnastics practiced with the child in infancy had an effect. Therefore, I boldly took with me a lot of different things that can be done with my hands. What can you take with you to entertain your child? It depends on his age, and you yourself know better than anyone else what can please him and captivate him for a long time. I give a list for a 6 year old boy.
What to take with you in the car on a long journey
- New books. I took books with large print and interesting pictures to look at. I read and leafed through. I decided when. I sometimes gave wise advice, like “read Pushkin’s poems.” In general, I spent no more than 2-3 times a day with books for 15 minutes.
- Books with tasks - creative, logical, mathematical. I took Zhenya Katz’s notebooks, the set “We’re going - we don’t get bored” from Labyrinth, finds, Tatiana Zadorozhnaya’s book “How to draw any story.” I didn’t open much of Zhenya and Nakhodilka. I tried to draw along Zadorozhnaya only once (it turned out great!). The most popular set was from Labyrinth.
- Drawing. I put a clipboard and a lot of A4 sheets. I made a wonderful set of stationery in a box from Ikea (felt-tip pens, bright pens, compasses, pencils and sharpener, erasers, scissors, plain and curly, decorative tapes, glue, eyes). I included a new album with good paper and Cars. I didn’t draw much pictures. But he actively used paper: he rolled up airplanes, ships and hares, made and decorated pizza. I came up with a game of sending a parcel and going to a restaurant. He prepared (drew) different dishes for us, cut them out and sent them in a parcel (cardboard box) to front seat. In general, the sheets and stationery set were actively used. You can put unsharpened pencils in a set with a good sharpener, let him work on the go.
- Notebook for travel notes. The dream of raising Paganel does not go away in me, although the artist is actively growing. I didn’t go: in three days, one inscription appeared in the notebook: “I liked to start the book”... Vanya has been reading since he was 4 years old, and began writing at 4.5 years old. Moreover, I didn’t really teach him either one or the other. I taught myself. I am writing about how this happens to children in the camp here.
- Plasticine. Created all the conditions: new box, a set of cool stacks, a modeling board. So far it hasn't worked at all. It probably should have been given out as a surprise at some point.
- Map to mark the route. On a tip, I bought an erasable world map, but in fact it wasn’t very convenient to erase it on the road. The route was finalized upon arrival.
- Origami sheets. That was actually the Bomb! On the third day, as a surprise, I gave Vanya a book with diagrams for folding airplanes and beautiful sheets. And after that 5 hour journey all he did was design. The planes littered the entire cabin; at rest stops we tested them, some flew out of the windows. In general, origami really captivated the child and brightened up more than one day of his journey! Now he is asking for new folding schemes.
- Compact games (magnetic and logic). They, like the audio tales, also performed very well. I’ll tell you about them in a separate article.
- Flashlight or glow sticks- it’s good to give it out when it gets dark if the child is not yet sleeping.
- Binoculars- look around.
- Set of new yarn(to weave scarves and ropes) or rubber bands for weaving.
- Lego
How to give out surprises so that they last 3 thousand kilometers?
For the surprise box to work, there are several rules:
- The most important thing is not to dump it all en masse into some kind of “baby bag” that is available to him all the time. In this case, the value of gifts disappears. He won’t be diligently poking around and choosing something he hasn’t played with yet. Verified. Initially, some of the books, games and creative kits were in his special box for free access. It was a mistake. Because he watched it all in half an hour and lost interest.
- Each surprise should be wrapped as a gift before the trip. Many layers of paper. Or newspapers. A significant part of the journey will be spent simply unfolding. And, of course, in this form the surprise has much greater value.
- Give out surprises one at a time, several times a day. So that the child has time to fully enjoy them, play with them, and feel them.
- Make the surprise box itself inaccessible to the child, so that he does not peep in advance what is there. We didn’t have room for her in the trunk, so she rode next to Vanya the whole way. But he knew for sure that he couldn’t look into it, or all the surprises would go to gifts for others. I didn’t try to break the rule, I stuck to it.
That's all the rules. We easily got to Greece with this box, without ever resorting to the life-saving help of a tablet.
I also wrote about such a mega-important component of travel as
Anna Maslennikova talks about how her “Box” project helps parents keep their children occupied while traveling
A naughty baby on a plane creates inconvenience for both surrounding passengers and their own parents. A tablet can come to the rescue, but not all parents are delighted with this decision. And your favorite toy can get boring during a long flight. Muscovite Anna Maslennikova came up with special “travel boxes” for little passengers. How to provide for children interesting activity, and their parents and other passengers - peace and tranquility, the founder of the “Korobochka” project Anna Maslennikova told the portal site.
Anna Maslennikova, 27 years old, entrepreneur, founder of the project. A television journalist by education, she graduated from the Humanitarian Institute of Television and Radio Broadcasting. M.A. Lithuanian. Before launching her own business, she worked as an editor at Vesti FM and Mayak radio; content marketer at 3Dprintus.
How it all began
Anna and her husband Dmitry began traveling with their son Daniil when he was two and a half months old. On his first flights, the baby did not cause any inconvenience to his parents or others. But when he grew up a little, he began to act up on airplanes. Fly with a crying child uncomfortable for both parents and surrounding passengers. Anna didn’t know how to solve this problem.
Suddenly, she got the idea to take a small box on board and put in it toys and things that a child at that age might be interested in. Anna immediately decided that her “flight box” should be compact and fit into a medium-sized women’s bag.
The idea of how to entertain a child during a flight gradually began to transform into a business idea. Throughout the summer of 2015, Anna pondered whether something worthwhile would come of this. The young mother doubted that her invention would interest anyone. But she soon became convinced from the example of her own child that the idea really worked.
Anna decided to try out the first “Box” in September 2015, during an 8-hour flight. My son was woken up during the transfer, and he never fell asleep again. At the moment when the child was completely capricious, Anna put him in the cradle and took out the prepared “Box”. Her role was played by an ordinary box of sneakers. The 10-month-old baby enthusiastically played with its contents and was no longer capricious. “I realized that the man was busy,” recalls Anna. All the parents had to do was simply monitor his play and periodically maintain interest in it.
Before assembling the first set, Anna asked experienced mothers- both acquaintances and strangers. She called and wrote to them, asking what toys their children use on trips. From the collected list, the travel mom selected what she considered necessary, plus added some items to her taste.
Then Anna began “testing” her “Boxes”. She sent people an offer to take “The Box” for free - with the condition that they write a review of how the child reacted to it. She used the feedback she received to make further changes to the toy selection. All these experiments took 3-4 months. In total, it took almost a year to think through and test the idea.
In the spring of 2016, having finished dealing with the content of the “Box”, Anna seriously began promoting. The project website and pages on social networks were launched. Made with the help of designers beautiful boxes. It was possible to sell individual copies of “Korobochek” before, but “serial” sales began in May 2016.
What is inside
“Boxes” come in three types: small (5-7 items), medium (7-10 items) and large (10-12 items).
At the initial stage, Anna collected “Boxes” only for children under 3 years old. When she interviewed experienced mothers, she realized: the most difficult “flight” age is from 9-10 months to 3 years. It’s easier to get older kids interested in something; they can focus on one thing for longer.
Attention of children from one year to three years quickly jumps from object to object. Therefore, the set contains not two or three toys, with which he will play enough in a matter of minutes, but from five to twelve
“A child’s choice often depends on his mood. If some of the toys from the set are not of interest, he will be fascinated by something else. And then he can switch back to the next toy,” says Anna Maslennikova.
According to the entrepreneur herself, “Korobochka” is suitable for babies aged 6 months and older. The youngest recipients of the flight kit are between 3 and 5 months old. It happens that sets are bought “for growth.” Recently, one order flew to Norway to visit a baby who is only 1 month old.
A box “for the little ones” consists of various elements: books, rustling or musical toys, wooden beads, rattles, etc. Some of the elements are quite small (for example, round colored “pebbles” with a diameter of about 2 cm), which not all parents like. But Anna believes that these toys are useful for the development of a child’s motor skills and can really distract him for a long time. The main thing is that one of the adults looks after the baby while playing.
A little later, Anna began making sets for older children. She puts in them not only toys, but also books, stickers, puzzles, problems, creative items (pencils, markers, plasticine, etc.) Today, both preschoolers and students can receive the “Box”. primary school, and even teenagers. Maximum age recipients are 13 years old.
When selecting the contents of the “Box,” Anna has to take into account two limiting factors: cost and size of things. Now the size of the “Box” is 22x12 cm. The largest set consists of 12 elements and fills it almost to capacity. Therefore, some interesting and suitable, from the point of view of an entrepreneur, things (for example, large-format books) have to be “rejected” because they are too large.
How does the order happen?
After the client clicks the “order” button on the website, he needs to answer three questions: the age of the child, his gender and where the kit will be used. Taking into account only three parameters, the “Box” turns out to be quite individual. This is also helped by the fact that Anna signs each box with the name of the recipient.
Then, if the customer wants, he can fill out a short questionnaire about the child’s preferences. In it you need to tick off what the child is interested in, whether he likes to draw, sculpt, etc. According to statistics, a person spends 40 seconds on a questionnaire. Most clients agree to fill it out. “Of course, I’m unlikely to be able to take into account all the parents’ preferences. But I try to fulfill their wishes as much as possible,” says Anna.
To achieve the best results during the trip, it is recommended not to show the child the contents of the set in advance - otherwise the surprise effect will be lost
Sometimes one customer buys two boxes - when he goes on a trip with two children. In these cases, Anna follows certain rules when packing. She puts several identical toys in both “Boxes” so that the children have “their own” and do not take them away from each other. But most of the items in the two sets will be “different”, even if the “clients” are about the same age. This allows children to play with each other and exchange toys.
“There doesn’t seem to be anything special about my idea – just a box and toys. But, firstly, they are folded into a beautiful box. It is given at a certain moment, and due to this, the desired effect is achieved. Of course, in each situation it is very individual how much you might like the box. It's a lottery in a sense. But so far it seems to be working,” says Anna Maslennikova.
Suppliers
Each box, regardless of the age of the recipients, contains books that Anna loves and carefully selects. She usually looks for them in the Biblio-Globus store. To understand whether a book is suitable or not, you need to see it “live” and touch it with your hands. After such trips, the founder of the “Korobochka” project contacts the publishing house and orders a batch of books she likes. Anna collaborates with some of them (for example, with the publishing house Clever) on an ongoing basis.
Anna uses the same principle to select other items for her sets. If she likes a toy, she buys it in a store in a single copy and tests it - gives the purchase to her son or friends who have a child the right age. If the “target audience” likes the toy and is suitable for the “Box” in size, Anna buys it in bulk and puts it in her sets.
When there is no time to go shopping, the entrepreneur looks for new elements for her product on the Internet. Some manufacturers have convenient, well-designed websites, and Anna prefers to purchase from them. But if she needs to put something specific in the “Box”, based on the wishes of a particular child, it’s easier for her to buy the right thing in a regular retail store.
Some of Anna's suppliers are individual entrepreneurs who make something interesting. For example, one girl makes beads for children that can be chewed. Some manufacturers are already approaching Korobochka with an offer to include their toy in the set.
During her travels around the world, Anna also looks for suitable things and toys for the “Box”. She buys what she likes and puts them in sets. Thus, some recipients of the “Boxes” discover in them “special” things that cannot be found in our country. The sets have already included toys from Estonia, Portugal, and the Czech Republic.
Delivery
The geography of “Korobochek” supplies in Russia is currently limited to Moscow and St. Petersburg. In Moscow, purchases are delivered by courier; the method of delivery to St. Petersburg depends on the client’s choice.
“Korobochka” went beyond the borders of Russia literally from the first day of the project. Anna does not use postal or courier services: the cost of such delivery would far exceed the cost of the “Box” itself. Travelers themselves bring them to their acquaintances and friends around the world. Thus, “The Box” visited the USA, Italy, Norway, Georgia and several other countries.
When Anna Maslennikova herself flies to another country, she always writes about it on social networks and invites locals to place an order. In this case, she gives purchases “from hand to hand”, and does not charge money for delivery. During one trip, Anna can take up to five “Boxes”. This is how she sold several sets while visiting Israel.
The main competitor is the iPad
The “Boxes” compete with small sets of toys, as well as toys from the “On the Road” series. But their main disadvantage, according to Anna, is that the sets are small, and there is only one toy “for the road”. These items are not enough to keep a child occupied for a long time. The Korobochka project does not yet have any direct competitors producing similar sets.
But the entrepreneur considers her iPad to be her main competitor. There are usually cartoons and games there. With a tablet, the child is as busy as possible and does not require parental attention. When a child plays with the “Box”, he still needs to be supervised. But, according to Anna, such games are much more useful than watching cartoons on an iPad.
Now Anna’s son is 2 years and 3 months old, and she is trying to limit his access to the tablet. They started using the gadget “in doses” only when my son was one and a half years old, and only in cases where there was no energy left for other ways to occupy the child’s attention.
“Some are surprised that Korobochka does not offer an opportunity for parents to completely relax. I always put a note in the “Box” for clients: “Have an easy flight, but don’t forget that a child under 3 years old should not be left alone.” Many people think that once they receive the “Box,” they can forget about the child for a while. If this were really true, I would already be a millionaire. But this is not a magic wand. In any case, you need to keep an eye on a small child,” notes Anna.
Sales and promotion
The cost of the “Box” depends on its size. A small set costs 1,400 rubles, a medium set costs 1,900 rubles, and a large set can be purchased for 2,500 rubles. Delivery in Moscow costs 300 rubles.
“Boxes” are sold only through the website amkorobochka.ru. The project page is on Facebook and Instagram. Quite a lot of buyers come based on recommendations from those who have already ordered sets. Anna also uses thematic communities on social networks related to children or travel for promotion. She writes short feature articles for them.
In the summer of 2016, Anna Maslennikova had her first experience of “bringing” her project to festival sites. She used to often attend Seasons magazine festivals as a spectator. When she had her own project, the girl decided to take part in this festival with him. Such events, according to Anna, give her the opportunity to communicate with clients and see what the children themselves put in their “Boxes”.
It was participation in festivals that “told” Anna that “Korobochka” attracts not only kids. Children of 8-9 years of age and even teenagers enjoyed playing at the stand
“At the festival I gave master classes with children. The age of the children is from 1.5 to 13-14 years. In 2 days we had about 150 children. We didn’t seem to be doing anything special - we were just drawing, gluing and assembling boxes. But the children spent from 30 minutes to an hour in my area,” says Anna.
At first, the entrepreneur sold 5-7 sets per month. After six months, the number of orders ranged from 7 to 15 per month. In September of this year, the project had about 100 clients per month. To cope with the increased demand, Anna hired two employees. Today Korobochka’s monthly revenue is approximately 200 thousand rubles. And there is a good trend towards its growth.
Feedback
For several months after the launch of the project, Anna herself was delivering the kits. She did this, among other things, in order to communicate with customers and better understand their needs. She also always asks customers to leave reviews and comments. The girl takes most of them into account in her future work.
“When you create a product, you imagine some kind of portrait of your client. If the portrait is “created” incorrectly, then there will be problems with selling the product. Therefore, it was very important for me to look at clients and communicate with them in order to understand how right I am in what I do,” admits Anna.
Some buyers are skeptical about the “Box” at first and buy it just to try another way to entertain children on the road. But after the first trip with “Korobochka,” their attitude towards her changes to positive and even enthusiastic. One client wrote to Anna: “I couldn’t even imagine how much my child would like The Box. The flight has long passed, but he still does not part with her. The child even wears it to school. Recently, at the hospital, we calmly waited for a doctor for 30 minutes, while a child and other children played “Box” all along the corridor and guessed some riddles.”
Another customer sent an audio file in which she said how impressed she was by “The Box.” “The main surprise was that there were “so many different things” in it. It was very nice to hear this,” adds Anna.
The situation when customers did not like the contents of the set arose only once. It turned out that Anna and the child’s mother simply had different ideas about what the baby needed on the road. They “separated” peacefully, apologizing to each other for the fact that their tastes did not coincide.
The project team
Since the birth of the business idea, Anna has been working on the project together with her husband Dmitry. He participates in all important business processes, including negotiations. From the very beginning he was “imbued” with the idea of “The Box”. And even when she was overcome by doubts about the viability of the idea, her husband always advised not to abandon the project.
“I’m nowhere without my husband’s support. He is essentially responsible for the development of the project. I try my best not to distract him. It’s very difficult for one person to follow a project, especially when you want to grow,” states Anna.
The Maslennikov family travels often. Anna and Dmitry love to meet new people and cultures, the couple wants to instill a love of travel and their discoveries in their son. Due to travel, Anna is not always involved in working on the project. “For now, other people cannot collect sets without me. We have a solution to this problem, but we need to work on it,” she explains.
Her friend, editor of the Seasons publication, helps the entrepreneur with filling the website and social networks. The hired employees appeared in the project only two months ago. These are two girls who work with clients, help with delivery and other processes.
Prospects for growth
Now Anna is busy preparing the “New Year’s box”. This will be a limited collection, different from the “regular” one in design and content. It will contain several New Year-themed items and toys. In mid-November, Anna plans to announce the “New Year’s box” and begin accepting pre-orders, which will be delivered to customers by mid-December.
The entrepreneur’s immediate plans include further work on kits for different ages, as well as improving logistics. In the longer term, Anna is considering the issue of increasing the age of recipients of the “Box” up to adult travelers.
“When I give the “Box” to customers, they sometimes say that they want one for themselves. And we imagined (for now only as a joke) that an adult serious man in a suit was flying somewhere, and suddenly opened a box on which was written: “For Igorka.” In this regard, it’s still a more promising idea to make a box “for girls,” but all this needs to be thought through,” says Anna.
The main task that Anna has set for herself in the near future is to grow and increase sales. But to prevent a decrease in quality as volumes increase, she will have to devote more time and effort to the growing project. Now, while her son is small and requires constant attention, this is impossible.
“I’m a mother on maternity leave, my main “work” is now sleeping, and therefore I can “find” time for my business. In a few months, the baby will go to kindergarten, he will have his own hobbies. This means that I will have more free time, and I will be able to devote as much of myself to this project as possible,” plans Anna Maslennikova.
The article uses photographs of Daria Buzenkova, Yulia Sverchkova, Mikhail Loskutov, @rududu.
