Mid-Autumn Festival Toy Market: Vietnamese Products Take the Lead

(Baonghean) - With the Mid-Autumn Festival approaching, the children's toy market is starting to liven up. Compared to previous years, Vietnamese-made products are dominant this year with diverse designs, rich styles, and affordable prices...

Rich in variety

Walking around the streets of Vinh City with many toy shops before the Mid-Autumn Festival, such as Nguyen Van Cu, Dinh Cong Trang, Le Hong Phong, Hong Bang, Nguyen Du..., you'll find a wide variety of items like lanterns, star-shaped lamps, masks, and teddy bears, all made in Vietnam. The most prominent products for this year's Mid-Autumn Festival are lanterns and star-shaped lamps. While in previous years, colorful plastic lanterns with music from China were widely available, this year, Vietnamese-branded lanterns have dominated the market; the manufacturers are clearly indicated on the products, such as Gia Long, Phu Loc, Ngoc Thu... These items are produced by businesses with educational themes: praising the homeland and the country, focusing on the sea and islands with lanterns depicting lighthouses and naval soldiers carrying rifles on their shoulders; National heroes such as Saint Giong, Ngo Quyen, and the Trung Sisters are featured in the lanterns. In addition, there are lanterns printed with familiar fairy tale characters like the Little Mermaid, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Doraemon, Hello Kitty, butterflies, and carp. Creative, DIY lanterns made from cardboard and foam are also widely available on the market. With the aim of combining learning and play, helping children develop creativity and practical skills during the assembly process, this product is becoming a popular choice for many parents.

Customers choose to buy Vietnamese-made lanterns on Nguyen Van Cu Street (Vinh City).

According to our survey, masks featuring familiar Vietnamese folk characters such as clowns, jesters, and the Earth God, made of papier-mâché, have appeared in children's toy stores, replacing the previously popular plastic masks of characters like Sailor Moon, Sun Wukong, and Zhu Bajie, which are made in China. In addition, other toys such as lantern parades, lion dance heads, unicorn dance heads, and Earth God heads for lion dance performances during the Mid-Autumn Festival are also available in various sizes for customers to choose from. Ms. Le Thi Lan Huong from Hamlet 16, Hung Loc Commune (Vinh City) said: "This year's Mid-Autumn Festival toys made in Vietnam are reasonably priced, have more beautiful colors than those from China, do not depict violence, and have high educational value, so I feel very confident choosing them for my child."

According to some vendors, the prices of toys this year are generally stable compared to last year. Currently, small star-shaped lanterns cost 10,000 - 15,000 VND/piece, lanterns vary in price from 20,000 - 50,000 VND/piece depending on the material, papier-mâché masks cost 25,000 - 40,000 VND/piece; lion and dragon heads cost 80,000 - 200,000 VND/piece, and leather-covered drums cost from 40,000 - 90,000 VND/piece, depending on size. Besides traditional handcrafted toys, items such as stuffed animals and educational wooden toys "made in Vietnam" are also selling well. Wooden toys are mainly for families with better economic conditions, with prices ranging from 200,000 - 500,000 VND/set. According to Ms. Nguyen Thi May, owner of a toy store on Nguyen Van Cu Street, this year's Mid-Autumn Festival saw a significant increase in the popularity of Vietnamese-made products due to their clear origin and high safety standards. Meanwhile, sales of Chinese-made toys decreased considerably because of numerous reports in the media about the toxicity of unsafe toys. "To meet consumer demand, this year I only imported domestically produced goods for my business, and they were well-received, resulting in much higher revenue than imported toys," Ms. May stated.

Strengthening the management of the toy market.

However, the market still has many low-quality toys of Chinese origin. Exploiting children's psychology, these toys often mimic cartoon characters, including those that incite violence, have high potential for injury, and pose many toxic risks, such as fire-breathing animals, serrated swords, devil masks, water guns, and plastic bullet guns. To protect the rights and health of consumers during the 2015 Mid-Autumn Festival, the Nghe An Market Management Department has developed Plan No. 423/QLTT-KHTH dated September 4, 2015, to tighten and strengthen inspection and management activities for goods serving the Mid-Autumn Festival.

Accordingly, market management teams in the city and districts, in coordination with other functional forces in the area, have intensified inspections and enforcement actions against organizations and individuals trading in children's toys, checking for origin, invoices, labeling, and conformity certificates. Emphasis has been placed on inspecting harmful and violence-inciting children's toys. Through these inspections, market management teams have discovered several stores and businesses selling toys of unknown origin. For example, on July 23, 2015, the Mobile Market Management Team, in coordination with the Vinh Tan Ward Police (Vinh City), inspected a goods storage area in Cong Hoa Block, Vinh Tan Ward, and a store at 138 Tran Nhat Duat Street, Vinh City. During the inspection, authorities discovered 29 sacks of children's toys manufactured in China at the two locations, including cars, airplanes, superheroes, building blocks, and some violent toys such as plastic swords and guns. At the time of the inspection, the owner presented sales invoices, but they were not legitimate. The team proceeded to draw up a report and temporarily seize the goods for processing according to the law; the total value of the goods is estimated at over 300 million VND. Recently, on the morning of September 14th, the Special Business Team of the Police Department for Administrative Management of Social Order (PC64) of the Provincial Police discovered and seized 1,000 dangerous toy guns capable of causing serious injury, and 1,050 plastic swords, knives, and sticks during an inspection of a kiosk on Le Huan Street, Hong Son Ward (Vinh City). All of these toys were purchased from the Mong Cai Border Gate (Quang Ninh). Authorities confiscated and destroyed all of these toys and imposed administrative penalties on the business establishment...

According to Mr. Nguyen Van Thang, Deputy Head of the Nghe An Market Management Department, the department recently destroyed 77 substandard, counterfeit, and smuggled goods with a total value of over 450 million VND. Among the destroyed goods, children's toys accounted for the largest proportion, comprising 43 different types. These products were primarily violent in nature and were smuggled goods with unclear origins. “To prevent the sale of toys of unknown origin and toxic toys, in addition to the efforts of the authorities, the local government at the ward and commune levels must also actively participate to promptly detect these small-scale trading points. Furthermore, parents need to be more responsible and serious in guiding and choosing toys for their children. Consumers can visually assess products by only choosing toys that are clearly marked, have conformity stamps, and clearly state the manufacturer and the responsible party… Only in this way can we preserve the identity and traditional cultural beauty of folk toys that were once widely loved by consumers,” Mr. Nguyen Van Thang warned.

Ngoc Anh