Canoeist Launches A New Company

[[old] bw1099]

I think we had a set of these when I was a kid. They look really familiar. But I think they were kind of beat up by the time I ever got to use them. Maybe an older cousin had them first.<br /><br /><!--QuoteBegin--><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><div class='genmed'><b>QUOTE</b></div></td></tr><tr><td class='quote'><!--QuoteEBegin-->You should have a captioned illustration showing a couple of basic pieces and how they interconnect. </td></tr></table><br /><br />I agree. (And illustrations of the basic pieces would jog my memory.)<br /><br />I have always been a fan of toys that deal with spatial concepts -- building things, fitting things together. I have attributed a lot of the successes in my life to having a strong spatial sense. (And feel like a lot of other people who don't have much spatial sense just don't get it.)<br /><br />bw<br />engineer and one time sculptor

[[old] Bayko]

Quick service! As good as C2!<br /><br />I ordered yesterday at about 10:30am and the toys arrived here today at 1:15pm. Now Pete and I can play with them for a few days before I bring them to Adora. <br /><br />Rick

[[old] Canoeist]

Alex, thanks for your comments about our website. I forwarded them to our overworked IT director. (She also does accounting, PR, purchasing, legal stuff, procurement, HR, logistics, and finance.)<br /><br />Mike, thanks for the lead, I forwarded your message to the VP of marketing.<br /><br />Rick, thanks for your order! I hope you enjoy playing with it as much as your grand daughter. Also, I hope that there are about six thousand more people like you that buy our sets before the end of the year.<br /><br />Cheers,<br /><br />Paul Flack, President and Chief Bottle Washer - Bridge Street Toys

[[old] lowwall]

<!--QuoteBegin-Canoeist+Oct 29 2005, 09:18 PM--><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><div class='genmed'><b>QUOTE(Canoeist @ Oct 29 2005, 09:18 PM)</b></div></td></tr><tr><td class='quote'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Alex, thanks for your comments about our website.  I forwarded them to our overworked IT director.  (She also does accounting, PR, purchasing, legal stuff, procurement, HR, logistics, and finance.)<br /> </td></tr></table><br /><br />You are welcome. It's also worth taking a look at (web usability guru) Jakob Nielsen's site, start with <a href='http://www.useit.com/alertbox/designmistakes.html' target='_blank'>Top Ten Web Design Mistakes of 2005</a>.

[[old] michaelb]

Paul,<br /><br />the website looks better now, at least there appears to be more products offered and the links to the pdfs which help. I don't remember ever seeing these as a kid. Did you license the original product or have you copied/redesigned them (doesn't matter to me, just curious)? You don't seem to offer a basic "girder and panel" set; everything is either a building or pieces ala cart, right? I like the look of the tower set. It would help if there was some way to get a sense of scale of the pieces and/or the final buildings (HO scale at 1/87 doesn't really tell me that much).<br /><br />thanks for any more info.

[[old] eparizeau]

Hey folks - A great article in today's Boston Globe on Canoeist's new company. Sounds like he is producing the Christmas present of the year. (...well after C2 Ergs, of course)..Well done Paul! <br /><br />See:<br /><br /><a href='http://www.boston.com/news/local/articl ... n_girders/' target='_blank'>http://www.boston.com/news/local/articl ... rs/</a><br /><br />Gambling on girders <br />Mom, Dad, and the kids team up to put classic building kits back on the market<br />By Stephanie V. Siek, Globe Staff | November 27, 2005<br /><br />WESTON -- Paul Flack knew exactly what he wanted to get for his son's birthday.<br /><br />It was the same gift he and millions of other children had pined for more than 40 years ago: the Kenner Toys Girder and Panel Set -- the XBox 360 of the '60s.<br /><br />The problem was, Kenner had stopped making the construction kits at the end of that decade, the year before man walked on the moon.<br /><br />Paul's wife, Carol, offered a solution: Why don't they make the sets themselves?<br /><br />The couple held a ''strategic planning meeting" with their son and daughter in the family dining room, and thus was born Bridge Street Toys. Paul got to pass on his favorite toy, and Carol got to pass on her passion for business and manufacturing.<br /><br />Now the quiet white clapboard house on the hill is home to the family-owned business whose sole mission is reintroducing the Girder and Panel toys of the '50s and '60s.<br /><br />Paul, 49, and Carol, 44, , run the business with Ruth, 12, and Paul Jr., who is 10.<br /><br />Originally conceived as a family hobby, Bridge Street Toys (named for the street they used to live on in Medfield) has consumed their spare time, their savings, the parents' day jobs, and the dining room, living room, basement, garage, and third floor of their house. They are management, labor, quality testers, and product developers, all rolled into one.<br /><br />The Santa's Workshop atmosphere of the home factory is classic, but other aspects of the business are pure 21st century. The sets are sold exclusively through the company website, www.bridgestreettoys.com. A computer is used to design the sets and pieces and the blueprints that come with the instructions.<br /><br />As vice president of marketing and sales, Ruth helps design packaging and brochures. She came up with ''Engineer Dude," the hard hat-wearing stick figure who serves as one of the company mascots, along with his friend ''Engineer Dudette." She also maintains a blog on the company website, explaining how the company got started.<br /><br />''She's our own acid test," said her mother. ''We give her something, and everybody's kind of like, 'Will she like it? Will it get past Ruth?'<br /><br />The younger Paul -- ''small Paul" as he's known around the house -- is vice president of product development. His job? Child's play. He conducts quality testing and devises new structures to be built with the plastic bridge and girder parts. His models are photographed for manuals and promotional materials. Small Paul has also learned how to use AutoCAD software to design pieces and models in 3-D.<br /><br />The kids have learned a lesson in time management, turning their business work into school work. Ruth built a nine-foot tower for a science fair. She had to have a group of friends guard it so curious onlookers wouldn't accidentally knock it over.<br /><br />Girder and Panel consists of dozens of plastic beams that snap together to construct the frame of a building or a bridge. Plastic panels snap onto the outside of the frame for walls. The pieces are interchangeable and, depending on the size of the set, can be assembled into entire cities, complete with skyscrapers, highway overpasses, factories, and houses. They are scaled to be used with HO-sized trains and cars.<br /><br />A Canadian toy company briefly revived the Girder and Panel line in the '90s, but other than that, the toys have been out of production.<br /><br />Bridge Street Toys employs a full-time graphic designer, Inna Aronzon, to work on packaging and the website, and a full-time engineer, Jeff Modell, to design the pieces.<br /><br />The family doesn't watch much television, so there's plenty of time for the kids to work in the garage putting together the kits. They use a scale to weigh the parts, so that they don't have to count them out individually.<br /><br />The Flacks estimate that they get about 150 orders a week from their website. They're sticking to online orders for now, although small Paul is quick to add that retail stores and catalogs have expressed interest. They have enough trouble keeping up with the business they have now.<br /><br />''One thing we're learning is that there's no such thing as time off," Carol said.<br /><br />The current kits, which range from $25 to $75, include the makings for a fire station, a bank building, an office tower, and an office plaza. The biggest kit has 500 pieces.<br /><br />By the time they started shipping in October, the company already had several hundred orders. Many came from baby boomers looking to recapture their childhood construction exploits.<br /><br />Not that the Flacks would make fun of that. After all, it was nostalgia that got the business started.<br /><br />The elder Paul credits the Girder and Panel kits with leading to his career as an architect and environmental engineer designing chemical factories.<br /><br />''Whenever I go downtown and I look up at a bridge, I still see the sets I built as a little kid," he said.<br /><br />He still recalls the set he ''would have died for" as a child in the early 1960s: The Hydro-Dynamic DDT factory. While the pesticide was declared toxic years ago and banned, the factory was a wonderland of tanks, tubing, dyed water, pumps, and siphons. The same pieces could be used to assemble a detergent factory, an atomic energy lab, or a water purification facility. Bridge Street Toys wants to introduce something similar, though without the design flaws that gave parents heart attacks when colored water leaked onto floors and furniture.<br /><br />Carol, who quit her job as a chemical engineering executive last August, said they would like to do a line specifically aimed at technically inclined young girls. Unlike Paul, she didn't have ''cool toys" like the girder and panel as a child. Girls of her era were expected to play with dolls and model *** DELETE - SPAM ***.<br /><br />It was with girls in mind that Bridge Street introduced ''Make Your Own" wall panels, which can fit into computer printers. Kids can draw on them or use software like PowerPoint or Microsoft Paint to create patterns.<br /><br />The Flacks' factory occupies three bays in the garage, with one outfitted as an assembly area and the other two stacked floor to ceiling with boxes of parts. It's painted yellow with bright blue trim. Other than wooden shelves, there are few frills. (''Our factory is the coolest place now that we have a heater," Ruth observed wryly).<br /><br />Most of what goes into the sets is made in New England: the plastic panels, roofing panels, and wood bases in Rhode Island; the plastic carrying totes in Massachusetts and Illinois; and the project booklets in Waltham. The family makes the signs and flags, using a laser printer and laminating machine. A plastics plant in China makes the girders.<br /><br />Last week the family was preparing to welcome two additions to their line: the Tekton Truss Bridge Set and the larger Bridge Mania.<br /><br />''I can't believe it will all come together," said Carol. ''It's beautiful. It's awesome."<br /><br />Stephanie V. Siek can be reached via ssiek@globe.com. <br /><br /><br />Child's play<br /><br />10<br />Age of Bridge Street Toys VP for product development<br /><br />9' <br />Height of tallest building built by VP for marketing and sales (age 12)<br /><br />524<br />Number of pieces in the $75 Tekton Plaza kit<br /><br />585<br />Number of orders placed as of Nov. 20<br /><br />2<br />Number of paid employees at Bridge Street Toys<br /><br />1957<br />Year first Girder and Panel Set produced <br />