Melissa & Doug

The famous American company Melissa & Doug started its career more than 25 years ago in.... a garage! Today, it has a variety of great wooden toys, games, creative sets, costumes and sensational sand toys.

Melissa and Doug is not just the name of an established brand in the toy market. It is also a friendly couple from the United States, who decades ago decided to create toys that stimulate children's creativity and inspire toddlers to develop.

The brand's origin story is almost as cool as their products. Both Melissa and Doug were raised by teachers. The couple knew pretty quickly what they wanted to do in the future, namely - creating unique products for children.

At the age of 34, Doug proposed a joint business to Melissa, and a few years later, marriage. With the first proposal, Melissa consciously answered "yes"; with the second, she was so busy creating new products that she didn't even realize it was a proposal. Ultimately, Melissa and Doug managed not only to establish a successful company, but also a happy family.

Like a true American startup - they started in their parents' garage. They invested their savings to develop their first product, and later distributed it themselves. To know what recipients thought of their toys - they put their names and phone number on each product asking for feedback. They answered calls at all hours of the day and night, taking the company phone even to bed.

One of the brand's first acclaimed, innovative products was a textured puzzle. The scene illustrating farm animals took on not only shapes, but also cuddly texture elements, rendering the down of a chick or the hair of a sheep. Over time - the brand's assortment grew, and so did Melissa and Doug's family. The first testers of their products were their children, Brendan and Ilana. Without their approval (and a series of serious safety tests) - the toys could not be released to the market.

Through the years, the brand has developed thousands of designs of wooden puzzles. It has reinvented wooden toys by giving them a new form to stimulate children's creativity as much as possible. It created a series of toy food products so that children could play at imitating their parents. Over time, the assortment also included products for the youngest, role-play-inspiring toys, board games, costumes, creative sets or sets of sand toys. The range is growing all the time, and Melissa and Doug are delighting with more and more new toys for young and old.

The brand remains true to its mission - it wants to create toys that stimulate the imagination, encouraging creativity. In a stimulus-filled, over-stimulated environment, a child's sensitivity and natural need to explore can fade. That's why Melissa and Doug toys inspire thinking outside the box, breaking down barriers and experimenting. Each toy is a prop that can be used in play in hundreds of ways. It all depends on the idea, humor and imagination of the child.

Melissa and Doug wants, through its toys, to give toddlers a real childhood - full of freedom, imagination and fun. In addition to toys, the brand has a blog dedicated to playful inspiration and ways to entertain children creatively!