Business Opportunities Weblog

July 3, 2008 by Angela Shupe | 0 Comments

A while back we did an interview with Katja of Skimbaco where I noted about the Oprah mention made about the ladybug shoes that Suri was wearing on her show. Although Katja’s online store sells these great shoes, it is Jenny Ford’s business, Monkey Toes, where they originated from.

These fun shoes are as unique as their maker. The hand painted quality gives them a special trait that you won’t find in bulk products on the market. That’s not all that is great about her, the story behind the business is a good one, too.

What is Monkey Toes? How long has it been since it launched?

Monkey-Toes is a fun line of hand painted children’s shoes and socks. We hand paint characters on to the shoes and socks (these are not hand painted) that transform a blah canvas shoe into a little friend for the feet of kiddos. We launched December of 2002.

What kind of products do you offer? How many styles and colors?

We currently offer 9 different styles of shoes in both tennis shoes and mary janes – in sizes 1-10. We also have 4 different styles of socks – Ladybugs, Bees, Frogs, Pigs. The colors are vibrant and range from white to pink to green and to denim. Take your pick, you’re bound to find something for finicky feet! We have also created a couple of collections – Teaching Toes – Boogie Monsters. These tennis shoes and mjs (mary janes) teach children their left and right by associating their right and left foot with a name and a different character on the toe – Lefty Lu and Ralphie Right. We have a new addition to this collection coming soon – the Pound Pals – a cat and a dog each individually adorn the right and left toe of the shoes. They are going to be a hit with little girls! We also have a Twinkle Toes Collection – the first released are the LUV bugs. This is a fictional character in pink and purple with glittery accents. We just finished up an Exclusive shoe for Poshtots.com, called the Garden Damselfly. This design is not typical of our usual whimsical designs – it is actually a little more of a realistic painting. It turned out really nice and I hope that the Poshtots.com customers will enjoy it too. We are also getting ready to launch Flutterflies (hot pink and green) and Limited Edition shoes for Halloween – GLOW BUGS. These shoes are the Ladybugs, Bees and Spiders with Glow-in-the-Dark eyes. They are only available August 1 – Oct 15.

Click here to read the rest of the interview.

In Interviews | 0 Comments
Tags: Children, Ecommerce, Handmade, Mompreneur