About the Beta
A New Website
Dear friend,
Thank you for taking a moment to try out our new beta website! You’re genuinely helping MudPuddles make the best website we can make, so you can learn about the toys, books, events, and expert knowledge you need.
What does “Beta” mean?
The term “Beta” means something that is not yet finished, but is ready to be tested by a select group of customers (that’s you). “Beta” means not everything will work quite right, and when things don’t work we need you to tell us! “Beta” means you get a sneak-peek at what the MudPuddles website of the future will look like, and start using it right now.
What are the goals of this new website?
When you come to our physical store in Sherwood, Oregon, you get a chance to learn from the MudPuddles play experts. You get to play with toys before you buy them. You get to talk with other parents to hear what books are the best. You get to ask advice about what will stimulate age-appropriate development, and how to help tear your kid away from the TV. So we got sad when we realized you couldn’t do any of those things on our website.
Our goal with this new website is to help you find the right toys and books for your children, to aid in your adventure learning about parenting and play, to invite you to exciting upcoming events, to start a two-way conversation with you, and to make the whole experience both fun and informative.
Finding the right toys and books
Lots of websites talk about children’s toys. A handful have information about children’s books. Many of these sites will happily sell the items to you. But none of these websites care whether you get the right toys and books. Most websites, and the companies behind them, can’t care, and can’t help you beyond trying to push stuff on you.
We care. And we can help you find the right toys and books. Instead of just putting up marketing blurbs written to sell stuff, our staff of experts is spending hours crafting Expert Pick Reviews. These are in-depth reviews of our hand-picked, best-of-the-best toys right now. If you’ve spoken to a MudPuddles play expert in person or over the phone, you already know how helpful it is to get an expert’s perspective, and now we’re doing that on the web. We’re not yet selling online, what we’re doing is teaching online.
Of course all this information is free for all. You can’t click “Add to Cart” right now, because we haven’t yet figured out the way to turn our hyper-perfectionist helpfulness into a usable web store (you don’t want us to be like those other online stores, we know). Instead, make a Wish List, send it to your friends and family. Share links to our articles on Facebook and Twitter. Learn about some cool new toys, and reconnect with some classics. Then, if you like what you see, give us a call or stop by our store to learn some more and buy that perfect toy or book.
While you’re browsing around the Toys section, try out the Age slider in the left-hand sidebar. Drag it to the age of your child (or your nephew, or your friend, or whoever). We’ll highlight only those toys appropriate for that age.