Personalizing a song

MANILA, Philippines - There are many products in the market today catering to children. Among them are children’s books and CD’s. But what happens when a song mentions a child’s name? This is what Patty Javier-Uy and her husband Archie discovered with Kid’s Juke Box.

Founded by Kurt Penberg in 2000, Kid’s Juke Box started with a small stall in a mall in San Diego, California. The company offers personalized children’s CD’s as well stuff toys and alarm clocks. The company soon grew that in 2007, Penberg and his business partner Richard Ackerman decided to sell it to the mainstream market and created the Grab and Go technology for the personalized products. Currently, Kid’s Juke Box has more than a 1,000 names with its songs and stories available in five languages.

Patty, who works in a bank, stumbled upon Kid’s Juke Box during a vacation with her family in the United States in 2009. It was during a mall trip in Las Vegas where they saw the Kid’s Juke Box stall selling personalize CD’s. Patty and Archie immediately approached to see if there was a children’s CD for their two-year old daughter Audrey.

“We asked them if they had a song with the name Audrey and luckily they had it. So we bought one for $30 which we found quite expensive. But because we really wanted the product, we decided to get one for her (Audrey),” she said.

After buying the children’s CD (an Elmo CD), Patty said that when her daughter’s name was called out, she would look for the sound. It helps that the songs were catchy for her daughter. “She was very happy to hear the songs and happy to hear her name being sung by Elmo.”

Not only was their daughter happy. Even her family was very appreciative of the songs in the CD. It was after their trip that she and Archie made their research and decided to bring the product to the country.

“We thought of bringing the product here because it wasn’t available. So we did some research and we were able to get in touch with Kid’s Juke Box USA,” she says.

Patty says that they decided to pursue with Kid’s Juke Box because of the start up capital that they need to invest. “Initially we were asked to invest around $1,000 and after that we started selling online.” It also helped that they are in constant communication with the owners. Currently they are selling personalized CD’s, interactive story books and name poems through their website.

Aside from online selling, they also joined bazaars and the feedback has been good says Patty. Bloggers also made reviews and a magazine even featured them which she says “made a lot of sales without having a store.”

What make’s Kid’s Juke Box different says Patty is that “it’s special in the sense that it’s personalize. The name of the child is mentioned many times in a song and aside from that, our products are both educational and entertaining for the kids. It’s not only the kids that benefit from it but also the parents because of their kids’ behavior.”

But like any starting business, Patty also had worries. “Initially it was the pricing because when we bought the CD, it caused us $30 to purchase one CD in the US and if you convert it, it would be around P1,500. We feel it was too expensive for the Philippine market. Luckily we were able to get a good rate from the US principal so we were able to bring down the price which we are selling for P650. But we are studying it further so we might raise the price to P700.”

Although they have only started last year, Patty is happy with the improvements. Online orders have also been coming in. They now plan to expand the business by looking for re-sellers. “We want to reach the whole Philippines not only Metro Manila,” she says. 

They are also studying the possibilities of distributing it to kid’s stores.  Other products such as the stuffed animals and alarm clocks will be introduced this year.

And for those who are interested to become entrepreneurs, here’s what Patty has to say: “If you have passion in something you like, if you have a goal, you have to make sure that it’s something that you really want to do. It would be nice to have a certain business as long as it something that you have passion for and something you know you will continue and enjoy doing.”