Squinkies Do Drops Review
Reviewed by Louise Totton
As pretty much any parent of primary school aged kids knows, collecting things seems to be very ‘in’ at the moment. Actually, it’s been pretty much a constant since I was at primary school, thirty years ago. I started off collecting erasers, before starting my first real ‘collection’ – my Premier League 95 sticker album. I still remember the excitement of spending my pocket money on a few new packs of stickers and hoping that one of the ones I needed would be there.
I have two daughters, aged 8 and 5, and they’re both mad for collecting things, from sparkly hair clips to funky pencils, and their latest “must have” – the LEGO cards from Sainsburys. So, we were really excited to try out some Squinkies Do Drops toys out. Squinkies are cute, tiny plastic characters. They come either in packs with just the Squinkies, or as part of little playsets with houses or somewhere for the Squinkies to hang out. The Do Drops element are little hair dos or hats that come with the Squinkies, and can be mixed up to make different combinations.
We were sent the Squinkieville Airplane playset, the Ice Cream Shop playset, a 6 pack of Squinkies Starter Pack, with 2 “dos”, and 4 Squinkies Mystery Villas, each of which contain two Squinkies and one Do, but they’re sealed so you never know which ones you’ll get.
The back of the packaging has pictorial guides to show the kids which Squinkies there are available to collect, and whether they’re common, rare or ultra-rare, with the ultra-rare ones being incredibly coveted and treated like they’re made of solid gold. These can then be ticked off, so the collector knows which ones they still need and which they may have duplicates of to trade with friends.
The thing we really liked about these is that they are a lovely little toy as well as something to just collect. We haven’t yet been out and bought any more Squinkies, so the collecting side of the toy hasn’t really started for us yet, but both girls have loved playing with the little characters and making little families from them. They enjoy swapping the different Dos between the characters, and there has been a fair amount of swapping between each other of the characters. I like that they encourage collaborative play as well as allow them to use their imagination and act out little scenarios.
The playsets aren’t exactly cheap – the Ice Cream Shop is £14.99 and the Airplane is £9.99, so these are probably the kind of things you would buy as a gift. But at £2.49, the Mystery Villas are at a pocket money level, and are the kind of thing that kids will enjoy buying, opening and collecting.
They’re the kind of toy that grumpy adults (mostly dads) don’t see the value in and would complain are overpriced, but that kids totally love and will really enjoy.
Rating: 4/5
For more information visit squinkies.com or look out for them in your favourite toy reseller or online.
