Post OfficeTea Tree Plaza

Helen Nixon2 June 2008

• The TTP Post Office is located just inside the TTP entrance on the western edge and southern Modbury Hospital side of TTP (next to Myer).

• It is a busy post office with several people lined up waiting for opening at 9am on Monday, and steady stream of customers coming in over the next 30 minutes. The is the time the manager suggested that we do the ES because it was ‘quiet’.

In order to reach the counter of the Post Office for service, people are forced to walk past several displays that target parents of young and school-aged children.

The first display contains ‘Kung Fu Panda’ ‘Trace and colour’, ‘Colouring’, ‘Activity’ and ‘Sticker activity’ books produced by Dreamworks.

The second display customers pass is 4-sided. The most obvious side that faces people as they enter contains Maths education products by Eureka, ‘Australia’s No 1 Educational Software developer’. These target students in Years 7-10.

Purchase of the software is explicitly promoted as an ‘investment’ in children’s future ‘for less than 55 cents a day!’ Note also the information that it is promoted as ‘100% Australian’.

A second side of the same display contains other titles in the PC software range produced by Eureka Education.

Along with car games, this section of the Eureka display includes ‘Fun and Spooky Adding and Subtracting’, designed for ages 5-9, and ‘developed in conjunction with Australian and New Zealand Curriculum’.

A third side of the same 4-sided display is headed ‘Computer software Eureka’.

Alongside ‘Let’s learn French’ and ‘Let’s learn German’, are titles for children from 3 years such as ‘101 kid’s brainy games’ which promises ‘games to enhance your child’s problem solving and logical thinking skills’.

Other titles are ‘Junior Science’ and ‘Prep School primer’, both for ages 4-8

• The fourth side of the display (no photo) contained Playstation 2 Games.

• Titles of interest to young children were ‘Paddington Bear’ and ‘Charlotte’s Web’.

As customers move towards the service counter they are flanked on the right by the books below

Cocky Circle Little Books (far left) in packs of 10 for ages 1+.Packs of 2 books – ‘Casper the Caterpillar’ and ‘Wiggle Eyes’ (left).

‘Gross Jokes’ in 3 book packs (right) and Steve Parish Kids Story Books in packs of 8 (far right).

On customers’ left as they queue for service are the bins below

The first bin contains craft packs for ages 4+ produced by Chicken Socks, www.klutz.com‘Amazing lacing’, ‘Foam gliders’, ‘Make your own tiaras’, ‘Paper purses’, ‘Rescue trucks’, ‘The super-hero starter with red cape’.

As customers progress on the queue, they pass to their left bins of footballs then a bin of licensed colouring and activity books before displays of books and DVDs.

The book display included some books for parents (in foreground) but most – including ‘read to me’ books with CDs - were designed for early readers. All of the products for children were licensed by Disney.

‘Read to me’ titles: ‘Toy Story’, ‘Cars’, ‘Peter Pan’, “Alice in Wonderland’, ‘Finding Nemo’, ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’.

‘Sticker book’ titles: ‘Pooh Bear’, ‘The Wiggles’, ‘Princess Sparkly sticker book’.

The Disney Learning series included ‘Reading and the Alphabet’ books 1 and 2.

•Capital and lower-case letters•Consonants and vowels•Tips for helping at home.

The include ‘characters from your favourite Disney Pixar films’ and ‘reward stickers inside’.

The final display before customers reach the counter is the set of ‘Funtastic Storytime Collection ’ books (similar to Golden Books in format) from Disney: ‘Finding Nemo’, ‘Peter Pan’, Alice in Wonderland’, ‘Monsters Inc.’, ‘A bug’s life’, ‘Cinderella’, ‘The Incredibles’, ‘Bambi’, ‘Snow White’, ‘The little Mermaid’.

Elsewhere in the store can be found licensed products such as Winnie the Pooh ‘Back to school packs’ containing scribble pads, exercise books, book labels, pencils, etc