PlanToys: Our Commitment To Sustainable Play

For over 40 years, PlanToys has gained recognition globally through our philosophies and beautifully crafted wooden toys. With an enduring mission to help nurture Better Kids, Better World through Sustainable Play, we developed three pillars of sustainability that pave the path for our planet-friendly operations — Sustainable Play, Sustainable Way, and Sustainable World.

In 1981, PlanToys’ founder Vitool Viraponsavan established the company with a desire to change society for the better by supporting children in their learning and play environments. Children would be supported throughout each developmental stage with the play that emphasized eco-friendly living and strengthened foundational skills in physical, emotional, social, and intellectual.

In addition to toy design, we also create play spaces for expanding the experience to support more children. In 2019, we built the Forest of Play, a playable exhibition at Chulalongkorn University. This was the first time that we produced playthings on a larger scale. After the exhibition ended, we moved this play space to the front of our Bangkok office and expand the play areas for more variety of learning. The following year, we built another Forest of Play, a play space and toy museum near our factory in Trang province to be a comprehensive learning play area for children, families, and school field trips amid the real forest atmosphere.

By playing a role in the early developmental years through play and activities, we believe that we have the chance to impact children’s lives in the long term and help them grow into individuals who value themselves, others, and the planet we called home.

For over 40 years, we’ve only used non-toxic materials and sustainable production methods that illustrate our mission of supporting children in their developmental stages and also protecting our employees from any harmful toxicity during production. We ensure the maximize use of natural resources and create minimum to zero waste throughout our production process. We use reclaimed rubberwood from rubber trees that no longer produce latex to produce solid wood and plywood for toy production. We also upcycle leftover sawdust to produce PlanWood, a unique material that allows us to design toys with dynamic shapes. In addition, when coated PlanWood toys with a non-toxic water-based lacquer, this allows us to make wooden toys that can be played with in water!

In addition, we never neglect to create a happy organization. We established the PlanToys Employees Savings Cooperative Limited for financial support. We reduce the burden of workers’ expenses by allocating space within the factory to make vegetable gardens for consumption and sharing. We encourage knowledge and awareness among employees through organic rice planting activities with local farmers to understand the value of food and can also apply knowledge for their sustainable livelihood.

We strive to create play opportunities that can be accessible to all children. PlanToys, together with our partners, initiated the PlanToys Bring Smile and Mom-Made Toy project to design toys specifically suited for special needs children by focusing on Visual Impairment, Autism, and Cerebral Palsy. We set up the Toy Library at our factory and the public libraries in Trang with free lending toys service. We built the Forest of Play and the Toy Museum in Trang to be a comprehensive learning play area for expanding play opportunities to the local community.

We contributed part of our sales proceeds to social development projects. We contribute 1 euro for every Wonky Fruit & Vegetable Set sold, to Kromkommer, an organization that aims to raise awareness for reducing food waste. We donate $10 for every purchase of Walking Elephant to the Save Elephant Foundation Thailand to support their projects.

Contribution to society cannot be achieved without the cooperation of all our customers and worldwide partners who always support PlanToys for our Sustainable World.