Anyone that's looking for Smile Educational products is out of luck! They're not selling to the general public any longer :(

My children were brought up on the great quality and competitive prices of Smile Educational products - but now I'm trying to find the products for my nephews and nieces....

So, I decided to share my findings so that everyone else out there doesn't waste their time....

I've spoken to a couple of the work-from-home consultants and found out that they're no longer selling Smile products to the general public!

The "story" is complicated, but in essence, the company Smile Educational Systems (www.smilesa.co.za) was sold to Media24 (http://www.media24.co.za which owns Nasou Via Afrika www.nasou-viaafrika.com) on 1 April 2007. They also owned Idem that also sold educational toys mainly to government departments.

Bottom of the line, it seems that Nasou have decided that from end Sept 2008, they would no longer sell Idem nor Smile Educational products to the general public, but rather sell only to government - this has left the hundreds of work-from-home consultants in the lurch! Not to mention, the woman-in-the-street, that now needs to find replacement products :(

Makes me think, how can a great business with a huge, self-motivated marketing and sales engine be left to die? How can a company like Smile (http://www.smilesa.co.za/about) that was founded in July 1979 by Doreen Maree and running profitably, be taken over by a large corporate and fail to continue with a winning recipe!!?????

They can't even manage to update their Smile web page (http://www.smilesa.co.za) to tell their former customers that there's no more goodies coming their way!

Wake up Via Afrika! Maybe read your mission statement again and realign your goals going forward:

http://www.viaafrika.com/index_eng.asp:

"

Via Afrika businesses aim to become the leading publishers, sellers and distributors of profitable educational reading, learning, audio and visual products in their respective markets.

"

Now for that huge self-motivated marketing and sales engine: I hear that some enterprising company didn't let a good thing disintegrate into nothing.... a company called "unIQue Kids" - Learn with a smile! has kept the sales team together and is now making inroads into introducing their products to the old Smile market.




Update: Dec 2009: I've found their brand new web site with new product information and online store:
http://playandlearn.comli.com/

The site contains the following info (and more):
Play2Learn Catalogue and pricelists
SucZeZZ Brochure and pricelists
unIQueKids Brochure and priceLists

Based in Cape Town but can ship anywhere (email them for shipping costs)
http://playandlearn.comli.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=20&Itemid=53