Mexico City, Mexico — KidZania, a global leader in children’s edutainment, have officially opened its largest children’s theme park yet, KidZania Cuicuilco, located in Mexico City. Not only does the park introduce children to new and relevant careers in a highly entertaining way, but for the first time, integrates innovative experiences to teach children environmental stewardship, empathy for kids with different abilities, how to make “good-for-you” food and recreation choices, hands-on driving and road safety via a fleet of kid-sized eco-friendly vehicles, and much more.  In this new expansive park experience, empowerment for kids has never been so vast, realistic and fun.

Fueled by a child’s natural desire to create, explore and collaborate, KidZania Cuicuilco is equal parts entertainment and education, making it one of the most progressive theme park concepts in the world today. Young visitors enter KidZania Cuicuilco through the park’s mock airport into the sprawling 150,000 square foot kid-sized city complete with 90 establishments, including city hall, a bank, restaurants, a hospital, sports stadium and more.  Once in the park, kids choose from among 120 different trades and professions that it takes to run a city.  It’s the ultimate role-playing experience for kids ages four to 14.

“KidZania Cuicuilco is our most inventive and engaging theme park yet,” says Xavier Lopez Ancona, president and founder of KidZania. “With KidZania Cuicuilco, we’ve introduced 21st century career choices, elevated awareness around global issues like the environment, and made certain that every child, no matter their level of ability, can participate. We’ve brought the most authentic and fun real-life experiences to life to help children understand and manage their ever-changing world. As we continue our global expansion, we look forward to bringing these new, relevant and awe-inspiring entertainment experiences to kids the world over.”

Following are just a few of the many unique, hands-on activities and experiences now available at KidZania Cuicuilco:

• More than 120 careers, including guide dog trainer (complete with real dog), mechanic, power plant operator, surgeon, CSI investigator, tortilla chef, road paver, and more.
• World’s most authentic driving experience for children – complete with driver’s education, auto insurance, and the largest fleet of electric kid-sized vehicles (minivans, SUVs, ambulances, city buses and police cars).
• Fully immersive environmental job experiences featuring an electric power plant, wind turbines, solar panels, and water treatment facility to emphasize the global importance of conservation.
• Recyclables drop-off center for the surrounding community, which is integrated into park activities.
• Three-story disaster center, which simulates flood, fire or earthquake and teaches children how to respond.
• Tools to help special needs children (and KidZania staff) navigate the park independently, as well as activities that allow typically-able kids to experience what it would be like to have a disability.

KidZania Cuicuilco also features a state-of-the-art security system to ensure a safe and fun experience for children navigating the park with or without their parents. Every child and parent/chaperone entering the park receives matching RFID-bracelets, providing the location of child and parent within a mere meter of the person’s location. While the children play, parents can relax in the parent’s lounge, which features a spa, movie room, restaurant and Internet (WiFi) cafe.

KidZania Cuicuilco has more than 90 global partners present in the park, including Nestle, LAN, Toyota, DHL, Berlitz, Evenflo, Manpower, Cartoon Network, Banco de Mexico and others. They are an integral part of the experiences and add authenticity to the career-based, role-playing activities.

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It is nativity week across the UK, and parents have been rushing to stores to lay their hands on this year’s essential festive costumes as well as turning their hand to various household items as they compete to create this year’s best nativity outfits.

Best dressed mum at the school gates is not enough now, as the competition is heating up in the classroom with this year’s nativity costumes. George at Asda reports record sales of children’s nativity fancy dress costumes compared to this time last year. Outfits are flying off the shelves, with a sheep and angel costumes coming in as clear favourites, selling out online in a matter of days.

Current best sellers include the Shepherd, Star, and Mary costumes, with the shepherd costume showing an 856 percent uplift this week compared to last year. It not just for nativities that kids jump at the chance to dress up. Girls & boys fancy dress costumes are one of George.com’s best sellers.

Sixty-three percent of mums who responded on Asda’s Facebook page highlighted that their children would happily wear a fancy dress costume every day if they could. Nearly a quarter admitted that their child often wears their fancy dress costume to sleep and half claimed their children often wear their outfit for three days in a row before they can pry them out of it to wash it.

Although some kids might be embarrassed to wear a homemade attempt, the time-honoured tradition of using tea towels and bed sheets to create costumes is still alive and well, with 30 percent claiming to make their own versions. Asda has also reported a 400 percent sales uplift in tea towels and an uplift of 100 percent in bed sheet sales as mums tackle their very own Shepherd and Angel outfits.

With a third of parents admitting it was important to keep traditional values alive and 26 percent of parents letting us know that their child specifically asked to make their own costume this year, it seems part of the nation still likes to keep the creative juices flowing.

Bee Hessell, spokesperson for George commented, “At George, we are famous for kidswear and love to get into the Christmas spirit and help families do the same. Demand for nativity outfits is ever-increasing, with boys and girls both enjoying the chance to take part in nativity plays.

This year, the sales of the range have been higher than expected as busy mums and dads struggle to find the time in their day to day schedules to make their own. We stock a great range – from donkeys, to shepherds and kings, even stars – and have seen that these are certainly among the nation’s favourites .”

Image Courtesy of  http://www.flickr.com/photos/ggraves/

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Have you ever looked in your closet and realized that you had so many clothes that you didn’t even wear? A former Harvard Business School student, James Reinhart, looked into his closet and tried to solve that problem. By launching a web-based company to make swapping adult clothes easy called ThredUp, Reinhart also realized that adult clothing was not the right market to enter.

According to Bloomberg Businessweek, Reinhart realized that right market to tap into was kids’ clothing. Reinhart stated, “Once you start dipping into the data, it turns out to be a $6 billion-a-year market.” According to U.S. Agriculture Department data and a survey of 412 mothers conducted by ThredUp, the average American spends approximately $14,300 on clothes and grows out of about 1,300 items by the age 17.

As a kid-to-kid clothing swap service, San Francisco based ThredUp was re-launched in April 2010 and has tapped into a secondhand market. As a member on the ThredUp site, sellers follow a two set process: package 15 “new to you” items in a box and input the items by brand, gender, size, and style on the site.

The purchaser or “thredders” can easily purchase the 15-item package for only $5, not including the cost of shipping, and contribute to the “thredding” processing by selling their own items one day. To gain access to newly posted boxes, shoppers can become premium members for only $30 a year. Instead of buying secondhand, Reinhart estimates shoppers can save $50 per box using ThredUp swapping clothing.

As of July 2010, ThredUp has signed up nearly 200,000 members across the U.S. with a growing rate of 1,000 members per week. ThredUp members not only spend a total of over $8,000 per day on shipping but also have given the company a chance to recycle more than 50,000 pounds of clothes.

Expanding into toy sway last December, ThredUp members begin trading children’s books just last month. With millions in investment led by Red Ventures and the former EBay Chief Executive Officer Brian Swette as advisor, ThredUp may enter at least one European or Asian market before the end of 2012 says Reinhart.

SwapBabyGoods.com and Zwaggle.com are other sites that encourage the swapping of kids clothing. The three competitive advantages ThredUp exercise are the opportunity for their members to have access to thousands of boxes of goods instead of goods just from one use; prepaid mailing labels and empty boxes directly to users’ homes; and the reduction of postage due to packaging several items together.

According to Neal Gordenflo, publisher of the online magazine Shareable, ThredUp has “cracked the nut and proven their model works…and that the swap business can be scaled up.”

Eventually ThredUp will enter different markets beyond swaps, Reinhart says, “The American mom is the most powerful consumer in the world. In a world where we have a lot of moms who are just an e-mail away for us, there are a lot of opportunities.”

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The McDonald’s Corp. has bowed to pressure from health and children’s advocacy groups and will introduce changes to its trademark Happy Meals. The new meal will include a serving of fruit or vegetable and lower the portion of french fries from 2.4 ounces of potatoes to 1.1 ounces.

The new menu was announced Tuesday and will take effect from September in selected markets. By April, the fast food chain expects all restaurants in the U.S. to have implemented the change.

The president of McDonald’s, Jan Fields, said on Good Morning America: “What we’re doing is offering fruit to every child that comes into McDonald’s, to it is an automatic.” The company, which has long been criticized for peddling unhealthy food to children, according to CBS News, has stated “We recognize the importance of fruit in a child’s diet.”

Alongside the reduced French fry serving, a side dish of apple, carrots, raising, pineapple slices or mandarin oranges will be included, depending on the season and the region, reports the LA Times. On average the new meal will represent a 20% decrease in calories.

Critics of the world’s largest restaurant chain have challenged the practice of selling kids meals with toys with have little nutritional value, connecting it with the United States obesity crisis. Legislation have already been put in force that bans meals with toys if they do not live up to certain nutritional criteria. According to the LA Times, McDonald’s spokeswoman Danya Proud has said “We know we’re a leader and we know we need to be part of the solution.”

But she adds, “we can’t be looked at as providing the only solution.”

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