Billing for your toy shop in Bihar
Every whistle, top and doll billed at its own price, and every family's udhaar on a page of its own.
From the child's pointing finger to the school's prize bill
Cycles, sikki pieces and factory toys, each counted apart
A child's cycle, a sikki piece and a plastic car sit on one shelf, but they come and go in different ways. Make each its own item with its own count: the cycle by the piece, the sikki pieces from the maker's box, and the plastic toys apart from both. A shortage of one never hides behind a stock of the other.
The school's order, billed to a page of its own
Open a page for the school. The hundred prizes are billed on it as lines with the day, and when the school pays after the function you read the page with the teacher and tick it off. The payment is not mixed up with the families' udhaar.
A child's cycle bought in two payments
A cycle costs more than a family keeps in hand, so a part is paid on the day and the rest after the harvest. Make the bill for the cycle, record what was paid and leave the rest on the family's page with the day. After the harvest you open the page and take what is left.
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Bihar's districts, seen from a toy counter
A toy counter in Bihar sits in a district with its own crafts and its own buyers, and the people who come in tell you about both.
- Madhubani painting, made now on paper and cloth for sale, has become a main source of income for scores of families in the district, so painted things are a normal sight on a Madhubani counter.
- Patna has long been a farm hub and a trading centre, with grain, sugarcane, sesame and Patna rice as its busiest exports, and families from the villages around come to the city to buy.
- Gaya's own festival sweet is tilkut, made of roasted sesame and jaggery and listed as the district's product under One District One Product.
- Every November, on Kartik Purnima, the Sonepur cattle fair in Saran fills the place where the Ganges meets the Gandak, and it is counted among the biggest cattle fairs in Asia.
A battery car next to a one-rupee balloon, and a school's prize list
A battery car and a one-rupee balloon on the same counter
The cheapest thing on the counter is a balloon for a rupee, and the dearest is a battery car or a child's cycle priced for a whole month's saving. The big toys are kept at the back and shown only when asked for. Nothing records which was taken out of its box, which was bought, and which went back on the shelf with a part missing.
A teacher's budget in words, and the toys to choose by price
A school function sends a list with the number of children and a budget in words, and not a rate for any toy. You choose the toys by price so that the sum fits what the teacher wrote, and wrap them. The paper list lies on the counter, and the next day's customers cover it with their own slips, so the teacher's words are gone before the toys are all picked.
Regular families who pay when the money comes
A toy is not a daily need, so a family buys it when the festival comes or when the child has done well at school. Many of them are old customers, and you let them pay later. By the next market day the amount is in the notebook under a first name that two other families also have, and you cannot tell which family promised what.
What a toy counter in Bihar uses first
Bills on your phone
A bill with a battery car, a ball and a bag of balloons on separate lines, the car at its price and the balloons by the piece.
Orders to suppliers
Sikki toys are ordered from the makers, plastic toys from the wholesaler, each on its own page, so a short piece is never asked of the wrong one.
Daily reports
How many cycles, cars and dolls went on each day of the school-prize season and the Diwali weeks, kept for the year.
Online orders
Your sikki toys and cycles on your own online shop, so a family chooses a cycle and a sikki gift on the phone and the order reaches you.
What toy shop owners in Bihar ask
The sikki toys come from the maker in a box of mixed pieces. Can I count the box into the phone piece by piece?
Yes. Open the box and enter each kind of piece as an item with its own rate and the number you found. A sold piece comes off its own count, so the sikki shelf and the factory shelf never share a number.
A mother wants three sikki toys packed together as a gift. Can the bill show the three?
Yes. The bill lists the three sikki toys and goes to her phone, so the parcel can travel with the proof of what is in it, and the one who opens it knows what was paid.
A mother asks for a girl's cycle. How do I tell her which ones are in the godown without carrying them out?
Each cycle model has its own count on the phone, with the frame in its name, so you read out what is there while she waits.
Sikki grass toys and boxes from Madhubani
In Raiyam village in Madhubani, artisans weave golden Sikki grass into toy elephants, and a Delhi-based supplier ordered Sikki toys to be sent to London. A toy made by hand from a grass of the riverside fields can reach a shelf in another country, and the weaver's name stays with the village where it was made.
Sikki grass boxes, made by the women of Madhubani, are filled with dry fruits and given to daughters at the time of marriage. So in the wedding months a toy counter in Bihar sees families who have a gift in mind for a small cousin or a niece, and who may already hold one of these boxes in the house.