A Wallingford family’s Christmas tradition is now on store shelves available nationwide.
It’s called Santa’s Enchanted Mailbox, and it’s a device that delivers letters to Santa.
“They place it in the mailbox and the letter magically disappears to the North Pole,” said inventor Chris Cirri.
Cirri got the idea from his kids. He brought it to his father-in-law and brother-in-law, and together they created a prototype.
“When I first saw it I was like this is pretty cool we should make this into something,” said Steve Signore, Cirri’s business partner.
They signed a deal with toy company, Mr. Christmas, to mass produce the mailbox overseas and launched sales online last Christmas.
“We sold just under 10,000 of them,” Cirri said. “Every single unit that was made was sold.”
Local
This year, they’re going even bigger. The mailboxes are now on store shelves at more than 2,000 Walmart stores nationwide.
“When Mr. Christmas called us to tell us about it I almost fell out of my chair,” Cirri said.
“It has just taken on a life of its own and it’s just unbelievable,” said engineer David Seales.
Cirri says it’s a trial run for Walmart, but so far sales seem good. None of the men have experience making toys. This is all new to them. Maybe it’s a $1 million idea.
“I think everyone has those ideas and it’s a matter of taking those steps to bring your idea to reality,” said Cirri.
For now they’re keeping their day jobs, but believing in the magic. Magic they’re working to spread past the holiday the season.
“We’re working a second book right now,” said Cirri. “We’re working on a version that involves the tooth fairy.”
