It transports you into a different world where toys dominate. No, this is not the fictitious North Pole home of Santa Claus and his industrious elves, but a toy town much closer to home.

Travel some 60 km from Bengaluru and you arrive at Channapatna , home to skilled artisans who spend their days making colourful wooden dolls and playthings.

Fashioned out of soft ivory wood and painted with bright organic colours, these toys fill many a shop in this town of Bengaluru rural district.

While the toys once sold like hot cakes, today there is hardly a buyer for them and shopkeepers report a nearly 50 to 70 per cent dip in their sales over the last few years.

The poor sales have hit people like Mr M.N. Ravikiran, who runs a family business, the Sri Kaveri Handicrafts Emporium in Channapatna, hard. “Unlike a few years ago when we saw a large number of customers everyday, we hardly have any sales now. It is only during Dasara that business seems to pick up a little,” he says despondently.

To the shopkeepers’ disappointment they are no longer allowed to put up signboards to advertise their presence along the highway where many have their outlets in the hope of catching the eye of tourists making their way to Mysore and other places from Bengaluru.

“Not only has the local municipality made it clear that retail outlets selling the toys cannot put up signboards, but we receive no support in advertising from the tourism department too,” Mr Ravikiran laments.

The other factor affecting the business of shops selling the Channapatna toys is the lack of parking space for cars near them following the widening of the road.

“In the past people stopped their vehicles to come into our shops to check for toys but now they don’t as they cannot park them anywhere,” he adds.

But the major blow to the Channapatna toys has come from the cheaper Chinese toys flooding the market today. “Although Channaptna toys are safer as they use vegetable dyes for colours, the lead-containing Chinese toys are preferred only because they are cheaper,” the retailer regrets.

The times are not easy therefore for the around 3,000 artisans of Kala Nagar in Channapatna. Artisan Farid Khan, 35, who is employed by a private toy emporium, says he often goes through long spells without work because of the falling demand for the toys.

Not surprisingly, many have given up their traditional work and moved into other professions, dealing yet another blow to the Channapatna toy industry.

Syed Walli, a manufacturer of toys and wooden jewellery, admits it’s not easy to get skilled artisans anymore as many have taken to other professions with the toy business dipping. Manufacturers who export the toys seem to be faring better, however.

One owner of a retail outlet, who also runs his own manufacturing unit employing 10 artisans, says he continues to get orders for the toys from the United States, Germany and Australia. “This is keeping my business going,” he adds.

Although the Development Commission in association with the Karnataka Small Scale Industries Development Corporation (KSSIDC) established a Chanapatna Craft Park about a year ago, a common facility service centre for lacquerware complete with high-end imported machines, it has hardly helped smaller artisans and retail outlets.

But park manager, Shanthaiah, says it does have a role to play as it saves time and requires lesser manpower.