Cottage Toys Holds Groundbreaking Ceremony For New Location

The Rork family has dug deep with a groundbreaking ceremony of a new Cottage Toys location in Lakefield at a media conference on Monday.

(left to right) Andrew, Donna and Ethan Rork at the groundbreaking ceremony. Donna opened the sporting goods store in 1989. Photo by David Tuan Bui.

Current and former staff, construction workers and community members attended the ceremony where the owner Donna Rork announced the details of the new building for the aquatic sporting goods store.

Four Points Construction will build the new location and is projected to be completed on May 1 next year. The store will be open all season compared to its Lakefield location — with others in Peterborough and Stoney Lake — which is seasonal.

"It's a dream that I've had for a long time and it's nice to see it come to fruition,” said Rork. “When I woke up this morning and realized this was happening, I was very emotional. I've worked at this a long time, I've pushed, pulled, dragged myself through lots of troubled times in business as everyone does and to get to this point feels really good.”

Additionally, the new location will feature air conditioning/heating, greater storefront space, better outdoor display, a storage basement, higher ceilings, more parking, a cleaner shopping experience and a more technological adaptation to the business according to Rork.

“There are all kinds of new opportunities to really customize the experience with laptops,” said Rork. “You can walk around with a customer and build an order. You can do that on a tablet, walk out the door and we deliver it to their cottage.”

The building will be located behind the Lakefield Restaurant on 37 Concession St. It is the same location where the business started in 1989.

The location is ideal for the store since it is at the heart of cottage country, near the marina and the area has a lot of traffic according to Rork.

A regular customer had spray painted the golden shovel and left it for the business for the groundbreaking ceremony. Photo by David Tuan Bui.

The former windsurfing instructor noted that with the pandemic weakening and restrictions becoming looser that people are eager to go cottaging more often while purchasing recreational goods as part of the getaway.

“There's been so much increase in cottage purchases, boat sales are through the roof and that's an obvious sign that people are going to continue (after) skiing, tubing, stand-up paddleboarding, kayaking and all the fun stuff that we do,” she said.

The pandemic dealt a crushing blow to the business as there were two months of zero income when COVID-19 forced the country into lockdown.

"I cancelled all my orders. I don't know what's going to happen, I'm running out of money and it was really scary," explained Rork. "I was really low on cash because you've gone a whole winter with no-to-little cash flow."

The business saw some of the best sales ever beginning in May last year when they reopened two months after the initial lockdown. Cottage Toys was so successful that it became troubling to manage the surge of orders at several points.

“It was quite overwhelming, we had such a hard time managing the volume and it's all coming in at once,” said Rork. “We’re really grateful for the growth for our business.”

Engage with us on social media on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. Write to us at tips@ptbocanada.com. Sign up for PTBOBuzz newsletter here.