Parenting + Toca Boca = Party Time

Get our your party hats and forks, it's party time at Toca Boca and Parenting magazine. The two companies have cooperated on Parenting's Birthday Party Playtime, a new universal app for children designed for play on the Apple iPad, iPhone, and the iPod Touch. Now available for download on the App Store, here, the game allows children to host their own virtual birthday party and builds on the success of the original "Toca Tea Party" app.

The cooperation started several months ago, when Parenting and Toca Boca - both companies are owned by Bonnier - began talking about several different possible collaboration ideas.  The result is Parenting's Birthday Party Playtime, designed for kids to play with parents and friends or even alone.

"Birthday party ideas and activities are consistently one of the most popular areas on Parenting.com, so Parenting's Birthday Party Playtime is a natural fit to launch our partnership with Toca Boca," said Rachel Fishman Feddersen, director, digital content, strategy, and design for The Parenting Group. 

A recent study conducted by Parenting and BlogHer found that one in four moms allow their children to interact with a mobile phone by age 2. "As smartphones and tablets become increasingly popular during playtime, it's more important than ever for parents to find age-appropriate apps that will help their children learn," says Mark Wildman, Vice President and Group Publisher of The Parenting Group. 

The app is a starting point and the companies will be evaluating it together to see what makes sense to do next, says Björn Jeffery, CEO of Toca Boca. "Parenting has great reach among parents and we have several award-winning products already," Jeffery says. "If the two can be combined in a smart way, it would make sense to talk about more collaboration further ahead."

The app is the second from Parenting - the magazine launched Parenting Ages & Stages in fall 2010 (read more here). Parenting's Birthday Party Playtime is the eighth app for kids from Toca Boca.