The Village of Tinley Park featured one of its local business owners at their board meeting on Nov. 1.

Chris Pluymert, owner of Classic Collectibles, shared with the board and attending community members what made his toy and collectible store successful.

Classic Collectibles has been in business for over five years and their Tinley Park location has been open for over a year now.

Pluymert said all types of toys are bought, sold and traded in his shop. They carry just about anything you can imagine, including G.I. Joes, Hot Wheels, Barbies, Star Wars merchandise and more.

He added that opening a toy store was his childhood dream when he used to pretend to own a toy store by arranging all of his toys in his bedroom.

“This was always a dream of mine since I was a little kid,” he said. “When I was 12 years old, I had a pretend store in my bedroom. I took the doors off the closet and that’s kind of how it started. When I opened this, being in the collectible industry for all these years, a lot of people have lost focus. They focus more on the money and although we cater to higher end collectors and stuff like that, we really focus on the kids. We’re looking to make it more of a family environment. My staff is you know, they're told to take care of the kids. They're allowed to come in there. They can trade and barter with us. Give us a hard time if they want. There's just not a lot of left anymore, you know? So, we focus on that.”

He invited members of the community to the store, which is currently open Wednesdays through Sundays from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. and will start having extended holiday hours soon. The store receives new inventory every day. Despite the store's expensive and rare collectible items, Pluymert’s main focus is having a family-friendly and child-centered experience.