I had a great experience at The Learning Shop last night while shopping for holiday gifts for my boys. I had never been there before, and wrote it off in the past as being a place that was too expensive for our budget, but I found the prices to be fair, the stock amazing and the staff extraordinarily helpful.

There are six Learning Shops in Wisconsin: Appleton, Madison, Wauwatosa, Brookfield, Greendale, and the one I went to in Fox Point. I went in search of Playmobil sets, which are similar to Fisher Price Little People, but geared towards slightly older children since they have a lot of small pieces.

Playmobil, headquartered in Germany, offers a farm, airplane, hospital, castle, pirate ship, police station and many other themes. For each set, you can also buy extra pieces and mini-sets to further complete the scene.

A fair share of parents told me about the imaginative wonders of Playmobil, and I was psyched to throw down some cash and expose my boys to these quality toys. My husband and I looked at a lot of different Playmobil sets, and started to realize all of the Playmobil people were Caucasian. There were dozens -- yes, dozens -- of different sets, and we only found one Playmobil person -- a pirate on the $100 pirate ship -- who was brown.

So, I asked salesperson about it, trying to sound light and not condemning, and she was very understanding. I told her that my son was Hispanic, and I didn't want to make a big deal out of it, but it would be nice to have a Playmobil person of color to throw in the mix. She said we were not alone in questioning this and urged us to send an e-mail to Playmobil. She then gave me a catalog with the Playmobil Web site and a phone number.

She and I paged through the entire catalog, searching each set for African-American or Hispanic Playmobil people. We found very few. Finally, the saleswoman went in the back room, and came back with a bag of Playmobil people who were light brown and labeled "dwarfs." At first that seemed odd, but Playmobil offers a lot of magical sets -- castles and whatnot -- so they probably originally went with one of those sets. This gesture inspired me to buy a couple of Playmobil products.

This blog was not intended to harp about the lack of diversity in the Playmobil community, rather to point out a salesperson at the Learning Shop who listened to me, empathized with my situation and provided a solution. This is a rare and awesome experience in the world of retail.