The Toy Chest K
Owner Hilary Key.
~story and photos by Chrissy Alspaugh
eeping her business open while its doors were COVID-closed was not how Hilary Key planned to celebrate The Toy Chest’s 50th Anniversary. But Hilary and her husband, Danny, have proved they are not defined by setbacks. Through success, failure, silent struggles, and becoming parents, these masters of reinvention continue thinking outside of the toy box to bring their dreams to life. Hilary, a 31-year-old mother of two, is in her seventh year as owner of The Toy Chest, a specialty toy store in the Artists Colony Shops complex. She and Danny also own The Allison House, an 1876 Victorian mansion that hosts up to 14 guests in the heart of Nashville. Danny also launched and serves as managing broker at Brown County Real Estate. Here’s a little bit about how they’ve made it all work.
54 Our Brown County Sept./Oct. 2021
Question: You guys are involved in such diverse businesses. Talk about your roles outside of the toy store? Hilary: The Toy Chest is where my heart is. I love and believe strongly in the power of play. Between having a family and a job I absolutely love, I don’t want my attention split in too many other directions. Q: Was the pandemic your biggest challenge as a business owner? Hilary: It has been a tumultuous seven years, so the biggest challenge is hard to pin down. I was most affected financially by the 2016 construction on SR 135. At that time, I still viewed the store’s success as subject to whatever tourism made it through my doors. In 2017, we learned a larger company was taking over the site of our Bloomington location of The Toy
