An independent teddy bear building shop has opened in Falmouth and promises to have a furry friend for every little girl or boy.

Bobby Bear Workshop, which opened in November, is tucked away inside St Georges Arcade.

The new business venture was the idea of owner, Carol Perry, who failed to find something local and out of the ordinary for her daughter's ninth birthday.

She also decided to take advantage of the closure of Plymouth's Build-A-Bear, which would have forced parents to travel to Exeter for their next closest stockist.

To offer something unique, Carol also wanted the shop to have a focus on birthday parties and offers prices that won't break the bank - meaning that children "don’t have to feel left out because it’s too expensive".

Kyara Coulson, who helps to run the new store, said: "The idea started when my manager Carol was planning her daughter's ninth birthday party.

"She looked for everything around Falmouth and Truro and could only find the usual party stuff - like the Jump4 trampoline park.

Mini tea table in the shop

"There was a Build-A-Bear in Plymouth but that shut down, so she decided to create her own.

"We do a lot of events and birthday parties with games and we let parents bring their own food. We can also provide food like cupcakes and crisps.

"For the parties children get a 16 inch bear included and we can tailor the games to the age and interest of each child."

Kyara continued: "All of our feedback has been really positive, people expect Build-A-Bear but we offer so much more. We have two floors, downstairs is the bear building area and upstairs is our party room.

Some of the bears in stock

"It is full of flowers, which were all made by hand and paintings. Everybody that has come up has said they weren't expecting what they end up seeing. It has all been very positive.

"If we don’t have an event or party booked we will be in the shop and people can pop in, have a chat or come in and pick a bear and we will do the routine. We welcome parents to sit down and have a coffee or bring food, like a pasty, in with them.

"We also do themed arts and craft days, we've had a mermaid day and are planning more events for Easter. "

The shop

Describing the bear building process, Kyara said: "We make a massive fuss of the child as they come in and let them browse amongst, what we call, the skins - they are the unfilled bears.

"If there is a bear they want that we don't have - we can order it in but we've got everything from dinosaurs to frogs, elephants and unicorns, for Christmas we had snowmen and we've also got the traditional Yogi-looking bear.

Bobby - the bear filling machine

"We tend to tailor the stock to the season and have recently got some Peter Rabbit bears. When they come in they can pick exactly what they want and then we head over to the filling machine, which we call Bobby.

"We let them be a part of the whole routine. We then put the heart inside the bears, which have love, friendship, wishes, dreams and courage on them.

"Afterwards they can chose outfits - we've even got shoes and sunglasses. We have voice recorders if they wanted to put a message inside or we have what we call aroma-bearaby which are scented pouches we put inside the bear."

Kyara added: "We are a lot cheaper than Build-A-Bear - we want all children to be able to afford the nice things. It is nice for us to know we can help them and they don’t have to feel left out because it’s too expensive. We can also cater for children with disabilities during our parties or events."

A usual 16 inch bear is £11.95 and bear outfits are £7.99.

More information can be found on the Bobby Bear Workshop's Facebook page here.