RINKER ON COLLECTIBLES — Column #1528

Copyright © Harry Rinker, LLC 2016

Saving Barbie

What is the shelf life of a toy?  The Slinky was invented by Richard James in 1943.  The Radio Flyer wagon and Lincoln Logs will celebrate their 100th birthday in 2017.  Games such as Parcheesi and Tiddlywinks are more than 100 years old.  The yoyo is more than 2,500 years old.  What do these games have in common?  They are generic games.

An article that appeared in the December 2005 issue of “Popular Science” noted “In the world of toys, where the average shelf life of a product is less than 18 months….” [https://books.google.com/books?id=TZOEBBZkjj QC&pg=PA99&lpg=PA99&dq=Average+shelf+ life+of+a+toy&source]  Do not be confused by the fact that toy shelves still feature Star Wars products.  The lines are refreshed each year.  The license is old.  The toys are new.

The lifespan of dolls is longer.  Ideal’s Shirley Temple doll enjoyed two manufacturing golden eras, 1934 to 1940 and again in the 1960s through the 1980s, the later dolls primarily targeting the adult collector market.  Ideal’s Revlon doll was made from 1956 to 1960.  Nancy Ann Storybook dolls date between 1936 and 1964.  The average doll lifespan is less than 10 years.  A doll still in production after 25 years is a star.

Barbie made her debut at the February 1959 New York Toy Fair.  She turned 55 in 2014.  She will be 60 in less than three years.  Sixty may be the new forty, but not in the secondary doll market.  Barbie, the Billion Dollar Baby superstar, is aging badly.  Botox treatments cannot save her.  She no longer reigns as Queen of Doll Hill.

Consider the doll challengers Barbie defeated during her reign – Madame Alexander, the end of the golden age of vinyl, numerous Hasbro look-alikes, Nancy Ann Storybook, Germany’s Plasty Petra doll series, Mego’s Candi and Maddie Mod, Italy’s Ceppi Ratti Tanya, and Bratz.  Each battle took its toll.  Hasbro’s Disney’s Frozen dolls ended Barbie’s Queen of the Hill reign.  Mattel weakened Barbie with its acquisition and strong marketing of American Character dolls.  Perhaps sensing Barbie’s demise, Mattel has launched Monster High dolls.  Although it is unlikely the line will last more than a decade, it is another nail in Barbie’s coffin.

Barbie was not modeled on a real person.  Mattel never claimed the doll’s proportions were representative of an ideal body type.  Barbie became real when Mattel decided to make her a young, professional woman.  Barbie has had more than 85 different professional careers, forget her reincarnation as numerous historical and contemporary personalities.  In the age of women’s empowerment, Barbie was the best advocate for young women “being all they can be.”

Women’s liberation, the Participation Age (where everyone deserves a trophy and equality runs amok), the anti-anorexia movement, racial anger over Mattel’s failure to racially balance Barbie’s skin tones, and other societal concerns made Barbie the perfect scapegoat for anyone with a cause.  The concept of play was lost.  Barbie suffered because she was too perfect and too human.

The continuing early exit from doll play is another factor contributing to Barbie’s longevity problems.  Initially, the Barbie target market was young girls between the ages of 6 and 9.  Today, the target audience is 3 to 6.  The younger group requires a different doll marketing approach.

Adult collectors need to share some of the blame for Barbie’s trouble.  The Barbie secondary market was hot in the late 1980s and 1990s.  Realizing its sales potential, Mattel created Barbie products designed for the adult collector market.  Holiday Barbie and Fashion Barbie are two examples.  Children were not allowed to play with these dolls.  A speculative secondary market developed.  The collapse of the speculative secondary Holiday Barbie market marked the beginning of the end.  Collectors stopped hoarding newly minted Barbie dolls and accessories.  To Mattel’s credit, it has largely withdrawn from the collector market.  The Barbie Collection Spring 2016 contains a Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice doll series and a “Star Collectibles” series, indicating Mattel sees licensing as a means to offset the market decline.

[Author’s Aside:  When deciding what to take to Michigan versus what to leave behind at The School (the former Vera Cruz [PA] Elementary School), I chose to take my Lingerie Barbie collection with me.  These dolls were not meant for child’s play.  There is nothing wrong with Fantasy Barbie no matter what your sexual persuasion.

Mattel deserves credit for marketing movies that saved Barbie, at least until now, from the fate of Hasbro’s G.I. Joe, who is not a doll but an action figure.  Continual reinvention hurt rather than strengthened the G. I. Joe line.  Barbie did not shrink in size in the 1970s.  Mattel maintained its standards.

The smartest marketing move Mattel made was to take Barbie global.  If her reign as Queen of the Doll Hill depended on American sales, Barbie would not be a “Billion Dollar Baby.”  International sales kept Barbie alive for two decades.  At one point, Barbie was a “Two Billion Dollar Baby” thanks to the global market.  Barbie’s market shrinkage is universal.  Her international longevity has nowhere near the strength of the American Barbie market.  Forget the “two” in Barbie’s title.  Market sustainability is not infinite

Eliana Dockterman’s “A Barbie for Everybody: Beauty Ideals have changed.  Can the blond icon catch up?” in The February 8, 2016 issue of “Time” is a thoughtful analysis of Mattel’s latest attempt to prolong the life of Barbie.  I avoided talking about the changes in Barbie’s body shape up to this point.  I wanted to present a case suggesting it was not the body changes alone that led to a reduction of Barbie’s market share.  Having presented the argument, Mattel’s attempt to make Barbie’s body conform to contemporary standards has and will contribute to her ultimate demise,

Barbie now has four body shapes – original, petite, tall, and curvy (a polite name for a Barbie doll with a robust posterior).  My first thought upon hearing this news was a mental image of Zero Mostel singing the second stanza of the lyrics of “Comedy Tonight” from the movie “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum”– “Something appealing, / Something appalling, / Something for everyone / A comedy tonight.”  I found humor in Dockterman’s article.  Mattel most likely did not.

I was around for Barbie’s first body alternations.  In an age where there is an epidemic of obesity (I am a contributor), there is a grim irony that Mattel felt the need to chunk-up Barbie.  The first changes were subtle, a little more cellulite added here and there, especially in her hips. Of course, if Mattel’s plan was to appropriately age Barbie, the additions made sense.

Besides reshaping Barbie’s body, other changes include less makeup, a younger look (teenage rather than young adult Barbie), articulated ankles (and, exactly what is wrong with high heels), and a wide variety of skin tones and faces.  If I did not know better, I might suspect that the team from American Character dolls is now in charge of Barbie’s future.  Barbie’s market strength is that she had a distinct, easily recognizable look.  Barbie was affordable, albeit one wonders what the bottom price point is after reviewing “The Barbie Collection Spring 2016” catalog.

My advice to Mattel’s “Save Barbie” internal think tank manager is to create a gigantic poster of “The Evolution of Barbie” dolls pictures on the top of page three of the spring 2016 catalog.  Place a placard beneath the poster with this caption: “Do you recognize this doll?”  Fire everyone who answers yes.

Jill Filipovic’s Viewpoint article entitled “Barbie’s problem is far beyond skin-deep” appeared at the end of the Dockterman story.  Filipovic’s piece ends: “Barbie today may be more realistic looking than at any other point in her 57 years.  But, her changes are superficial, and Mattel is still very much thinking inside the pink box.”  I fully concur.

Harry L. Rinker welcomes questions from readers about collectibles, those mass-produced items from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.  Selected letters will be answered in this column.  Harry cannot provide personal answers.  Photos and other material submitted cannot be returned.  Send your questions to: Rinker on Collectibles, 5955 Mill Point Court SE, Kentwood, MI  49512.  You also can e-mail your questions to harrylrinker@aol.com. Only e-mails containing a full name and mailing address will be considered.

You can listen and participate in WHATCHA GOT?, Harry’s antiques and collectibles radio call-in show, on Sunday mornings between 8:00 AM and 10:00 AM Eastern Time.  If you cannot find it on a station in your area, WHATCHA GOT? streams live on the Internet at www.gcnlive.com.