Back to the Future

What comes up so often in the Strawberry Shortcake collecting world is whether something is honoring the original line and theme created in the 80's.  I've touched on that in the last blog and it's really been out there this last week as we got to see pictures from The Bridge Direct booth at Toy Fair 2016.  They tied into the original line in a major way!



Now, last year The Bridge Direct released a 5.5" and a 15" ragdoll of Strawberry herself! We all swooned with delight. But, I think none of us really expected anything more than that as they were celebrating the "35th birthday" of Strawberry. I think we were thinking of it as a one and done kind of offering like the fantastic Hasbro 30th anniversary set.
A short little aside here is that so many of us wondered why Orange Blossom had her Party Pleaser outfit in that set and not her regular one. The shocking, and all too simple, answer when the question was posed to a rather stunned employee of Hasbro when we were planning the Strawberry Shortcake Con at Hasbro HQ that year, was that they didn't realize that was not the everyday outfit! OMG, do your research, people! But, I have to say I like the Party Pleaser (PP) outfit better anyway! 

OK, back to those fabulous birthday dolls!  I don't recall if they were the first things to come out after American Greetings had sold the Strawberry brand to Iconix, or not, but at any rate the brand was newly owned by Iconix and many in the collecting world were worried what the legacy would become. Personally, knowing what Iconix did with the wonderful Peanuts brand, I was more excited and hopeful.  I felt confident they would protect our Strawberry and I feel like so far they are doing well.

Strawberry had felt rather stagnant for so long to me, under American Greetings far reaching arms. There was so much potential not being explored. The brand had long ago become an evergreen. Why weren't we seeing Strawberry everywhere?

Really look at what Iconix did with another evergreen brand --Peanuts.  It is everywhere and it's so wonderfully done. It completely protects the original look and theme of Peanuts, while putting it in feature movies, on mugs, clothing of all sizes, bedding, candy, kitchen wares, etc, etc. The company name alone implies that they want their brands to be true icons, if that means anything at all.

That is the potential I saw when they bought our Strawberry. They didn't spend $105 million to sit on it and do nothing.  But, I was surprised it came about so quickly in dolls from The Bridge Direct and in such perfect dolls! I really can't help but wonder what went on behind the scenes to bring back these vintage dolls.

And now this year at Toy Fair while there where great new dolls that belong in the modern world of Strawberry Shortcake revealed.


And then WOW, There were lots of and lots of new dolls that were Vintage style!
Check it all out here , thanks to idlehandsblogspot.  We owe you such debt of thanks!

So now that you've stopped drooling over these amazing photos, do you think Strawberry can be Iconix's next Peanuts? Can a "girls" brand make as big of a splash? Will toy stores pick up this line and run with it? Will these dolls get endcaps on the front of aisles rather than the back like the current vintage doll at Target? What's to come?

I have no idea, but I'm excited! And hopeful!

Ode to 1991's

Since mentioning the THQ(Toy Headquarters) 1991 dolls yesterday, I keep thinking about them. This little lady from my collection is one of my favorites from that line:

One thing I really appreciated about that line of Strawberry dolls is how they honored the old quite directly, but put a new spin on it.  I like the real girl/doll world interplay.

I was a young adult when I bought these dolls. I've always appreciated the style choices the designers made for them. I found, and still find, all the clothing, just perfect! I want to get hands on and dress and redress these dolls!  Still, I spent days deciding whether to free them from the their blister packs, then when I did, I sure as heck spent hours dressing and redressing them and mixing and matching the 2 outfits each came with. Of course, being a purist, I always ended the sessions putting them back in their proper outfits, but I digress. . .

In 2003 Bandai was the next toy company to have the doll license and they went completely into the zone of the characters as real little girls, proportionally sized,  rather than mini girls in a big Strawberry world.  But of course they lived in things like cakes and berries and what not, so it wasn't too literal in the "real world" sense.  They honored the vintage well, but less directly in the looks of their characters. And also brought in some terrific new characters. More on that another time!

Anyway, Back to my point, which is the 1991 dolls ended up being this somewhat perfect bridge between the original Kenner era, and the forth coming Bandai era, though they surely didn't know that at the time. I pause now to wonder if 1991 had any influence in the decisions about the Bandai era? Hmmm

 I'm not sure why the 1991 dolls weren't a sensation. Maybe it was "to soon" after the end of the Kenner years? Maybe. At least partially.

I think this is the most under-celebrated era of SSC. It came and went quietly, and people collected them now, but quietly. Conversation in the SSC circles I'm in don't often turn to the THQ era with much depth at all. I say we take today to celebrate the 1991's!!!

Hello, Strawberry Fans!

Hello out there!

 I feel like most of my life, in some capacity, I've spent my time waiting for Strawberry.

 What do I mean by that? It's simple, really. Since I've been a young child, I've been waiting till the next time I could see Strawberry Shortcake. Whether it was the cartoon on Saturday morning, or going on a trip to the local K-mart and spending the whole visit in the Strawberry Shortcake section, or as an adult waiting for the next licensee to to share what's "coming soon", I've been waiting for Strawberry.

In those times between Strawberry sitings, I tend to fill my dolly needs with other collections, and that, I hope will be part of this blog, as well.

I must admit, I've never ever been a morning person. So, try as I might, even as a 7 year old, I rarely awoke early enough to watch the Saturday morning cartoon in the 1980's.  As an adult, I do find the voices hard to take, but I so thoroughly enjoy the animation. Someday, I will watch one straight through!

As a child, I was completely in love with the entire line of Strawberry Shortcake and at times barely more than noticed the other dolls in the aisle. BUT, they were expensive dolls and ones my mother was not overly fond of at the time. So, alas, I had no strawberry dolls of my own. I would play with friends dolls and dream about them and stare at them in the Sears catalog till those pages were soft and limp.

My first SSC dolls of my own were in 1993 when Kmart again was my Strawberry hero. I was away at college and found the 1991 series on clearance! My heart went pitter patter! I had a very limited budget and so each week I'd go back to Kmart and get another of the dolls, until I had them all. It was a euphoric experience each and every time!

Then, some years later, this odd new thing came around, called ebay! What was the first thing I searched for? I don't remember! BUT one day it finally occurred to me to type "Strawberry Shortcake" into the ebay search engine and in that moment I hit the return button and thousands of auctions were at my finger tips, I fell down the rabbit hole. I knew it. And I was happy!

I hope you'll continue on with me as I discuss all things dolly, while I'm waiting for Strawberry!