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KSL Investigators. High 5. Studio 5. Outdoors with Adam Eakle. The Today Show had a five-minute spot dedicated to the toy. Coleco had a hit on its hands. Too much of one. By the first week of October, they had sold all two million of the dolls they had manufactured. Media began showing video of shoppers crowding into stores demanding the toys. Fights broke out and were captured on film. If YouTube had been invented, it would have racked up millions of view.
Instead, the scenes were broadcast on both local and national news. The blackmarket took off. Prices skyrocketed to ridiculous levels. Toy retailers guess each year what will catch the attention of children and their parents. Some are genuinely caught off guard when a toy sells at far greater volume than expected. Others, however, try to create the image of a shortage. They will run an advertisement for a toy supplies limited! Shortages pop up everywhere. Magically, though, enough supplies flood out of domestic warehouses to meet the demand.
This is Black Friday in a nutshell. Create limited items at a ridiculously low price and sell them at a weird hour. More people show up to claim the deal than can buy them. Fights break out. News story is created. Every single year. With this knowledge—and all too many years in Corporate America—I might eye news stories about shortages and the need to order early for Christmas quite cynically. When I hear a certain toy is going to be scarce, I wonder if some warehouse is loaded down and some executive is sweating and hoping that the trick works again this year.
The worst thing that might happen is I miss a craze. Not too many of those are aimed at us in the second half century of our lives. It means nothing unless the ultimate customer buys them. It could be fun though. Can I get CNN to cover that? I promise, I promise, I promise — the paperback is coming.
As soon as retailers start listing it on their sites, I will shout it as loud as I can. I could only dream that the book sells faster than it can be delivered. I n country stores, old men gather over breakfast and coffee to swap tall tales. No harm in stretching the truth when nothing exciting happens in their small town.
Life is hard enough without thieves. By October 6, Coleco said all 2 million dolls it had manufactured were gone. Store managers tried to curb chaos by stocking the dolls in the front of the store. But as soon as they paid, customers were afraid to face the throngs pushing through the doors, spilling from the parking lots.
One man even flew to London to buy a doll for his five-year-old daughter. At the same time, knockoffs called Flower Kids were pouring in from overseas. Sometimes the only way to tell the difference was by the lack of bellybutton. The Cabbage Patch phenomenon finally exposed the envious underbelly of the American adult. Even so, the company used a withholding strategy to ensure Cabbage Patch would sell reliably year-round, not just during holidays.
It worked. The Cabbage Patch phenomenon became a cultural touchstone. It preceded American Girl Dolls, which kids could customize to look like them. And just this year, the current toy-of-the-season is the Hatchimal, a robotic bird that hatches from its own egg after you cuddle it for 10 to 40 minutes. Their marketing line? Sign in. The weird, rabid history of the Cabbage Patch craze. Parents fighting in the aisles…over dolls.
Stephanie Buck Follow. Timeline News in Context. Parenting Toys History Christmas Marketing.
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