Beanie Babies!

A handsome kiddo and his Beanie Baby collection...

inky.gif (11188 bytes) What is it about the Ty Corporation's line of Beanie Babies that made them such a collecting craze?  These little guys were the hottest items on the market from 1995-1999, when Ty announced it was finally discontinuing the line at the end of December in favor of its popular Beanie Buddies and other new collectibles. anim-inch.gif (5186 bytes)

I think the main appeals of Beanie Babies were:

1. They appeal to boys and girls, and to adults.  This is a HUGE selling point.  Can you think of another collectible that targets every possible market?  Barbies?  Coin collecting?  Sports memorabilia?  Star Wars?  None have such a wide range of appeal.  Even the newest craze, the Pokemon cards and toys, seem to be geared mainly for adolescent boys.

2. They're cute, and inexpensive for grandparents to buy for their grandchildren.  Cute is a requirement if you want anything to be marketable.

3.  You can beat the heck out of them!!  Throw em up against the wall!  Release that stress!!

Glad to see 'em go?

I happen to feel that since fall, 1998, the TY Corporation, which hired people from Disney to do its marketing, did a real disservice to its customers.  It's ok to focus on making money, but it's crucial not to frustrate or alienate your customers.  Ty began retiring Beanie Babies before anyone could even find them on store shelves (i.e. Santa, Pumkin), and instead of retiring a few Beanies at a time, Ty retired 28 of them in mid-98, and several more piles since, in hopes that people would flock to stores to buy up the remaining supply of these suddenly "scarce" collectibles.  Ty is alienating children, whom the Beanies were originally made for, and forcing people to pay anywhere from $15-100 for a new Beanie Baby on the secondary market.  Since fall, 1998, it has been nearly impossible to find a 'new' Beanie Baby, Ty hasn't stepped up their production, and a lot of people I've talked to are extremely frustrated with this sort of marketing.  Go to the Ty Web Page's GUESTBOOK, and you'll see some of the greedy dealers and the ads they place online (which Ty allows) for secondary market Beanies.  They might as well be ads for sportscards, heck, many of the Beanie dealers USED to deal in sportscards.  Isn't there anyone interested in these things who isn't trying to make a buck?

Visit the official Ty Beanie Baby website