those of you who are doll collectors, you'll understand

This is actually more of a rant toward the manufacturers of certain playline dolls than anything.

Someone asked me recently if there was any doll I'd ever seen and then passed up, only to end up kicking myself for it later. I answered with a loud YES!

About 20 years ago, while the Strawberry Shortcake dolls were waning in popularity, in a last ditch effort to save the line, Kenner introduced the berrykins line of dolls. These were smaller dolls but non-poseable, who were sort of like "buddies" to go with certain dolls. I don't know much else about them because they didn't particularly interest me, and the dolls that they were included with had been previously released under different playlines (Strawberry Shortcake, etc.) However there was one "new" doll in the line - a doll named Banana Twirl. She came with a berrykin, which was a little plastic figurine of some sort.

Anyway, to make a long story short, Banana Twirl was seen once at a toy store in 1985 or 1986 ( I forget what year). Stupid me did not snag her immediately, thinking that she would still be around for a while and not realizing that she would become so hard to find and expensive in the future. Ever since then, I have kicked myself many times over.

When toy manufacturers release playlines of certain dolls, there is always at least one character who is harder to find than the others. Why they do this I don't know. But as someone who likes to have a complete set of certain doll collections, I think this is a stupid practice.

I could probably find the elusive Banana Twirl on eBay, and if I truly wanted her that badly, I might even be tempted to pay the $300 and up pricetag she now commands. But the toy companies, I believe, knowingly make less of certain dolls in a playline, making them much harder to find and obtain than others, which probably has frustrated many a mom and dad when they go to buy them for their kids.

One other complaint I have is why some companies feel the need to release more and more "new" characters in a playline every year. The Bratz line is a good example of this. Last year alone, not one but two new sets of "twin" dolls were introduced. Then a set of "triplets" was released, but they turned out to be a rehash of one of the "twins" sets only with an extra sibling. The year before only one set of twins was released. There's a good likelihood at least 3 more sets of twins will be released, for little girls to want and beg for.

Then the companies tout on their boxes, "collect them all!" Many times the number of character dolls in such playlines or collections is over 50. Example: at least 80 different Star Wars figures were released in the late 70s & early 80s, and the chances of accumulating all of them was pretty slim. Did they really think kids, let alone collectors, were going to be able to easily "collect them all?" At some points the "thrill of the hunt" for these dolls/figures turns more into the agony of the hunt.