History of the Barbie Doll

Series Summary

For those of us that were born into a world filled with pink and purple, gravitational forces outside of our control pull us to the Barbie doll aisle. Whether you are five or fifty, going to the toy store would not be complete without a stroll down the pink isle of Barbie doll fantasy. In Barbie's world, anything is possible. She is able to change careers, live in mansions, and be the envy of all other girls. Sure, she receives some rather direct criticism. However, regardless what people say, Barbie is an American icon that is permanently etched into our toy memory bank.

In this free video series, Sonja Fischer shares her passion of collecting Barbie dolls with you. Sonja gives you the history of the Barbie doll, and she gives you pointers for collecting unique and priceless dolls. She offers advice for storing and displaying your Barbie doll collection. She even tells you how to evaluate the worth of your Barbie dolls.So, if Barbie holds a special place in your heart, take some time and learn about Barbie doll collections today!

Video Transcript

"First off, in order to be a really good Barbie Doll collector, you have to understand a little of the history of the Barbie Doll. The Barbie Doll was founded in nineteen fifty-nine by Ruth Handler. She named it after her daughter Barbara. And her husband was Elliot. They also had a son named Ken, so two years later in nineteen sixty-one, the Ken Doll was born. Which ended up being Barbie?s mate? So in nineteen fifty-nine, Barbie was sold at a toy fair. They had three hundred and fifty-one thousand sales of the Barbie Doll. They went for three dollars each. Well, Barbie Dolls have definitely gone up in price since then. And that's the reason to get into Barbie Doll collecting. I'm going to show you how to collect Barbie?s. Some people collect Barbie?s for fun, and others collect Barbie?s because they want to make money. Well I'm here to show you how to do both. First off, to make money, you have to understand what you're doing. There's lots of ways to be able to determine what kind of Barbie Doll there is to pick. First off, one of the things to look for is if it is a vintage Barbie Doll versus a modern Barbie Doll. Vintage Barbie Dolls are less than nineteen seventy-two. Modern Barbie Dolls are greater than nineteen seventy-two. And usually the ones that are the vintage ones are the ones that are worth more money because they're very rare and hard to find. Especially in the box. One of the things I'm going to show you in my collection that I have today is one of the Barbie Dolls that I have is close to nineteen seventy-two. It's actually from the nineteen eighties. It's a Horse Loving Barbie. This Barbie is actually fun, and I like it a lot because it actually is introduced the first pet of the Barbie, which was the horse. Over the years, Barbie has had forty-three pets. So I just showed you some examples of a vintage Barbie Doll. Well a vintage Barbie Doll can go for almost ten thousand dollars. The nineteen fifty-nine in the box, never removed from the box, which is NRFB. And if you find that at a garage sale for a really cheap price, you definitely want to think about buying that Barbie, because you might actually have ten thousand dollars on your hands. Let's move to the modern Barbie Dolls. An example of a modern Barbie Doll that I have, that I just recently purchased from a Mattel outlet store, was two thousand and six. And you can find the year of the Barbie placed on the bottom. It'll actually tell you what year that was in production. And I saved this Barbie because it's an on location Monte Carlo Barbie. One of my interests is modeling, so I actually save all the Barbie Dolls around modeling. So you might have some likes or dislikes that you like to save your Barbie?s around. But that's the vintage Barbie Doll."