Dateline: 09/30/99
No more Happy Holidays...
One dolly Santa won't deliver
Judging from the amount of email received here, many collectors are unaware that the Happy Holidays series ended with the 1998 doll.
From 1988 through 1998, this wildly popular, and highly collectible series was the highlight of the year for many collectors. Each year's doll was greatly anticipated; none more so than last years. The series closed in 1998 with a beautiful closed-mouth doll, dressed in a dramatic black velvet gown, spangled with silver, highlighted with trademark "Barbie® pink".
Why did Mattel end such a successful series? Will a new series replace it? How will this affect the value of the "Happy Holidays" dolls on the secondary market? There are no tangible answers. Mattel hasn't said much about it, and while the November 1999 cover of Miller's Fashion Doll Magazine features a "New!" Holiday Barbie®, it is in fact the Holiday Treasures doll, available in November only to members of Mattel's Official Barbie® Collectors Club. At least for this year, no replacement, no new Holiday series.
But is it such a loss? For the last two years of the series, the dolls languished on the shelves long after Christmas was over, and collectors saw the much-anticipated 1997 doll marked down to as low as $5.99 in some areas before they were all gone. Even the 1998 doll saw markdowns before the shelves emptied. Collectors blamed Mattel, saying that overproduction ruined the collectibility of the series. Mattel said they were merely responding to collectors complaints that they wanted greater availability of dolls. Either way, if you missed the 1996 (aka the "voucher" doll) or 1997 doll, don't despair... The 1999 Sears Wish Book has the African-American versions of both dolls still available.
To view pictures of the entire Happy Holiday series, check this page at Mattel's Barbie.Com
Perhaps the next significant series will be the Birthday Wishes series. Started this year, these dolls are still found on store shelves in the U.S. Mattel categorizes this new series as part of the "children's collection" but also as a "collector edition". The first issue is dressed in a soft, delicate pink gown, and the box carries a card that can be personalized. Average retail for this doll is $40 in the United States; the price tag alone indicates the doll will most likely be collected, and not played with.
So, mourn the end of one series if you wish, look forward to collecting the next one, and as always... collect
what you like, and like what you collect!
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me know!
