Reply to Felicity letter...

[TaffyCheerful]

No, the current CEO of Mattel was not the CEO of Kraft, merely a senior VP or such at Kraft Foods. Nonetheless, he claims that his two daughters had AG dolls, but apparently he never really understood the concept of books first...

Taffy

[ponydreamer]

Okay, Taffy....thanks for correcting me. However...he was still in the midst of a company that does business in a less than honorable way. ( in my opinion, at least)

I still think he's got the Kraft mind set...

[Felicityexpert]

Maybe.BTW, Welocome to the board. Taffy knows all kinds of things about Mattel.

<font color="#051E50" size="1">[ November 27, 2004 12:21 PM: Message edited by: Felicity+Addyfan ]</font>

[adriana82]

Just wanted to give my humble business-student perspective on the situation...

CEO's and managers are not necessarily free to act in whatever way they see best. This is because they are elected by a board of directors for a company, and the directors are more or less the top shareholders of the company. They provide incentives to the CEO to make decisions that will increase overall STOCK VALUE of the company, which is why they are often pressured to make cost decisions (like eliminating some of Felicity's line and others). Or else they could lose their job.

Maybe this helps a little. As an avid Felicity collector, I too am VERY distraught.

[americangirllvr]

Hehe, I didn't know that my simple email reply would result in this! [img]biggrin.gif[/img]

[ponydreamer]

Sorry, Amy!!! [img]tongue.gif[/img] I get a little riled up about this! LOL!!!!!

[americangirllvr]

No problem! [img]biggrin.gif[/img]

[amsinstl1]

Originally posted by rachie421:
As far as when the AG today and bitty baby were introduced, I know that they came out right before the company was sold but it seemed that when they first came out the historical line was still the heart of the AG collection and thats what seems to have changed. But then that could be because the company was sold right after they were introduced and they have added so much in the past few years. BTW, why did they have bitty baby for awhile in the early 90s then stop and restart the collection in the late 90s?

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Bitty Baby (originally "our new baby", I think)and AGOT were introduced several years before PC was sold to Mattel. I believe PC was sold in 1998-1999 and AGOT has been around at least since 1995, if not earlier. Bitty Baby did come out in the early '90s for younger girls and included a book about caring for your baby. You could choose a girl or boy doll. I can't remember exactly the original name of Bitty; anyway, Bitty was re-introduced several years later (not sure of exact date); her line had been retooled: the new name, and only avaliable as a girl, however there were more ethnic choices. PC's focus revolved around the historical concept. I believe one of the reasons they came out with AGOT is because many people were asking for a "Girl of the '80s" or "Girl of the '90s" and the best solution seemed to be to let each consumer buy their own doll and make it the character s/he wanted.
I think that after Mattel bought PC Bitty line and AGOT was expanded to capture the market.

<font color="#051E50" size="1">[ November 28, 2004 10:03 PM: Message edited by: AnneMarie ]</font>

[rachie421]

Thanks AnneMarie! That was interesting!