Madison benefit and Marisol???

[margersk8]

For those of you who have been there, what is the price of a ticket? Are hotel rooms readily available and how do you get an early admission time? Do they sell entire collections (Marisol's Whole World), or do you usually have to buy all items separately? Do all dolls have an X on them? Is there a good chance they will have Marisol? Thanks.

<font color="#051E50" size="1">[ February 01, 2006 03:17 PM: Message edited by: rel'smom ]</font>

[jlogemann17]

Ticket prices vary- I think they were $16 for the earlier time and $10 for the later time, but I could be wrong. To get tickets you go through a ticketmaster kind of place, but I don't think it was ticketmaster. What you need to do is go to the Madison Children's Museum website, and then go to the "benefit sale" area of the website. There, there will be an address, where you can mail a self addressed stamped envelope, which they will use to send you ticket information in May. When they send you the ticket information, it will also have some hotel information (hotels that have special rates for the sale). I went the first time last year, and found everyone to be very accommodating- the hotel even offered a free shuttle bus to the sale.

All the dolls will have an x on them. It is very small, about the size of a pencil eraser, on their bottoms. I doubt very seriously that they will sell all of Marisol's world. They may sell some Marisols, though, and perhaps some of her things, although I imagine they will sell out quickly. Last year they had Kaileys for $85 I think (which were still available at 9:15), and a few Lindseys- but those were snatched up in the first few minutes.

They don't sell everything at the sale, but they do sell lots of some things. For example, they had lots of tables and chairs for the historical dolls, but not as many beds. I think it's just the luck of the draw what they have any given year. They do give you some ideas of what will be there and some prices when they send you the information in May.

About getting a good ticket time- it's a little skill and a lot of luck. I was online the moment tickets went on sale, with a good computer and a DSL, and the system was so jammed up I couldn't get through for a few minutes. By the time I did get through, I got 9:15 tickets (the sale starts at 7, and 125-150 tickets are sold for each 15 minute time slot). My friend was trying to call the 1-800 number and didn't get through at all. (she stopped trying when I got the tickets).

I hope this helps, and good luck if you decide to go next year! It was a lot of fun, and I got some really great stuff for a good price.

Jo

[kikilives]

Mykidsloveag,
Thanks so much for all your information. Most of the times when someone asks about the sale they get replies telling them to do a search and its hard to find the madison topics that actually have the info instead of just referring them to another post. I didn't expect to see information when I decided to read this thread and I thank you for all the info from the bottom of my AG heart!

[jlogemann17]

You're welcome. I found this board when I was looking for information on the MCM sale last year. It was so nice when people answered all of my questions, I'm happy to return the favor.

Jo

[margersk8]

Thank you for all the info. It was so helpful as the search on this board is rather awkward so I appreciated not being referred to it. Your comments were really helpful. Now I just need to convince DD it may be OK if we have a doll with an X on its bottom. I wasn't thinking when I passed on Marisol this summer at AGPC. Live and Learn.