Pleasant company attic find :)

[Skittl1321]

I had a great find this weekend! While cleaning out my parents attic I ran across all my AG magazines- from the premiere issue to 1996.
Most of them still have the paper dolls intact. I also came across about 20 old catalogs- most from 1995, so they aren?t real old- but oh still good. And most of them are in perfect condition. I also found all the old brochures that came with the dolls and clothes and it?s neat to see the formatting, and I found Kirsten?s hankie. (The only thing I was looking for and didn?t find is Felicity?s thimble.)

I read all the magazines on the plane (trip from h---) back- so now I?ve read all the short stories that I didn?t buy. It was fun to match the magazine stories up to what they renamed them as... And neat to see the illustration of samantha in her bloomers. I really need the new outfit they made her [img]smile.gif[/img] I?m over 25% of the way to the 100 day challenge.

[stebbarry]

That sounds like a fun adventure in the attic. Too bad you didn't find the thimble! - Meg B.

[moderator]

Oh, what a find! The original issues were so wonderful. When the magazine first came out, I found the premiere issue in a bookstore while visiting my dad (he lived apart from our family during sabbatical leave so that we would not have to move and switch schools). Although I was a teen at the time, I was still young enough to be absolutely enthralled with it, especially the fact that they were printing NEW stories about the dolls. That doesn?t sound at all exciting now, but it was back then, because it was something you never ever expected them to do. I felt ?too old? for the paper dolls at the time, but I kept them all in a cardboard box that I was able to use when I first started mentoring. I wish everyone could see the first year or two of the magazine. It was just the most amazing thing that inspired imaginative play. Each one was like a book that you wanted to keep and store away to read again in the future. Congratulations on your find! [img]biggrin.gif[/img]

[judiaci]

That is a great find. I once bought a 1995 catalogue off of e-Bay just to get the complete Felicity Collection in catalogue form. 1995 is pretty old when you consider how much has changed and been retired.

[Skittl1321]

I only brought one catalog back with me but I will have to do some price comparisions. I doubt they have changed too much... I remember dolls being $82 and they are only $87 now. The furniture might have changed, and the outfits have definetly changed a bit too. I used to go through every new catalog I got to see if any of the prices or pictures changed. The biggest change is the descriptions. They used to be amazing.

When I found them my dad said "We really should have gotten you Kirsten and Felicity's complete collections they had some cool stuff" and my mother's response was "She asked every holiday, you certainly had your chance." My Dad just likes to tease, could you imagine if he had- I'd have a fortune in Felicity stuff.

[tomgirl571]

I loved those paper dolls when I was a little girl [img]smile.gif[/img] My sisters and I used to fight over who got the newest one!
Congradulations on the great finds!

[QNPoohBear]

cool! I am a pack rat and I saved all my catalogs from 1989 on and I have all my issues on AG Magazine until they took out the historical characters' stories. The prices on items haven't changed much at all, really. The quality of the accessories has changed and the collection sizes have changed and the catalog layout has changed a lot but the prices remain pretty much constant.

[moderator]

I've also been incredibly surprised at how little prices have changed. A while back I posted the shipping costs, which have even been kept down and in some instances are less than years ago!

But you have to remember that the prices back when the dolls were first released and before AG was "mainstream" were probably perceived by many to be highly overpriced. I remember my parents couldn't believe how much the items cost and wouldn't purchase me any of the dolls or basically anything AG except for their school supplies, which were educational. Now these aren't that outrageous of prices. AG seems to try to keep prices about the same, and instead change the manufacturing process or materials (moving to production in China; changing from wood to plastic) in order to help keep the prices down. Now that they're popular, they have the ability to make things en masse and save money on production; it seems they are passing that along to us.

Life of Faith talks a bit on their website about how things have to cost more money when a company is not as popular. I bet something similar would apply to AG when they were first around.

[MOM to JILLIAN]

Congratulations on your AG attic treasures. The magazines with the short stories would be so neat to have. Glad you found Kirsten's hankie. I still can't believe I threw out my old catalogs from the early nineties. I'm a packrat by nature, but threw them out sometime during a move. Have fun with your finds!

[prasnlrd]

Wow! That sounds so cool! I bet prices were reallllll different too! [img]wink.gif[/img]

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