of teen-age social activities," prescribed
Dichter, and the ads fit his bill. In agency tests, girls gave them high marks, embracing Barbie as a real person, one they
might even want to spruce up and emulate.
"We haven't superimposed a culture on the kids," Schneider explained. "The kids have dictated what their own culture should
be. Every commercial was tested with children. And anything that didn't get through the barbed wire on the test never got
on the air."
But Mattel was not yet out of the woods. "Advertising can make a good product better," Schneider said. "It can make a mediocre
product slightly better. But the fastest way to kill a bad product is to advertise it. Because then more people find out that
it's lousy. The kids tell each other. If they're disappointed, the product disappears."
MATTEL'S FIRST BIG PROMOTIONAL EFFORT, HOWEVER, was not to children but to toy buyers. If stores didn't stock the dolls, all
the ads in the world wouldn't sell them. So in the dead of winter, 1959, Barbie made her debut at the American Toy Fair, the
industry's annual trade show in New York City.
Toy Fair, old-timers say, has not changed much in thirty-five years; it has always had the trappings of Mardi Gras. For decades,
people in costume— bunnies, pirates, spacemen—have passed out toy promos in front of the Toy Building at 200 Fifth Avenue.
Inside, spies have combed showrooms, searching for ideas to knock off. And for seven long days, business lunches have merged
into business dinners that have merged into hangover breakfasts.
It was into this chaos that Barbie strode, unseasonably bare in her black-and-white swimsuit. Voluptuous, half-naked, she
curiously didn't make much of a splash. Perhaps this was because male buyers had human distractions; most toy companies hired
breathtaking models to demonstrate their wares. But even when buyers glimpsed her, it was far from love at first sight. Condemning
her sexiness, Sears buyer Lowthar Kieso, toy tastemaker for the catalogue empire that had been one of Mattel's biggest customers,
rejected her—an odd bit of prudery at a trade show where, to make sales, models batted their eyelashes and stuck out their
chests. Other buyers agreed to stock her: not, however, legions.
The Handlers returned to California. Was it possible that Ruth's daring, Elliot's vision, Charlotte's chicness, Nakamura's
persistence, Adler's resourcefulness, Ryan's inventiveness, Dichter's insight, and Carson/ Roberts's imagination had spawned
a turkey?
Carson/Roberts began its commercial blitz in March, but still nothing happened. Spring came, then summer—meaningless seasons
on the temperate West Coast. But it is doubtful that in Hawthorne the summer of '59 went unnoticed.
"When school was out, that doll just disappeared from the stock of the shops," said Charlotte. "Kids had to have the Barbie
doll. . . . It just took off and went wild."
For boomers, it was one of those watershed moments, like Elvis's return from the army or the arrival of the Beatles in 1964.
Barbie was a handheld piece of the one true Hollywood; scary and sleazy and spellbinding. Even her brunette version was golden.
She was grown-up, contemptuous; yet we possessed her; she was forever susceptible to our rough little fingers. "Barbara"—the name means "foreigner," from the same
root as "barbarian," and Barbie still had enough of Lilli in her to elude the dreariness of the homegrown. She was sunshine,
Tomorrowland, the future made plastic. Not all that she promised was good, but we didn't know that at the time.
CHAPTER THREE
SEX AND THE SINGLE DOLL
E ight months after Barbie's launch, Ruth was riding high. While most of her cogenerationists languished from the "problem that
has no name," she was running a half-million-dollar business. "Ruth works a full day, driving away in a pink Thunderbird at
8:15 A.M. every day with her husband, leaving a gorgeous $75,000 home in Beverly
Dichter, and the ads fit his bill. In agency tests, girls gave them high marks, embracing Barbie as a real person, one they
might even want to spruce up and emulate.
"We haven't superimposed a culture on the kids," Schneider explained. "The kids have dictated what their own culture should
be. Every commercial was tested with children. And anything that didn't get through the barbed wire on the test never got
on the air."
But Mattel was not yet out of the woods. "Advertising can make a good product better," Schneider said. "It can make a mediocre
product slightly better. But the fastest way to kill a bad product is to advertise it. Because then more people find out that
it's lousy. The kids tell each other. If they're disappointed, the product disappears."
MATTEL'S FIRST BIG PROMOTIONAL EFFORT, HOWEVER, was not to children but to toy buyers. If stores didn't stock the dolls, all
the ads in the world wouldn't sell them. So in the dead of winter, 1959, Barbie made her debut at the American Toy Fair, the
industry's annual trade show in New York City.
Toy Fair, old-timers say, has not changed much in thirty-five years; it has always had the trappings of Mardi Gras. For decades,
people in costume— bunnies, pirates, spacemen—have passed out toy promos in front of the Toy Building at 200 Fifth Avenue.
Inside, spies have combed showrooms, searching for ideas to knock off. And for seven long days, business lunches have merged
into business dinners that have merged into hangover breakfasts.
It was into this chaos that Barbie strode, unseasonably bare in her black-and-white swimsuit. Voluptuous, half-naked, she
curiously didn't make much of a splash. Perhaps this was because male buyers had human distractions; most toy companies hired
breathtaking models to demonstrate their wares. But even when buyers glimpsed her, it was far from love at first sight. Condemning
her sexiness, Sears buyer Lowthar Kieso, toy tastemaker for the catalogue empire that had been one of Mattel's biggest customers,
rejected her—an odd bit of prudery at a trade show where, to make sales, models batted their eyelashes and stuck out their
chests. Other buyers agreed to stock her: not, however, legions.
The Handlers returned to California. Was it possible that Ruth's daring, Elliot's vision, Charlotte's chicness, Nakamura's
persistence, Adler's resourcefulness, Ryan's inventiveness, Dichter's insight, and Carson/ Roberts's imagination had spawned
a turkey?
Carson/Roberts began its commercial blitz in March, but still nothing happened. Spring came, then summer—meaningless seasons
on the temperate West Coast. But it is doubtful that in Hawthorne the summer of '59 went unnoticed.
"When school was out, that doll just disappeared from the stock of the shops," said Charlotte. "Kids had to have the Barbie
doll. . . . It just took off and went wild."
For boomers, it was one of those watershed moments, like Elvis's return from the army or the arrival of the Beatles in 1964.
Barbie was a handheld piece of the one true Hollywood; scary and sleazy and spellbinding. Even her brunette version was golden.
She was grown-up, contemptuous; yet we possessed her; she was forever susceptible to our rough little fingers. "Barbara"—the name means "foreigner," from the same
root as "barbarian," and Barbie still had enough of Lilli in her to elude the dreariness of the homegrown. She was sunshine,
Tomorrowland, the future made plastic. Not all that she promised was good, but we didn't know that at the time.
CHAPTER THREE
SEX AND THE SINGLE DOLL
E ight months after Barbie's launch, Ruth was riding high. While most of her cogenerationists languished from the "problem that
has no name," she was running a half-million-dollar business. "Ruth works a full day, driving away in a pink Thunderbird at
8:15 A.M. every day with her husband, leaving a gorgeous $75,000 home in Beverly
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