Try & Fail. Fail To Try?

Who remembers the Cabbage Patch Kids? For those of us who weren’t a child of the 80’s, here is a quick history lesson about the phenomena that swept the world and dominated many a list to Santa!
In 1976, the young art student Xavier Roberts began crafting fabric sculptures based on the 19th-century German technique known as “needle molding.”

Two years later, Roberts got some friends together to renovate a turn-of-the-century medical facility and start the BabyLand General Hospital in Cleveland, Georgia, where people could “adopt” one of his so-called Little People. These handmade dolls had soft faces (as opposed to the hard plastic ones that would be sold on the mass market) and were sold with birth certificates, unique names and certificates of adoption.

By 1981, the growing success of Babyland General Hospital had been documented by national publications including Newsweek and The Wall Street Journal. The following year, Roberts’s company, Original Appalachian Artworks, Inc., agreed to let a major toy manufacturer, Coleco, reproduce a version of the handmade soft sculpture. The result was a smaller doll with a vinyl head, and an “adoption fee” of around $30. Now known as Cabbage Patch Kids, these dolls soon became a legend.

By the end of 1983, close to 3 million had been sold and demand was outstripping supply. The dolls graced the cover of Newsweek, after becoming the most successful new doll introduction in the history of the toy industry. Sales of the dolls and of Cabbage Patch Kids-related merchandise–including diapers, clothing and cereal–topped $2 billion in 1984 alone.

As a little girl, my sister and I also were “mothers” to a Cabbage Patch doll each, except we always felt somewhat cheated as ours weren’t the authentic Cabbage Patch kids – they didn’t come with the signature on the bottom.

To make things worse for me, and it’s really amazing I turned out okay despite all these challenges in my childhood, my sister had the gorgeous kid with the red hair, and I had another not so desirable one. Talk about upsetting!

So, how does this all relate to the real estate market and industry? Well, it doesn’t, but I have this week, bid for and WON (I am still amused by this ‘won’ terminology because I’ve never had to ‘pay’ for anything I’ve ‘won’ before!) Authentic, vintage Cabbage Patch Kid circa 1982 in MINT condition on e-bay (this was in fact my first foray in to the ‘world of ebay’ but more about that some other post!). She has beautiful brown hair and she has been named ‘Annabella’ or ‘Bella’ as Milla likes to call her. Of course, Milla, has laid claim on her though she does know that it is ‘mummy’s dolly’!!! I am VERY impressed with this $32 purchase and feel like I have finally set the record straight from when I was young with my fake undesirable doll!

And, maybe there is a message in that.

You can achieve what you set out to, and rectify the wrongs or misfortune of the past. One bad property investment of either your own or a friend/family member of yours, does not necessarily mean that all the rest will be too. Its just about knowing what you want, knowing where to look for it, and then making it happen!

What it also suggests to me, as a business woman, is that from little things, big things grow. The most difficult and challenging thing to do in starting out in business or attempting to break ground in your industry is to actually take the first step. Who knows, maybe one day down the track I will look back on these early days of All Brisbane Realty and think to myself ‘wow, who would have thought we would come this far’, though what ever the outcome, there sure is truth in the saying that ‘It is better to try and fail than to not have tried at all. But if you DO fail, try, try and try again’. I’m sure Xavier Roberts of BabyLand General Hospital, Giorgia fame would certainly agree with this!