Ty 'retires' Sasha & Malia dolls

It's no secret that I'm not a big fan of Ty. When they were king, they ran roughshod through their retailers. Now that the pack has swallowed them up, they seem to be out of ideas and have resorted to gimmicks to stay in the news.

Their TyGirlz line (no, they're not Bratz, they TyGirlz, there's a BIG difference) features dolls that are 'not' based on real life people. The line includes 'Happy Hillary,' 'Precious Paris,' and 'Bubbly Britney,' but no longer 'Marvelous Malia' and 'Sweet Sasha.' Ty insisted the dolls, which were introduced in January and featured brown skin and brown eyes, were not based on President Obama's daughters. It was just a coincidence that they were introduced in the month that a newly elected President took office with daughters of the same name, right?

A spokeswoman for the first lady mentioned that the dolls were inappropriate and that they should not be using “young, private citizens for marketing purposes.” Several weeks later, they've decided to 'retire' the dolls without comment about why.

The sad thing is Ty gets more out this by the publicity than they ever would have with sales, so the gimmick worked.

Update (2/19) - The New York Daily News is reporting that Sasha & Malia dolls are selling for as much as $3,000 on ebay. Ugh. Some of that money should be going to a charitable cause, no?

Barbie 'makes do' with $100 million

Despite winning it's copyright infringement lawsuit against Bratz manufacturer MGA Entertainment, Reuters is reporting that Mattel was awarded 'only' $100 million. Mattel had been seeking an award of $2 billion and it's shares fell 3.7 percent in after-hours trading. It's a drop in the bucket of what they were seeking and should allow MGA to survive this penalty.
Reportedly, Barbie (above) was on suicide watch and had strapped a belt of explosives around her waist in protest - all while still maintaining her trademark smile. Read more about the lawsuit here and here.