She has also been the subject of numerous fashion columns across the United States. She is also responsible for helping to build the biggest toy company in the world. Not bad, for a piece of plastic.
The Barbie Doll was created by Ruth and Elliot Handler, owners of a small toy company in Los Angeles. Ruth noticed that her daughter Barbara tried to dress her paper dolls with cutout clothing. They realized that young girls enjoyed this form of dress up, yet there were no three-dimensional dolls available to dress in different wardrobes (after all, how many things can you dress a baby in)? Ruth felt that girls would be far more interested in a doll that looked like a real young adult.
In 1956, the Handlers were traveling through Europe on a business trip, accompanied by their children (Barbara and Ken). While in Lucerne, Switzerland, Ruth noticed a German doll on display named Lilli. Lilli was a three-diminsional doll, with adult proportions and she was outfitted with a whole line of clothing and accesories. Lilli was everything Ruth had been thinking of as a replacement for the two-dimensional paper dolls so prominent in the United States. The Handlers spotted a magical opportunity, purchasing several Lilli dolls and bringing them back to Los Angeles where she showed them to her designers. One of the designers took a Lilli doll to Japan where he found a company to manufacture a similar doll. The result was an 11 1/2" tall teenage doll which they named after their daughter, Barbie.
The Barbie Doll debuted at the New York Toy Fair in February 1959. While buyers were initially confused to see a doll that looked so different from the popular baby dolls of the day, sales of the Barbie Doll soon took off, selling out the initial line of 500,000 and over a million outfits. The dolls were marketed in major print advertisements as well as on the popular Mickey Mouse Club television show. The genius behind their concept was that even though a Barbie doll sold for only around $3.00, the real money was made in accessorising her. The different pieces of clothing cost between $1.00 - 5.00 and some young girls could not do without an entire wardrobe which sold for $136.00 in 1963. Their concept was obviously successful as they sold almost $100 million of Barbie merchandise in 1965.
After a while, Barbie fans decided that she needed a man in her life - thus came the arrival of her boyfriend Ken (named after Ruth's son Ken). She was soon joined by friends Midge and Allen and a little sister Skipper. They frolicked around in a Barbie car and resided in a Barbie house.
It would seem that Mattel's Barbie merchandising opportunities are endless and Barbie continues to be one of the best-selling dolls and in fact, toys, year in and year out - she is also, perhaps, the most successful fashion icon in history.
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