Harvard Business Publishing

At the Chicago American Girl store last summer, my daughter and I stood in line for her doll to get a new 'do. The adult in front of me, also with his daughter, was a hipster dad all but rolling his eyes while he made the order. It was as if he was trying to share some ironic distance with the saleswoman while the daughter was oblivious to this. The saleswoman was having none of this, speaking in a friendly and direct fashion. The American Girl store experience leaves no room for irony. If you're in, you're in.

I strongly believe that developing experiences for people is how future businesses will be successful. Young people in particular value experiences over consumption.

Also, Pleasant Rowland who started American Girl lives in my city. She and her husband single-handedly funded our Overture Center for the Arts and there were rumors around that Pleasant was beyond meticulous in choosing the finishes and helping with the design. It's no surprise to me; I'm sure that's how American Girl became so successful in the first place.

I laughed a lot about the article. Having lived myself in New York I experience this "authentic service" so often that beleive it or not, I came out of the store without any dolls for my 6 year old daughter On September 30, 2008. I bought a dress for her, and took a picture of her as a memorabilla instead. I explained her that these people were rich. As the author states in the article, families had so many dolls in their hands, my daughter was surprised how come others could afford these and we could not.
Then we went to Saks. I liked shoes so much, my daughter would tell me "buy it mom, buy" but I gave her the same response "these are for rich people, not for us".
We still had a lot of fun and the picture is a wonderful memory of our American Girl Place experience.
Moral: You can still visit luxary places for your education, but you don't have to become the part of it and put yourself in debts.

My daughter has loved history since she was five years old, so the Historic AG dolls were the perfect toy for her. Pleasant Rowland was a teacher who invented these dolls as a way to provide girls with toys that had some substance. These dolls delivered just that to my daughter. We are not rich, but IMO these products were an excellent investment in her education - particularly in ensuring that she never forgot that learning is fun and rewarding, or that learning for the sake of learning is what education should be about. She learned to count on Addie's abacus and developed a love of cooking by using the scaled down but identical to real cooking implements. Her grandmother, in the beginning stages of Alzheimers, recognized this as a way to stay connected to her only granddaughter, and bought her Kit who would have been born the same year as her. By growing up playing with a waffle iron that is identical to the one her GM had, and playing with a typewriter and camera, etc from that time period, she did indeed stay connected. I even made her dresses to match Kit's and we made a 19th century post office, sewing studio and green grocer plus a bakery to house all this play. Making these things brought my son and dh into the fun, and helped my son and daughter have the great relationship they have.

Eventually my dh graduated to the 7" dolls (the 20.00 ones nearly everyone overlooks) and at 13, still plays with them, by making them clothes and food, etc.

Unfortunately, very few parents take advantage of these aspects of this product. IMO it is a vastly overpriced line if you don't. This is especially true now that Mattel owns the line and gutted it of everything that had substance. You can set up a doll spa at home, and can buy any other brand doll and achieve the same shopping and make up fascination if that is your goal for your child.

The bottom line is you have to know what values you want your child to grow up with. You also you have to know who your daughter is, and how to encourage her in a direction that is both a good fit for her and educational, for this product to be worth the money. It helps to be artistic and know how to complement the line with other activities.

I'm happy to say that my daughter loves fashion and makeup as much as any other 13 yo, but she's just as fascinated by the current election. She still loves history, only now she is more inclined to put her stories into writing than to play with dolls.

I can say with absolute conviction that if American Girl was not around when she was in the doll stage of growing up, she would not be as well rounded and delightful a person as she is today. BUT you do have to know how to use it. The majority of people buy this brand for the cute factor or ( even more often) the show off factor. That makes it the least cool product on the market, IMO. And every child will pick up on the show off factor. Mine did and because of it she refused to take her dolls outside the house - even to AG club meetings.

There's a little known thing that moms (or aunts) and daughters can do with these dolls. You can go to americangirlforum.com and sign up to be a reviewer of new products (expect to be put on a waiting list). We've done this for years, and it has been a blast to see the new dolls a couple years in advance of production, and to have a say that really does affect the finished product. I have seen products we suggested changes for come out with those exact changes. That has been empowering and has encouraged my dd's interest in business. It's also exciting - but you have to keep anything you see to yourself. That has encouraged my dd to learn to keep secrets.

IMO no toy has ever given a child as much as this one gave my dd. so, no, it is not just a toy for the rich. It's a toy worth saving up for. Better yet, if you can't afford the dolls, only buy the accessories, like the tiny stereo viewers, cameras, waffle irons ( waffles actually stick!) and other things that are made by the same company that made the big ones. If you join the forum you can eventually make enough money to pay for these ( my dd and I have earned about 300.00 over the years).