Over the years, few toys have inspired mass riots at department stores during holiday shopping quite like the Cabbage Patch Kid. In 1983, Cabbage Patch Kids were all the rage, and parents went nuts trying to secure a doll for their children (they were so popular, they earned a spot in our article The Most Popular Christmas Toys from 1980-2000). There were reports of violence, which included hitting, shoving, and trampling, with some even going as far as hitting each other with baseball bats! Check out this news story from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania in 1983 to get a taste:
So who came up with these popular dolls and why were they such a hit? Now, the Cabbage Patch website would have you believe that a man named Xavier Roberts came up with the design of the dolls all on his own, but that’s not true. Back in 1976, Roberts was a young art student who attended the state fair, where he met Martha Nelson Thomas. Thomas was selling handmade dolls that she called Doll Babies who had very round faces and came with an adoption certificate. Sound familiar? Indeed. Roberts bought up some of these Doll Babies, and proceeded to re-sell them at higher prices. When Thomas found out about this shady practice, she got him to stop, but that just led to him basically stealing her idea and creating his own line of dolls called Little People.
Roberts began selling his Little People dolls at arts and crafts shows in the southeastern United States, where people could pay an “adoption fee” of $40 to get their own doll. Soon enough, in 1978, he created his own company with some friends and bought an old medical facility in Cleveland, Georgia that they turned into the BabyLand General Hospital, where people could visit and see their dolls be “born.” But it wasn’t until 1981 when he was approached by a man named Roger Schlaifer, an Atlanta designer and licensing agent, that things would take a turn. Schlaifer’s company became the exclusive worldwide licensor for the dolls, and actually helped coin the name “Cabbage Patch Kids.” Schlaifer was intent on creating the first and largest mass-market children’s brand in history, so he brokered a licensing agreement with Coleco, who agreed to mass produce the dolls in China.
And that’s when things started to take off with the mass hysteria in 1983 — nearly 3 million Cabbage Patch Kids were adopted, but demand still could not be met. The dolls were so popular, they were even featured on the cover of Newsweek magazine, and Coleco had to cancel all of its advertising because they couldn’t keep up with demand. Though they were fairly inexpensive, ranging from $18-$28 a doll, people would often buy them and resell them for a profit. By 1984, with all of the other licensed materials being made to go along with the dolls, including children’s apparel, bedding, sleepwear, and books, the brand had generated a record-setting $2 billion in global retail sales.
Cabbage Patch Kids continued to be popular through 1986, but soon trouble was brewing in paradise when Roberts created a new plush toy bear series called the Furskins Bears that directly competed with Cabbage Patch Kids. Coleco went from making over $800 million in 1986 to filing for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy in 1988 after a series of questionable acquisitions and paying Roberts some apparently ridiculous sum to keep the license of the CPK dolls (Roberts bought back the licensor rights from Schlaifer in 1988). It could’ve been the end of the Cabbage Patch Kids, but you know you can never keep a good brand down. The license for CPK dolls has changed hands many times over the years, from Hasbro, to Mattel, to Play Along Toys, and finally to Wicked Cool Toys as of 2021. Indeed, you can still get Cabbage Patch Kids today, but they certainly don’t have the appeal that they did back in the early ‘80s.
What was that appeal all about, honestly? We’re not 100% sure! But we are sure that somehow our parents got one for us. Did you have a Cabbage Patch Kid growing up? What did you love about it? Let us know in the comments, but first check out one of the original commercials from the ‘80s:
Or if you want to give a child in your life today the gift of their very own Cabbage Patch Kid, you can! Check out some retro and more modern style options:
- Martha Nelson Thomas brought a lawsuit against Xavier Roberts for basically stealing her idea for the dolls, and reached an undisclosed settlement out of court in 1985.
- Roberts insisted on being part of the Cabbage Patch Dolls fictional origin story — he is included as a ten-year-old boy who discovers the cabbage patch kids and basically saves them from the evildoers. You can read the whole story on the Cabbage Patch Kids website.
- In 1992, the Cabbage Patch Kids were chosen as the first official mascot of the US Olympic team. Each athlete had a doll at the Barcelona games, and many were left behind at a local children’s hospital as a “Friend for Life.”
- In the year 2000, the US postal service released a commemorative stamp featuring a Cabbage Patch Kid. The public voted on items most representing the ‘80s, and Cabbage Patch Kids received the fifth most votes behind ET, Washington’s Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the end of the Berlin Wall, and video games.
- You can still visit the BabyLand General Hospital in Cleveland, Georgia today to see how Cabbage Patch Kids are “born.” The hospital moved to a fancier location in 2009 and admission is free.
- Martha Nelson Thomas brought a lawsuit against Xavier Roberts for basically stealing her idea for the dolls, and reached an undisclosed settlement out of court in 1985.
- Roberts insisted on being part of the Cabbage Patch Dolls fictional origin story — he is included as a ten-year-old boy who discovers the cabbage patch kids and basically saves them from the evildoers. You can read the whole story on the Cabbage Patch Kids website.
- In 1992, the Cabbage Patch Kids were chosen as the first official mascot of the US Olympic team. Each athlete had a doll at the Barcelona games, and many were left behind at a local children’s hospital as a “Friend for Life.”
- In the year 2000, the US postal service released a commemorative stamp featuring a Cabbage Patch Kid. The public voted on items most representing the ‘80s, and Cabbage Patch Kids received the fifth most votes behind ET, Washington’s Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the end of the Berlin Wall, and video games.
- You can still visit the BabyLand General Hospital in Cleveland, Georgia today to see how Cabbage Patch Kids are “born.” The hospital moved to a fancier location in 2009 and admission is free.
1 thought on “‘80s Childhood Toy Wonder: Cabbage Patch Kids”
I’m the cabbage patch kid