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A Beanie Baby is a stuffed animal made by Ty Inc. , owned and founded by Ty Warner who promoted the line in up-scale stores (and miniatures known as Teenie Beanies in McDonald's ) and with intentional scarcity, under-filled with plastic pellets, or "beans," giving it a flexible and vulnerable, huggable, feel, rather than stuffing (see PVC ). A Beanie Baby, essentially, is a Bean Bag in the form of a stuffed animal toy. The original nine Beanie Babies launched in 1994 were Legs the Frog, Squealer the Pig, Spot the Dog, Flash the Dolphin, Splash the Whale, Chocolate the Moose, Patti the Platypus, Brownie the Bear (later renamed to "Cubbie") and Pinchers the Lobster. COLLECTIBILITY Starting in late 1996 , a Fad dish craze of Collecting Beanie Babies began. Ty systematically Retired various designs, and many believed that the "retired" designs would inevitably rise in value. The craze lasted to around the year 1999 and slowly declined thereafter. In a buying frenzy reminiscent of the Cabbage Patch Kid mania of the early 1980s , several speculators purchased these collectibles ''en masse'' in hopes of making a fortune years later from being able to sell rare specimens. This hope was strengthened by various unofficial Beanie Baby guidebooks which carried unsubstantiated predictions for each toy's future value. However, much like the Cabbage Patch Kid fad, so many people believed that purchasing large numbers of these collectibles was a good investment that very few people profited from the craze. Like Tulip Mania , this was a toy-sized example of an Economic Bubble . In recent years, the popularity of beanie babies has diminished, possibly because of the popularity of Webkinz . Some of the most common beanie babies can be found on EBay selling for a less than a dollar. New and rare beanies are still being sold at retail price or higher. Tags The tags on a Beanie Babies are considered a very important part of its value. Without a tag, the average Beanie drops in value more than fifty percent. Beanie Babies have two types of tags: swing tags, which are also called "heart tags", and tush tags, those attached to the Beanie's rear end. Each tag over time has gone through many changes, these changes have become known as "generations", there are currently 11 generations of swing tags, and 13 generations of tush tags, a special Canadian tush tag, and the rare few Beanie Babies embroidered tush tags. Rarity During the beanie baby craze, the rarest non-special edition beanie, according to the Winter 2000 edition of ''Ty Beanie Babies'', published by Collectors Value Guide, was considered to be the "Dark Blue Peanut the elephant". Peanut was common in a lighter hue, but the dark blue version consistently sold for thousands of dollars. "Nana the monkey" was considered the second rarest beanie baby; eventually, his name was changed to Bongo. "Wingless Quackers the duck", a bright yellow duck; "Chilly the polar bear"; both the all-black and the white face version of "Zip the cat"; "Derby the horse" with the fine mane; "Peking the Panda Bear"; and "Humphrey the camel" also commanded high prices. Special edition beanies, such as the #1 Bear or the Billionaire bear that were given to Ty executives, were also particularly hard to come across and highly valued. Throughout the collecting mania, the bears were usually the most sought-after beanies, and thus they carried higher market values. Sometimes earlier editions of a common beanie baby, such as the "old face" Teddies , would be more rare than newer versions. TEDDY THE BEAR Teddy the Bear was the first Beanie Baby Teddy Bear ever introduced by Ty Inc. It was produced in two styles, known as "old face" and "new face" Teddy. The shape of "new face" Teddy later became the style of numerous other Beanie Baby teddy bears produced by Ty that had a variety of themes. Teddy was made in six different colors: brown, cranberry, jade, magenta, teal, and violet. Brown was to last of the colors to be Retired . There were several Beanie Buddy versions of Teddy that were produced, including New-face Cranberry Teddy as one of The Original Nine Beanie Buddies, Old-face Teal Teddy, and the violet employee bear. BEANIE BABIES IN LAWSUITS Several Beanie Babies were involved in lawsuits over Copyright Infringement . They often resulted in the beanies being Retired or their names or designs being changed. Roary the Lion Roary the Lion was a Beanie Baby Lion produced by Ty in 1997 and 1998. Its production was forcibly ended in 1998 when a federal judge ruled that its named violated the rights of the '''Imperial Toy Corporation''', which produced a similar plush lion named '''Roarie'''. {Link without Title} Doodle the Rooster Doodle the Rooster was a Beanie Baby Rooster produced by Ty Inc in 1997. Its name was changed shortly thereafter to ''Strut'' in response to complaints from Chick-fil-A . COUNTERFEIT BEANIE BABIES Counterfeit Beanie Babies were manufactured illegally during the height of the Beanie craze of the 1990s and were sold on the secondary market often at prices much lower than the market price of the genuine versions. {Link without Title} While most counterfeits were of rare Retired beanies and other special editions, some fakes of common beanies were made as well. Some counterfeit versions of real beanies were made that had never been produced by Ty. For example, some red "Pinky the Flamingo" and mint green "Quackers the Duck" were seen. While serious collectors only wanted genuine copies of the real beanies, some sought out fakes as a way to be in possession of a tangible copy of the specimen. Fighting Fakes Several organizations ran services that verified the authenticity of beanies. Several signs of a counterfeit included:
Cases The authorities seized more than 6000 Princess and Britannia from a Ring {Link without Title} . TRIVIA
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