EL SEGUNDO – Mattel announced that their biggest selling Barbie ever is the… Zombie Barbie!
The first Barbie appeared in March of 1959. Through the years there have been many big sellers: Malibu Barbie, Holiday Barbie, Silkstone Barbie, Stacey, Midge, Bitch Barbie, Barbie Gone Wild, Sugarplum Barbie, Halloween Barbie, Slut Barbie, Mean Girl Barbie, Geek Barbie, Valley Girl Barbie, Jock Barbie, Nascar Barbie, Tinkerbell Barbie and on and on…
But Mattel reported yesterday that the best-selling Barbie ever is the Zombie Barbie.
“We were all shocked. Every generation of girls has embraced Malibu Barbie and our basic Barbie Doll, but young girls today are not interested in those Barbies, they want Zombie Barbie,” said Mattel President Kevin Gillmore.
“It speaks to the devolution of society and mankind,” said child psychologist Chris Rigaux from Yale University. “Girls have been changing over the centuries and the most drastic changes have come in the last fifty years – really ever since Barbie was first introduced. Girls are no longer drawn to everything that is ‘sweet’ and ‘nice’, they are more interested in blood and death, even from an early age.”
Gillmore said that Mattel did many focus groups with young girls aged 2-7. “We put all our Barbie dolls in a room and observed the girls playing with them. When we our focus groups in March, April and July of this year, the young girls all rejected every Barbie Doll, except for Zombie Barbie. It shocked us all. But we are going to run with it – because we want to turn a big profit this year.”
Will Zombie Barbies damage young girls?
“Well, there is a debate in academic circles about Barbie,” said Rigaux. “I released a white paper last year. My thesis was that the regular Barbie did more to damage the self-image and self-esteem of young girls. The original Barbie had a waist that was far too thin and young girls set an ideal for a girl at a young age, and ideal that they could not become. So depression and low self-esteem became major problems over the last fifty years. But now, with Zombie Barbie, girls are developing a much stronger self-image. It’s a doll every child psychologist supports.”
Makes sense. And the Zombie Barbie is flying off the shelves. Many retailers are already predicting it will be the biggest seller this Holiday season.
Here’s a short video of a girl who grew up playing with a prototype version of Zombie Barbie. See how well-adjusted she is:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HA4xwl-sSKs]
Wher is Zombie Ken?