NotesGeppeddo dolls were sold during the holiday season from kiosks in shopping
malls. Here is some company information taken from their literature:
"What is Geppeddo?
Geppeddo® is a holiday
business which operates primarily in shopping malls from
approximately November 1st through the middle of January each year.
Geppeddo offers an exclusive line of collectable porcelain dolls,
accessories, and related products. The Axis Corporation, a Salt Lake
City, UT based company, owns and operates Geppeddo.
How and when did Geppeddo begin?
The Axis Corporation founded Geppeddo in 1990 largely to take
advantage of specialty retailing, an exciting new appendage to
traditional mall retail which involves the use of hallways for small
retail operations. These "stores" usually involve carts or kiosks
that allow businesses to get their products displayed in the hottest
spot in the mall— right where the customers walk! Although specialty
retailing takes place year-round in malls, The Axis Corporation
decided to focus Geppeddo stores only on the holiday season, the
busiest shopping period of the year, and then offer Geppeddo
products year round through mail order."
Along with the My Way Babies, the vinyl My Way Kids were considered "Geppeddo
Playables", as opposed to the "Geppeddo Collectibles" porcelain dolls.
They could be assembled with the
customer's choice of face mold, wig, eye color and clothing in about an
hour while the customer browsed the mall. When they
were first introduced, the My Way Kids were all-vinyl and had jointed
elbows and knees. The later (much more common) dolls have a cloth body
with internal armature, like most porcelain dolls have.
In the picture below, you can see American Girl Samantha, a later My
Way Kid, an earlier My Way Kid and Magic Attic Heather. As you can see
from the pictures, My Way Kids are much closer to Magic Attic size than
American Girl.
On
the left you can see a My Way Kid wearing Magic Attic Club Chloe's
starter outfit. It fits her extremely well. These shoes fit because they
are sandals but some closed-toe shoes are too snug because My Way Kids
have slightly larger feet. The cloth-bodied My Way Kids also fit Magic
Attic Club outfits very well.
The quality of the all-vinyl dolls is
very nice. They have jointed elbows and knees which is unusual for a
vinyl play doll. It makes them slightly easier to dress but the
stringing on our all-vinyl My Way Kid is way too tight for her to sit
with ease or hold her arm in a bent position.
The cloth-torso dolls
have a weird-shaped body but the cloth is sturdy enough and the internal
armature means they are poseable and can stand on their own. I do not
like the exposed and prominent plastic ties at the neck of our
cloth-body My Way
Kids. Both the cloth and the all-vinyl My way Kids are difficult to
balance standing upright, which explains their odd posture in the
pictures above.
Some
of the face molds are cuter than others but at least there is a variety.
The inset, fixed eyes are very nice quality and quite natural looking.
The face painting is subtle and minimal as you'd expect for a child
doll.
The clothing quality is medium. Better than a Battat or Meritus
doll but not anything near American Girl standards.
All in all, I'd say these are medium quality play dolls. It would
have been fun to have one custom-made and I like the jointed one because
she is unusual, but nothing else about them really stands out.
Geppeddo
