Vinylmation Dolls

[CaryHaven]

I'm not sure if there's a better place for this, but can someone explain Vinylmations to me? They're vinyl dolls, right? What makes them so special besides them being so expensive? Why are they so expensive, even on a Disney scale?? Maybe I'm just seeing the super expensive ones online? Are there cheaper ones?

 

[ksantilli]

Yes, they are a little vinyl "doll" I guess you could say. There are many people out there that are avid Vinyl toy collectors and I think that's how Disney can make them more expensive.
My 3 kids collect them. They love them! We buy them for most holidays/events. They love to be able to trade them when we go to the Disney Store and when are in the parks. Sadly, they have lessened the number of places you can trade at WDW, but it's still a lot of fun.

My kids have display cases in their rooms filled with theirs. It's a fun souvenir for the kids and I'd much rather bring home those than another stuffed animal!

 

[KimBean]

Would love to know this. Don't get them. They popped up one year without explanation and I'm bewildered. Lol.

 

[CaryHaven]

I don't like stuffed animals either (my kids love them of course). I guess I could see how a couple of the princess ones would be cute, but I guess I just don't understand the price. I didn't know there were other vinyl toys that people collected either.

 

[nkereina]

Think comic books... coins... beanie babies... they are items you can collect, and not everyone understands or is interested. There are many different ones, they come out frequently, many are limited editions. I think there are artists who have put out unique, limited edition ones that make them more expensive yet. We don't collect them regularly, but my fiance has several of the small Marvel ones since he is a Marvel fan.

 

[delmar411]

I'm not sure if there's a better place for this, but can someone explain Vinylmations to me? They're vinyl dolls, right? What makes them so special besides them being so expensive? Why are they so expensive, even on a Disney scale?? Maybe I'm just seeing the super expensive ones online? Are there cheaper ones?

They aren't dolls. They are mickey shaped figures about 3" tall. People collect them because they like them. You used to be able to trade them in nearly every store and in every resort until the beg of 2013. Then Disney decided to reign it in and there is pretty much 1 place per park to trade them now and none in resorts.

They run $12-17 each figure for the most part.

Not sure what else to say about them. They are easy to collect and just sort of pile up. LOL

 

[gtpoohbear]

My kids collect them, we have a large bucket of them at home and they do play with them, just like any action figure. The special ones can be pricey, but compared to other stuff at WDW they don't seem unusually expensive. I've also bought several complete sets (of 12) on eBay for around $40, which makes them only a few dollars each.

 

[momto3boysillbe]

We started collecting them a few years ago because they looked a lot like Mickey with cool designs/characters painted onto his mold. They've since changed the face by flattening and smoothing it out and we have lost interest since then for the most part. They're just plastic collectibles.

 

[Wendybird55]

They are 3" Mickey Icon dolls.. What makes them collectible to some is that they are painted in such ways to represent different images / people / characters. They have many different series such as Villains, Disney Parks. Urban, Cutesters, Muppets with each collection having usually 12 different dolls and one "chaser" mystery doll. The big caveat to collecting Vinylmations is that for many of the collections you don't know which doll your are purchasing. They come in a sealed box with only the name of the series name on it. Every box in the series looks exactly the same and you have no way of knowing which one you get until you purchase it and open the box. My sons collects vinylmations and especially likes the Villains, however, he may have to buy upwards of 20 vinylmations from one series to get all 12 of the series and maybe more to find the special chaser. It can become expensive to try and collect an entire series. That is why many people trade them and you can trade them at Disney in certain stores.

There are vinylmations that you can see when you buy them, but the ones the collectors really want are the ones in the sealed boxes. You do see them on Ebay sometimes for a lot of money because if people need to complete a collection they may be willing to pay the $$ especially for the rarer chaser dolls. Collections do retire so if you're missing characters and the collection is retired the only way to get them is on second, more expensive, market. Sometimes people on ebay will have an entire series for sale with all the characters. And though it may seem expensive, it can cost a lot of $ to get an entire set on your own being they cost around $13-$14 a pop and you will probably need to buy more than there are in the collection to get them all the characters.

Some of the collections have really neat looking characters..the artwork on some of the series is clever and good.

You can equate it somewhat to the Lego mini figure collections where you don't know what you're getting when you buy them and you have to buy multiple mini figures to try and collect all from a specific series. My son likes to collect these as well, however I've gotten good at feeling the bags to try and figure out which mini figure is inside. So far for the new Simpsons mini figure collection we have 15 of the 16 with only 4 duplicates. Last time we bough them I was 5 for 6 in being able to figure out which figure was in which package. Unfortunately you can't do that with Vinylmations.