Events and their poisoned gifts

Entrada en español

This time I want to talk about events that provide the various companies for dates such as summer or Christmas. At the beginning of entering the hobby events caught my attention by ignorance, poor me, I thought that in those events companies offered a generous discount or gave away clothes and accessories when making certain expense on your purchase. I have used only three Christmas events, two of them in Dollzone Spain in which certain molds they had in stock their price was reduced and so they came home the Leo (Daisuke) and the baby type C (Mabushiko) one year and  then the Fox (Dean and Sam) two years later. The third event I took advantage of, was one of Angell Studio in which if you reached a certain amount of money, you got clothes to choose from a list they had and that's how Byron arrived with a couple of suits and Danielle got that so beautiful gothic dress she wears for Halloween. Outfits that I have to say that are as expensive that I wouldn’t have bought for this reason. Another type of events don’t interest me and now I'll explain why.

As we know, in this hobby big sums of money are spent, and even more if we stop to think that they are dolls and we’re cheated with the price of them, but I'll leave that for another moment. The companies aren’t stupid and they know that people are eager to buy their dolls and more at times when they do events, so they take advantage and so everybody wins. If you pay attention, in the events they use to give away a limited head, either SD or MSD size. In companies like Dollzone, you can even get a free doll, although it’s a miniature of 11cm tall posing so bad that you put on your nerves and as you don’t know what to do with the damned doll, the poor doll ends up in the marketplace waiting to see who’s the next victim fooled by that thing that only serves as an ornament and little more. If you're lucky, the doll can have more play and pose better, but ... This is when another problem comes.

If you get a limited head, you can only do two things with it. Or buy a body for it even though you hadn’t thought about having another doll, that may even be of a size that you never thought to have but now you have the head you say, why not? And so, you are going to spend more money on a body. Or maybe you decide to sell it and get luck that a buyer decides to buy it at the price you put initially. If you can’t sell it at the desired price, the poor head will end up staying months on the marketplace while its price goes down because no one dares to buy it, and when you finally get to sell it, it may be at a so low price that it hasn’t really helped much to take advantage of the event. So now we have three situations:

1. You've spent a lot more money by having to buy a body for this head you’ve got. To this we must add: wig, eyes, clothing, shoes and accessories. If you have a knack for face-up, that’s what you save, if not, another extra expense. Total extra expense: many euros/dollars more.
2. You have managed to sell the head, but at what price? Have it really worth it?
3. You haven’t managed to sell the head and therefore, or you decide to keep it and try your luck later or you are in point one.

And if what you get is a doll, congratulations. It may be a mold that fits in your family and you can use it perfectly, but in most cases are about dolls that you would have never thought to have and you have one at home now. And here we start again:

1. You have a gift doll, but it involves spending money on wig, eyes, clothing, shoes and accessories. If you have a knack for face-up, that’s what you save, if not, another extra expense.
2.  You have managed to sell the doll, but at what price? Have it really worth it?
3.  You haven’t managed to sell the doll and therefore, or you decide to keep it and try your luck later on or you are in point one.

When we decided to buy the MSD, it caught us for Christmas, but seeing that the event of Dream Of Doll was about a gift of a SD head and spending the money we would spend we would have entered in the event, we decided to let it go and wait a couple of months more. Why did I miss the opportunity? It’s easy, I didn’t want to get into the hassle of selling a head and on the other hand, already had decided not to have more dolls and to see the head at home I might have been tempted to buy a body. I was not fooled by the situation, as simple as that.

5StarDoll now has an event that really made me laugh. I'm already seeing people spending much more money like mad and just to obtain at least the cheaper event. But not everything is as cheap, because as you want it or not, if you decide to keep the given away head/s, you're going to have to buy more bodies! So, more spending. And though 1/6 and/or 1/4 dolls are sent for free, if you decide to keep them, you will need to spend much more money on them, full equip them, you know, and perhaps you have never thought to have that size dolls or that size dolls of this company. If you analyze, they are poisoned gifts that only incite to spend more than necessary and that is why the company has organized it. I don’t think it takes much money make these dolls when they can give them away as merrily, we know that they inflate prices with them and the only ones who get fooled are us, the customers.

I find this event as funny that I have made accounts at low price and see how easy it is to fall in the trap. And if you’re a capricious person, you've got even easier to fall.

In order to reach 299$ you just have to order a SD, the Angelo for instance: 260$, add the costume: 45$ and shoes: 17$ you've easily reached 322$. Let's see what we get:

. A 1/6 doll and a free head.

Great. But now you find yourself with a head without a body, therefore, you need one. Let's say you're excited to have another 1/6 doll and you pick the head of that size, so you have to add 100$ more for the body. We have spent 422$. If you know to stop, you leave it here and that’s what you get: a 1/3 doll with an outfit and shoes (and no face-up) and two naked 1/6 dolls. But what if you want to buy wigs for the three dolls and a costume for each 1/6 doll because you don’t want them to have them naked? Or maybe what interests you is to get the limited heads. So you need to spend 27$ more. Here are the two options:

1. You decide to spend 27$ more to get the limited heads and you buy an outfit for 30$ for that 1/6 head they’re giving you and you are going to buy a body for. You've succeeded in reaching 452$. Now you can get both limited heads and a 1/3 doll. If you know to stop, you leave it here and that’s what you finally get: a 1/3 with an outfit and shoes (and no face-up), a naked 1/3 doll, a head you have chosen, 1/6 in the example, with the body that you have bought with an outfit (and no face-up) and these two limited heads. In total you get three dolls of different sizes and two heads.
2. Now you find yourself with two heads without a body and you want to buy bodies for them. We see the size: 1/6. Recall that the 1/6 body cost 100$, so you'd need two bodies, 200$. If we add the 452$ you’ve already spent, this makes a total of 652$! So you get all gifts:

. A 1/6 doll

. A 1/4 doll

. A free head

. The two limited heads

Viewed this way it seems profitable, but now ask yourself these questions: Would you really have spent those extra 330$ when you wanted to buy the 1/3 doll? Have you planned to have 1/6 and 1/4 dolls before you see this event? Did you really want that all these different sized dolls were from same company or did you liked other better? Do these dolls they give you were on your wishlist or simply you've taken because they were a gift? If the answer is no and you have taken them because they were given away, then you have been cheated and the company has got extra money from you.

Have you noticed how easy it has been to get it all? They have everything well planned so that customers fall into temptation and end up spending more than 599$, because I remember that I've been doing accounts for the low to reach the minimum of the event. Only the smartest will know how to spend what they planned without falling into the trap and by the way, getting a free doll and head for the purchase.

Okay, now you’ll tell me that those dolls that are given away you can sell in the marketplace. Let’s see the price of the dolls:

Heads (I add the size and price of all by the possibility that the gifted head can be any size, or that makes me think):

1/3: $ 60

1/4: $ 50

1/6: $ 40

Of course, you will not be able to sell the heads to the initial price and you will have to sell them by lower price.

Dolls (nude and not equipped)

1/3: $ 260

1/4: $ 195

1/6: $ 130 / $ 150

Doing sums, in the example given would have got dolls/head by the value of 385$, plus the limited heads, yes, but for how much would you get to sell them? Sure for a lot less in the case of getting sold. And don’t believe that they lose the 450$ they say the event costs. Just make another sum. If a 1/6 head costs 40$ and they’re giving away two 1/6 limited heads, it means that they cost 32,5$ each one!

450 – 385 = 65      65 / 2 = 32,5

When they can give away as many dolls and as many heads, is because in reality the price of the dolls are inflated and they lose nothing, with the sales that can generate thanks to the event, they already earn of leftovers. And we're talking about a company that sells cheap dolls.

And remember, if you keep all these dolls and heads, you will have to spend more extra money in clothes, shoes, accessories, eyes, wigs and face-up for they all.

And then look at something else:

You have to pay 1$ more to get it! It’s not much, but 1$ of a customer and another dollar of another, sums.

And then there is the issue of shipping and customs. Although more for customs because it would be a surprise that such as large package would pass and not having to pay a good money for it.

I think this kind of event can only be of interest to a group of people who are interested in these dolls and heads, splitting the cost and dolls/heads or those people who wanted to have such as a big BJD family and already where interested in dolls from this company.

I hope this has made think somebody and make you think better when carried away by the excitement of the events. Depending on how you use them, they can be end giving you a poisoned dolls and/or heads.