Quest for Elmo Tickles Consumers’ Fancy in Many Ways
The glittering eyes of a child cuddling a Tickle Me Elmo doll on Christmas morning was the last thing on Jesse Carrasco’s mind. For him and many others in a crazed crowd of 250 outside the Puzzle Zoo toy store in Santa Monica on Friday morning, this was a mission of conquest.
Elmo is the toy this holiday season, after all, and they were determined to claim their prize in this ultra-hyped episode of American commercialism.
“It’s like a symbol of endurance--a triumph,” said Carrasco, 16, of his search for the elusive doll. “I can say, ‘I got an Elmo before Christmas.’ ”
Carrasco, of Anaheim, bundled himself in sweatshirts and slept Thursday night outside the Santa Monica shop in hopes of being first in line when the doors opened Friday at 7 a.m. He was one of 50 lucky shoppers picked by lottery to buy the furry toy that giggles, talks and vibrates--a phenomenon that has stirred a consumer frenzy across the country.
Los Angeles has been no exception: A thriving market of would-be sellers and obsessed buyers has sprung up, with some of those who already own Elmo dolls taking out newspaper ads that offer the toys for $500 and up.
Becky Gilbert is one of the faithful who has searched for Elmo day and night. Indeed, Elmo-hunting has become virtually a full-time job in recent weeks.
Gilbert has scoured the Toys R Us near her Redondo Beach home twice a day--when shipments arrive--hoping that new dolls will emerge. She showed up outside Puzzle Zoo at 4:30 a.m. Friday with her 2 1/2-year-old daughter, Demi. The two left empty-handed, but Gilbert vowed to return in three weeks when the store gets its next load of the animals.
“We’re on a mission,” said Gilbert, 32. “We haven’t succeeded yet.”
Others who turned up at Puzzle Zoo on Friday said they were drawn by the chance to buy the toy, but also wanted to participate in the frenzied scene.
The crowd pressed against steel barricades as Santa Monica police officers stood guard to keep buyers from rushing the store. Puzzle Zoo owners called out raffle ticket numbers one at a time. Gleeful winners pranced through the front doors, past a phalanx of television crews and photographers and on to the prize--a waist-high stack of Elmo dolls.
“Now I have a Christmas story,” said Klamaria Grogan as she emerged with her red Elmo under her arm. “I feel like I won something. I can say I got up at 5 a.m. and my number actually got called.”
Marina Dominguez of Redondo Beach didn’t win a chance to pay $39.95 for a doll, so she stood back from the crowd and offered her own assessment of the early morning shopping spree that lasted less than an hour.
“Isn’t it funny how a stuffed animal can get all these news crews out here?” she asked.
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Psychologists see the Tickle Me Elmo rage as a positive development because it brings people together.
“We talk to our neighbors about the Tickle Me Elmo doll. Maybe we wouldn’t have reason to talk to them otherwise,” said Jerry Shaw, a psychology professor at Cal State Northridge. “It may create a sense of temporary community because people are focused on something in common.”
But others see an insidious underbelly in the Elmo craze--parents manipulated by demanding children, driven by guilt to buy a toy that has little educational value.
“It’s keeping up with the Joneses at the nursery school level and that is what makes it particularly unappealing,” said author Jack Solomon, who devoted one chapter of his 1988 book, “The Signs of Our Time,” to an analysis of why parents bought their children Cabbage Patch dolls and other toys. “It is child-driven consumerism. It’s not the noblest side of American society.”
But some of the shoppers at Puzzle Zoo weren’t thinking about kids at all. They coveted the furry little Sesame Street character for themselves.
Susan Brody could not stand to part with her Elmo when she walked out of the store. She decided to add the toy to her bear collection rather than hand it over to her 7-year-old nephew in Minnesota as she had originally planned. “This is a keeper,” Brody, 35, said as she patted the doll’s stomach. “This is adorable.”
Her boyfriend, Mike Oltean, said he doubted the boy would miss the doll. “What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” Oltean said.
Besides, Oltean reasoned, there will be another chance to buy a doll for the nephew. That’s because three Elmo cousins--Tickle Me Big Bird, Tickle Me Ernie and Tickle Me Cookie Monster--are expected out after New Year’s.
