A lot of successful entrepreneurs live by the rule that a successful idea is created when you find the solution to a problem that many people have. That mantra sums up why Spanx founder Sarah Blakely is one of the richest self-made female billionaires.
It all starts with an idea, not necessarily the drive to make billions. An idea that is going to invade the lives and homes of people everywhere and help them feel better about themselves. Which is why we love the idea of the new Angelica Doll brand.
We came across a super cool Kickstarter campaign created by mom and dad team Angelica and Jason Sweeting who identified a problem in their daughter’s life and wanted to fix it.
One day Sophia came to her parents and said she was no longer happy with the way she looks and wanted yellow hair, blue eyes, longer hair and even expressed a dislike for her own facial features.
As a parent hearing your child talk in a self-loathing way from a young age would be incredibly devastating. Instead of getting depressed about it, Angelica decided to take matters into her own hands. She recognized that the type of doll she put in Sophia’s hands every day was impacting her self-worth in a huge way, so she went on the hunt for a doll that looked more like her.
When she couldn’t find one, the only solution was to create one. As her idea grew, Angelica knew that this was something not only important for her daughter, but for many other girls in the world.
“As I began to develop The Angelica Doll and give serious thought to the things I wanted to do for young girls, I realized that I had been influenced by society’s standard of beauty for as long as I could remember. Here I am – 27 years old, and I am honestly just beginning to walk into who I am, my natural beauty,” she says on her Kickstarter campaign page.
“I want this to happen earlier, not only for my daughters but for your daughter, your niece, your sister, and for all young girls around the world. I want this to happen for all the young girls who never felt pretty enough because of their kinks, curls, wider noses or fuller lips.”
As a parent, you don’t need to go searching for academic evidence to show you the impact of what a young child sees every day and how it shapes their world views. You have the “focus group” right in front of you – your own children. The things we say, what they see, the examples set before them, and the experiences they are exposed to play a vital role in a child’s self-esteem and self-worth.
“I’m creating Angelica to let girls know that they are beautiful. Our girls need to see a reflection of their own unique beauty. It’s time for our young girls to have a new standard,” said Angelica.
The Angelica doll is the first in her Naturally Perfect line which will eventually feature a series of girls with different hair styles, skin tones, and career choices.
Yep, this badass mom wants to give girls the option of playing with a doll that is a great example of diversity AND brains. Move aside Barbie!
The Kickstarter originally only asked for $25,ooo in funding but just over a week before the campaign ended they had already raised over $76,000! That’s a testament to parents like Angelica who find a need and know how many more people will benefit from their idea.
In their campaign video Angelica says it took 8 months to perfect the hair on the doll. She wanted girls to be able to do all sorts of styles on the doll as well as make it realistic.
If you are a parent who has been incredibly frustrated with the lack of diversity in kids toys, or with the heavily stereotyped way that girls are marketed to when it comes to beauty (which is a scary foreshadow of what’s to come in their adult lives) then these are the types of dolls you need to know about.
There are a number of parents taking matters into their own hands when it comes to giving their children an accurate representation of the diversity in the world. In Nigeria, Taofick Okoya created the Queens of Africa dolls because he wanted his niece to have a doll that looked like her, and saw there was a huge gap in the market.
With the power of social media and crowd-funding platforms, parents, families and even children have a more vital voice in the kids toy market than ever before. In the UK school girl Sophia Trow was upset that shoe brand Clarks only made dinosaur shoes for boys, so she wrote a letter to the company and essentially forced them to realize their gender stereotype mistake.
More recently, another UK girl (are we seeing a budding feminist pattern here?) Izzy Cornthwaite wanted a Darth Vader costume and a light saber for her birthday, but when she went to the Disney UK site, the costume was listed under the “boys” section and Izzy was devastated. She wrote a letter to Disney about her problem, and Disney responded by removing the gender label from the costume and apologized to all “little Jedis” out there!
It is a growing movement of consumer voices telling the toy market that they don’t want to be dictated to with labels and stereotypes anymore. We’re holding out high hopes for the Naturally Perfect doll range and are excited to see this trend of parents and children taking matters into their own hands to create the type of entertainment that best serves them in an empowering way.
