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Period: to
Introduction Stage of American Girl
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Fouding of Pleasant Company
Company is first founded with a debut of 3 historical dolls. -
Period: to
Growth Stage 1 of American Girl
1st growth stage of american girl under the original company of "Pleasant Company". They expanded and adapted to new kinds of dolls, the bitty babies, and also added books to their product mix. They are expanding from being solely dolls with historic characters. -
Debut of historical character, Felicity Merriman
Debut of new doll, Felicity Merriman. -
Launch of American Girl Fashion Show
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Launch of Americn Girl Magazine
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Debut of historical character, Addie Walker
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Debut of Bitty Baby
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Debut of "Contemporary Advice and Activities" books
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Debut of historical character, Josefina Montoya
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Acquisition of Pleasant Company by Mattel
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Period: to
Growth Stage 2
Second growth stage of the American Girl company under the new company Mattel. Noticed increased in sales in this stage with the new website, new store in NYC, new book line, and new kinds of dolls other than historical characters (girl of the year). -
Americangirl.com Launches
With the internet becoming popular, the company launched a wesite to keep up with the technology and for online shopping. -
Debut of historical character, Kit Kittredge
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Retirement of founder Pleasant Rowland
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Debut of the first Girl of the Year
All other previous characters have been historical characters, this is the first time they've created a girl of the year and made them contemporary. They have been continuing this tradition every year so far up until present. This keeps customers waiting for a new story behind a contempory style doll, rather than only historic ones. Each new doll of the year matches the style of the time so that the company is keeping up with the ever-changing styles and fashion. -
Debut of the Bitty Twins
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Debut of historic character, Kaya
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Opening of American Girl Place in New York
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Release of American Girls first TV Movie
Movie is about the historical character, Samantha. They wanted to be more diverse with their products and open to a larger age group so instead of only having the doll for their historical character, they're adding a new aspect, which is a movie. They are still continuing with bringing their historical characters to life and creating more movies. -
Renaming of Pleasant Company to American Girl, Inc.
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Debut of Samanthas best friend, Nellie
This is the first time they've come out with a character who is the best friend to a historical character and matches their story. They've continued this out the years and come out with best friends for almost every historical character. -
Period: to
Growth Stage #3
During this growth stage the company had expanded the age of their target market by adding movies and motion pictures to their products of their historical characters. Movies, rather than dolls, increases the age level of their target market from only young girls. They also added a best friend to each historical character so that young girls will want the best friend for their doll. -
Release of second TV movie
This movie is based on the historical character, Felicity Montoya. -
Release of third movie.
This movie is about the historical character, Molly. -
Debut of historic character, Julie Albright
Julie is a historical character and is introduced with her best friend Ivy. -
Release of first major motion picture, Kitt Kittredge
This movie was a large hit and the main actress, Abigail Breslin, was nominated for an Academy Award due to this motion picture.This was a whole new take on advertising and marketing their product. -
Debut of historical character, Rebecca Rubin
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Period: to
Maturity level
The company stabilized and only came out with a few more historical characters and girls of the year. The only new addition was the "My American Girl", which is where a girl can design the look of her own doll so she can look like her or who she wants. This kept up with consumer demand, but there were no new adaptions or diversification. -
Debut of My American Girl Dolls
This is when a girl can personally design her doll online, the hair color, eye color, hair type, etc. Typically done so girls have a doll that looks just like them -
Debut of historical characters, Cecile Rey and Marie-Grace Gardner
These are characters from 1853 who lived in New Orleans -
Debut of historical character, Caroline Abbott
A young girl growing up during the time of the War of 1812 -
Period: to
Growth stage #4
A new growth stage started up for the company, according to Mattel, their sales went up 5% compared to previous years due to their new additions of the online portal where they can bring their college dolls to life in an online university. With this new adaption to the technological world of videogames, this made the company enter a new growth stage. -
Debut of Innerstar University
These "college girl" style dolls can come alive online in the innerstaru.com avatar portal for young girls to play as if they are in college. -
