So, in just a couple of weeks Branded in the 80s will turn 8 years old. Though it’s kind of arbitrary, we tend to focus on the “big” anniversaries in the five-year increment territory, but I had a couple of milestones I really wanted to hit when I started this project. The first was making it to the seven year mark because I have a special fondness for that particular digit. The second is marking the 8th birthday of the site because again, it has a special meaning to me. I first dreamed of having my own little spot on the internet back around 1998. I’d been farting around the interwebs via AOL and Compuserve and I really wanted to stake out a small piece of the digital landscape to do something. My best friend, who was in the midst of getting his computer science degree at the time, had just recently built a website for a class project and he promised me he’d help me build one of my own. It never materialized, though a lot of that had to do with my not knowing exactly what it was that I wanted to do with a website. Regardless, that marks the beginning of what would eventually become Branded, and it took me eight long years of brainstorming and procrastinating before I eventually settled on what I wanted to do. So in the back of my brain I’ve always hoped that I’d be able to keep this thing going at least as long as it took me to get it off the ground. Well, mission accomplished I guess. As for my next milestone, well, I don’t really have one I guess. I’m kind of curious to see what will happen at the eleven year mark considering that will mean that I would have spent slightly more time talking about the 80s than the decade itself lasted.
Anyway, when I look back at where the site started and where it really took off for me the one aspect that kind of changed everything was when I started investing in a pretty stupidly large collection of 80s stickers to scan and share. Part of this came out of wanting to acquire a bunch of the stickers I had as a kid, but another was that there was a distinct lack of sticker scans floating around on the internet and I felt like it was an opportunity to contribute a small portion to the digital nostalgic pop culture zeitgeist. One of the aspects I love about the nostalgia-minded community is the eagerness to share the cool junk that we love. So it was pretty neat timing that while I was thinking back on all of this I was approached by the cool lady behind the rad RainbowBrite.co.uk website with to help share some fun stuff.
She obviously runs a pretty neat Rainbow Brite fan site, so she acquired a bunch of info and ephemera to post up there. But in her research and collecting she’s amassed a bunch of other cool non-RB stuff that she felt needed to get out there. So she graciously offered to send me some scans of a pretty neat 1985 Mattel Events Guide to share here at Branded. Tying this in a bit more into my silly milestone is that I just happened to turn eight the year this Event guide was published (seriously, there has to be something to this, numerology-wise…)
These event guides were sent out to retailers as a way for Mattel to bolster excitement for their product lines and I’m sure to secure a larger market share of the retail market by encouraging stores to increase orders and devote more shelf and peg space to Mattel stuff. They did this by helping to host local in-store meet and greet events with some of Mattel’s most popular brands and characters. So if you were lucky enough to shake hands with Skeletor at a Toys R Us back int he day, most likely this was one of the guides that the store had to help them schedule and promote the event…
It’s really cool to get a glimpse into this aspect of the marketing and promotion of some of our favorite toys from back in the 80s. Not only is it cool to see some rad artwork that only exists to promote these in-store events (like the neat illustration of the Hot Wheels play area that was shipped to the store), but it’s also awesome to see and read about some of the swag for the event that was either given away (like the Hot Wheels kid’s drivers licenses) or became a “free item with purchase” like the super cool Hot Wheels combination watch/wallet below!
1985 was also a great year for Mattel toys because they were hip deep in the Marvel Secret Wars toy line…
What really struck me about this Secret Wars event is that it wasn’t just geared towards boys. Mattel makes it clear that “boys AND girls” will received a free water color poster. That kind of inclusion back in the 80s seems pretty rare, but then again, Mattel worked on some pretty progressive toy lines like these two favorites, Princess of Power and Masters of the Universe! I mean I know most of the boys who were into He-Man were also secretly into She-Ra…
Man, I feel like I missed out so much on these in-store events. I never managed to attend one and after reading through this guide I feel like I missed out on some amazing experiences and swag. So, I wonder if a little boy could have been initiated into the Legion of Good receiving a free golden power ring and poster? I sure as hell hope so. Also, holy crap, a 15 foot high replica of the Crystal Castle?!? How awesome would that have been to see? I wonder if the stores had to ship them back or of they were ordered to destroy them. I have to imagine that one of these must have made it into a private collection. Hell, at that size it would practically be big enough for kids to play in as a fort. The mid boggles at the possibilities…
Apparently for ’85 Mattel introduced new full body costumes for He-Man and Skeletor. I’ve seen photos of buff guys in the He-Man duds before, but never a full body costume like this complete with toy-accurate mask and all. I like that they even managed to replicate the spiny fin on Skeletor’s wrists (like on the toy…) Sadly there was no 15 foot Castle Greyskull or Snake Mountain, but there were some pretty rad glow in the dark posters!
A lot of this stuff has to be pretty rare. I searched for awhile and couldn’t find and example of the glow in the dark Masters of the Universe poster (not even on He-Man.org!) So it;s cool at least to get a glimpse into this promotional world to know that this stuff exists. FYI, there’s a bit more to this Event Guide, specifically the Rainbow Brite section, but if you want to see that head on over to the cool RainbowBrite.co.uk to find out what was in that in-store event. Thanks again to them for sharing this rad piece of 80s toy ephemera and helping to make the nostalgia community that much richer!
