How much is too much for a BJD?

I have a rule of thumb. Tinies no more then $300, MSD no more then $500 and the big ones which now have to be 60 cm or less no more then $700. Fact is the doll price is just the start. Trying to find the perfect wig, the shoes and clothes can be hard for some sizes esp if not that main stream. So if the company has clothes that are fair priced and look well made or I can find an etsy seller that works in that size and makes good stuff I am set on that doll. But what starts out at say $300 has now grown to $500 as the clothes, wigs shoes and of course shipping costs all add up. Inflation since Covid has really upped the prices of many things and I regret selling some items that now cost me 5-10% more to get again. But I have a plan and hopefully this is the year it works. LOL

 

The most I've spent on a doll was about $650, which hurt a little at the time but I could at least afford. He was worth it though, with huge wings and fantasy parts. That being said, I generally don't like to go above $300ish, especially considering the cost of accessories that get added, and I stick to the 1/4 range anyways so that helps. Anything larger is just too large for me.

 

I tend to be price sensitive around $1000 for SD, $500 for MSD. Including the cost of face up, wig, and eyes. But some dolls have and will push me past my comfort level Knowing that, I see no reason to set a hard limit. For a doll that I'd spend $1000 on, I need to feel confident that I will get more than $1000 worth of joy out of it. That's, what, one or two music festivals? Okay, so if I love her for a year or two, then I totally got my money's worth, right? Yeah, I'm pretty good at talking myself into buying dolls

 

1000 euro is too much which basically means volks haracter dollars aren't going to happen. XD

 

There’s two dolls I’m looking at that would cost me over 1000 were I to get them, so I think that would be my limit… I used to think I’d pay the extra for company faceups but to soften the blow, I’d probably buy them blank now.

 

My limit depends on the type of BJD.

D.Lace is a somewhat unknown seller because they only produce preorder batches that can take a long time to finish. It's that way because D.Lace seems to base their models on Renessaince art and they devote time to the details. One example would be the Broken Roman Soldier. Imagine a Roman marble statue that was shattered and then put back together. The Broken Roman Soldier is what would happen if all the pieces were put together with some missing and each individual shard still visible. The effect makes the Broken Roman Soldier look like a marble puzzle piece or Kintsugi. This would all be made by hand and be available in different sizes. It was around 900 for the 1/3 version, but never produced because the preorder failed. I bought it on layaway because i wanted that model.

Gem of Doll produces nice dolls but takes advantage of the US market by pricing at what an American would expect. Their shops on Taobao and Shoppee have the new models priced where the Non USD currency would equal the US price after conversion. It's like the US doll on Alice being $700USD while the Taobao Chinese shop has the same doll listed at 5000 Yuan. $700USD = 5000 Yuan. If the items aren't new, the NonUS stores have them discounted over time or just less while the US prices never change. Gem of Doll has the US Vincent Lily wig listed for $80ish. Taobao has it for $20. You can spend $900 on the US shop for one fullset while ordering on Taobao and dropshipping can get you 3 fullsets for the same price. Not to mention, they respond to every customer in every country except the US.

I'm getting Gem of Doll as cheap as possible.

 

Probably not over 500 euros because the customs charges in Sweden are insane and most dolls that i love are from overseas . And adding shipping on top of that…

If i had a stable income i would probably not spend more than 1000 though. Anything above would make me too scared to touch it

 

I think I wouldn't spend more than €2000ish, simply because they don't make dolls I like that cost more than that (unless they're getting scalped). I'm very glad I don't want any €2000 dolls at the moment, cause that would be a financial nightmare.

What really bugs me however is another thing, and I'd like someone to explain it to me so maybe I'll change my mind: I can justify marking up prices for foreigners due to extra fees, currency losses, extra work/annoyances, risks and whatnot, but it really annoys me when I'm asked €700 for a doll that sells for €450 locally. That's an over 50% increase and if selling a doll profitably for the lower amount to locals is possible, I can only see it as price gouging. It gets much worse than that with certain companies who charge almost double the price.

 

Around 2000 canadian dollars. I don't own any dolls that expensive, but I am willing to pay that much for some doll I really want if the price feels right. It has to be perfect tho, at that price defects gonna bother me more. And I will be afraid to take it out of the box

 

After $1000, my brain just starts thinking about the pretty purses I could buy instead. I'd probably be fine with going a little over that amount for the right doll, though, but I've been lucky that the sculpts I love are all comfortably in the $500-$700 range.

 

If I can't afford to pay in full, then it is too much for me. When I bought BJDs, it was because I had saved for ages, or had money set aside in case I found an appealing doll.

 

I answered this a year and a half ago and said $600 was the limit, but time to update. I recently paid $900 for the perfect doll- Iplehouse Lahela in light brown skin--because there was *no* other sculpt out there that came in the right color, with the right facial features, the right body type and right size for her. I searched for about four years for a cheaper alternative and nothing worked. I have zero regrets on getting her.

I also realized I have about $1500 in Cooper, and didn't even notice. He's a hybrid, with six alternate heads, and extra hands and feet. So I bought all his parts over four and a half years, and $600 for the body, then $50-150 for each head, then $20 for hands, $20 for feet spread out so much didn't even click in my head as being so expensive.

But on the other hand, having high limits doesn't mean I have to spend so much on a doll. Really, any price is too high if you don't enjoy the doll. I impulse bought a Bobobie Apollo a couple of years ago for under $200, and while he was pretty, I had almost instant buyer's remorse and wished I hadn't gotten him. Nothing against the doll himself, he just ended up not being my aesthetic, and I didn't have a strong character for him. I sold him pretty quickly. I also have a ResinSoul Mi I got for about $200 and I absolutely adore her!

So it's kind of a trick question. A grail or doll you just can't settle on something else for is sometimes worth breaking the limit. A cheap doll can be too much and a waste of money if it's not what you really want. I think the real question you need to ask yourself is if you'll regret spending so much, or be excited about it.

 

I find that the longer I'm in the hobby, the more I'm willing to spend. This is partly because I'm more financially stable now I'm older, but also because I've just become more accustomed to dropping huge amounts of money on dolls and it doesn't freak me out as much anymore.

I've always taken the view that it is worth spending a lot of money on something you really want, rather than settling for second best (I never understood the concept of cheaper "starter" dolls. Not getting the doll you want seems like a bigger waste of money to me). If a doll is really expensive, I ask myself, would I rather spend that money on this one doll I really want, or would I rather have 2 or 3 cheaper dolls for the same amount of money? The answer is always, I would rather have the expensive one that I want.

I think another reason why my budget has increased is because I have a limited amount of space in my flat and my heart! So I would rather invest a lot into having a small but perfect (to me!) collection.

I do have a rule that if I can't afford to pay for a doll in full then I'm not allowed to have it. It's not worth the stress of worrying about money. I've never paid much more than $1000 for a doll, but that's because I've thankfully never wanted a doll that costs more than that.

 

If they’re the perfect vessel for a character dearest to my heart, then ain’t no mountain high enough. And I mean that. I will go without other things if it means I get the perfect doll for my perfect character.

I’ve paid $1000 for a head before, but she had been my beloved OC for nearly 20 years at that point. And then her never ending clothes and accessories. Custom wig. Updated body. All of that. I’ve definitely stopped counting the $$$. But it’s good for my heart and that’s all that matters.

For a random doll that I think is really pretty? After feeling the bliss and satisfaction of having perfectly rounded dolls for my perfectly rounded characters? $100 can even still feel expensive. And that doll will sit pretty collecting dust.

 

I think the simple answer would be that it's marked up because the company knows that's what the foreign/western customer is ready to pay for this. If it's through a dealer, there's also the dealer's cut calculated into it, and not everyone compares with the local prices.

There are further factors though - dolls are much more popular in Asia, meaning it's guaranteed that there will be more customers for the given product and there's also loads of local competition so prices have to be competitive, too. The overseas buyer tends to be more picky as the community is small and it's expensive anyway so to make the few foreign purchases worth it with the hassle, they also charge more. I think it's not wrong to also take median income into account - it of course varies on case by case basis, but most western currencies are stronger and salaries are a little higher right now than in most Asian countries and a business will of course ask what the customer is able to pay for better and for worse.

But yeah it's definitely price gouging as well - and whether one pays that price or not doesn't really matter if it's not the main market anyway.

 

I think my limit is around $500, considering I really only get MSD dolls. I actually haven't even went over $300 for a single doll since I don't buy fullsets, only a face up or blank. If I ever decide to get an SD I think my limit would probably go up but I doubt I will even go past $800 even then. Luckily or unluckily, the only SDs I've been interested in are hard to come by or old limited sculpts I have very little chance of finding. It's probably for the best.

 

For me anything over $300 is too much and most of my dolls have cost way less than that.

I'm a low end collector who hybrids to get what I want sometimes. I've put together hybrid versions of expensive dolls I wanted by getting the head as cheaply as I can use then getting a used and less expensive body.

I just got a gorgeous Moonlight Wonder Kirin head for like $60. I have a used Spiritdoll body that it's likely going on that I snagged for like $150 a while back.

From what I can tell Kirin is out of stock now but a complete Kirin probably wasn't cheap.

I'm doing the same thing with another head I picked up cheap and another Spiritdoll body. The doll I'm putting together is close to 1K if you go buy him new. He will probably be close to $300 for me when he's all done but that's a fraction of what he costs new.

I don't buy too many SD sized dolls these days. Mainly I just wanted these two. Most of my dolls are minis now which helps. I can usually get a mini used now and again for well under $200.

Mostly I look for the project dolls, the ones that need some redoing. That keeps me pretty much in bounds of my budget.

 

My absolute max is $1200 USD. First off, that’s like $1500 in CAD, depending on how bad the exchange rate in question is. But the actual reason my limit is set at $1200 is because that was the cost of my grail. Lilith, my twigling ingenieuse was $1200, and no other doll is worth more than that to me. I’ve come close to that for a few dolls, sure. Like I’ve done custom coloured twiglings that set me back close to that amount, and even a feeple60 fullset with three heads that came close, but nobody is allowed to cost more than lilith.

 

1000 for a blank doll and it'd absolutely have to be a dream, holy grail of a doll. So like Whale Tower's Rafayeh or Dream Valley's 1/4 dragon. But that's the rarity, typically my upper limit is like 600. If I see a doll above that I have to really think, how much do I want this doll? Do I have a good plan or idea for this doll? Will I use all the elements of this doll (if I'm buying a fullset).

Fortunately, I strongly lean towards minis and those tend to be less expensive than bigger dolls. Unfortunately, I like fantasy dolls! Ah, Dream Valley and Dollzone...

 

$1200 for a limited doll of a character I love from a fandom (like anime/game). $800-900 for a bigger doll like a Ringdoll or a Dollfie. $2000 for a custom doll.