"Never to be sold again"

I ran into that as well in the animation cel world, but I assumed it was because the cels themselves were stolen from the studio somewhere along the line. I refused to buy them.

If I had not 'won' my Akira in a raffle, I would have sold him long ago. The story is worth the $400 I could get for him. I'd buy a sei or Rei...and particularly one of those Latidoll Adels, but I just don't have the money for that right now lol. If you don't love it anymore...its fine to sell it. If you don't want someone else to sell it, then you need to make a contract. Verbal or e-mail agreement just won't cut the cake.

 

I feel that it's unprofessional of companies to ask the buyer that the doll never changes owners. I can understand that companies wouldn't want scalpers to resell them at much higher prices, but they can't control what happens to a doll once that doll leaves their hands . At the end of the day, a company is a company, not an adoption center.

 

Yes, this, exactly!

 

Not true actually- verbal contracts are perfectly valid. Email even more so, because there's proof. But yeah, a "traditional" contract written up by a lawyer isn't the only way to have a legally binding contract, although perhaps it's the easiest to enforce.

 

i actually didnt know that was posible. what do you do if you dont like the doll when you get it?

 

I don't think it is possible. If you don't want the doll to be resold, then don't sell it. If you need to sell it but want it back later, ask a friend to buy it. I got a friend on LJ who is only offering a doll there because she wants him in a good home of someone she knows.

 

Personally, I think whether I paid $500+ or nothing at all, if a doll is mine and I either:

- don't want it anymore
- really need the money

I should be free to do with it as I please.

Some dolls aren't available to even buy online, such as sei/rei tenshi, and a lot of people wouldn't have the chance to own one unless bought secondhand.

Even if the person selling it marks is up ridiculously high, there will always be someone who is willing to pay that price for it. I just recently bought a sei-tenshi. My chances of ever winning one are very slim, as I probably won't ever make it to a Dollpa, so why not buy it if someone is willing to sell? I know they're given out for nothing, but I'm willing to pay to get it.

I don't think companies should be able to say "Don't sell this, ever", because really, there's no way to enforce it. Sometimes people need the money, and keeping a doll you don't care about would seem pointless to me.

 

I'm glad Nytshaed posted her adorable Sei! It shows the other side of selling gift dolls. If nobody sold them, then people who were unlucky in drawings or couldn't participate wouldn't have a chance to get them ever! Even if you were to give away a gift doll, how would you choose the recipient? I'd love to be given a Sei tenshi, but so would almost every person on the board.

Also, I can't imagine selling something with a "don't resell" clause. If I was that concerned about the item, why am I not keeping it? And you can't expect the buyer to love it in person. I've had plenty of dolls who have been very different in person than in photos.

 

I am incredibly unlucky at winning anything, and unless people sold their dolls like the Sei's, I would never be able to own one. So I am grateful that people do occasionally, so I too have a chance to have one.

 

Mmmm....not sure if "unprofessional" is the right word - unrealistic, perhaps? But bear in mind a few things:

- at the time that Hypermaniac were stating that they would not sell a doll to a collector whom they knew had sold an HM doll the hobby was a bit different; the dolls were actually considered to be "homed" or "adopted." Selling was seen as a slight and an interpretation of the hobby not in keeping with Hypermaniac's company philosophy. They were absolutely within their rights to refuse to sell based on this knowledge.

- tensiya.com certainly was covering themselves legally. What an incredibly messy situation to have sold a doll to Collector A, Collector A then has sold the doll to Collector B before the doll has even shipped....the possibility of problems arising from this are pretty apparent. And incidentally, one of the reasons that DoA does not allow sellers to sell dolls which are not in hand. It has never seemed that tensiya nor dollshe minded in the slightest that the Bermanns were being resold for prices that were four and five and six times the original cost!

- the tenshi are given as gifts, as thank yous, as lovely tokens of gratitude. To sell a doll that is a gift at a humongous profit....must be frustrating to the companies that give dolls or doll heads away.

 

Oh, me too. I can be in a room with say 100 prizes, and 101 people, and I would be the one left out. In fact, it happened at the tea party for Resin Con in 2007. Everyone else got a prize and at the end, my card was the one never chosen. Luckly, she still had stuff to give out!

But as much as I love those tenshi, I can't afford a $5000 doll.

 

I'm guessing it is to deter scalpers, but really.... you can't blackmail someone into keeping something they don't really want or can't really afford.

 

I'd like to add another thing about the Hypermaniac situation is that there were VERY few of them at the time. If they were making hundreds and hundreds of dolls it would be quite impossible to keep track. But if the numbers are more in the dozens you have a better chance of figuring out which one sold.

However, since HM increased their production to more of a 'as many as pre-order within the designated time' system, they seem to have also set aside the previous 'no resale' deal.

It was a big deal when I got my 2003 Hypermaniac because we had to be very up-front that the Korean person helping me was assisting ME in buying it for me (never to re-sell) and wasn't re-selling herself. However, Hypermaniac didn't seem to have a problem with that and of course I still have the doll. ^^
Hyla

 

I don't know about this... I think there's a certain distinction in making dolls that command so much attention and create such desire. I'm sure some of that spills over onto their other products, so to speak... it can only help the business in question. If I were a dollmaker, I'd personally love it if my dolls were selling for over-the-moon prices on the secondary market.
Seriously, it can only be a good thing for them if you think about it.

Raven

 

I think it's really nice of a company to give away dolls and if I was given a gift doll like that I would try to not sell it but if I wasn't bonding with it I would give it to a close a friend that I know would bond with it and cherish it
I would try everything before selling it unless I really needed to pay important bills like food or rent

 

Wow, never heard of this, but most of the time I live with my head in the sand. Anyways, the impression I got from such a request is there are some doll artists that fear their dolls may end up in the hands of people that would copy and sell their ideas.

 

Ok, i'm probably going to get slammed for this, but here goes. First of all, these aren't "gifts'. They are purchases, plain and simple. A company has no business telling anyone what they can or cannot do with the doll once it is sold. Why should they care? It's sold, it's done. Before anyone starts yelling at me, and saying "Grrrr, what do you know about art!" etc, let me just state, i sculpt, i paint, i draw, and i do some fashion design for bjd.. I've sold my pieces, and would never dream as to be so arrogant as to dictate to someone what they can or cannot do with it. Yes, I understand that to some these are not just dolls, but i doubt that is the reasoning for it. They do not want their dolls being sold on the secondary market, and then skyrocketing. Well, unfortunately, that's just part of this industry. If you are not prepared to deal with the fact that people might sell your 'art', after purchasing it, then maybe you should consider a different profession. The Bermanns were often sold with a 'do not sell' thought. However, i see many Bermann dolls being sold....not just sold, but sold immediately after they were purchased, which says to me that people bought them with the pure intentions of selling them for a skyrocketed amount later. While i don't agree with scalping, it is just a part of the hobby, albiet an ugly one. But business have no right to tell anyone what they can or cannot do with the product once they take the money for the doll.

The only time that i feel a company has a right to tell anyone what they can or cannot do with the doll, is regarding copying, duplicating, etc. But selling/trading/etc are, IMO, out of their realm of what they have the right to allow/disallow. I also say that if a doll company wants to try to tell people that they cannot sell a doll after it has been purchased, then they also need to be willing to take ANY doll back, and give the money back to the individual. This way, the person does not have to keep a doll they do not want, and they do not lose their money.


Now, to the idea of a doll truly being 'Given'. THIS is where i feel a company/person does have the right to say that you cannot sell the doll.
why? Because then everyone would be trying to get the free doll only to sell it to someone else, making money at the expense of the company.


There have been cases of people (even here on DOA) mentioning that they want a doll more than anything, of a particular mold, but can't afford it. Then a kind DOAer or doll hobbyist sees the plea, and out of the kindness of their heart, GIVES them said doll, only to find that same doll on the marketplace or ebay later. If you are given a truely free doll, and then decide you don't want it, you have no right to sell it. I think you should send it back to the person who originally gave it to you.

I remember quite a while back a case on here of a hound that was given to a girl, out of kindness, and then it was found later that the girl was selling the doll not even a month after she got it.

 

I think we've already established that it's a bit unrealistic for a company to expect that a doll won't be sold at some point, however, we've also clarified that the Hypermaniac requirement is an older one that no longer applies and at the time fit with the company's philosophy. I've also stated that tensiya and dollshe don't seem to mind the secondary market of the dolls, tensiya made the request out of an obvious desire to keep the transaction problem-free.

So, how do you feel about the tenshi and the gift heads being sold?

 

well, if the gift heads come with a purchase, then in my opinion, they are part of the purchase. They were given along with the purchase. There are many who buy things just to get the gift heads, much like with Luts. So if someone is selling them at a reasonable price, this is a bit different. I sort of see a difference between a company giving someone a gift head because they spent over 400 dollars, and an individual giving a doll head/doll to a person out of kindness. One is a marketing strategy, the other is an act of selflessness.

If someone wants to sell the event head, after they got it, i don't see a problem with that, as they had to lay money down to even aquire the head. I just get irritated at people who uber-inflate prices just because it's a rare, or limited. and i don't mean adding 20 or 30 bucks. There are people asking 2600 dollars for the Beryl and such. While this doll was not a freebie, it is just an example of the sort of 'inflation' that i get annoyed with.

but that is another dolly debate all its own LOL

 

This is just in regards to Volks, but even though I can understand their feelings, I can't help but wonder why they don't have a more selective way of giving out the Sei Tenshis? The raffle is a good way not to appear biased, but maybe they should offer them to loyal customers who've expressed interest in owning one, and who would promise not to sell it? I think if they're going to give someone something they think is that precious, then they have the right to make certain demands. Otherwise, they'll always risk giving one to a someone who just wants to sell it.

Of course, I'm just basing my opinion on my limited knowledge of the process, so I could be way off.

Another thing I wonder, though, is if the occurence of selling sei tenshi is higher in the West than it is in Japan/Asia? I know the act of giving gifts is supposed to be a Big Deal in Japan, so by accepting a sei tenshi a Western recipient might be entering into a contract of etiquette that they didn't even know existed.