Price difference between Tiny's, MSD's and SD's

The cost of resin is not the only factor involved in the creation of a doll. Many of the same labor costs apply to all of them: faceup, mold creation, sculpting, etc. It may take as long to sculpt a tiny as it does to sculpt an SD, and that is also a factor in the cost.

Making tiny items is considerably fussier and more precision-oriented than larger items. This applies to sculpts as well as clothing.

It isn't about the cost of the materials.

'Cute' doesn't have a price adjustment.

 

Call me crazy
I have every size BJD and my most expensive doll is a Limited Release Lati Yellow (Tiny)

 

It depends on a lot of factors. Amount of parts, where it's produced etc. China has cheaper way of producing, so their larger dolls are cheaper as well.
Dolls from Fairyland have an insane amount of parts, which all need processing, so that's what boosts up their price.

 

I only have one tiny, a Pipos Star Cheshire, and I'd have to say I'm amazed with him. He stands better than my larger dolls, though I'll admit I still prefer my 65 cms He was about half the price, maybe a bit less. That's not too bad, considering I bought one SD head for the same price as Cheshire cost me ($300). It just goes by what you're comparing the cost to.

You are paying more per ounce of resin for a tiny, which is why I plan on having just one. I wanted him because I'm a huge fan of Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland ^^ Some people might prefer the smaller size, or find it's easier to afford a $100-300 tiny than a $400-700 SD. But the key is that less resin does not mean less expensive, that's for sure

 

Tinies have smaller parts and they're harder to make. They may require less resin, but there's more errors when casting tinies and lots of pieces may be unusable. The small the doll, the harder it is to make! I would say MSD are the middle point- they require not too much resin and not too much effort to engineer and cast. Tinies require less material but more engineering and skill in casting, so they cost more. SDs are huge are require tons of material, and possible special engineering to enable them to hold a pose despite their large size and gravity, therefore they are also expensive.

 

Exactly. I don't think it's fair to compare a cheaper company to a more expensive company. The cheaper company is cheaper for a reason - usually because they're based in a certain place, or use cheaper materials, or mainly because they pay less for less work. That's how they pass the savings onto the customer

The detail difference is amazing when you compare a cheap company to a more expensive company. It also depends on the engineering. I got a dragon baby from DZ once, and had to sell him, because DZ didn't sculpt the ball joint to fit correctly on the claw (it wasn't just me, it was apparent on the sales page when I looked for it). And I was annoyed that this was considered acceptable, but the statement 'You get what you paid for' rang true. I paid for a cheap doll, I got a cheap doll with joints that didn't fit right.

That's why I (and a lot of others in this hobby) are willing to pay more for a tiny. Everyone has a personal level of what we consider good quality, and we're not crazy for wanting to pay more for it.

 

I USED to think that buying a tiny doll for the amount--or close to the amount--of a larger doll was crazy... But it's true that it takes the same amount of time in sculpting and in molding and in casting and in painting, etc. that a larger doll might take. The base cost of the resin probably is only a small part of the total time and cost of a making a smaller doll... And you can always think about the money you are saving in shipping!

I have big dolls and tinies. I just love some of the tiny sculpts, so I buy them. It does make me freak a bit about the price... but I still get them anyway.

----

This sort of reminds me of doing an illustration job where a full page would be like $100.00 and a half page would be half: $50, and a quarter page $25... But it took about the same time and effort to do a quarter page as a half and a full... you could pretty much just change the sizes and do the same drawing--but just because it was SMALLER it would pay less... What you'd save in ink and paints and paper is NOTHING, and the time spent would be the same. So SIZE shouldn't really mean anything as far as pricing goes...!!!

 

I have spent more for some of my tinies than I have for my SD dolls. This is because the doll is Limited or a rare mold. My Yo-four sister cost me the most of all my tinies. She runs between$800-$950 on the second hand market. I know your probably saying that's crazy but when dolls are limited in quality that is what happens. I adore my girl and would never sell her no matter how expensive she gets. I will also say the same doll in white skin has only been released once and she was going for $1500-$2000 on YJ. Yikes!!

 

Since others have already explained to you why your "logic" is flawed, I'll merely add my tuppennies worth.

Personally, I refuse to own anything, regardless of size, that does not pose to my extremely picky personal standards. If that means I end up paying more than your rather arbitrary amount of $220, then so be it. That does not make me "crazy", that makes me a wise investor that just bought a doll I know I won't immediately want to sell on again because it doesn't do what I want it to. I'm sure I'm not alone in having perfectly valid reasons outside the realms of price for the choices I've made for my collection either.

 

And has been brought up in numerous threads before, $220 might be a lot to some people and might not be that much money to others. Not everyone on this board has the same financial limitations.

 

I guess this really depends on where your doll come from. Think about those artistic limited edition dolls. They are limited and hard to get. Some are extremely (I have use this word) inspirational. That's why no matter what size they are, the price is high, especially when they are sold out officially.
Also, one other point to make, about the price of dolls is the cost of actually making it and designing it. Renewing a body or producing a doll mold are very time consuming. So the bigger the production scale, the bigger the revenue. But on the other hand, smaller production scale gives a more time for the maker to style it and give it better touch ups (e.g. face expressions, characters etc.).
But all come to the end, it doesn't matter how much it cost, once you truly fall for it, you will start to save the money ^^ (I just spend $300+ on a Rosen Lied tiny ~ oops )

 

My favorite tinies (Secretdoll baby fairies) are by the inch, the most expensive (approximately $100 US per inch) dolls I own. I have three of them and find them enchanting in spite of their odd little faces and tiny size (a little over 3 inches tall). What can I say; I like what I like. I'm not offended by other people's opinion of them and would rather have them than a big doll for the same price. It's not about the money.

Editing to say that I have no logic whatever about buying dolls; I only buy the ones I fall for madly. Fortunately, that's a fairly limited amount.

 

I think it's the fact that you're acting like people outside the hobby. Y'know, all the people who go "You spend that much money on a doll?!?! You're CRAZY." ? Most people don't expect that kind of attitude within the hobby, especially from those who know how expensive these dolls can be.

Tiny can refer to anything under 35cm, but I often called the tinies that are 26cm tall as 'Yo's (after Volks YoSD), and anything tinier as tiny.

 

I have 10 tinies. The cost is related to the exacting standards of the manufacturer. They throw away more than half of the dolls/parts that come out of the molds because of flaws like bubbles, uneven resin pours, and parts that stick to the mold and break off. Also, the molds have to be remade because they no longer have clear definition after being used a few times. All of this is expensive.

For example, Fairyland has temporarily halted production of the adorably unique Realpuki dolls because of manufacturing problems. They have a high reputation to uphold and will not send out flawed dolls. They may resume production later this year and I will buy more when they do because I think that the manufacturing problems may cause them to shut down production of this particularly fine line.

 

Heh. Aside from the one big Soom MD I owned, my current tiny cost me the most, naked AND blank, out of my tinies and MSD's. The other tiny I owned pretty much cost the same amount as my two MSD's.

As for throwing away defective parts, it's not a matter of bubbles, but a matter of precision and miscasts. If your molds were off by a half a millimeter on a big doll, with an arm diameter of, say, 20-30 mm - well, that's not a big deal, you'd just probably have to sand a few seams here and there. If your molds were off by the same amount on a tiny, with an arm diameter of 5 mm, it's downright unusable. My Soom tiny has tiny little joint pieces that fit together just perfectly - there's absolutely no room for error there, because then his joints won't fit right and he won't pose. (I'm not even going to talk about the pukis and how tiny THEIR joint pieces are) Compare that to a friend's Idealian and his beefcake arms and thick joints (built that way, to, of course, not break under the force of his elastic), and he's got a lot more leeway when it comes to these kinds of things.

Smaller things are a lot harder to make than larger things. When I used to make miniature boats, I can tell you that regardless of the boat's size, it would take me the same amount of time to finish one. There are things, shortcuts you can do with bigger items, and get away with bigger flaws than you could with small ones. This is why tiny clothes, shoes and wigs cost pretty much the same as the big ones, because once you go down in size, it becomes more and more difficult to make the actual garment.

Personally, I don't judge the doll I wish to buy by the size, but instead by craftsmanship. There are big dolls out there that I would never in a million years pay even $220 for, because they're just not worth that much to me. And then there are tinies that I'll gladly by for twice that amount because the amount of time and effort that went into creating them absolutely justifies it.

 

It's not just tiny bjd's that cost more relative to size, I collect miniatures and dollshouses and you can spend literally anything on an item, often the smaller it is the more expensive. One of the most exquisite items I ever saw at a dollshouse fair was a teeny 1/12th bureau which was priced at £1500 - not related to the cost of the raw materials at all but to the skill and workmanship that is involved in downsizing without losing the instrinsic nature of the item. Miniature bears, another of my past loves, are the same. When I was collecting bears I used to take about £100 to bear shows and come back with one or two bears (large/medium size). One year I fell in love with a little 6" bear which cost me £85 and that was all I bought. And I still adore her. It isn't the size of the item, it's also the desire to own it, and I just prefer smaller things. Would I rather pay $400 on a tiny or a SD? No contest