Some of you may recognize the source of my title for today's post. It's from a song originally called Ils On Change Ma Chanson, Ma (Look What They've Done to my Song, Ma) . The words seem appropriate for Cruise Control Vanessa. Vanessa is (was?) my favorite Fashion Royalty sculpt. Although there have been too many of her released in the last two years, I still looked forward to each and every one.
What ever happened to the days when one could debox a nearly perfect doll?
Prior to the Josephine Baker dolls, I never had the thought of re-rooting a doll right out of the box. Since October 2008, there has been one doll after another with serious hair defects. Every one of these defects is factory worker caused and not a machine malfunction.
We've had clumps of hair glue, dried net marks and frizz and it's nauseating. I am really through with writing to customer care and sending pictures and getting form letters and being told that I have bad luck. I don't have bad luck; the dolls are badly done.
This is Barbie hair.
These are just like Barbie shoes with the bendy heel syndrome.
Regarding the outfit, the shorts are fabulous and the blouse is nice. It's a complicated piece and shows a great deal of effort in the construction.
The jewelry, which is not shown, consists of unadorned silver colored chains and what looks like straight pins for earrings. I kid you not.
Just wow! I was really looking forward to this Vanessa because she is tan. But the hair is horrendous. I am really becoming very disappointed with Integrity.
ReplyDeleteWas the hair uncombed before taking the pics? what did it look like right out of the box?
ReplyDeleteWow.. looks like I sadly made the correct decision, not joining W or buying anymore Integrity items. Too bad I never learned that soon enough ;)
ReplyDeleteThanks for your continued excellence and honesty, Terri. Truly.
J.
The doll had a net over her hair and the hair was in one wavy piece. I wanted to say clump. It was not styled, just waved slightly. It had to be combed.
ReplyDeleteThe hair is atrocious and unacceptable. For the price of these dolls and the so called quality they should never come out the box looking like that.
ReplyDeleteWOW Terri, you called it! Barbie hair and shoes, your absolutely right i must say. I already called my repainter, cause mine has wonky eyes (shocker...) and i can't stand the blue eye shadow especially cause i just had it removed from the last Vanessa released... Stirred Not Shaken. This Vanessa was rushed and the main reason it sold like it did was cause of the tan. I already know she is gonna be redone by many folks cause it's disappointing
ReplyDeleteMarti: I'm going to try to redo her hair myself. I spend enough money on dolls and I don't want to add more to have it repainted. To me, her face is acceptable - it's the hair.
ReplyDeleteTerri
I was really looking forward to receiving my doll...now I'm scared. I'm not sure even barbie's hair looks that bad. What's going on? Doll prices are going up, and yet quality is decreasing. I'm not happy.
ReplyDeleteColleen
I am astonished that her outfit is made as well as it is. The stripes are a different texture! At the same time, it feels like the effort was wasted for such a simple design.
ReplyDeleteI'm not a fan of the doll. She looks like she was a friend of Cher by Meego.
Welcome to my nightmare Terri. I sent 8 dolls back to Integrity in 2008 for defects. Two of them were convention dolls and of the two, one was the MAIN DOLL, Tatyana!
ReplyDeleteI am so sorry that this happened but I am not surprised. Because of my own "bad luck" last year (they told me that too) I haven't bought a single FR since getting back home from the convention last year.
I know there are a lot of other people who have gone and gotten "bad luck" with the line and wonder if this has anything to do with the reason the entire Spring line is still available for purchase.
I miss the days of getting what you paid for. I miss having good luck! LOL!
Teri/SmittenK.
That looks like Integrity playline hair. And that eyeshadow, here it looks ok, but I've seen pics where it's just garish!
ReplyDeleteWow for a minute last week I contemplated keeping her as Vanessa was my fav sculpt at some point but then I sold her ..And I am GLAD I did.
ReplyDeleteBarbie Indeed
Like always terri i love your post.
ReplyDeleteI have to say this time reading it i got real concerned .I have been a barbie collector all my life for a long time before ever going into fashion royalty.
I have stop collecting barbie because of the bad quality that sometimes I was getting.So when I bought my first fashion royalty doll I was surprised at the quality.Since then I joined the club ,this is going to be my second year as a club member.
I had a lot of fun getting the older dolls but not so happy with the new ones.So I got real excited as soon as I heard the upcoming convention is going to celebrate the past years collection wich i hope means bringing the quality back into these girls.
I took a big step to go for these dolls but I don't want to regret doing this move.
Yours Truly Jaulio
Oh Terri the hair looks ridiculous.
ReplyDeleteI'm gonna reroot her platinum blonde à la Miami Glow anyway but I still wanted to keep my second one brunette.
btw, does she have blue eyes? If yes I'm absolutely in love.
Hi Terri,
ReplyDeleteGreat blog as always. It infuriates me that quality control chose to send out these dolls with such awful hair. Why? Because it was such a costly mistake? And they thought we wouldnt' notice? I hate frizzy doll hair. I've already contacted a friend of mine to trim and fix it. Bummer.
Marsha
Plastic Cat: I think they are a pale blue/green.
ReplyDeleteTerri
Teri thank you so much for keeping us in touch with the reality of Integrity's lack of quality on the last few dolls to surface. It amazes me the lack of care that has been going into their dolls these past few years...could it be that Jason is totally "over" this F.R deal and paying more attention to his growing fashion career? Maybe without the captain of the ship, Integrity is going back to what was sutiable for their playline dolls. I'm so disappointed with that doll, her hair is an absolute mess!!! This won't change folks until WE stop paying their ridiculous prices and make them wake up to the fact that quality is an issue for us. They keep doing this because WE keep buying their dolls with lack of quality. WE keep accepting their price hikes. I'm officially boycotting them until they start actually producing quality to show for the insane print points.
ReplyDelete