Who is Collecting Dolls Today?

Anyone can collect dolls.  It isn't just for little girls and old women anymore.  Although there are certainly a lot of females with a strong interest in doll collecting, now that it has grown into a business of sorts, men are also becoming more heavily involved in the collecting of dolls.

There is a common image of doll collecting being more of a feminine hobby.  Surely this is because it is a lot more common for little girls to openly play with dolls than it is for boys.  Little girls playing with their Barbie dolls is something you expect to see, and do see often.  Many parents would even discourage their young sons from "playing dolls" unless the toy was an "action figure" molded into shapes designed to maime and destroy.  Left to their own devices, many little boys enjoy playing with any doll they come across because they just like pretending and using their imaginations.  Most times, boys seem to outgrow the doll phase but it really is not a bad thing if they develop an appreciation for collecting them.

As I mentioned above, the collecting of dolls has become a serious business for some people.  Buying and selling dolls can be quite lucrative if you know what you are doing.  I'm sure that many people selling dolls on eBay are men.  Most likely they have not been holding on to some cherished doll since childhood.  They probably purchased it at a yard sale or auction and have decided to make it available for collectors more interested in the dolls themselves than in making a profit for them.

There are many men who now lament the loss of their prized GI Joe collections that may have been lost to abuse and damage or, in many cases, given away by parents to younger relatives or friends of the family.  They look now on eBay and see how much their collections would have been worth and just moan, thinking of possibly thousands of dollars worth of collectible figures that were simply given away back in the days before eBay made everyone aware of the collectibles market.

Collecting dolls is not necessarily the same as playing with dolls.  Actually, many doll collectors would never dream of letting their dolls get into the hands of a child who would use them to start acting out an adventure that could damage or de-value the doll.  Dolls are collected and often displayed in ways that show them off, but keep them protected as much as possible.  The types of dolls being preserved may be different, but the demographics of doll collecting reaches across the gender lines.

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