Gen Z is obsessed with Jellycat plushies — and spending thousands for them: ‘A modern-day Beanie Baby’
You’re not supposed to play with your food — but these stuffed toys have changed that.
Jellycats — plush toys shaped like fruits, vegetables, waffles, cakes and other objects and animals — have soared to popularity among Gen Z, who are forking over hundreds of dollars for the adorable stuffed dolls.
“Jellycats are the only thing that’s ever come into my life where I’ll see one in a shop window and think: ‘I have to get that,’” 25-year-old Andrew Elliott, a London-based Jellycat collector who boasts 43, told The Guardian.
“They’re sort of like a modern-day Beanie Baby, but not just animals.”
The company, founded in 1999, has seen substantial growth as the toys have soared to internet stardom.
According to Bloomberg, Jellycat Ltd. saw its annual global income jump nearly eight times from 2013 to 2022, totaling $57 million. From 2021 to 2022, it nearly doubled.
The figures coincide with “a growing number of “kidults” who splurge on toys, dolls and other figurines.
“If you tell people you collect cuddly toys, it can feel as if you’re going to be judged, because it feels like a children’s hobby,” Chloe Day, a 25-year-old Jellycat collector from the UK, told The Guardian.
“But then when you go on TikTok and see all these people the same age as you – women and men – it encourages you to not hold yourself back.”
On the social media app, the tag “#jellycat” has now been used on more than 214,000 posts as people tout their behemoth collections, fueling a viral frenzy for the stuffed animals.
In one clip, content creator Spencer Barbosa referred to her collection as “the family,” while fellow Gen Z gals partake in Jellycat exchanges with their friends or tote their beloved plushies around in their bags or attached as charms.
“I like to replace stuff in the house with them every now and again,” said Elliott. “I put Jellycat fruit and veg in the fruit bowl. At work, I used to replace my colleague’s office supplies with Jellycats, things like rulers and pencils.”
The craze has also prompted a wave of food-inspired storefronts from the company, from a fish-and-chips counter at Selfridges in London to a Parisian patisserie hawking plush French pastries.
At FAO Schwartz in New York, Jellycats shaped like pancakes, waffles and bagels are served up in a frying pan before being sold to zealous customers hitting the hotspot for tourists.
“In generations before us, I feel like a childlike essence was taken away really early,” 21-year-old Jellycat Diner employee Taylor Sailsman told NBC News.
“You had this idea to get out of high school, go to college, go to work, start your family, whatever. But, you know, you can still be a professional and love plushies. I feel like we’re getting out of older ideas of what it is like being adults.”
The toys — which range in price from around $20 for smaller sizes to more than $100 for larger ones — have become somewhat of a collector’s item, with variations of the stuffed dolls selling out online.
Jellycats can become unavailable in just days at times, according to The Telegraph, and the company has started to “retire” some designs.
“It’s like stocks. You have to sell something when it’s hot,” San Francisco-based Aria Babow, a stockist and Jellycat obsessor, told the outlet.
She boasts an impressive collection of 2,700, often buying two of the same — “one for display and one for back-up,” just in case.
Some fans anxiously await drops online so they can add new collectibles to their stockpiles.
“Jellycat keeps supply really tight as well, and die-hard fans know that if they don’t buy lines as they launch, they may not get a second chance,” children’s store owner Nicola Tompkins told The Telegraph.
“Sadly, there are customers who take advantage of the scarcity and buy to resell at massively inflated prices on auction sites.”
On eBay, some rare Jellycats go for hundreds — if not thousands — of dollars, a price hike that has prompted shoplifters to wipe the shelves of the toys. A colossal ice cream cone rings in at $1,200, while the NYC-exclusive soft pretzel keychain is asking $999.
While Jellycat fanatics have called the “scalping prices” a “joke” and a “disgrace,” per The Telegraph, some overly zealous customers just can’t help themselves.
One TikTok creator named Meggy revealed that she snagged the “most expensive Jellycat I’ve bought (to date),” which she called her “prized possession.” The ice cream cone — seemingly a hot commodity — rang in at over $600.
“Money cannot buy happiness, but it can buy Jellycats,” she said.
