User:YowLife/sandbox

Marketing
Early on, Ty had trouble finding retailers to order Beanie Babies. To get small retailers to stock the product, Ty introduced Beanie Babies at the 1993 Toy Fair in New York City. This event helped garner attention for the set of plush toys. In 1994 small local stores in Chicago, Illinois, began selling Beanie Babies for around $5 U.S. Dollars.

Early in 1995, Ty created the first iteration of the Ty Web site, the first business to consumer website designed to sell products to consumers directly. To go along with with the launch of the Ty website in 1995, all Beanie Baby hangtags were printed with the Ty website URL and a a new piece of text was added with the company's name and the following message: "Visit our website! ! !" As a result, many consumers visited Ty's website for more information on Beanie Babies. This endeavor would mark the beginning of the Beanie Babies Boom.

Later in 1995,Ty was forced to end production on the popular toy Lovie the Lamb, due to an issue with suppliers in China. CEO Ty Warner came up with the solution to tell retailers that Lovie was merely discontinued, and even suggested that many other Beanie Babies would be discontinued as well. This news would spread via word of mouth, as motivated sellers began to stock up on Ty plush toys while they still could, thus creating a new demand for Beanie Babies. As a result of this artificial demand, consumers began buying Beanie Babies in bulk from the Ty Web site to relist them on auction sites for highly inflated prices.