Plush Toys
Buy and sell plush toys in Panama.
Plush toys run from the Stitch a child will not sleep without to a Squishmallow kept on a shelf with its hang tag on, and from a palm-sized graduation bear in a mortarboard to a gift bear taller than the person it was given to. New and pre-owned both turn up, and the pre-owned ones are two different things: some were hugged for years, others never left the cellophane. Classic teddy bears and lifelike animals have a narrower home in stuffed animals. In Panama many of the small ones are graduation bears from kindergarten or sixth grade, and they tend to come up several to a bag.
Plush toys sort by who they are for:
a child attached to one character, a collector hunting a particular name, or someone choosing a gift that will fill a corner. Licensed plush, from Stitch and Pikachu to the Sanrio and Disney casts, is bought for the character, and most children never notice whether it is official. Collectible lines work differently. Squishmallows, Jellycat and Ty’s Beanie Boos are followed by teenagers and adults who know every name and which ones are scarce, so the tags and the exact version count as much as the toy. Giant bears and unicorns are gifts first and toys second. Classic teddies and lifelike animals are under stuffed animals, and a doll with a soft body belongs with dolls.
Embroidered eyes on a baby’s plush:
choose those over plastic eyes fixed on with a backing, along with no ribbons, buttons or beads, and seams that hold when you pull hard at the neck and limbs. A soft rattle or a crinkle book for the first months sits better with baby and toddler toys. Older children get more from plush that talks, sings or walks, but anything with a battery box can only be cleaned on the surface.
Giant bears lose their price fastest:
new, one around 1.4 metres tall is about $50, and a licensed Stitch or a mid-sized unicorn of a foot or so runs $12 to $25. Second-hand, the giant bear goes for a small part of that: nobody can see inside the stuffing, it takes a car to move, and most owners just want the armchair back. Collectibles run the other way: a Squishmallow or Jellycat with both tags, from a character no longer made, can fetch more than it did new, while the same toy without its hang tag sells like any other. Old Ty Beanie Babies are the reverse of their legend, since tag and poem “errors” add nothing and most change hands for very little.
Plush that has been through the washing machine:
gives itself away in the stuffing, which goes lumpy or flat, and fur that feels crunchy has met a hot dryer, which partly melts synthetic fibres. Smell it too: plush holds smoke, perfume and pets, and none of that shows in a photo. Run your fingers along the seams under the arms and around the base, tug each eye, and on anything that makes a sound open the battery box: green or white crust on the contacts means a battery leaked inside.
Squishmallow and Jellycat copies:
with collectibles the risk is a fake rather than wear. A genuine Squishmallow names Kellytoy or Jazwares on its labels and carries a hang tag as well as the sewn-in tags. A genuine Jellycat has a card tag whose style code matches the fabric label, and it only exists in the sizes the brand actually makes. A rare character with no tags at all, priced like a common one, is a copy until shown otherwise.
The sewn-in label on a plush toy:
is what a collector enlarges to tell whether it is genuine, so photograph it in daylight and close enough to read, along with the front, the back and the height in centimetres. Before cleaning, read the care label: many say surface wash only, and a damp cloth and a day in the shade is often the honest limit. Say whether it comes from a smoke-free home and whether a child played with it or it sat on a shelf. Graduation bears and small character plush go better as one bag than one by one. If the bear is a giant, tell the buyer coming from Colón or David before they set out that it needs the whole back seat of a car, and have it waiting in a clean bin bag against the street dust.