Duffy Travels – A Duffy the Disney Bear Fansite

May 4th, 2011 | Posted by Jen

When I posted my entry about meeting Duffy, I forgot to mention one thing–which I feel is even more important after what I recently learned. After you meet Duffy at Disney World or Disney Land, you receive a special sticker:

This sticker is actually only going to be available for Duffy’s first year–which means it’ll be gone this October (October 13th, 2011 to be exact).

I actually have two extras that I’m not sure what I will do with just yet as the nice Cast Member in charge of the photos gave me three, but they are incredibly cute stickers. However, this hasn’t been the only sticker outside Japan–the one on the left was given out in Hong Kong Disney during Chinese New Years and the one one the right was given out during Duffy’s first arrival in Hong Kong Disney:

Photo thanks to Pooh Travels
…they’re so pretty. *wants one of each* *goes to add to wish list*

Anyway, besides that, at the Duffy Passholders event, several costumes were shown in an image and considering most have come out, I figured it’d be right to post it up to look forward to what’s going to come next:

Photos thanks to dizneydogs
The image on the left is the costumes for 17″ Duffy while the image on the right is the costumes for the 12″ Duffy that comes with them on. For the 17″, there are still 3 costumes to come: The Pirate Costume, The Sorcerer Costume, and the Car Racer Costume. I’m guessing one of the blue outfits is “My First Trip to Disney World” as I have seen the Disney Land one, but have yet to see the Disney World one around.

For the 12 inch Duffy, we still have the Halloween Costume to go which actually looks very close to some of Duffy’s Halloween costumes over in Japan:

Photos thanks to Nana’s Dear Collection
I just hope more costumes will come, besides the ones on the board 🙂

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May 4th, 2011 | Posted by Jen

Even if people understood the story and saw Mickey taking pictures of Duffy which encouraged it, people still wonder what caused many fans to take pictures of Duffy in the parks and other places. Well, the answer to that is The Photo Spots. In Tokyo Disney, 3 special photo spots were made for those with their own Duffy (and/or Shellie May) to place their Duffy down and take a picture with:

Photos thanks to gurgi

Now, obviously, not everyone can get to Japan (though, I’d love to get back one day and take some pictures :D), so you should be happy to know that spots have been showing up in Epcot and California Adventures. There’s only a few, but more are supposed to be added. I know I saw one or two when I was in Disney World in February and if I had known, I’d have taken my Duffy immediately. I’m looking forward to doing so when I go back this Fall 🙂

Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures of the ones in Epcot or California Adventures, but it’ll definitely be what Nomi and I try to get pictures of next 🙂

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May 4th, 2011 | Posted by Jen

Whether this Duffy is actually different or not, Duffy will at least be getting even more fans as he’s given out and shown on the Oprah Winfrey show. The Disney Blog recently updated with an entry about a Disney Surprise being on the Oprah Show tomorrow (May 5th). You can find what time it will be on for you here.

While it doesn’t say or show anything about Duffy, this entry on the Oprah forums from someone who went to the show says otherwise.

At the moment, we know the Duffy given out has a red ribbon–but not much more. We don’t know if there’s any changes and if the red ribbon was just put on (as it -is- a gift), but we’ll be watching tomorrow and keeping our eyes out today for any further updates. 🙂 We’ll be sure to update with not only more information if we find any, but hopefully pictures too!

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May 3rd, 2011 | Posted by Jen

I think that’s one of the main things I hear (besides Duffy being similar to Build a Bear which is addressed in the FAQ) when it comes to Duffy–is he too expensive? Why is he “so pricey”? With the troubling economy here in the US, it’s definitely something to think about–but sometimes, regardless of funds, that doesn’t mean something is expensive. For example, a game that usually goes for 50 dollars is suddenly having a 50% off sale. 25 dollars for a new, full story game, is an incredibly good price. But, if you don’t have the money or just can’t afford it right now, 25 dollars, is, yes, expensive.

I think the other issue is people are comparing it to Build-a-Bear, where Bears can be as cheap as 10 dollars. What people aren’t taking in is that they’re usually a few inches smaller too. And some Build-a-Bear’s are as expensive as 25 dollars. Sometimes even more. The bears also go, regardless of size, 30-50 dollars, if not more, when they come with outfits.

Duffy goes for roughly 25-30 dollars when 17 inches. When with an outfit, it is usually a smaller version (12 inches) and goes for 25-30 as well. Outfits go for 15-25 dollars. In general, not much more than a Build a Bear overall.

And the thing is, which I think is one of the biggest things people are overlooking:
1. This is -Disney World-. Everything is pretty expensive in Disney World. I love Disney, I really do, but you’re paying that much for tickets, a lot of money for food, and heck, even hoodies are 50-60+ dollars sometimes. So, for a teddy bear, the mark-up, compared to some of Disney’s things is really not that bad.
2. Duffy sells for roughly 3,800 Yen. That is equal to about 46 dollars. Yep, the price of Duffy + an outfit here.
3. Not only that, outfits in Japan usually go for roughly 3,000 yen or so, which is equal to about 37 dollars. Yeah, almost twice the price of an outfit here.

Considering all of all that, is Duffy really that expensive? To be honest, no. Yes, they do make cheaper outfits here and the Japanese outfits have tons of detail (which is why they are so much pricier), but in the end, I think the price they decided to pick for Duffy was pretty good. I’d like to hope they can make detailed outfits like the ones in Japan one day at not too much of price-up, simply due to all the money issues right now.

At the very least, I do hope Duffy sticks around this time–as I’d hate for him to go away again.

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May 3rd, 2011 | Posted by Jen

Another thing that Build-a-Bear popularized, besides clothes for Stuffed Animals, were birth certificates for them. While they weren’t completely out of the blue (Pound Puppies did come with them sometimes for example), it wasn’t the most common for plushies, though, it had been around for Dolls for a good time (Cabbage Patch dolls are a good example). If you’re one of those people who really like the idea of having Birth Certificates, some talented individuals made some for Duffy 🙂 (The last one also working as a good autograph page)

By (in order of right to left, top to bottom): DuffyDaisuki, milliepie, bababear_50, and wendypooh

Maybe some Shellie May certificates will be made one day too 🙂 Though, I’m sure you can use these for her too!

I probably like the first two the best–each for different reasons, though, the common reason is I think they look the most like, well, birth certificates. As for the different reasons, I think milliepie‘s is the closest to the popularized Build-a-Bear versions so for people who are big Build-a-Bear fans, but also love Duffy, it’ll fit right hand. On the otherhand, DuffyDaisuki‘s matches the older style of certificates in general, which I think kind of fits considering Duffy is in an older version of Cape Cod among other things. Still, if you do use one, be sure to thank their creators 🙂

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May 2nd, 2011 | Posted by Jen

I actually wrote this up the other day, but for some reason, the page didn’t save with the update, so here it is! XD

Anyway, as you can probably tell from the subject, we recently became affiliates with Nana’s Dear Collection. She’s incredibly nice and has a beautiful website! It’s filled with pictures of every single Duffy, both the US and Japanese and was a huge help in the making of the Wish List Page here.

If you’d love to see more on past Duffy’s and even how an outfit looks, I’d highly recommend giving a look 🙂 To be honest, I think the only things she doesn’t have listed are the Year Bears (イヤーベア)/Collection Dolls (コレクションドール) which, if you’d really like to see, are actually really easy to find using Google 🙂

And even if you’re not too big into the history of Duffy and Shellie May, I’d give a look over regardless as her collection is truly a sight to behold and her photos are absolutely amazing, so be sure to take a look and ejoy! 😀

(Also, we did a slight update to Nomi’s wish list <3 She decided she prefers the 2010 version of the Sweet Duffy set 🙂 So those have been put up <3)

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May 1st, 2011 | Posted by Jen

For those of you who may have cared, our wishlists are now officially up 🙂 More will be added at anytime and hopefully, lots will be removed as well!

As for why we also have US stuff there, there are a few reasons:
1. We can’t go to Disney 24/7
2. We may not have had money to get it at the time we were there
3. We only want parts and if we can, we’d rather split* the outfit with someone then go by it.

*A split is when a person pays for partially for an item along with at least one other person. Each person essentially pays just for the parts they want. (IE: Canadian Outfit. One person wants the pants, one person wants the hat, one person wants the shirt… each pays 5 dollars and everyone is happy)

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May 1st, 2011 | Posted by Jen

While browsing around, I found someone mentioning that they have their Duffy wear outfits from The Bear Mill. The outfits are reasonably priced (usually around 15 dollars), and will fit Duffy fairly well. Two of their outfits:

One of their outfits on:

Picture thanks to Disney Store Duffy.

So for those of you looking for more variety, you may want to take a look 🙂

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April 30th, 2011 | Posted by Jen

Do you know a Duffy fan who is graduating this year? 🙂 Well, the 2011 Graduate Duffy Bear has been released over here in the US:

Photo thanks to this auction
And I’m sure it’d be the perfect gift ^_^

In other news, I’m excited that according to this auction, some of the always available Tokyo Disney Sea Duffy outfits have started to appear in Hong Kong! As to why this is exciting, it means there may be a chance of everyone outside of Japan to possibly have a chance at some of Japan’s outfits and spread all the love around without having to pay such overpriced prices 🙂 Let’s hope for the best that they make their way over both the Pacific and Atlantic!

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April 30th, 2011 | Posted by Jen

Some of you may remember me mentioning other various Duffy-themed merchandise 🙂 Well, I wanted to bring up a few more, so take a look at these photo frames:

Auctions here and here respectively.
While they may focus more on Minnie and Mickey, I think it’s good they’re at least putting Duffy out there with them, after all, they’re essentially Disney’s main characters. Hopefully we will see Duffy solo frames in the future too 🙂

Now, the next thing I have to bring up isn’t exactly Duffy-related, but I’m bringing it up in hopes that maybe sometime in the future, it could be 🙂

A Picture I took of myself by the UniBEARsity cart in Disney Town in Pigg

There is an American version of the site, but it does not have Disney Town. Hopefully it may in the future 🙂

However, seeing UniBEARsity stuff makes me hope there will be Duffy stuff in games sometime soon too! 🙂 Wouldn’t that be neat?

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