Loading

Action figure | play set:Goldie Blox: Girl Inventor - Zipline Action Figure

GoldieBlox, Inc.2014

The Strong National Museum of Play

The Strong National Museum of Play
Rochester , United States

In 2012, Stanford engineering graduate Debbie Sterling founded GoldieBlox, a toy company dedicated to inspiring young girls to enter science, math and engineering fields. Sterling created a Kickstarter account to fund her company, which reached its goal in four days, after learning that women represented only 10% of the workforce in her chosen field. All products feature the character Goldie, a young female engineer dressed in overalls who builds various items with her friends to solve problems. Many products come packaged with a storybook and a corresponding playset, allowing children to build along with Goldie. This particular set includes an action figure and parts to create a functioning zipline.

GoldieBlox became particularly well known for evocative advertising. An initial commercial, set to a parody of the Beastie Boys song "Girls," depicts a group of young girls using rejected tea sets, feather boas, and other traditionally female "pink" toys to build a Rube Goldberg machine, demonstrating their desire for complex toys to make them think. Sterling eventually pulled this advertisement after the Beastie Boys claimed copyright infringement. In 2014, GoldieBlox became the first small business to air an ad during the Super Bowl, after winning a contest sponsored by software company Intuit. This 30 second commercial, valued at $4 million, parodied the Quiet Riot song "Cum on Feel the Noize," replacing the lyrics with "Come on Bring the Toys." It again depicts a group of girls rejecting their pink toys, this time building a rocket ship to launch them into space. During the latter half of 2014, "GoldieBlox vs. the Big Sister Machine" earned nearly 50,000 YouTube views in 24 hours. This ad, reminiscent of Apple's 1984 commercial, features an Orwellian "Big Sister" on a viewscreen, repeatedly intoning "You are beauty, and beauty is perfection" as a line of girls dressed in sparkling pink dresses and heels pick up similarly-attired fashion dolls from a conveyer belt. The spell is broken when "Goldie" enters the line in her overalls and smashes the computer with her hammer.

Show lessRead more
  • Title: Action figure | play set:Goldie Blox: Girl Inventor - Zipline Action Figure
  • Creator: GoldieBlox, Inc.
  • Date Created: 2014, 2014
  • Location: China, China
  • Subject Keywords: engineer, inventor, engineer, inventor
  • Type: Action Figures and Character Toys, Construction Toys and Blocks, Action Figures and Character Toys, Construction Toys and Blocks
  • Medium: plastic, printed cardboard, fabric, cord
  • Object ID: 115.5, 115.5
The Strong National Museum of Play

Additional Items

Get the app

Explore museums and play with Art Transfer, Pocket Galleries, Art Selfie, and more

Home
Discover
Play
Nearby
Favorites