Retro toy collector with virtually 500 My Little Pony makes unbelievable plea to folks
Always wishing her childhood toys had been “saved”, Gem has kept a selection of her daughter’s favourite toys and wants to encourage other parents to do the same
A retro toy collector who has almost 500 My Little Pony dolls has urged all parents not to throw out their children’s toys as she wants them to leave “no pony behind”.
Gem Smith, 43, from Nottingham, always loved having the My Little Pony toys, Jem and The Holograms dolls and Care Bears while she was growing up, but they were all gradually given away or donated – so she’s got them back.
When she gave birth to her now 13-year-old daughter, she started reminiscing about her all of childhood toys and realised she wanted to make sure she could “reclaim all her favourites”.
Her searches started on eBay but they soon progressed to antique shops and toy fairs – and now, she has nearly 500 My Little Pony toys, including one from Macau and a collection of Dutch Ponies.
Always wishing her childhood toys had been “saved”, Gem has kept a selection of her daughter’s favourites and wants to encourage other parents to do the same.
Gem, said: “Other than my favourite childhood Winnie-the-Pooh teddy bear, I didn’t have anything, so I went on a mission to reclaim all my favourites.
“People have said to me, What will you do with them? Are you going to keep them forever or will you sell them?’, and I just can’t bring myself to think about selling any of it because I love it all.
“There’s a popular motto in the My Little Pony community, which is, No pony left behind’, so if you’re in a charity shop and you see a pony, you just grab it – they all get rescued and restored.”
Although Gem has not counted all of her toys, she knows she has nearly 500 My Little Ponies as she keeps a spreadsheet with details of all of their names, how much she bought them for and the year they were produced.
The Daily Star recently reported that one Antiques Roadshow guest had a collection of 600 My Little Ponies spanning from the 1980s.
The collector told him she began with her first three in the 1980s and “it all grew from there”.
Mark pointed out a bigger sized pony in the collection and revealed how that particular size toy was released in 1981 before the toys were scaled down.
He said: “These are all in beautiful clean condition – and condition, as with any collecting area, is critical.” He was particularly taken with one blue coloured toy called the Princess Pony, real name Princess Saphire Variant III, and explained how a version recently sold on its own for between an eye watering £1k and £1.5k.
Agreeing with the guest’s current valuation of £30,000 for the My Little Pony collection, the antique expert added: “I feel that money is safe and I think, I’m going to guess and say that, over the past five or so years, particularly during lockdown, you’ve seen prices go up.”
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