We always love to see an encouraging and fantastic product for the young girls in our lives. Whether it’s your daughter, granddaughter, nieces or even a young girl you mentor, we think the Go! Go! Sports Girls dolls are a super product geared towards building our girls up as strong, independent and healthy while encouraging a lifestyle that will result in lots of self esteem.
Creator Jodi Norgaard talks about her motivation:
Imagine browsing the store for toys with your 9-year-old daughter, and she picks up a doll wearing a half shirt, belly ring and eye shadow. “Mommy, is this doll for me to play with?” she asks. That’s what happened to me, and it inspired me to create the Go! Go! Sports Girl doll collection.
The Go! Go! Sports Girls are plush, sports-themed dolls designed as a fun and educational way to promote self-appreciation and the benefits of daily exercise, healthy eating and sleeping habits, self-esteem and overall healthy life skills for girls. The dolls are age appropriate and do not encourage an older or overly mature image. The image is positive and innocent with a subtle yet strong message – appreciate and be true to yourself.
I spent two years launching the product, from rough sketch to the fall of 2008 debut of the Tennis Girl doll at the U.S. Open in New York, where 500 dolls sold out in six days. While designing the doll, I worked very closely with my consultant/daughter, the perfect person to help. To ensure the dolls were in correct proportion to how girls are really built, I measured my daughter and her friends every time they came to our house.
The dolls have been honored with numerous awards, including the coveted Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Platinum Award, and articles in magazines, newspapers, blogs, TV and radio interviews, as well as a feature on the Today Show. The most recent press is from Parents.com naming the Go! Go! Sports Girls as one of “The Coolest Toys From Toy Fair 2012”.
I think that’s a pretty cool story, right? Being someone who has been active with Big Sister, I know the importance of positive role models for young girls. It is easy for girls at an impressionable age to, well, be impressed upon in a negative manner. We should all be encouraging the girls around us to be strong and healthy women. I know that I have made the commitment, and so has Jodi… will you?
Go Go Sports Girls! dolls can be purchased at Amazon, Toys R Us.com and FAO.com just to name a few. Check out their website and consider gifting to a young girl you know.
