Clifford Berryman’s cartoon in Washington Post on Nov 16, 1902 depicted an incident, which involved President Theodore Roosevelt, his attendants and a Louisiana Black Bear Cub. It was said that having failed to shoot any bears a bear cub was caught and presented to Roosevelt to shoot. He refused.

This is the accepted story on the birth of Teddy Bears, but at the time a different story emerged.A bear killed one of the hunting dogs and in the process was badly wounded. Roosevelt ordered a mercy killing to end the bear’s misery. We can understand why the first story was so readily accepted.

In 1903 a year after Berryman’s cartoon appeared in the Washington Post, Russian emigres Morris and Rose Michtom of Brooklyn, New York, made a jointed plush version of Berryman’s Bear. Around the same

time German Margaret Steiff a wheelchair bound polio victim took a large order (3,000) jointed Teddy bears for a New York department store. The early Steiff Teddy Bears are very much sought after by Teddy Bear collectors worlwide. The period between 1903 and 1908 became known as the ‘Teddy Bear Years’ and by 1907 Teddy’s Bear boosted by Seymour Eaton’s rhyming Tales ‘Roosevelt bears’ became universally known as the Teddy Bear.

Boosted by increasing demand for these loveable creatures soft toy manufactures sprung up in Europe and the USA. By 1909 the Teddy Bear appeared in a children’s story ‘The Tale of Teddy Bright Eyes’ which fuelled demand in Britain. The Teddy Bear market was dominated by German toy companies until the 1920

Since February 1903 to this date, these soft to touch and easy to love Teddy Bears have become a favorite item for children and adults alike worldwide. Recently there has been a noticable swing toward dressed Teddy Bears.

this is not a new trend Teddy Bears became more 'humanised' in the 1930 when Teddy Bear manufacturers introduced Teddy Bears wearing different clothing and World War 11 saw a proliferation of knitted Teddy Bears. A fine example of a knitted Teddy can be seen below it was knitted by my wife!

In the 1955 the first machine washable Teddy Bear was produced by Playsafe Toys.

For many years now Teddy Bear imagery has dominated the greeting card market and we commisioned a young american artist to produce imagery for our 54 Teddy Bear greeting cards designs. The full range of Teddy Bear Greeting cards can be seen on this site). These Teddy Bear cards were drawn with future personalisation in mind.

A combination of writer AA Milne and illustrator E H Shepard led the the creation of Winnie-the-Pooh. This Teddy Bear became famous from 1926 and Milne's son Christoper Robin featured in many of these Teddy Bear stories, he had a Teddy Bear called Edward and enjoyed playing in Ashdown forest with it. In 1958 we saw the arrival of another famous Teddy Bear 'Paddington Bear' who was met by Mr and Mrs Brown at a railway station. He came from Peru and later stared in an animated TV series. Teddy Bears have featured in English literature most notably in Brideshead revisited where Aloysius stared. Since then we have had Super Ted and Fozzie the Teddy Bear from the Muppets and Pudsy Bear has been the offical symbol for BBC's Children in Need charity appeal.

 

Today Teddy Bears come in all shapes and sizes. The early Steiff Teddy Bears had large rounded ears with hand-embroidered noses and large brown glass appealing eyes.

I'm the proud owner of a number of Teddy Bears that have been made from recycled fashion clothing by the shoe designer Paul Andrews and featured in a style magazine. Bear "Artists" began in the USA in the 1970's and many create beautiful single or limited edition Teddy BearsArctophily the name for the hobby of Teddy Bear collecting come from the Greek words "arctos" which means Bear and "philos" which means love. Paul and Rosemary Volpp have amased an outstanding collection of over 4,000 Teddy Bears that are housed at their home in California. The boom in Teddy Bear collecting in the 1980's saw a dramatic price rise of antique Teddy Bears which in turn let to some of the old Teddy Bear manufactures producing replica versions of their older Teddy Bears. Early Teddy Bears fetch high pices and in 1989 saw a Teddy Bear fetch £55,000 at Sotherby's and that was superceded in December, 1994 Teddy Girl was sold at Christie’s, South Kensington, London to Yoshihiro Sekiguchi, a Japanese business man for £100,000, the highest price ever paid for a Teddy Bear. Artctophia is not restricted to the collecting of stuffed Teddy Bears and bear memorabilia offers collectores a wealth of items from Teddy Bear soaps, to silver Teddy Bear spoons, Teddy Bear postcards and Teddy Bear hatpin holders are much sort after. Teddy Bear imagery has been used in many advertising campaigns,

Rowntree's Chocolates used a lovely cardboard free standing Teddy Bear advert in 1925 and for those who thought corporate Teddy Bears are something new are very much mistaken as "Bear Brand Genuine Swiss Milk" in 1912 produced a Teddy Bear with printing on its back!

It's not always a Picnic!

Our love affair with the Teddy Bear has lasted over a century and shows no signs of waining but not all stories of Teddy Bears are happy adventures. Gaspare Gatti's son Vittorio's good Luck Teddy Bear went down with Gaspare when the Titanic sunk. Gaspare's widow Edith found this little Teddy Bear inside his waterproof tobaco pouch and treasured it. Her home was destroyed in World War 11 but she survived and so did the Teddy Bear. When Edith passed away in 1962 the Teddy Bear was returned to Gatti's son Vittorio and the Teddy Bear was later donated to a museum by Vittorio's widow. 1993 saw the rhode island Teddy Bear invasion when thosands of Teddy Bears were swept of a barge and washed ashore sartling the surfers and delighting residents! More recently "Mabel" a Steiff Teddy bear once owned by Elvis Presley was destroyed by Barney a doberman. This Teddy Bear was worth £40,000 ! Gillian Gibsons a teacher was jailed for naming a Teddy Bear Mohammed and in Russia children aged 8 to 15, now have the chance to be involved in a nationwide movement called "Teddy Bears" ("Mishki")

Teddy Bear lovers will not be suprised that the renowned MIT (Masssachusetts Institute of Technology) have chosen a Teddy Bear to test their super Cilia skin. This robotic Teddy Bear will be programed to interact with it's owner and alert medical staff to changes in sick child's condition.

Paul Lakeman is a Director of PTI Ltd a company formed to provide the very best in Personalised Teddy Bears

 

 

 

 

Let me introduce myself, my name is Paul Lakeman aka MrBearman of FlyingBears retailers and wholesalers of fine Teddy Bears and I've been Personalising Teddy Bears as gifts or great promational items and fund raisers for over 10 years. I must have personally processed over 20,000 Personalised Teddy Bears as Gifts, from preborn to Grannies 100th Bithrday, over 10,000 Teddy Bears for corporate customers and I've opened retail Teddy Bear units in Jersey, Benidorm and Blackpool. It's what I do I really enjoy it I get real satisfaction in producing some of the finest Personalised Teddy Bears in the World. These Teddy Bear Gifts allow you to be creative in your communication. Unlike other Personalised Teddy Bear offerings that only allow three lines of text in Block capitals we offer a far more complex and engaging Teddy Bear Gift that allows you the customer to express yourself in a meaningful and sincere way. I refer to it a double personalisation, it's not only the recipients name that is personalised on the Teddy Bear jumper or Teddy Bear hoodie but the name(s) of the giver (s) can also be added making a complete Personalised Teddy Bear Gift.

I've set up a number of website dedicated to producing the very best Personalising Teddy Bears www.funkybears.com www.funkybears.com.pt www.design-a-bear.co.uk www.topteddy.com.pt and this TopTeddy site was set up because many customers asked if us if we could produce a much larger Personalised Teddy Bear Gift. I will endeavour to update this Blog frequently and let you know what personalised messages people are requesting for their Teddy Bear Gifts.

After an extremely busy period personalising Valentine's Teddy Bear Gifts the next big occasion for Teddy Bear Gifts is Mother's Day on the 2nd of March and I've already processed numerous Mothers Day Teddy Bear Gifts (you can see an example on our Home page). Whilst Happy Mothers Day 2008 is the most requested message The Best Mum in the World Teddy Bear Gift comes a very close second and not very far behind our best selling Heart Teddy Bear Gift (a name running through a heart). I'm just embroidering one at the moment and it is one of my favorite combinations a Honey coloured Teddy Bear from the FunkyBears Ko-Hair range with a Emerald Green Hoodie. The Heart is embroidered in red and I've used metallic gold thread for the personalised name, Kath. The metallic gold thread superbly complements the Honey coloured Teddy Bear. I've also made a couple of Happy Easter Teddy Bears ordered from the Design a Bear site, which sells a range of super soft limited edition plush Teddy Bears with Teddy Bear jumpers. The choice for this order was our best selling smoothie Teddy Bear with again the Emerald Green Teddy Bear jumper (rather than the hoodie) and another with a navy Teddy Bear Jumper. I've used the same thread combinations and it has produced two really lovely Teddy Bear Easter Gifts. Among the other Teddy Bear Gifts I'm producing today are: To a special Cousin (on your Christening) and a Congratulations Teddy Bear Gift for a wedding (Bridesmaid Teddy Bears, Page boy Teddy Bears, & Flower Girl Thank you Teddy Bear gifts still remain our best sellers) along with a couple of Teddy Bear Birth Gifts with the name of the child and date of birth. Michaela recently produced a large quantity of Teddy Bears for a Bat miztvah and I've just sampled A Teddy bear or mossbank Bulldogs rugby team. I remember when David Beckhams latest was born Michaela from our Blackpool office sent a personalised Birth Teddy Bear to Beckingham Palace. She was both surprised and extremely delighted when Victoria's mother phoned her and said ' We received hundreds of gifts for the Baby but the Teddy Bear Gift you sent was so nice I must have a couple more personalised Teddy Bears for the other boys! Their personalised Teddy Bears were made and sent and we received a cheque and a lovely signed photo from David and Victoria thanking us for the Teddy Bears. For examples of our FunkyBears Teddy bear gifts please visit

www.funkybears.com/Gallery.aspx
Whichever of our sites you use for your Personalised Teddy Bears Gifts we always say this' We will do the utmost to supply a superb gift that will tug on the heart strings of the recipient. It's is your input and our obsessive attention to detail that will make your Teddy Bear Gift so very special.

People often forget our Teddy Bears make superb promotional Gifts and today we have received an order for 10 Teddy Bear for a local kitchen company, we have also processed 25 Teddy Bears for a local 5 star Hotel and Spar and 12 Teddy Bears for a local Golf club. More details of our promotional Teddy Bear can be seen at www.flyingbears.net and Michaela at our Blackpool office will help with any questions 01253 408666. We supply Teddy Bears to many of the UK's leading Hotel chains including Hiltons, Thistle group. Menzies, Barcelo, Mercure, MacDonalds, Copthorne, Millenium Group, Best Western and Hand Picked. We also produce small 3inch message Teddy Bears, our Thank You message Teddy Bear is used my many of our clients and the local branch of RBS encourage their staff to use them to thank other staff members who have exceeded expectations. A small 'Jersey' Teddy Bear is one of our best sellers as people find it an ideal gift if they have to buy multiple gifts that are extremely affordable. The benefits of using Teddy Bears as a corporate promotional tool is many but most importantly a Teddy Bear is likely to remain on view unlike many other promo items. We regularly produce Teddy Bears for dance clubs, football teams, charities and organisations of every description.

One of the Top Teddy orders received today was for a Creamy Teddy Bear it was for a much belated Valentines Teddy Bear Gift! To my Star on Valentines Day and more orders are coming in for Mothers Day Teddy Bear Gifts. If you need any help with your choice of Gift please do not hesitate to call me on 01534 856931, We are in the Teddy Bear personalisation business and we like to get personal with our customers and for any you that are unsure about the quality of or product please visit www.funkybears.com/comments.aspx where you find customer feedback. This is some feedback on one of our first personalised Top Teddy’s:
Thank you SO much Mr. Bearman for once again provides a swift, fast and rewarding delivery service!!!I was really pleased and surprised that my order came quicker than expected. In addition the 'extra' surprises and Teddy Bear cards I received were a special treat this latest order for a larger Teddy Bear was just as delightful as the one we ordered from funkybears last year for our other daughter. Once again I will not hesitate to use your personalised Teddy Bear services again. You will truly make our Valentine Birthday daughter a very Happy 40 year old!! Warmest regards Margaret.

It makes my day when I receive feedback from delighted customers who have received their Teddy Bear Gifts. Don't forget if you order from our sites you will have a choice of a Free Personalised Teddy Bear card and the FunkyBears and Design-a-Bear sites have Free Teddy Bear passports with every gift. Customers have contacted us to say that they have had their Teddy Bear passports stamped by customs officers the latest from Russia!

Don't forget to visit

www.funkybears.com/teddybear/gift/personalised/refer.aspx

and enter YOUR name in our Free Prize draw for a massive Teddy Bear no purchase is necessary.

Our Teddy Bear Affiliate programme will go live in the next few days so anyone out here who has a website suitable for selling personalised Teddy Bear Gifts please contact me on 01534 856931

Tomorrow we will look at how your Special Tedy Bear Gift is created, from the selecting of the Teddy Bear fabric, selecting the Teddy bear shape and stuffing to the final unique Teddy Bear personalisation

 

 

Hi, Today we will look at how your Teddy Bear gift is made.

We first have to chose fabric to make the Teddy Bear. We must have examined over 1000 swatches of Teddy Bear fabric and after much experimentation and rejection and garnering feedback from our Teddy Bear customers we have finally chosen the Ko-Hair fabric for our www.funkybears.com offering and for our two Top Teddys. We also selected a super soft plush fabric for our www.design-a-bear.co.uk Teddy Bears. This was all done on my trip to Shanghai, a truly modern and vibrant city where I met our chinese agent Leo and visited the factories that produce our Teddy Bears. After choosing the Teddy Bear fabric we selected a mixture of soft kapok and crunchy beans to fill the Teddy Bears this will ensure the Teddy Bear Gift has exactly the right feel to it. Deciding on the colours the Teddy fabric should was the next task and armed with a pantone colour swatch we made our choice. Once the fabric has been dyed it is cut using our exclusive Teddy Bear patterns and asembled using safety lock in eyes. When the Teddy Bear production starts Leo sends a representative to the factory to monitor quality control. While this is taking place hundreds of miles away production starts on the Teddy Bear jumpers and Teddy Bear hoodies. The yarn selected and dyed into over 20 colours and then knitted into a fine knit so they will take the detailed embroidery for your chosen Teddy Bear message.The fabric is then assembled into Teddy Bear jumpers and Teddy Bear hoddies.The pink Teddy Bear hoodie is our all time best seller. Another factory is printing the Teddy Bear passports, our full range of Teddy Bear greeting cards and our Teddy Bear Gift Boxes. Once everything is ready the Teddy Bears and Teddy Garments are sent to the container port to be forwarded on to our warehouse in Blackpool

Now this is where you come in, for it's your input that will make the Teddy Bear Gift so special. First you choose your Teddy Bear's colour and select a top to go on the Teddy Bear. Then comes the personal touch; you decide on the text to go on the Teddy Bear's top; choosing a heart, star and more than likely choosing kisses to add to the Teddy Bear's garment. This allows you to truly express yourself in a meaningful and sincere way. After all, it's your input that leads to the Teddy Bear's final, unique look! What or customers appreciate is that they can not only put in a name or message in any language on the Teddy Bears but they can also add the name of the giver(s).

Together we can create a beautiful, personalised Teddy Bear Gift. Not only do you get to decide on the Teddy Bear's personalisation message, but the next step also invites you to personalise the Teddy Bear's greetings card both on the front and inside. Once we receive your instructions, we input the personalisation message for the Teddy Bear's garment into an embroidery software program that converts your message into a stitching file. The Teddy Bear garment is framed up and the design outputted to the embroidery machine where a trace takes place to ensure perfect placement of your chosen design on the Teddy Bear's garment. All of this is done to make sure that your Teddy Bear looks exactly right, according to your personal specifications.

While the Teddy Bear garment is embroidered, we print your personalised message on the Teddy Bear's greetings card and print the Teddy Bear's passport. Next the personalised Teddy Bear, the custom greetings card and the Teddy Bear passport are all placed in the gift box and the Teddy Bear is dispatched to you. All of this is done with the greatest care to make sure that your Teddy Bear arrives in perfect condition. All of these extra special touches, put together with your input, really make our Teddy Bears incomparable – your Teddy Bear will become a fine example of your individuality, and is sure to become a cherished and memorable gift.

The end result of this collaboration is a totally unique Teddy Bear Gift –because your Teddy Bear is custom manufactured to your exact specifications, it would be impossible to find another Teddy Bear like it in the world- making it a fantastic present for a loved one, friend or family member.

We have, together with our valued customers, created tens of thousands of unique Teddy Bears from our own outlets, and those of our Teddy Bear producing partners in the UK, Spain, Mallorca, and Tenerife.

Please note it's your input that makes the Teddy Bear Gift so special. The reason your Teddy Bear is so unique is because you decide on how your Teddy Bear looks, what the Teddy Bear's garment says and what the Teddy Bear's greeting card says.

We hope you enjoy the creative process and will continue to use us for affordable, memorable Teddy Bear Gifts in the future

It all started six years ago from our garment decoration business in Jersey. A chance question from a passing tourist requesting a name on a Teddy Bear and Flying Bears was born. Over 60,000 personalised Teddy Bears later, 1,000 plus corporate clients, four websites, the business has proved successful in creating the perfect Teddy Bear gift for every conceivable occasion, from ‘new born’ to Grannies 100th. Not only have the business enjoyed creating the customer experience built around the brand but have more importantly involved the customer in the creative process of personalising there own Teddy Bear. This creative process provides a more satisfying purchasing experience, involves the customer with the brand in an intimate way and more often than not, leads to a repeat purchase.

Our first Flying Bears retail unit was established many miles from Jersey, in the old town of Benidorm on the Costa Blanca. With a container full of Teddy Bears, knitted jumpers, accessories and new lightweight machines with improved embroidery software we were all set to go. Embroidering the Teddy Bear jumpers was like a dream come true, they had been specially designed for easy framing on a 12cm frame and the new machinery embroidered the tight knit fabric superbly. We could see the delight in our customer’s eyes when they saw the finished Teddy Bear and knew how well the gift would be received. We call it ‘Teddy Bear eyes’. When we first opened the Spanish retail unit we wrongly assumed that we would be selling most of our Teddy Bears as souvenirs to British holiday makers. Not so, Spanish, Dutch, French, Icelandic, Italian, Scandinavians, Americans of all ages have taken to our concept and are all active byers of our Teddy Bear Gifts. We kept hearing the young Spanish locals say “Que Guapo” (how cool), and have made a number of Teddy Bears dressed in capuchas (hoodies) for a top DJ in Madrid. Our Teddy Bears were featured in two of Spains top style magazines. So age, gender of nationality doesn’t come into the equation, the Teddy Bear is cherished the world over and makes a perfect gift for anyone for any ocassion

In this time we have also succeeded in establishing an excellent reputation providing personalised Teddy Bears to hotel groups, corporate hospitality, schools, charities, clubs and associations, developed an internet presence to support both wholesale and retail activities and further developed our customer base of ‘Flying Bears’ retailers (more needed). The company currently trades from three locations, Blackpool, Spain and Jersey. Established in 2004 under the Flying Bears banner, the Blackpool office and warehouse focuses on the fulfilment of all corporate and wholesale Teddy Bear orders throughout the UK and Europe. Our Spanish unit still remains and continues to stimulate referrals and enquires for new business. Jersey on the other hand, our spiritual home, provides the fulfilment of all bespoke personalised Teddy Bear orders received from our three internet sites developed over the last year. Many of our customers had remarked that once they had purchased their unique Teddy Bear gift there was no way they could order another when they returned from their holiday. This inspired us to create and develop a simple website allowing the browser to create their very own special Teddy Bear Gift .The internet has been a significant step with two of the three sites, www.funkybears.com and www.topteddy.co.uk already translated into two languages, for our Portuguese www.funkybears.com.pt and Spanish partners (we are currently in talks with other European partners and are seeking partners worldwide).

Despite the progress made on the business front we have not neglected our main component, the Teddy Bear. The Teddy Bear shape and size remain constant however; carefully selected super soft fabric and colours have been added. The knitted hooded Teddy Bear top complete with pouch is still a firm favourite with customers and is featured on the funky bear site in several colours, making this Teddy Bear Gift super cool and trendy. To compliment our final offering we have created our own exclusive funky Teddy Bear themed card collection, all of which can be seen on the Top Teddy website. Over fifty Teddy Bear Greetings cards have been created to compliment the final offering with the added bonus of personalisation to the front and inside of each card. With the addition of a new branded Teddy Bear gift box the final personalised Teddy Bear and Teddy Bear gift card becomes complete, and if you’re really lucky we will add a free mini Teddy Bear ! One new addition to the range is the larger Teddy Bear ranged in fudge and cream as seen on top teddy, requested by many of our customers who wanted a larger Teddy Bear.

Over this short period of time the company has evolved to become one of the leading personalised Teddy Bear gift retailers in the market, providing quality embroidered personalisation on superior knitted garments. The addition of the unique personalised card and Teddy Bear passport are further testament to the detail and experience we bring to the final offering. Don’t forget all orders placed on our www.funkybears.com website are VAT FREE and are delivered to the UK for only £19.99 with same day despatch if the order is received before 1 o’clock. Relying on the efficiency of the Royal Mail your Teddy Bear should arrive at its destination within three to four days. If you require a same day delivery an additional charge of £8.00 will ensure delivery anywhere in the UK before 1 o’clock the next day. If you do experience any problems on either website we can be contacted by phone or e-mail to help you. We hope you have enjoyed reading this article and look forward to processing that special Teddy Bear order that YOU create.

Best Wishes, Paul Lakeman.