Tickle Me Elmo: The Toy That Sold Out in 1996
How a plush Sesame Street doll that giggled became the hardest gift to find in December 1996, and what the contemporary reports actually say.
November 3, 2026 · ZABI LLC
A doll that giggled
Tyco debuted Tickle Me Elmo in July 1996, a plush Sesame Street doll that giggled when its belly was squeezed. According to the Houston Chronicle, as cited by Fox, toy inventor Ron Dubren saw two children tickling each other into hysterics in a park and wanted to recreate that in a stuffed animal. Fox says his first concept was Tickles the Chimp, and that Tyco considered a Looney Tunes version with the Tasmanian Devil before settling on the gentler Elmo.
Fox also quotes Dubren crediting a "Try Me" feature, which, he said, showed off everything about the toy: it laughs, it escalates, it starts to shake. A toy whose whole point is clear at a glance is a good piece of design, and in hindsight it helps explain the rest.
Rosie, and then the shortage
Tyco expected to sell 400,000 that year, the New York Times reported, as Fox relays. The Star Tribune, as quoted by the Rochester Post Bulletin, put the figure at 400,000 shipped by July with 600,000 more ordered for the holidays. In October the picture changed. Tyco sent 200 dolls to The Rosie O'Donnell Show, and AARP's history says demand surged after the toy was given away on it.
By 5 December the Associated Press was reporting that stores could not keep the doll on their shelves. Tyco was flying dolls from its factories in China, expected to have shipped a million between July and Christmas, and still did not expect to meet demand. Neil Friedman, who heads Tyco's preschool division, told the AP, "You can never plan a phenomenon." The same report compared the scene to the 1983 Cabbage Patch craze, which we cover in our account of that December, and to the Holiday Barbie shortage of the year before. It described parents lining up before dawn at stores rumoured to have the toys. One mother who could not find an Elmo at F.A.O. Schwarz in New York told the reporter, "Grown people are willing to go pretty far for one of these dolls."
December on the shop floor
The best way to see it is through local papers. A Rochester Post Bulletin look-back describes a shopper who was first in line on Black Friday at a store in Rochester, Minnesota, got an Elmo and said, "Now I can go home." A week later a local toy store called Elmo the must-have preschool toy, and the shortage had led some parents to behave questionably. By the Saturday before Christmas, local classified ads were offering new, boxed dolls at many times the suggested retail price.
There were darker stories. AARP, citing People magazine, describes a shopper stampede in Canada that injured an employee, and the Post Bulletin look-back cites a Star Tribune report of two Chicago women arrested after fighting over one. We have kept these to what the sources said. Tyco's own reaction, in the AP piece, was to fly in more dolls.
What came after
Fox and AARP agree that Tyco sold more than a million Tickle Me Elmos by the end of December 1996, and more than five million by the end of Christmas 1997. Fox adds that Time included the doll in its list of the top 100 toys of all time. When the Deseret News covered the Furby rush two Decembers later, a K-B Toys manager pointed out that Elmo had arrived in July and Furby in October, and suggested the later arrival may explain the intensity of the Furby rush. The calendar, in other words, mattered as much as the toy. The story of the Furby of 1998 is told separately. A decade later Fisher-Price released a sequel, Elmo TMX, which we cover on our 2000s list. For the decade's other toys, the 1990s list has the rest.
Reported by the AP, December 1996
Tickle Me Elmo
The 1996 dolls are collectors' items. The buttons below search for the Tickle Me Elmo name, which should show whichever versions are currently listed. We have not checked which are, so treat the buttons as a search rather than a promise of a particular toy.
The practical points for a parent or grandparent are the familiar ones. Read the age label on the box and check what batteries it takes. The idea, a plush figure that giggles when it is squeezed, is the same one Ron Dubren described to the press, and it is easy to judge for yourself at a glance.
Sources
Where the facts in this post come from. Rankings and lists belong to the people who published them; the selection and the stories are ours.
- Fun, games in short supply; desperate parents, Associated Press (Rachel Beck), via The Spokesman-Review, 5 December 1996 — Tyco shortage report, flights from China, Friedman quote, comparison to 1983
- A brief history of Tickle Me Elmo, Fox — Dubren profile (Houston Chronicle), New York Times 400,000 figure, Rosie O'Donnell dolls, sales, Time top 100
- Memorable holiday toy crazes, AARP — Rosie O'Donnell demand surge, sales by Christmas 1996 and 1997, People magazine account
- Furby frenzy fueling face-offs, Deseret News, 5 December 1998 — K-B Toys manager on Elmo (July) versus Furby (October) timing
- Remember Tickle Me Elmo? Brainerd Dispatch (Rochester Post Bulletin look-back) — Star Tribune shipment figures, Black Friday scene in Rochester, December 1996 local reports