History of Collecting Kinder Surprise Figures

Pages 4 and 5 of the Welz guide, first edition: Dear collectors! This is the first guide to collecting figures and objects found in Kinder-Ueberraschungseiern made by Ferrero. When 20 years ago at Easter the first U-eggs with toys and figures inside were sold, nobody could imagine that these would become serious and much sought after collectibles. Until today more that 1.000 different figures made of plastic or metal were released all over Europe. What first was a toy for kids from 4 to 14 then became a collecting passion for many adults. Suddenly whole Germany was in 'shaking-disease' because with some skill and good hearing you can identify the contents of the so called 'U-Eier' already in the supermarket. Soon collecting was limited to figures, puzzles and lists of contents. Only a few collectors specialized on toys or other miniatures out of the eggs. Much sought after are today all sorts of advertising for 'U-eggs', e.g. posters, objects, or dioramas, which were given to bulk purchaser by Ferrero representatives for merchandising. Some of these found their way to the collectors market and there especially complete dioramas go for highest prices. But also older metal and plastic figures are high in demand. These old miniatures were not marked yet, so often other small figures are offered to be real Ferrero figures. Often these came not out of the eggs but out of a surprise packet bought in the next kiosk or toyshop. It was the goal here to create an informative, ambitious, and most complete price guide with of course only originals. The number of all ever produced figures is not known yet. On toy shows and fleamarkets still unknown variations of the rarities are found. And this fact is a thrill to the collectors, too. So I wish you much success with you collection and I hope that this guide will help you therefore. Volker Welz Increase in value and prices The fact, that figures out of Kinder-Ueberraschungseiern made by Ferrero are sought after collectibles and speculation-objects today is not only known to thousands of collectors in Germany and foreign countries. Because the figures are used more often as investment, increase in value is happening. The demand in rare, complete, and good shaped figures has increased rapidly the last years. Prices of DM700 and more have been recognized on the free market for some objects. Rare dioramas bring some thousand marks today. The new standard figures only have a steady increase in value because of the high number of production. The figures that are interesting for collectors were produced in the last 25 years. Most lines were not released again so their number is limited. So a decrease in value couldn't be noticed in most cases. It is still possible today to start collecting with paying DM2-DM3 for a figure, if you don't want to have the 'surprise-effect' when buying an original egg. And the search for a bargain on toy shows or fleamarkets could also be very nice and exciting.