MLPArena Nirvana Spotlight: South African Ponies by pinkkittywinks

[Silversnow]

Loving the spotlight, PKW and team! Thanks!

[pikkupapupata]

Pkw, that's so cool!! I just wish the photos were clearer; I haven't been able to find other photos of an SA card. Thank you!

[Loa]

That custom is so clever!

[Taffeta]

It's a shame that that backcard scan isn't clearer, because the answer to the licencing problem may be included on the fuzzy blue text at the bottom of the backcard. A lot of clues can be found in backcard small print.

I have to admit, I don't like SA ponies. I mean, some have nice colour schemes, but the rooted tails creep me out a bit. Also, the prices are crazy. If they were to be sophisticated bootlegs, then the fact they're more expensive than some of the 'real' ponies is a bit worrying.

I don't need to ever own one I have seen a few at ponycon before, and that's enough for me

[kellyponyfeathers]

So, just to check, we're not sure if SA ponies were produced under official license from Hasbro? They may turn out to be bootlegs, technically?

[invaderhorizongreen]

This is very neat, they are such strange yet wonderful ponies. 

[pinkkittywinks]

So, just to check, we're not sure if SA ponies were produced under official license from Hasbro? They may turn out to be bootlegs, technically?

It's a possibility that can't be ruled out just yet.

So far I've only seen poor quality scans of one backcard featuring the earth set. You just can't see the fine print on the bottom this fine print would tell us if they were truly made in South Africa and about the license and distribution.

I do believe a collector located in South Africa got in touch with Prima Toys a number of years ago regarding the G1 line, but sadly there was no information to be had they just didn't have records going back that far.

Prima Toys did distribute the G3 line, but on looking at their website they aren't distributing the G4 line currently.

I'm hoping one of our South African based collectors can help us out with information or a clear backcard image.

Love pkw xxx
 

[Taffeta]

The text is completely illegible. The things I do notice from the card are that the rainbow does have the TM by the MLP logo, which could mean nothing but may be important.

Also that the artwork is based on the art from the Y2 US card but with the unicorns and pegasus ponies omitted. They are obviously placed in different places and in a couple of cases the names are also positioned differently. It may be the blurry picture but I feel like this is a recreated version of the artwork rather than the actual artwork. That said, the UK also redrew the US artwork (adding in bows, braids etc) so that might just have been normal practice for sets that didn't feature all the same ponies as the US set:

http://www.etherella.com/scrapbook2/comparing1984.jpg

I checked Argentina and their card art looks a lot more like the US art lifted in situe. The positioning of the six ponies on the SA card is much more distinct than on other cards and spreads across the whole of the card where others have braiding instructions and stuff. It suggests that the card was probably produced for these ponies specifically in South Africa. But it doesn't answer whether that was under licence or not :/

There's definitely a copyright symbol in that blue blur. But it's not clear whether the words after say Hasbro Bradley or Hasbro South Africa...or anything else. The mystery ><

[pikkupapupata]

I want to see that backcard clearly so bad!

[pinkkittywinks]

I think I have found the information we are looking for, I had it all along!!!! Saved on my PC for YEARS ago was a capture of a no longer working website created by a South African collector called Seashell.

I have highlighted in bold the information we were looking for:

My Web PageThis site hosted by Free.ProHosting.com
       Enter your search terms  Submit search form         


 South African Ponies
Hi there!
This page is dedicated to South African MLP variants .......
I was given these two South African ponies when I was a little girl!
I despirately wanted Seashell and Applejack, and so these are the "Seashell" and
"Applejack" I was given......
You can imagine my disappointement at the time, I'm sure! - they were not what i
was expecting!
Anyway...take a look at these ponies........
 

This is a SouthAfrican variant "Applejack"
She has the body pose of Moondancer and the head of prancing pegasus, Firefly!
 They must have just used the moulds and created pony-variants!
The hair of these ponies is of poor condition....it was never as silky and
shiney and regular MLP hair.
Also, the tail hair does not go in through one hole as in the regular MLPs,
instead it is threaded in through many small holes.....
 
 

This is a SA variant, "Seashell"
She has the body pose of unicorn Glory and again the same pegasus head of
Firefly's!
The hair is also not nice and shiney and is inserted through many small holes.
This Seashell was called "Seashell" on her packaging, but she has the different
colouring!
The symbols are painted on or stamped on, often badly.
 
These versions were fairly common in South Africa and many people got these
versions since they were MUCH cheaper than the regular My Little Ponies......but
of course, they LOOK much cheaper too!
 
 
Here is the backcard of SA "Seashell".

The cards have the real MLP pics on them and say:
"c 1985 Hasbro Bradley, Inc., Pawtucket R.I. USA All Rights Reserved"
They were made by "Prima Toys", a South African toy company, but nowhere does it
say WHERE they were made...
On the underside of the pony hooves is the same imprinted writing, presumably
just from the original moulds. The back two hooves say (rather illegibly),
"c 83 Hasbro Pat Pend." and "Hong Kong"
On the back of the backcard is written:
"Hello, I'm a cute pony.
I love adventure and making new friends.
Please be my friend, and comb and braide my long
silky hair and tie it with ribbon."
then this is repeated below in the Afrikaans language...
 
So, basically, these are cheaply made variants of MLP's.
The original moulds were obviously used but joined incorrectly, the heads
obviously
not fitting the bodies since the head is of one pose and the bodies of other
poses.
They are made of a much harder material than the vinyl of the regular MLPs.
These ponies do have similarities to the Argentinian and Mexican variant ponies,
which were also made by local toy manufacturers under the Hasbro name, and are
also not quite as well made as the US and other regular ponies.

I have also come across SA variant Moonstones, Windys, Sprinkles (white with red
hair....!)
and others

Here are some pics of SA variants i have received from various collectors:
(appollogies for not referencing these pics, please contact me if these are your
photos,
as i have lost your email and would like to give you the proper credit!)


SA variant Bowtie


SA variant Moondancer


SA variant Windy

These SA ponies were very common in their day, however, any MLP's are very rare
in South Africa these days and SA variants even less common for some reason...
They are therefore quite special and rare collector's items! and worth quite a
bit!

Please e-mail me if you have any other info on these....I'd love to know if they
were sold anywhere else other than in my country, or if they are indeed, All
South African variants!
 
Home
   Katrina aka Seashell 

Pics from Crazy Jack's:  http://www.moondancersdream.com/DQfreepics.htm
"My Little Pony" is copyrighted to Hasbro

Taffeta you have a better understanding of licensing than I do, what do you think?

Love pkw xxx

[Taffeta]

Ah, that's interesting Well found Seeing the bolded bit, if you look back at the shape of the blue blobs on the card you can see that everything Seashell says fits the shape of the print.

I am not sure if I do know more, especially not about Nirvana, but this is the question that it raises for me. Here's a lovely close up scan of an Argentinian card for comparison.

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/528398968774818134/

This one also contains the same copyrighting information for Hasbro Inc, but also adds that the ponies are made in Argentina by Top Toys and most importantly, it mentions a license.

I am having trouble finding comparative legible examples for Brazil and the Piggy Ponies etc, but from what I can see they also have a lot of blue text on the card which suggests maybe similar text.

I am not really much of an expert on Nirvana stuff, my knowledge mostly stretches to variations within Europe, which tend to be a bit different.

We know that other ponies were distributed in South Africa, some of which appeared on UK style cards and from presumed UK distribution (like Truly, Cupcake etc on that card I would love to get my hands on). But it's not uncommon for even pony cards in the Uk to mention Hasbro Inc. However, they also then say distributed in the UK by Hasbro UK (address). Those are official rather than licenced ponies but the system is very similar.

The South African card mentions the copyright, but doesn't mention a licence and doesn't mention distribution in South Africa. My disclaimer on this is that we haven't many examples of non-mainstream South African cards, leaflets, etc that might close that gap and just demonstrate that S.A didn't put all the wordy stuff on the card but still had the licence.

The artwork is not identical to the US artwork but as I said before, nor is the UK one for that set. Redrawing and packaging within one's own country is not unusual either. The fact the Rainbow has a TM on it and the copyright information is included might just indicate Prima preferred not to spew great amounts of detail on the cards...

I would just have thought it normal to have a distribution address at least on the card somewhere. BUT I also can't read whether there's anything like that under the Prima logo either :/ Or whether the pony may have come with an insert that had all that info on it, and so it never needed to be on the card. Prima not being on the pony hooves also means nothing given that several Nirvana pony lines don't have the company on the hooves. The Made in Hong Kong is a touch concerning but then look at the official NC ponies and how badly that's sometimes swept out, so may also mean nothing.

1985 also offers one other possibility - these poses all come from year 2 I think? Production of Rainbow Ponies and Sprinkles continued in the UK through 1985, but it's possible some of those moulds were discarded at that point. 1985 dates on cards often mean a 1985-1986 release so it might be that the moulds were given over to or sold to (or licenced to) Prima following their withdrawal from use for mass production in Hong Kong. Two historical facts that might tie it all together - Hong Kong is in the commonwealth, as is South Africa, and in 1985, Hong Kong was a British territory still, and the UK organised distribution to South Africa in terms of mainstream ponies to at least some extent. Right now I am having trouble thinking when the Moondancer pose was ever used for a pony sold in the UK, and am coming up blank. Firefly's pose was literally only Sprinkles who was already in production and may have been on the cancel list - I suspect she came to the UK as surplus stock because we were meant to have Cascade. And the Glory pose was still here, admittedly, but wasn't used again after the 1984-5 Rainbow Pony set except for Majesty, whose production did switch to China later on.

So...

Maybe this is a case of travelling moulds, rather than anything else. In which case they're copyrighted to Hasbro, produced in South Africa, but not so much licensed as inherited...?

I dunno. This is all speculative and doesn't address the fact Majesty was still available after 1985-6.

I don't think on this evidence alone it's possible to say yes or no. We need more information...but the the lack of licencing and distribution info makes me wonder.

(Side note, I now know the actual name of one of my argentinian baby ponies. xD yay).

[pikkupapupata]

If it helps at all, I remembered seeing 2 MOC Piggies, one Brekkar and one not, on eBay right now, so I went to have a look at the photos, and took some screenshots. I hesitate to post them as I don't know the etiquette, but I could if it's deemed okay on here. But, while there is still a bit of fuzziness, I was able to zoom in a bit and see some of the fine print on the cards. The non-Brekkar one says, '1984 MB España S.A. under Berne and Universal Copyright Convention. Made in Valencia, Spain in 1984'. underneath is a disclaimer in Spanish basically saying that the actual colours of the items may vary from those shown on the card. This information is on the back at the bottom. The Brekkar has this information on the front at the bottom, just to the left of the bubble. It says, '1984 MB España S.A. - under Berne and Universal Copyright Convention. Made in Spain.'. On both, I believe that © is present before 1984, but they are both just fuzzy enough that I can't say for sure.

I'm still trying to see if I can find a Brazilian card or something for comparison, but I was able at least to find these.

Okay, I managed to find two photos of Brazilian packaging, an Os Fofinhos card, and a Baby Buggy box. Between the two, I was able to get most of the fine print. The card has the information split into two parts at the bottom, one part on the left, the other on the right, and the box has it all in one place on one of the sides. From the card, this is what I have:

MANUFATURA DE BRINQUEDOS ESTRELA S.A.
Rua Cabo Norberto E. Weber Nº. 222 - São Paulo
Ind. Brasileira - C.G.C. 61.082.004/003-12 - Made in Brazil

The box has the same information, with two additional lines. I couldn't make out part of the first additional line, but here's the additional information:

Departamento de Vendas, Rua Joaquim Carlos 633 - São Paulo [blur blur blur blur blur]
Fabricado sob licença de Hasbro, Inc. Pawtucket, Rhode Island, USA

I hope this can bring even the littlest bit of insight concerning these mysterious South African ponies. 

[Leikin]

Interesting discussion! I was really just popping in to see if there was any info on how many ponies are known for each character, anyone know?

Also, I dont know hoe early SA started importing mlp, but is it possible that the cards are made for the imported ones, and they just used the same for the ones they made themself? Or did the import start later on?

I have also come across SA variant Moonstones, Windys, Sprinkles (white with red
hair....!)
and others

White with red hair? That sounds awfully a lot like Heart Throb.  Could it be a cause of mistaken identity? I mean, why would they make two withe pegasus with red hair, when none of them had that colour to begin with?

[pinkkittywinks]

There is some stuff I want to look for, but chronic illness is kicking my behind at the moment.

Great work Taffeta and Pikku on finding those bits of information, I've had a look at my backcard pictures and it's similar for each country

I hadn't considered a leaflet coming with the ponies

I've only seen two South African backcards and both were for the year two earth ponies. On looking at the ponies released it was year two and year three ponies

Before I forget!!! These babies! But no pictures of the backcard sadly.

https://mylittleponystickergallery.weebly.com/international-stickers.html

http://mlparena.com/index.php/topic,301123.msg274071.html#msg274071

Leikin: I think there was a "count" at some point, but I honestly can't remember some are ooak, others 2-5 and a few are about 8-10. I too wondered if Sprinkles was a case of mistake identity as well. I included her her as a "rumour" in the gallery and the spotlight, just for informations sake

Love pkw xxx

[Taffeta]

I remember those baby ponies. If ashlyne gave those pics, does she have them in her collection? Maybe she has the card?

Those are normal release babies, though interestingly that rainbow has no TM on it, nor the R from some of the other licensed ones in other languages.

Imports like that are a hazy grey area...I don't even know were to begin with them, except their existence is interesting to me

Otherwise the stuff that I am aware of being sold in S.A was stuff on cards we'd recognise here in the UK, including that one I mentioned - as far as I know.

But we really just don't have enough intel on S.A in general.