The Cabbage Patch riots were a series of violent customer outbursts at several retail stores in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

in the fall and winter of 1983. That year,

Cabbage Patch Kids Cabbage Patch Kids are a line of cloth dolls with plastic heads first produced by Coleco Industries in 1982. They were inspired by the Little People soft sculptured dolls sold by Xavier Roberts as collectibles. The brand was renamed 'Cabbage ...

had been released for sale in the United States, causing a tremendous demand for the product. Most stores at the time typically only stocked between two to five hundred of the product, yet with thousands of customers surging the store attempting to obtain one of the dolls, many fought with other customers in order to obtain one of the products. The holiday season of 1983 saw several violent occurrences in such major retail stores as

Sears Sears, Roebuck and Co. ( ), commonly known as Sears, is an American chain of department stores founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosenwald, with what began a ...

, J. C. Penney,

Ward Ward may refer to: Division or unit * Hospital ward, a hospital division, floor, or room set aside for a particular class or group of patients, for example the psychiatric ward * Prison ward, a division of a penal institution such as a pris ...

s and

Macy's Macy's (originally R. H. Macy & Co.) is an American chain of high-end department stores founded in 1858 by Rowland Hussey Macy. It became a division of the Cincinnati-based Federated Department Stores in 1994, through which it is affiliated wi ...

. In smaller retail sales, such as

Kmart Kmart Corporation ( , doing business as Kmart and stylized as kmart) is an American retail company that owns a chain of big box department stores. The company is headquartered in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, United States. The company was inc ...

and the now-defunct

Zayre Zayre () was a chain of discount stores that operated in the eastern half of the United States from 1956 to 1990. The company's headquarters was in Framingham, Massachusetts. In October 1988, Zayre's parent company, Zayre Corp., sold the stores ...

, retailers attempted to control crowds by handing out "purchase tickets" to the first several hundred customers, leaving hundreds, if not thousands, empty-handed after standing in line for several hours. Reports of violence included hitting, shoving, trampling as well as some customers attacking others with weapons such as

baseball bat A baseball bat is a smooth wooden or metal club used in the sport of baseball to hit the ball after it is thrown by the pitcher. By regulation it may be no more than in diameter at the thickest part and no more than in length. Although histor ...

s in order to obtain a Cabbage Patch Doll.Memories of a Doll Riot Veteran
(Retrieved 12 Nov 13) By 1984, with more supply of the dolls and demand dropping, violence declined. The Cabbage Patch riots foreshadowed subsequent holiday toy crazes, such as for the

Tickle Me Elmo Tickle Me Elmo is a children's plush toy from Tyco Preschool, a division of Tyco Toys, of the Muppet character Elmo from the children's television show ''Sesame Street''. When squeezed, Elmo shakes, vibrates, and recites his trademark giggle. T ...

in 1996 and

Hatchimals Hatchimals is a line of mini-figures produced by Spin Master. The flagship toys feature a robotic creature—representing one of various species—that "hatch" themselves from an egg. After their initial release in October 2016, the toys faced a ...

in 2016. The riots also inspired the plot of the holiday film ''

Jingle All the Way ''Jingle All the Way'' is a 1996 American Christmas family comedy film directed by Brian Levant. It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sinbad as two rival fathers, mattress salesman Howard Langston (Schwarzenegger) and postal worker Myron Larab ...

''.

References

{{Riots in the United States (1980–present) 1983 riots Riots and civil disorder in the United States 1983 in the United States Toy controversies 1980s fads and trends