Most toy inventors wouldn't think of making their plush toys limited edition and it's easy to understand why. If you have a great idea for a custom stuffed toy, you would want to sell as many as possible. You will probably cite the Elmo doll as an example. If you manufacture more, you'll be able to sell more. If you sell more, you will get more profit.
What if you don't have the advantages of a very popular character like Elmo? Let's say that your plush design will be patterned after a character of a children's book that you wrote. You're most likely using the toy as a tool to promote your book. You can't really rely on your character's popularity since it's far from being the next Elmo. So what can you do?
This is where you might consider making your toys limited edition. How can you make them limited? Obviously, you're not going to produce them by the thousands, you're simply just going to make a limited batch and have them numbered. For example, a plush doll may have the number 1 of 500. It means that there are only 500 toys for that design.
It's a simple case of the law of supply and demand. You're creating low supply for the product so that the demand will go up. A lot of people would buy the toys since people like having things that are limited - It gives them the chance to own something that is exclusive. This is why we have a lot of collectors that are on the lookout for limited editions. You rarely see these people buying an Elmo doll, they will be buying stuffed toys that not a lot of people have. Take a look at the Beanie Babies craze. There was a craze because the manufacturer discontinued manufacturing some of the designs. That made these designs limited and it created a big demand for them. Now, these plush toys fetch a higher price just because they're limited editions.
A custom plush toy that is a part of a batch of limited editions can create the same craze. It might not be as recognizable as Elmo but it has its own selling point - it's limited. Making your plush toys limited editions can help make your batch efficient. You can have 500 limited stuffed toys that are sold out which is better than having 10,000 of mass-produced toys and you end up selling just 1,000 of them.
If you have a great custom plush idea, you might be thinking that it would be a shame to just produce a limited number of them. If you are confident that it's going to achieve at least one half of the popularity that Elmo did, then go ahead and produce them by the thousands. But if you're not that confident, then make them limited editions. It's also a great way to test the market and if things work out, then you can go ahead and create a second edition of your toys. It would be easier since you can just change the size, color or something else that wouldn't require a complete overhaul. It's a low-risk and high-reward project and success will come easy that way.
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