Barbie Truck Tour comes to town just in time for my birthday

The Barbie Truck Tour visited the Kenwood Towne Centre parking lot in Cincinnati on Saturday, Feb. 6.  That was also date of my 60th birthday.

I'd seen photos of the truck before when it had visited other cities, but this was the first time it had come to the Cincinnati area.  The press releases never really explained what the truck's purpose was, so I am going to tell you myself.

First of all, the truck itself is a Mercedes-Benz Sprinter van painted pink, of course, although I don't know what year.  It looks like a food or ice cream truck--the one side has pop-up windows for sellers inside to hand out merchandise.  The license plate is from California and it reads (what else?) "Barbie R."

When I got there I had to wait in line for about 25 minutes.   I must have missed the coat memo:  I had on my old red heavy wool jacket with the black fur trim and hood, but I would say that 90 percent of the people in line had on black leather or black quilted microfiber coats.  There were a mix of both adult women by themselves and women with children, both African-American and white, but no men at all in line.

The theme of the visit was Barbie in the 1990s and the truck and all the merchandise had the 90s slanted sans serif logo.  It was all new merchandise, just the retro logo.  In fact, I thought a lot of it was more 1980s-looking, with the boom box on the truck and the word "totally" written on the T-shirt and even a patch with the Barbie Rockers logo.

There weren't dolls for sale.  Everything was for us humans.  I bought a T-shirt and a necklace, and all purchases came with a free bottle of Barbie Bubble Bath.

When I showed photos to my family of the Barbie Pop-Up Truck,
my sister said it looked like an ice cream truck!

The T-shirt is black knit jersey, very soft and comfortable.  The logo on front says, "Totally Throwback Barbie Tour."  It is made by Tangram of Irvine, CA, and has the Barbie signature on the inside tag.  It costs $27, which is not bad for a souvenir T-shirt.

My sister immediately recognized
the Mercedes-Benz circle logo!

I am glad the necklace came with a longer 18-inch chain.
Shorter ones don't fit my fat neck!

I eventually will resell
the bottle of Barbie Bubble Bath.

The T-shirt is an unusually soft jersey knit.
I just hope it washes well.

The necklace comes on an 18-inch long chain, and the attached Barbie pendant is holographic; that is, it changes colors.  It, too, is made by Tangram.  Price is $15.

A freebie is a little white plastic bottle of Barbie Bubble Bath by Hit Promo.  It comes on a plastic lanyard that can be hung in the shower.

Some of the other merchandise items are a baseball cap, denim jacket, girls' makeup sets, a couple of cloth patch sets and a water bottle.  The most expensive item at $150 is a pink Barbie Polaroid camera, although I don't know if it was digital or actually took Polaroids.