Little things we've noticed

[minor muppetz]

I am curious to know if there was some marketing research with some of the covers because a lot of the ones that feature Telly always had him with another character like Elmo or Big Bird.

And it's clear that Cookie Monster was superimposed into the Sing Yourself Sillier cover, so apparently a cover with just Oscar and Telly wasn't marketable enough. And it does seem like Oscar wasn't on many video covers (the Sony Wonder release of Getting Ready to Read had Big Bird in place of the original Oscar cover, but Oscar and Slimey were on the Slimey's Worm Games cover).

And I'm just now realizing that many of the old videos with just Grover on the cover were not rereleased by Sony Wonder (though Dance Along was). Of course if Grover wasn't marketable enough to appear on his own on a video cover, they didn't have to use the existing covers.

I also can't decide whether it's odd that the original cover of A New Baby in My House has Elmo and that videos main characters over Snuffy and Alice, or if it's weirder that they were on the rereleased cover.

 

[LittleJerry92]

@minor muppetz in all honesty, Little Jerry and the Monotones had already been starting to fade out by the late 80s - the fact that we had a Fat Blue muppet in shades replace Chrissy and Richard shows they were starting to become forgotten. The fact alone that Big Jeffy was eventually merged with Little Chrissy, whether just as a duo or in LC’s band, shows the band was becoming outdated. Heck, I really think giving them a plot line in that tape was meant to be used as a farewell appearance as they were pretty much absent until 2000. Little Jerry didn’t even get to appear with Jeffy or Chrissy in their performances with Elmo, and I feel like the only reason the puppets for Chrissy and Richard were present in Mountain of Love was because they were used as “replacements” for Big Jeffy and Little Chrissy of the Alphabeats - while I’ve always considered the lavender puppet Chrissy, I think he was used as a “replacement” for Little Chrissy and the Pumpkin Puppet for Big Jeffy.

 

[MuppetSpot]

And I'm just now realizing that many of the old videos with just Grover on the cover were not rereleased by Sony Wonder (though Dance Along was). Of course if Grover wasn't marketable enough to appear on his own on a video cover, they didn't have to use the existing covers.

If they were fine with putting Grover on Let’s Eat, I think Grover was still in that era where he was marketable enough.

 

[minor muppetz]

I am curious to know if there was some marketing research with some of the covers because a lot of the ones that feature Telly always had him with another character like Elmo or Big Bird.

To be fair, since about 1998 it's been rare for a Sesame Street video to not have Elmo on the cover, and very few covers before then had Telly.

When it came to Sony Wonder's rereleases, I wonder what made them decide on whether to create a brand-new cover photo as opposed to basically using the same cover (though with different colored backgrounds). A lot of the older covers that had more of a set had their covers replaced, so maybe it was easier to replace backgrounds when they were already plain-colored, though some of those covers with the plain backgrounds were also completely replaced. Though if Sony Wonder wanted its covers to have the backgrounds match the rest of the box, I don't think it would have been that hard to copy and paste the character parts of the image.

I had wondered if maybe the video covers that had a brand new image might have had to do with the characters, but then I also noticed a lot of the covers that got replaced originally had Ernie in them, yet other covers with Ernie used the same cover (or a new cover with Ernie), and he continued to appear on new video covers (though I think Ernie was rarely on covers for new videos in the late-1990s).

 

[MuppetSpot]

It just hit me, none of the other companies after Sony Wonder rerelease the Kid’s Guide To Life collection.

 

[minor muppetz]

It just hit me, none of the other companies after Sony Wonder rerelease the Kid’s Guide To Life collection.

I thought Genius and Warner Home Video did.

then again, after Genius took over video distribution, a lot of them have been harder to find. Some were more common at first, some I’ve seen in stores on rare occasions, and I kinda want to say that some Genius rereleases I’ve only seen on the wiki.

another thing, in terms of characters on video covers: with the videos that originally had Ernie on the cover but the Sony Wonder cover did not include him, the replacement covers always had Big Bird instead of Ernie.

And then the Sony Wonder cover for Count It Higher, which had neither on the original cover, added both to the cover.

 

[MuppetSpot]

I thought Genius and Warner Home Video did.

then again, after Genius took over video distribution, a lot of them have been harder to find. Some were more common at first, some I’ve seen in stores on rare occasions, and I kinda want to say that some Genius rereleases I’ve only seen on the wiki.

another thing, in terms of characters on video covers: with the videos that originally had Ernie on the cover but the Sony Wonder cover did not include him, the replacement covers always had Big Bird instead of Ernie.

And then the Sony Wonder cover for Count It Higher, which had neither on the original cover, added both to the cover.

I checked on the Muppet wiki and no Kid’s Guide to Life reissues

 

[LittleJerry92]

In all honesty, I don’t think those were really popular enough to get re-issues. Sometimes I feel like we’re even lucky to have them on DVD.

 

[MuppetSpot]

In all honesty, I don’t think those were really popular enough to get re-issues. Sometimes I feel like we’re even lucky to have them on DVD.

I’m curious to know how popular some videos were and how unpopular’s others were. Though I swear to God, every time I’m at a thrift shop I always see Elmocize

 

[LittleJerry92]

Elmocize is actually one of my favorite Sony videos. I have so many memories of playing that tape as a kid.