A report on NPR’s Morning Edition about the new movie Kitt Kittredge: An American Girl caught my attention the other morning. The movie is based on the American Girl doll line, which, since its inception, has spawned a book series, a magazine, clothing and accessories, three TV movies and American Girl Place, which is a café, doll hair salon, photo studio, theater and doll hospital (yes, a place where girls take their damaged dollies).

I’d been reading about American Girl and its founder, Pleasant Rowland, in Trading Up: Why Consumers Want New Luxury Goods—and How Companies Create Them, a national bestseller that explores an emerging market trend the book’s authors call "new luxury." The authors use the term "new luxury" to describe products that "possess higher levels of quality, taste and aspiration than other goods in the category but are not so expensive as to be out of reach." In addition to the American Girl doll line, the category consists of a diverse set of products: Belvedere Vodka, Callaway Golf, Samuel Adams beer and Whirlpool, among others. American Girl stands out for us here at Intergalactic Post-Advertising HQ because it started with a woman, Pleasant Rowland, who wanted to do nothing more than tell a story. More to the point, she wanted to tell an existing story better.

Rowland was first inspired during a trip to Colonial Williamsburg. A longtime educator, she found the charming 18th-century re-creation a powerful teaching tool but mourned the fact that most children would never have a chance to visit it. She also recognized that the way in which history was taught at the time did not engage children and thought the lessons could be more exciting. It was not until later that year during a Christmas shopping trip for her nieces that her big idea really took root. She describes the moment in Trading Up as an explosion in her brain: "I imagined a series of books about nine-year-old girls growing up in different times in history, with a doll for each of the characters with historically accurate clothes and accessories with which the girls could play out the stories." American Girl was born. 

The premise worked. From September 1 through December 31, 1986, American Girl generated more than $1 million in doll sales, according to Trading Up. Rowland had touched a nerve. She had created a successful brand that seven-to-12-year-old girls connected with on an emotional level, and this had as much to do with the dolls—sold for $90 a pop—as it did with the accompanying stories about 18th-century life. "I think what American Girl is so good at doing is to create lasting moments for a girl and her family and really create an emotional connection with the brand," Ellen Brothers, president of American Girl, told Morning Edition’s Jesse Baker. Baker initially scoffs at Brothers’ corporate speak, but fesses up that she herself will forever cherish her American Girl doll, Kirsten. "She’s a reminder of all the things I loved about my childhood," Baker said, "and something I want to be able to pass down to my child one day."

Baker’s comment says volumes about the power of narrative. It also encapsulates a dedication to a brand that most companies only dream of. The history of American Girl is a lesson for the kids out there: The story’s the thing.