LAT: Doll Unit Avoids Growth Spurt

Professor Eric Johnson via LA Times about Mattel's American Girl, which will open a store in L.A. and try to keep its grip on the upscale niche partly by limiting its expansion:

"Mattel has certainly understood that whatever American Girl is to girls in the U.S., it is not Mattel blazed on the side," said Mr. Eric Johnson, a professor of management at Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and an expert on the toy industry. "If you go on the Web site, you have to really dig around to even find a Mattel logo."

Source: Los Angeles Times by Abigail Goldman April 17, 2006