Longtime Gilroyan Keith Muraoka has an empty space on his mantle
today.
Anticipating to place a tuxedo Herbie bobblehead from last
weekend’s Garlic Festival next to his overalls-clad bobblehead
Herbie from 2002, Muraoka was disappointed when his two attempts at
purchasing the silver anniversary bobblehead failed this
weekend.
Longtime Gilroyan Keith Muraoka has an empty space on his mantle today.
Anticipating to place a tuxedo Herbie bobblehead from last weekend’s Garlic Festival next to his overalls-clad bobblehead Herbie from 2002, Muraoka was disappointed when his two attempts at purchasing the silver anniversary bobblehead failed this weekend.
Now Muraoka’s only shot at getting his hands on a Tuxedo Herbie – aside from a big-hearted owner of extra Herbies – is on eBay.
On Tuesday afternoon, the Internet auction market listed four Tuxedo Herbies for sale. The highest bids on each hovered around $20, plus shipping and handling. The 3,000 individually-numbered bobbleheads sold for $10 at the festival.
“I knew they would sell fast, but not that fast,” said Muraoka, who has attended 23 of the 25 Garlic Festivals. “The main thing I’m disappointed in is the misinformation given to me by the mercantile volunteers.”
Muraoka said he showed up at the festival with his family Friday morning when the gates opened at 10 a.m., and when they went to the mercantile tent to buy bobblehead Herbie around 11:15 a.m., he was told the bad news by volunteers that the day’s allotment of 1,000 sold out in a half-hour.
The good news, the volunteer told him, was that 1,000 bobbleheads would be sold each of the following days of the festival. Muraoka then decided to try his luck at the second mercantile tent, where he was told the same thing by another volunteer.
“I thought, ‘great, I’ll come back early Sunday,’ ” Muraoka said.
But when he arrived at the mercantile tent shortly after 10 a.m. Sunday, he was told that the remaining bobbleheads had been sold on Saturday morning.
“There were at least three or four other people there who had been told the same thing I had by volunteers,” Muraoka said. “I didn’t believe it because it doesn’t make a lot of sense to hold them for people on Saturday, but not for people who come to the festival Sunday.”
Garlic Festival Retail Chairperson Connie Sanchez said it was the mercantile’s intent all along to sell 1,500 bobbleheads Friday and 1,500 on Saturday, which it did.
She said mercantile volunteers were never told there would be dolls available on Sunday.
“The numbers show that the buying crowds are on Friday and Saturday,” Sanchez said Tuesday afternoon. “So we decided to split the bobbleheads between those days. I did have a few people on Sunday ask me about the bobbleheads, but definitely not enough to sell 1,000. … When I asked those people to point out to me which volunteer told them to come back Sunday, none of them could point them out.”
In 2002, the first year of bobblehead Herbie, the 1,000 ordered by the festival sold out in 45 minutes. To meet the demand, the Gilroy Chamber of Commerce later ordered 1,000 of the dolls that arrived following the festival. Before the new bobbleheads were ordered, the original Herbies were selling for as much as $50 on eBay.
But this year festival organizers announced before the event that no additional Herbies would be available after the event in order to ensure the 3,000 numbered dolls held their collector’s value, according to Sanchez.
Patrons were allowed to buy up to four of the tuxedoed bobbleheads last weekend.
Zeb Carabello is a staff writer at the Gilroy Dispatch
