It’s been a while since I’ve been active in the doll community. There are several reasons for my absence, one of which was the impending customs changes in Norway. Long story short, they’ve added more fees, making it too expensive for me to order dolls or doll related items outside my own country, and there aren’t any local shops that carry anything resembling what we have in this hobby.
So, a doll will now cost me +25% of the dolls value including shipping, plus an additional fee for import. The same goes for buying a sweater. The import fee will be around the same amount as the sweaters cost, and again + 25% of the sweaters value including shipping.
These new rules have pretty much pushed me out of the hobby. Getting eyes, wigs, and even materials, is now too expensive for me. I will of course try to sew my own clothes, but we have a limited variety of fabrics here, and it’s usually extremely expensive, which is why I used to get these things online in the first place.
Secondly, my photos of my legit dolls are being used without permission to sell recasts. I’ve seen my Cygne with 2 different sellers, and I recently saw my photo of Modigli used also. It really is very dishonest using photos of a legit doll, a photo they stole from me, to sell a recast.. It breaks my heart.
It also seems like sale of used dolls are more prominently sold on apps, like instagram, and not on Den of Angels as much any more. After the activity died down a bit on DoA I found it hard to find dolls for sale, or sell dolls myself. With DoA we had the security of a feedback thread, and it was easy to browse or search. I guess Im getting old because using instagram for this is too difficult for me 😛
I see I have missed many events and gorgeous dolls being released, and while Im sad about it I just didn’t feel like putting as much energy into a hobby that I may have to eventually leave.
I am keeping my current dolls of course, and maybe I’ll be able to save up for more in the future, but right now I just want to focus on the dolls I do have. It sucks that I cant buy them shoes, wigs, eyes and clothes any more though..
Please, if you see my photos being used to sell recasts, know that they do not have my permission to use them, and that the photos are not of their actual product.