What do you get when you combine blind boxes and favorite grocery store brands, like Kikkoman Soy Sauce or Dove soap?
5 Surprise Mini Brands, of course!
Doll-sized groceries inside a mystery pack! Whoever thought of this is a genius!
5 Surprise Mini Brands are miniature food and beauty products that look identical to real brands. They are made by Zuru Toys and available at Walmart for about $5.99 each.
I’m always interested in small-scale collectibles, especially if they make cute dollhouse accessories, so I picked up four of these softball-looking packages a few weeks ago and am more than ready to open them!
5 Surprise Ball #1:
The Mini Brands come inside a white sphere (or ball) that opens into five compartments–hence the name 5 Surprise. Each ball has two large slices and three small ones.
The first section has a Collector’s Guide and a carton of Breyer’s ice cream.
The container looks just like a real tub of Breyers ice cream but much smaller. Even the information on the label is accurate!
According to the Collector’s Guide, there are over 70 brands to find, including Rare and Super Rare brands. Rare brands are either metallic or glow-in-the-dark, and Super Rare brands are gold. Our tub of Breyer’s ice cream is a Common brand.
Besides foodstuffs and household essentials, there are also shelves, a basket, and a shopping cart to collect.
A little box of Dry Oil Dove soap bars! How adorable! Of course, there aren’t really any bars inside. It’s just an empty paperboard box.
This is a bag of Knorr Asian Sides Teriyaki Rice. The bag doesn’t open, but there is something inside to keep it from going flat. It feels like a piece of cotton.
Yes, there is a legit recipe for Pork Fried Rice on the back! That is so cool!
I can’t get over how realistic these Mini Brands are. If I didn’t know better, I’d think there were actual Q-tips in that box. The box is a tad out of scale, but we can always pretend it’s from a wholesale store like Costco.
Here we found another bag of Knorr Rice Sides. The flavor is Asian BBQ with a Ginger and Sesame Soy Sauce. YUM!
Since we didn’t find a shelf, shopping cart, or basket, I’m guessing not every 5 Surprise ball has one of those items. That’s okay, though, because we still have three more to open!
5 Surprise Ball #2:
The shelf is only 4-inches tall and way too short for Barbie; however, it’s perfect for smaller dolls like Kelly, Shopkins, and (of course) fairies.
I use butter like this all the time, so having a tiny tub of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter in the dollhouse is fantastic!
The label has nutritional values, barcodes, and more just like its full-size counterpart. If you look closely, you can even see the number of calories in each serving.
Inside the third slice is:
Hellmann’s Mayonnaise! Love it!
The bottle is cream and looks like it’s filled with mayonnaise. It has a blue tip, clear plastic cap, and a Hellmann’s label that says: Made with cage-free eggs, Squeeze with ease, and Clean lock cap.
Our fourth slice had a pump bottle of Dove Baby Lotion. Again, the bottle is a little big but would still look cute in a doll bathroom or nursery.
Tink is right. This bottle of Tresemme shampoo is enormous (well, for a doll anyway). But I think I know someone who could use a bottle this big.
5 Surprise Ball #3:
Inside the first segment of our third Surprise ball is:
This is our second box of Dove Soap, but it’s not a double (thank goodness). This box has a blue label that says: White beauty bar with deep moisture.
We didn’t find a shelf, but we did get a box Magnum Double Peanut Butter Ice Cream. I’m thinking about making mini ice cream bars out of craft foam and putting them inside, just for fun. That would be an easy doll craft and perfect for summer?.
Alright, Tink. Show us our next Mini Brand.
Yep. It’s another bottle of Hellmann’s. We were bound to get a duplicate eventually. But look on the bright side–now we have plenty of mayonnaise for submarine sandwiches.
Ooo, that’s unfortunate. Let’s not panic, though. I’m sure the next section has something fabulous.
Yikes?!
Okay, so this ball was kind of a dud. Three of our five surprises were duplicates. Let’s move on to our last 5 Surprise ball and see if our luck changes.
5 Surprise Ball #4:
Inside slice number one is:
Another box of Dove soap. Oy, Tink is not going to be happy about that.
Section number two has:
Yippee! We got something new–a green bottle of Intensive Care Vaseline!
Here we have a bottle of Dove Deodorant for men. This is great because it gives the boys in our doll universe something to buy besides food.
Like the shelves, you assemble the cart by snapping the pieces together.
Now we can fill the cart with our Mini Brands.
The cart is definitely on the small side and can’t hold very much. Still, it makes Tinkerbell happy, and that’s what really matters around here?.
Alright, we’re down to our final surprise!
Unfortunately, we got another double: Q-Tips. However, getting duplicate Mini Brands isn’t horrible. We can use them to fill the shelves in our dolls’ supermarket and make the store look well-stocked.
Final Thoughts:
I like incorporating bits of real life into my doll universe, so I’m loving these Mini Brands! They are reasonably priced and add a fun twist to decorating a doll kitchen, bathroom, or grocery store.
You’re right, Tink–but that’s for another post?.
I LOVE IT!!!!!!!!! I think you should do a surprise pack giveaway!! You could do three different brands of surprise packets! That would be super cool, yeah?
A giveaway would be fun; however, I’m not in a position to host one right now. But, it’s a great idea and something I’d like to do in the future for sure ?.
Have you considered trying to make doll-sized soap bars out of polymer clay?
That’s a great idea! I want to learn how to use polymer clay for doll accessories but am a little nervous since I’ve never used real clay before (just the air dry stuff). But soap bars would be a great place to start.
These mini brands sort of remind me of the early days of the Kitchen Littles line, before Kitchen Littles went generic and stopped using licensed brands. Personally, I think the common mini brands items will end up being more desirable among collectors than the rarer ones because the commons look more realistic and will consequently display better.
Signed, Treesa
I agree. Some of the rare ones are neat (like the Hostess Cupcakes) but the super rare gold ones look a bit odd. The only way I could think of using them is if you pretended they were some kind of trophy?