I Built a Bear (Frog) at Build-a-Bear
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Build-a-Bear, the experiential toy store where shoppers can make and stuff their own plush bears, cows, frogs,capybaras, and licensed characters like Bluey, Hello Kitty, and assorted Pokémon, is nearly 30 years old. For most of its tenure, the St. Louis–based brand has been a mall staple popular for birthdays and other milestone celebrations.
Over the last five years, as many other brick-and-mortar toy stores have struggled to stay open, Build-a-Bear has been expanding. There are still plenty of Build-a-Bear stores in local malls, but the company’s bigger focus is on tourist destinations like FAO Schwarz, Great Wolf Lodge, and Carnival cruises, as well as shop-within-a-shops in 35 countries.
The strategy has paid off. Build-a-Bearreporteda record-breaking $529.8 million in total sales for the 2025 fiscal year, increasing its profits by 6.7 percent over the previous year. I didn’t go to Build-a-Bear as a kid and have never bought a gift there, so forMall Monthat the Strategist, I visited the recently redesigned Build-a-Bear Workshop at FAO Schwarz in New York, just down the aisle from theJellycat Diner, to build my own bear.
Build-a-Bear isn’t just for kids
Like a lot of successful toy brands, Build-a-Bear appeals to all ages. According to Chris Hurt, Build-a-Bear’s incoming CEO, who will take over the role in June, about 40 percent of the brand’s business comes from tweens, teens, and adults. This wasn’t always the case, but has been a driving force behind the brand’s staggering growth over the last five years, during which timestock grew by more than 2,000 percent.
Many people who first experienced Build-a-Bear as children are now parents taking their own kids to the store. On top of that, exclusive licensing partnerships with brands like Pokémon,Star Wars,and Sanrio have introduced serious collectors to the brand. Build-a-Bear further nurtures this multigenerational appeal with a dedicated section of its online store called theBear Cave. This age-gated section of the brand’s website is home to highly detailed (and often niche) pop-culture collaborations and cheeky designs “intended for shoppers 18 and older,” like ared-wine-drinking dog, aromantasy-themed gift set, and asilver fox,cougar, andpraying mantisyou can’t get in stores.
And it’s not just bears
I wasn’t prepared for the huge variety of non-licensed animals at the FAO Schwarz Build-a-Bear outpost, and I certainly wasn’t prepared to choose just one from the dozens of different species. I didn’t count them all, but depending on the size of each store, there are usually about 50 animals available to be stuffed, including bears, rabbits, frogs, cows, cats, dogs, turtles, horses, sharks, and pandas. Build-a-Bear’s design team pays close attention to trends and was one of the first major plush-toy companies to make acapybara, so those are also on offer, alongside the enduring axolotl and newer contenders likethe longhorn cow, the brand’s current best seller. Picking a teddy bear seemed a bit boring, so after several laps and careful consideration of what my 3-year-old son might like, I chose theSpring Green Frog. (My other favorites were the longhorn cow, theAlien Cow, and thepink axolotl.)
The least expensive animal you can stuff in person is theBirthday Treat Teddy Bear, which typically costs $14; the most expensive are the giant plush animals that cost about $100. The frog I chose costs $30 without any clothing or accessories, which isn’t cheap, but I think it’s worth the price, considering how big it is (16 inches tall) and how much fun it is to go through the building process. I was quickly won over despite my initial skepticism. The Build-a-Bear store experience was much more little-kid-friendly (and grandparent-friendly) than stopping by theJellycat Dineror making a customLEGO mini-figureat the LEGO Store. And with all of the personalized touches you can add, your new stuffed animal makes a good special-occasion gift.
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The bear-building process is extensive
When you arrive at Build-a-Bear, a “bear builder” employee will ask you to choose an unfilled stuffed animal. This was a novelty, and I enjoyed lifting each deflated friend to see what they looked like. Some, like my frog, have heads that are pre-stuffed. Once you’ve made your selection, you get to pick a sound that your new stuffed pal will play; there are over 70 available, from realistic animal sounds (I chose a ribbit) to dinosaur roars to theBlueytheme song. These are recorded on a battery-powered plastic disc that gets inserted into your animal’s paw and features a button that plays the sound when you squeeze it. You can also record a custom message or sound, which requires a slightly different piece of equipment (more on that below).
If you want your animal to smell like vanilla or bubblegum or birthday cake for several years, you can add a scented disc as well. I am not a fan of scented dolls or stuffies, so I opted out of this step. Then it’s time to fill your animal and choose whether you want it to feel floppy, medium-firm, or firm. I chose medium-firm and got to operate the stuffing machine with a big foot pedal. It’s a spectacle: Once you step down, you see the poly fill spin inside a huge clear cylinder; there’s a smaller see-through tube at the bottom leading to a metal tube where the bear builder attaches your animal. I also got to pick a fabric heart (gingham or solid red) that the bear builder put inside my frog’s chest, along with a battery-powered heart-shaped button that vibrates when pressed. Adding these two hearts is called the Heart Ceremony, and it’s always a little different depending on the animal or character you choose. “If you pick aStar Warscharacter, the bear builder might ask you to rub the fabric heart on your arm so your stuffed animal’s lightsaber is strong,” says Hurt. Finally, the bear builder sews your new friend closed and presents them to you.
After that, you are free to wander around and shop for clothing and accessories from an immense array of T-shirts, dresses, jeans, shorts, costumes, sneakers, boots, hats, sunglasses, underwear, sports balls, backpacks, drinks, and even cell phones with buttons that make different noises.
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If you want to make your bear even more personalized, some Build-a-Bear locations, including the one at FAO Schwarz, offer custom embroidery on the spot. I got my son’s name embroidered on the back of a little gray “I Love NYC” hoodie.
Before you leave, you’ll get a birth certificate for your Build-a-Bear. You can also purchase a drawstring backpack carrier, a stampable passport, and a number of other travel accessories.
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You can record a personalized message to a loved one
The Build-a-Bear staff at FAO Schwarz told me that customers record custom messages for special occasions like birthdays, graduations, promposals, and wedding anniversaries, and for all sorts of other reasons, such as sending a gift to family members who are far away or service members stationed abroad. One employee even told me that Kim Kardashian apparently keeps some of the custom Record Your Voice sound buttons around her house to leave messages for her kids when she’s traveling. It’s also common for people to record a last voicemail message from a deceased loved one to put into their Build-a-Bear.
You can change the sound in your Build-a-Bear at any time by bringing it into a store, where an employee will open it up, make the swap, and sew it closed again. But you can also do the entire recording process online and add it to a stuffed animal to be shipped to you or picked up in store.
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If you go on a child’s birthday, you can pay their age for the Birthday Treat Bear
All that customization adds up fast, so I asked Hurt about the best Build-a-Bear options for shoppers with tighter budgets. “Birthdays are really important to us. So if a child is 4 years old, they can come in and get the Birthday Treat Bear for only $4. If they’re 2, it’s $2. If they’re 1, it’s $1,” he says. The retail price of the Birthday Treat Bear is $14 (without any clothes or accessories), making this an especially good deal for very little kids.
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Almost all of the animals and some of the licensed characters are also available in miniatures called Mini Beans, which are more affordable and still very cute. Those are pre-stuffed, however, so they don’t provide the full Build-a-Bear experience. Some customers buy the Mini Beans to create mom-and-baby bundles (there are also somepremade bundlesavailable online).
The clothing is also great for other dolls and small dogs
There are lots of potential unofficial uses of Build-a-Bear clothes. The brand makes an outfit or accessory for just about any holiday or celebration you can think of, and most of them will fit similarly sized dolls and stuffed animals. I even considered buying a few pairs of boxer briefs for my son’s other stuffies, since we just finished potty training and he loves pulling up his own underwear.
Later, while talking to a colleague, I learned that some small-dog owners actually buy Build-a-Bear gear for their pups; she heard about this hack from friends with a poodle named Gravity who told her that, compared with clothing that’s actually made for dogs, Build-a-Bear’s is more affordable.
Building a bear (frog) was pretty entertaining, but would I do it again?
By the time I had finished building my frog, I was buzzing. It felt like time had stopped and I was a kid with rich parents who never say no, not even to a pair of three-inch working roller skates my frog can’t stand up or roll on. I walked into Build-a-Bear ready to scoff at the corniness of the whole endeavor but have to admit that it was a pretty magical experience. The only problem is the price: My frog and all of its add-ons(shorts, hoodie with embroidery, underwear, basketball, rain boots, roller skates, carrier, and passport) tally up to $116. For everyday families on a budget, building a bear at Build-a-Bear is definitely a special-occasion event. But the stores do at least carry a huge variety of smaller stuffed animals and bag charms (and even some cute plush inanimate objects with faces) that come pre-stuffed and are cheaper than, say, a similar-size Jellycat.
I’m not sure I would go back to the store and do the exact same all-out splurge experience again, unless it was for a very special gift. But I am thinking about bringing my son back for a $4 bear when he turns 4 just so he can experience the magic.
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