A member of r/americangirl recently posted asking where to find the girl-sized version of Tenny's Guitar for purchase. As I began looking into information to find listings for this guitar, it became a very interesting case, and I thought I would post the information I've found so far here on my blog.
I think this is a really interesting case because it shows one of the ways we can find certain branded or licensed products after they've been discontinued: by looking into the manufacturers of the product instead of the brand or license that is on the product. It also reminds me of the way Pleasant Rowland manufactured some of the early Pleasant Company accessories.
Because she didn't have the resources to create certain items herself, lots of early Pleasant Company accessories were things Rowland found in certain stores or things that were produced by other companies at the time.
For example, we had a discussion on r/americangirl where user LibraryValkyree stated
"My assumption with her Nutcracker doll was that - since it's from early Pleasant Company days - that it was probably a repurposed Christmas ornament or something similar.
I was in a kind of cheap-y souvenir shop or something once on a family road trip in like 1996 or 1997 or so that had several in a basket for a few dollars each, and I remember thinking it was super weird at the time - they had no other AG stuff or anything to lead me to think they were secondhand, but they had various other knicknacks and things."
Some other items, such as Samantha's early glassware/china sets, were also produced in collaboration with real China companies, and ended up being scaled down versions of human-sized china sets available in the 90s. There are many more stories like that, but the story of Tenny's Guitar for Girls is an interesting parallel to them.
In 2017, American Girl collaborated with Taylor Guitars to produce a girl-sized version of the "Taylor GS Mini" which was decorated to match Tenny's doll-sized accessory. The "Taylor Guitars" brand is very well known and has been used by popular music artists such as Taylor Swift and several others. Its original retail price was $599, with $100 of each guitar going to Notes for Notes, an organization that helped give musical equipment to Boys and Girls clubs as well as after school programs so they could create music programs without having financial difficulties of purchasing musical equipment.
The American Girl Wikia article on the subject specifically lists this guitar as the "American Girl Taylor GS Mini" and confirms the other information found in the press releases. The press releases do not specify that this item was a limited release in any capacity, so it can be assumed to have been produced at the same rate as the other GS Mini models from Taylor Guitars.
Although the press releases are very easy to find across the web, the actual guitar itself seems to have become very rare. One of the only listings I have managed to find through surface-level searching is here on a site called Reverb.
Looking at the Taylor Guitars brand site, this is the page for the GS mini. Interestingly, the retail price is still $599, meaning that the American Girl collaboration wasn't given any sort of price increase as some might have expected.
The specific American Girl GS mini has been discontinued for quite a few years now. If you're looking for it, your best option would probably be to look through used Taylor GS mini guitars, not including the American Girl brand name.
Additionally, if you're curious, here's a review on YouTube featuring the American Girl x Taylor Guitars GS mini, although it is not in English. I asked for a summary from a friend I know and here is what he said:
"This guitar, the "Taylor GS mini American Girl" is a special type of Taylor GS mini. It's the product of a collaboration between Taylor Guitar and American Girl.
The story: An American Girl named Tenny Grant is a lively young singer and songwriter. She is pursuing her music-loving dream in Nashville, the capital of Tenesse, accompanied by a small Taylor guitar with six cords.
After this introduction, the reviewer present the technical aspects of the guitar.
Finally, Taylor Guitars is going to give a donation of $100 to charity organizations for each guitar sold. The intention of this is to help young people who want to play music [be able to do so]. "
