Sesame Street 2000 - 2022

Last updated: Aug 20, 2024

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CTW becomes Sesame Workshop

In 2000 the company that produces Sesame Street, Children's Television Workshop (CTW), became Sesame Workshop. The "Sesame Street" street sign logo is changed so that the letters CTW are replaced with numbers 123. All new Sesame merchandise uses the new logo from this point onward, allowing collectors a quick and easy way to identify if a Sesame collectable was made before or after 2000. At this point the Sesame Muppets were still owned by the Jim Henson Company but by the end of the decade the rights for the characters would be sold off to Sesame Workshop.

Shown above is the complete set of 12 Sesame Street vending machine stickers from 2000. They were produced by Sandy Lion Sticker Designs, in Markham, ON, and printed in Canada. Each of the stickers are numbered on the back. I really like these stickers and have been trying to get the whole set since I first saw them in 2000. In June 2017 I completed the collection at last! So yes, I've been hunting for these stickers for 17 years!!! Its very awesome to finally have them all!

During the early 2000's I used to keep my eye on vending machines to see if I could find more of these Sesame stickers. Eventually I did find another machine that had these Sesame stickers and was so excited that I put my quarters in too quickly and jammed the machine. Silly me! Not only did I loose my coins, but I didn't get any stickers. Later when they fixed the machine they changed the stickers at the same time. Oh the comedy! 

These are among the last collectables to be made with CTW on them (on the back). All 12 are shown above in numbered order, which is: #1 Elmo, #2 Big Bird, #3 Cookie Monster, #4 Bert, #5 Oscar, #6 Rosita, #7 Count Von Count, #8 Zoe, #9 Twiddle Bugs, # 10 Grover, #11 Telly, and #12 Ernie. It's odd that some characters are larger than others. For example the Oscar sticker is quite small while Grover is huge. I've shown the back view for some of the stickers below.

Below is a list of the stickers in order of easiest to find to hardest to find, from my own experience in searching for these over the last 17 years!

Most common/easiest to find: Telly Monster

Common/easy to find: Ernie, Bert, Cookie Monster, Grover

Not as common/not as easy to find: Big Bird, Count, Oscar, Elmo

Least common/hardest to find: Twiddle Bugs, Zoe, Rosita

Here is the awesome "Me So Hungry Cookie Monster Puppet" talking doll that was made by Fisher-Price in 2001. I'm posting this in 2016, so the toy is already 15 years old and seems to have become quite a rare puppet to find, especially in the original box. My online search for this toy only provided one image of the toy in the box and about five of the puppet out of the box.

I really like how Fisher-Price shaped this Cookie Monster as they designed the toy to look like the original Muppet rather than a cartoon version of the character. Had they used dark blue fur I think this would have become the definitive Cookie Monster puppet to own, but as it stands I still think that distinction belongs to the original Child Guidance / Educational Toys puppet. This one is a very close second however! If you close the puppet's mouth or put the cookie in the mouth one of five sayings will play in Cookie Monster's actual voice. Squeeze his tummy and he has five more different sayings, and squeezing his hand will play his singing a few lines from "C is for Cookie"! How's that for awesome!

Shown above is the opening in the back for operating the puppet. It's a good thing they didn't put that horizontal slit any lower or it would have been very awkward! :) The only draw back with this toy puppet is that, despite the amazing technical design to have all of the "talking" pressure points activated from one battery compartment in the doll's tummy, there is no off/on switch! Therefor, the only way to use the puppet as a puppet without the talking feature is to remove the batteries. To me that's a design flaw as I want to be able to operate this toy as a normal puppet. In addition, although Cookie Monster is one of my favourite Muppets, I also want this thing to shut up after hearing the same sayings repeated over and over again (in other words, Me So Sick of listening to this toy). After all, toy puppets are meant to play with and allow kids to use their imagination to decide what they will say and do. Sometime it seems that toys have just become too modern and companies forget what a toy is for, so they over produce them. In any case, this "Me So Hungry Cookie Monster" is without a doubt an awesome puppet...but it needs an off switch! 

This is the instruction sheet that comes with the "Me So Hungry Cookie Monster Puppet".

Sesame Mini Beans: Grover, Elmo, Snuffleupagus, and Big Bird plush toys made in 2002.

Sesame Mini Beans: Benny Rabbit, Sherlock Hemlock, Twiddle Bug plush toys made in 2002.

Sesame Mini Beans plush toy were sold through coin operated vending machines. Each plush toy cam in a clear plastic ball as shown above.

McDonald's Restaurants also sold a series of Sesame Mini Beans in 2002.

Above is Zoe, Rosita and Cookie Monster, below is the Count.

On the left is the 5 inch tall Sesame Mini Beans plush of the Count made by McDonalds in 2002. I've shown it next to the regular sized Sesame Beans Count, which is 7 inches tall and was made in 1997.

In 2002 Gund produced these Sesame plush toys which are 10 to 11 inches tall. If I'm not mistaken, these are the first Sesame Street plush toys to have the copyright information attributed to Sesame Workshop, instead of CTW. I'm posting this in 2013, so at this point these Gund plush toys (and puppets) have been sold in stores for eleven years!

Above is an Oscar the Grouch mouth puppet by Gund from 2003. Other puppets in the collection include Big Bird, Cookie Monster, Grover, Ernie, Bert, Elmo, Abby Cadabby, Zoe, the Count and Snuffleupagus.

In 2003 Nanco produced larger sized plush toys of Sesame characters that were given out as prizes at fairs and exhibitions. Above is a 15 inch Oscar plush toy next to an 8 inch Knickerbocker Cookie Monster for size comparison. Below is the back view to show the lid of the trash can.

 

This is the Nanco plush Cookie Monster from the same series as the above Oscar. Cookie is 20 inches. Below is the 17 inch Elmo from this set. Cookie and Elmo are very well made using very soft, good quality fur. The stuffing is also soft. Oscar was made with a different type of fur so the he's not very fuzzy, and the plush toy is stuffed to be quite solid. There is also cardboard in the base and lid to keep the shape. As such the Oscar plush toy is not as cuddly as the Cookie and Elmo plush toys. These were all distributed by Ganz.

 

 

Nanco also produced smaller sized Sesame Street plush toys in 2003. Above are two different 10 inch Elmo dolls. The one with the blue overalls has a picture of Dorothy the fish on the front (a closer view is shown below) and the arms are positioned upwards. Both dolls have the same plastic eyes.

This small 8 inch Elmo plush toy was made in 2003 by Publications International.

In 2003 these small plush Sesame Street key chain heads were sold at McDonalds restaurants. I'm not sure how many are in the set. Oscar and Bert are shown above.

Also in 2003 Hunter Leisure Pty. Ltd. produced this 5.5 inch plush Cookie Monster key chain doll. Elmo, Ernie and Big Bird are pictured on the hang tag with Cookie Monster which suggests they may have been included in this plush key chain series.

This is one of those items that makes me worry about being too much of a Muppet freak and that I'm taking this whole "collecting Muppet stuff" thing a bit too far! Sometime around 2003, give or take a couple of years, I saved an unopened package of Sesame Street Christmas wrapping paper! Which means that I have been hording this unopened wrapping paper for about 15 years now!!! All in the name of making my Muppet collection unique! Silly me!

I'm not certain what company made this wrapping paper but the packaging says that it was made in Montreal. During the early 2000's I worked at The Bay department store (now called Hudson's Bay Company) in the toy and stationary departments, and one year we sold this Sesame wrapping paper so I bought a pack to keep in my Muppet collection. Yep, I'm weird!

In 2003 C&D Visionary Inc. produced a series of Sesame Street embroidered magnets. Shown above is Big Bird, the Count, Ernie, and Bert. I also saw Cookie Monster and Elmo magnets for this series. Below is the back view.

In 2004 Fisher Price produced a plush Bert doll (shown on the right) that was very similar in style to the vintage doll made by Knickerbocker in the 1970s (shown on the left). Unfortunately I never found the matching Ernie by Fisher-Price.

I'm not sure how it's possible that both Fisher-Price and Hasbro would be producing Sesame toys at the same time, but apparently in 2004 that's what happened. Above is a Hasbro / Milton Bradley "Chutes and Ladders" board game made in 2004, the same year as the above Fisher-Price Bert plush toy. Perhaps because they are different types of toys this arrangement was possible? In any case, this is a very awesome board game which I still play with my friends quite often as part of our board game night. Below is a look at the game itself...

The game includes four game pieces which are awesome PVC figures of Elmo, Big Bird, Cookie Monster and Zoe. The four characters are also pictured as illustrations on the spinner card.

The game board is also illustrated with the four game piece characters along with additional Sesame characters. I find it interesting that Ernie, Big Bird and Oscar each only appear twice on this game board despite being the star characters of the show (and one of the game pieces), while Bert, Zoe and Cookie Monster each appear six times, and Elmo appears the most often out of all the characters 16 times! Just a tad too much Elmo for my liking! The Count, my favourite Sesame character, doesn't appear at all!!! Sucks! :(  Still, it's a very fun game to play.

In 2005 Gund expanded their 10 inch plush toys series adding Snuffleupagus to the collection. Below is a view of Snuffy's face from the front to show the embroidered eyes.

Above are three of the Sesame Street garden statues (lawn ornaments) made in 2005. Big Bird measures 19 inches tall. There is a sticker on the bottom of the left foot with the copyright info, 2005 Sesame Workshop, which also notes the manufacturer "Loblaws Inc." with a Montreal address. There's also a gold foil "Made in China" sticker. The Cookie Monster statue is 17 inches tall and is much lighter than the Big Bird statue because it's hollow. Ernie is 14 inches tall. These were sold at Loblaws grocery stores in Canada. (I bought the Big Bird and Cookie Monster statues at the Loblaws in Almonte, ON.) The statues are made with some kind of breakable material and I'm surprised that I haven't broken them yet. You may have noticed my collection doesn't have many breakable items...there's a reason for that! :)

Above and below: Two of the statues next to a Big Bird finger puppet for size comparison.

Ernie garden statue with a PVC figure next to it for size comparison.

Below is a link to a blog posting by Janet Hingsberg, who was in charge of the Sesame license for Loblaws. http://www.janethingsberg.com/brand-development-sesame-street/ Her blog page has a photo of essentially the full collection (she's missing one of the Oscar variations and Slimey). The set includes two different variations each of Bert, Cookie Monster, Grover (one of them is Super Grover), Oscar, Elmo, and Zoe, as well as one variation each of Ernie, Big Bird, the Count, and there's even one of Snuffleupagus! To complete the set, a small statue of Oscar's pet worm Slimey was sold as a Rain Gauge. It's shown at this link along with the other variation of Oscar (he is waving): Sesame Street lawn ornaments | Muppet Wiki | Fandom Therefore including Slimey there's a total of 17 statues in the collection, with 11 different Sesame characters. Additional images of the statues are shown at this link: Sesame Street garden ornaments | Muppet Wiki | Fandom

In addition to the garden statues, Loblaws Inc. also produced Sesame Street bubble bath. The liquid soap was sold in a vinyl pouch in the shape of Big Bird or Cookie Monster, and was either yellow or blue depending on the character. I haven't seen any other characters for this set. The back view of the soap pouches are shown below. You can see they have a plug on them that is the same type used on inflatable beach toys. These bubble bath pouches have a very strong perfume smell to them.

In 2005 Rubbermaid produced a series of Sesame Street storage bins that were available in a wide assortment of colours. Each bin had an illustration of a Sesame character on the side. These bins are awesome for storing Muppet collectables. I also use these bins to store the fabric that I make my puppets with. For some reason I didn't buy all of the bins in this series and only ended up with five of the eight that were made (yet I have doubles of the Cookie, Grover and Zoe bins.... not sure what I was thinking). Considering all the stuff I collect, these Sesame bins are quite handy to have!

The orange Ernie and Bert bin shown above is a medium sized bin, while Cookie Monster, Grover and Zoe's bins are larger sized bins. A medium light blue Cookie Monster bin was also made, which I don't have in my collection (image found online is shown below).

In 2019 I found the Elmo Rubbermaid bin at a thrift store! Awesomeness!

This is a medium sized bin.

This is the sticker label that comes on one side of the bins, under the handle. These sticker labels were meant to be torn off and discarded. Therefore, if you happen to find these Sesame bins second hand, this label will likely be missing. Being a collector and a Muppet freak, I left them on. :)

Below are closer views of the Sesame characters on the bins that I have. These illustrations look like the same ones that were used for the Sandy Lion stickers at the top of this page, but they are in fact completely different illustrations.

In addition to Bert and Ernie, Cookie Monster, Grover, Zoe, and Elmo Rubbermaid also made bins featuring:

Big Bird on a red medium size bin

Oscar on a green medium sized bin

The Count on a black large size bin, released near Halloween of 2005

As well, there is another light blue Cookie Monster bin, this time in medium size rather than large.

Below are images of the medium sized Big Bird, Oscar and Cookie Monster bins that I found online from an auction site... they were already sold, darn it! These Sesame Rubbermaid bins don't turn up online too often. If I ever stumble across a picture of the Count bin someday, I'll add it here too.

 

This is a package of Sesame Street party invitations produced in 2005 by Sterling Greetings

Here is an Ernie sun visor from 2005 that was made out of thin sheets of condensed foam. Ernie's nose is made from a rubber ball. This visor was produced by Darmos Toy Limited which is based in Halifax, Nova Scotia (but made in China). A better view of the hang tag and the top of the hat is shown below. The strap on the back of the hat has the Sesame Street sign on it. The figure of Ernie is a really interesting design and well made given the materials. As the hat is made if foam it is easily damaged or torn. I doubt these would last very long once given to a young child and suspect the hats would be quite rare in mint condition.

This is a super-awesome, ginormous book about the history of Sesame Street that was published in 2009 by Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers. ISBN-13: 978-1-57912-638-4 It come with a bonus DVD of the very first episode as well as additional "retro" footage. A "must have" for Muppet fans!

In 2010 Hasbro/Playskool made this plush toy of the new Sesame Street character, Murray. The toy is 9.5 inches tall and to my knowledge is the first (and possibly still the only) Murray plush toy to be made. 

I've seen this character on Sesame Street a few times now and, no disrespect to the puppeteers or Muppet folks who created him, but I really find Murray to be quite annoying. Quite possibly the most annoying puppet on TV. He is basically just a big flapping puppet mouth that is actually shoved into the TV screen which is the opposite of what made the Sesame Muppets so likeable. Additionally, his voice is annoying and it doesn't seem like the Sesame folks are trying to make him a genuine, interesting character that viewers would be sentimental about. He is just the basic "Hi Kids, I'm a happy puppet, look at me, goodness I'm silly!" which is a very, very, basic, generic puppet character type...."Oh boy! I'm such a happy puppet. Isn't my voice weird? I can talk this way because I'm a puppet." That's basically all there is to Murray which is not very interesting to me in the least.

Here is the small 7 inch plush Count by Gund, made in 2017. 

I showed it next to a PVC figure for size comparison.

Above is a very cute stylized Grover "Big Heads" plush toy with embroidered features. It's 6.5 inches tall, very soft and fuzzy, and was made by Toy Factory in 2022. There are eight characters in the Big Heads collection, including Big Bird, Ernie, Bert, Cookie Monster, Oscar the Grouch, Elmo, Abby Cadabby and Grover. All of the characters have embroidered facial features except for Ernie, Bert and Abby who have printed fabric faces. Below is a promo image that I found online showing the complete collection. It's my understanding that these were distributed as claw machine prizes. 

In 2022 Toy Factory also produced a standard series of Sesame Street plush toys with embroidered facial features. I won this 14 inch Big Bird at a fair playing the Birthday Game. The same eight characters in the above Big Heads series are are in this collection as well. 

Photos and Text © Mike Artelle