The file
Small plush animals filled with plastic pellets and sold for about $5, with a heart-shaped tag and a name. Ty "retired" designs, which created scarcity, which created a market, which created adults fighting over Princess the bear.
People bought them as investments and put the tags in plastic. The bubble popped around 2000 and the divorce-court photo of a couple dividing their collection on the floor became the era's monument. The kids just liked the animals.
Sources: Wikipedia — Beanie Babies
