Mike Mittelman has invented Modern Hugs dolls, recordable, huggable, plush dolls that celebrate today’s modern grandmothers. A resident of West Windsor for three years, he and his wife, Jennifer, an attorney, were raised in the Philadelphia area. Their three children are Talia, 4, and twins, Evan and Ariela, who are 21 months old. Anny, an au pair from Brazil, lives with them.
“I read to my kids every night and realized that the grandmothers portrayed in their story books did not look like my mom or mother-in-law, or many of the other grandmothers I know,” says Mittelman on his website. He decided to do something to remedy the situation and has developed five prototypes that he is selling on a pre-order basis as seed money to fund the production.
The dolls include a recorder for grandparents to record their voice. The recording device inside the doll works by pressing the record button located inside the right hand of the doll. To deter children from accidentally erasing messages left on the recording device, the record feature will only start to work once the record button is pressed and held for a few seconds. Press the record button again after leaving the message to complete the recording.
A graduate of University of Michigan with a bachelor’s degree in communication studies, Mittelman received his JD from George Washington University Law School. He is the director of social media with the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York.
He and his wife moved from Westchester, New York, to West Windsor after their first child was born to be closer to family in Philadelphia. “My oldest daughter attended pre-school at Beth Chaim pre-school, and my two younger children participate in some programs there now,” Mittelman says.
He recently pitched Modern Hugs to Telebrands CEO AJ Khubani, the man in charge of marketing products on “As Seen on TV.” The Skype interview included descriptions of each of the five 16-inch dolls, including Bubbly Bubbie, Natural Nana, Movin’ Mom-Mom, Achieving Abuela, and Glamorous Grandma.
Mittelman says the dolls are not modeled after a specific person. “We created the first five dolls to strike a balance between the desire to show that we believe that there is more than one type of grandmother but also to keep production costs down in the first generation of dolls,” he says.
“The online pitch session went really well,” Mittelman says. “AJ Khubani of Telebrands liked my product and thought that the product was one that fit his ideal demographic, but he wanted to see more sales first before moving ahead together. As a company that is only a few weeks old, that is completely understandable. Still, it was great to be able to pitch to someone like Mr. Khubani and get that instant feedback.”
Visit www.modernhugs.com for more information about the dolls.
