5 Randomly Retro Pin-Badges, Part 2

Welcome to a 2^nd showcase of Randomly Retro Pin-Badges from the clutter pile.

The previous article received a suitable number of hits which warranted this part 2 even more. With a large biscuit tin in storage stuffed full of buttons there is certainly more than enough to pass a trilogy. Some of these feature designs that range from whacky, cheesy and downright cool spanning from the past five decades. So read on and marvel at the next 5 artefacts from pin-badge past...

1/ Bristol & West Snoopy Promotion (1987)

Whilst NatWest costumers enjoyed the premium of Piggy Bank characters, B&W kids savers received a Snoopy's Doghouse ceramic moneybox instead. I wanted a Powermaster Optimus Prime so bad back in those days, so I had an account set up with the local B&W building society. The insentive got me into banking at a primary school age and whatever was left from my allowance through buying Marvel comics and Garbage Pail Kids stickers went towards the fund. 4 years later, there was no Prime, but the collection went towards a Sega Master System I ended up passing on after a month. Oh yeah, the Snoopy badge (none of the other Peanuts characters were included in the promotion – not even Woodstock!) was part of a membership pack including some stationary (and that doghouse moneybox!). As for Powermaster Prime, I ended up acquiring his souped up Japanese God Ginrai counterpart in 2002 for next to nothing! Waiting does pay off.

2/ Vanilla Ice, Big Magazine (Early 90's)

This most likely came with the same magazine (or it might have been Smash Hits!) I found with a feature on how to mimic the artists trademark beak hairstyle. There's an earlier blog I wrote with a scan of the feature here - a blog which Vanilla Ice himself linked to via his official Twitter account. Nice to be noticed.

3/ Turtle Action (1990)

One in a long series of TMNT badges available from various greetings cards retailers. The image depicting Leonardo swinging through a white background (despite the rope being on the opposite side) is one of many images drawn in that 'no black outline' style on a lot of UK produced Ninja Turtles merchandise. 

 4/ Transformers Autobot Bumblebee (1985).

Acquired from the front of a Transformers birthday card. An insignia, a Transformers G1 logo and the name and function of a Transformers character are the design layout. There were other name badges too, including some for the dastardly Decepticons. Despite no character image, I was content enough to have a polished Transformers logo all the same, despite my name not being Bumblebee. 

 

5/ Care Bears, Birthday Bear (1985)

This suitably selected Birthday Bear card badge belonged to my brother. Like with Transformers, there were other character pins available too. A decent little artefact from the days when the Care Bears brand (pre-remakes) was at its most strongest. If memory serves correct these were also a free gift with an issue of Marvel UK's weekly Car Bears comic as well.

That's it for the second lineup of Randomly Retro Pin-Badges. A third summary of random enamel goodness is already in the pipeline. Whether its goodness is entirely up to you.

Until next time!

-HERO