Apparently I'm into furbies now

On the 14th of June 2016 supersonicmario0770 made a post on the adoptafurby forums. The thread was titled "Rainbow Furby?" and included a link to an archived ebay listing.

"I have never seen one of these before or where it came from. I can't find it when I look it up, no sign of it anywhere online but this ebay listing. It's pink with rainbow ears, hair, and chest."

At first most forum members thought it was a customized furby with dyed fur, although some thought it could be an unknown prototype. While the ebay listing is unarchived, we know roughly what it said.

On the 15th aibo7m3 posted this:

"I would err on the side of caution and and say that it's probably a custom too, but the seller's story is that this furby was an employee gift given to some of the members at tiger electronics (including her husband)."

Two weeks later on July 6th furbyandchips made a forum post, providing pictures of their own rainbow furby.

"My friend bought me the other rainbow furby the seller on ebay was selling. Identical to this one. I do not believe it to be fake or custom made. I have inspected it closely and the bottom of the box was open, so the inside cardboard can be removed, but the furby is still attached to the cardboard and didn't look tampered with. All tags are present and in mint condition. Everything is as it should be and looks like it was made in a factory and not customized by someone. The seller told my friend the same story which I believe to be true going by the fact the other furby she bought with it was only furby number 4 of that release, which makes me think it could of been someone who worked for tiger to have such a early one. This furby is in a regular box but if you look at some of the other special editions they too were in regular boxes."

Three years later, on the 19th of January 2019 furbyandchips provided an update on their website heyfurby.com.

"Hello Furby Fans! To start off our new blog, I thought I would write about a very interesting Furby in our collection. I do not know her Furby name as I have never switched her on, she is still attached to the cardboard base from the factory. We decided to name her May May, which means Love ;-)

A good friend found May May on Ebay America and I have never seen another furby like her. A while ago I posted about May May on a furby forum to try and find out some information about her, but no one there had ever seen or heard of this furby. I'm not sure which generation she is, if she is a prototype, limited edition or something very special. She has all tags present and looks to be an Official Furby Release.

Looking at the photo you will see she has rainbow eyelashes and a purple face plate, unlike any other furby. She also has rainbow pattern ears, mane and belly.

Her colours are amazing and I wonder if there are any more around like her. We will always treasure May May and hope to eventually find out more information about her. Stay tuned!"

furbyandchips quickly provided an update on the 21st. In this post, furbyandchips described searching the wayback machine for furby.com articles, finding what they were looking for on a page titled 'news updates'.

From the 9th of November 1999 until the 1st of August 2000 a competition to design a furby took place on the back of Post brand cereals. Children 17 and under were asked to color in their own furby design, and send their entry in the mail by the 1st of August 2000. Twelve designs at random would then be selected and posted on furby.com where a winner could be voted by the public.

The winner was Brittany from Missouri, who won a trip to the furby design studio in Illinois, as well as recieving their own furby. However, furbyandchips was still left with some unanswered questions.

"So it turns out that this is in fact an official Furby-Tiger Release! (some doubted this on AdoptaFurby Forum). I wonder if 'Brittany from Missouri' still has her Rainbow Furby? Also were any of the other 12 entries created?

As far as I know, there are only two Rainbow Furby's in existence. The one that I own, and the other one the original seller (maybe) still has? After some more detective work, I found out the other rainbow Furby had a highest bid of $525.00 before the seller chose to end the auction early! I can only guess they had a change of heart and wanted to keep it."

Eight months later, on the 11th of august 2019 an update was posted on the private facebook group Furby Collectors.

"Hi guys! I'm brand new to this group, and while I'm not a “collector” per-se, i am very proud of this furry rainbow dude right here. He's one of three in existence, made in 2000 when i was just 10 years old. i just so happened to be the lucky winner of a coloring “design your own Furby” contest hosted by Post cereals back in the day. i was flown to Rhode Island with my family and allowed to tour the Hasbro factory, meeting the artists, getting sneak peaks into prototype toys to come, and got to meet the CEO himself! He presented to me, in a formal greeting ceremony, with three of the Furbies I'd designed as a little girl. One to play with (kept outside of the box), one to keep sealed, and one they put into their archives. i felt ike a Charlie and the Chocolate Factory! Truly a dream come true for a kid. Sadly, when i was 16 years old, 13 years ago now, my boxed Furby was stolen from me and sold by my late older brother who had been battling an incredibly difficult and heartbreaking addiction. I've come to terms with it over the years, but have always wondered what happened to the rainbow siblings of this furry cutie. I'd seen images posted online of an Ebay listing with one of the sibling Furbies before but have not discovered much more about their fates. thought I'd reach out here and give a bit of backdrop to this weird story in hopes i may learn something! Here I've included a goofy photo of my multicolored friend from recently and a clipping of the arcticle written from when i was an excited 10 year old girl!"

This still leaves some questions. If the other furby furbyandchips's friend bought was number four, then why would the facebook poster believe there to be only three in existance, why would furbyandchip's believe only two to exist, and why would the original ebay seller say their husband recieved two as an employee gift?

We can most likely rule out the brother making both ebay listings, since he only had access to one furby. Could there be more rainbow furbies that we don't know of?

If you have any more information on this furby, please get in touch! I tracked down the news article the original creator was mentioned in, but I needed a newspaper.com subscription to view it so I wasn't able to get further information from that. I also wasn't able to check the facebook group for further updates as I don't use facebook. If anyone has pictures of the back of the rainbow furby and can share them, that would be appreciated!

Here's some more images: