Buttons, banks and bath soap
Interviewed once for a newspaper story discussing the huge success of Simpsons merchandise, series creator Matt Groening explained his role by joking, "I don't control the tidal wave of 'Simpsons' success, but I try to surf on it as best I can."

Sip on it! Two of the many designs and colors of plastic water bottles from Betras Plastics. See Household for more details on these water bottles.

And, without a doubt, there has been a deep ocean of Simpsons merchandise, much of which we've listed in our Value Guide.

The most popular Simpsons merchandise include items that make great display pieces. The cool-looking Bart-shaped telephone isn't comfortable or practical, but collectors often buy an extra one just to put it on display.

Another fan favorite is Mattel's well-designed set of Simpsons dolls, especially the "Really Rude" Bart with a toy noise-maker and a "Bubble Blowing" Lisa with its own saxophone. The dolls now are very hard to find in top condition, typically commanding prices of $50 or more each. There is also the Pull-String Talking Bart doll, which features six smart-aleck sayings including one but a nice subtext: "Kids in TV land, you're being duped!" That doll typically sells for $70 or more in mint condition in its original box.

On the other hand, there is lots of early Simpsons merchandise still moderately priced. This includes the "Mystery of Life" board game and the "Trace N' Color Drawing Set." Both typically sell in near-mint condition for under $15 each.

Although not terribly good-looking, the 1990 set of dolls from Burger King are probably the most sought and traded of all Simpsons items, in part because they feature all five Simpsons family members. But expect to pay no more than $30 to $35 for a set in their original bagged condition.

Two sets of trading cards from Skybox, still reasonably priced in many card shops, are brilliantly designed. Rather than doing little more than dumping a bunch of blurry TV images on thick stock -- as Topps did with its mediocre 1990 Simpsons card set -- Skybox brought to both sets some great original drawings, clever jokes and inside information. The scratch-and-sniff, disappearing ink and Arty Art insert cards were icing on the cake.

A few years ago Groening noted that one of his favorite items of Simpsons merchandise is a chess set with pieces shaped like Grampa, Homer, Marge and the children. "I got very excited about the Simpsons chess set, brought one home, and my kids have learned to play chess as a result," he told The Los Angeles Times in 1997. "So I can say that the licensing of 'The Simpsons' has done at least one bit of good that I know of."

In addition to thousands of items created for the United States market, there are lots of other Simpsons products sold in other countries, especially Canada, Germany, Australia and the United Kingdom. In fact, many American Simpsons collectors are especially attracted to the novelty of items from other countries. Robert W. Getz told Toy Shop magazine in 1997 that he was a big fan of Simpsons merchandise made in France. "A three-figure set of Homer, Marge and Bart was made in France in conjunction with a French detergent called Vizir. The figures prominently feature the Vizir logo. A set of Bart Simpson hor d'oeuvre knives were also produced in France," he said.

Unfortunately, far too much Simpsons merchandise doesn't hold up in quality, particularly some of the early stuff. Trying to make a quick buck on the show's sudden success, some manufacturers turned out products that were little more than cheap generic goods with slapped-on likenesses of Bart Simpson and other characters spouting tired catchphrases, such Bart's "Don't have a cow, man!" or "Aye, carumba!" Notable among the cheaply made Simpsons merchandise were games from Ja-Ru that, in our experience, quickly fall apart.

Show's success sparks bootlegs
The huge popularity of "The Simpsons" and the strong demand for anything Simpsons, especially in the show's earliest days, has often led to counterfeit Simpsons shirts, as well as bootleg buttons, bumper stickers and other easily duplicated items.

Many serious collectors have little interest in bootlegs. Mostly, the quality of these ripoffs are so bad it's their brazen awfulness that's their only redeeming feature. We've seen many Simpsons dolls so distorted that some sellers try to claim they are licensed items modeled after the crudely drawn Simpsons that appeared on the early "Tracey Ullman Show" shorts. Another popular claim is that these sour-faced bootlegs are "evil" versions of the Simpsons characters. (To tell if a Simpsons item is licensed, look for Groening's stamped-on signature, as well as the Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp. copyright, sometimes abbreviated TCFFC.)

A few of these knock-off Simpsons items, though, are clever enough to impress even Simpsons creator Groening, who has made room in his office for a bootleg plaster bust of Bart wearing a sombrero. "I've always said that copyright infringement is the ultimate compliment," he once said. Even so, Groening, who oversees Simpsons licensing, hasn't stopped Twentieth Century Fox attorneys from targeting flagrant bootleggers in order to protect the company's rights to the characters it owns.

Fox has authorized legal action against companies selling unlicensed Simpsons merchandise, and the company has warned that it will attempt to shut down any Internet Web site selling unlicensed Simpsons merchandise.

Not long ago, Fox successfully sued an Australian firm that briefly distributed its own Duff Beer, which featured a packaging clearly inspired by Homer's fictitious favorite brand. (Some bright Australians quickly bought up cases of the stuff, and are now selling unlicensed Duff beer for about $45 a can on the Internet.)

Long before this beer case in Australia, Groening and Fox turned down a pitch for a licensed Duff beer. "We had some legitimate requests to put out the beer, but that's something I said we absolutely shouldn't do. I wasn't going to have `The Simpsons' encouraging kids to drink alcohol," Groening told the Los Angeles Times.

In the interview, Groening said he and Fox are much more choosy these days over which Simpsons products they will allow to be licensed. Sometimes, though, rejection works the other way.

Groening revealed that food makers didn't like his concept for a Simpsons cereal, one that would be a parody of highly sugared ones. He wanted a vibrantly colored box to attract children -- except his cereal actually would have some nutritional value. "I wanted Bart to market it, with him on the box saying, `There's no sugar in it, but you can put as much as you want on it!' A sugarless cereal -- just my idea for a small public service to the kids of America," Groening said wistfully. "But we couldn't get one cereal company to go along with the idea of a healthy cereal for kids. I said, `How about a low-sugar cereal?' Nope, not good enough."