Roger Schlaifer Coca-Cola, Rushton Toys and IBM. In 1978 Schlaifer branded an early jogging-shoe roller-skate as Hot Rollers and licensed the Hot Roller brand for kids’ apparel, skates and fashion accessories which sold at stores such as Bloomingdales, Belk’s and Mervyn’s. Building on the success of his licensing Hot Rollers, in 1981 Schlaifer proposed an exclusive, worldwide licensing agreement with Xavier Roberts’ company, Original Appalachian Artworks, for the rights to "Little People" soft sculpture dolls and Babyland General Hospital. Schlaifer rebranded the "Little People" dolls as Cabbage Patch Kids. In addition to signing up Coleco Industries on August 9, 1982, as its
Cabbage Patch Kids to develop his own line of fabric sculptures. He called these hand-stitched, one-of-a-kind, soft fabric sculptures "The Little People". (Other soft sculpture dolls dating back to the 19th century were created using similar needle molding techniques.) His Little People were not offered for sale, but were "adopted" each with their own individual name and birth certificate. Instead of paying a purchase price, buyers of Little People would have to pay an adoption fee. The Little People were first sold at arts and crafts shows, then later at Babyland General Hospital, an old medical clinic that Roberts and his friends-turned-employees converted