bear company type privately held company industry manufacturing retail founded 1983 1 headquarters shelburne vermont 1 products teddy bears parent the mustang group subsidiaries current calyx & corolla pajamagram pajamajeans vermont brownie former gift bag boutique tastygram website vermont teddy bear company the vermont teddy bear company vtb is one of the largest producers of teddy bears and the largest seller of teddy bears by mail order and internet . the company handcrafts each of its teddy bears and produces almost 500 000 teddy bears each year . the company was formerly traded on the nasdaq stock exchange under the ticker symbol bear but was taken private by the mustang group a boston based private equity firm on september 30 2005 partially to avoid the reporting requirements of the sarbanes oxley act . history edit the company was founded in 1983 1 by john sortino who sold handcrafted teddy bears in an open air market in burlington vermont . sortino happened upon the idea of packaging and selling bears through the mail when a tourist visiting burlington wanted a bear mailed to her home . the concept was called the bear gram which features the customized teddy bear placed in a box complete with an air hole and stuffed with other goodies . by 1995 the company moved into its new headquarters in vermont s champlain valley . the company has two factories one in shelburne and one in newport . the shelburne factory is an especially popular tourist destination and also served as a concert site for the annual vermont mozart festival . the company also maintained two retail locations in vermont shelburne and on the main road between waterbury and stowe . also by 1995 vtb had sponsored on the east coast various guns for bears exchanges and expanded to the west coast in 1996 starting with uc irvine s student physicians for social responsibility and the brea police department . 2 in may 1997 the vermont teddy bear co. filed a copyright infringement suit against disney over pooh grams being similar to its mail order bear gram trademark and logo . 1 vtb acquired calyx & corolla an upscale flower company headquartered in vero beach florida in 2003 . ironically one of vermont teddy bear s marketing slogans claimed that sending a teddy bear is a creative alternative to sending flowers . in 2005 the company launched a new sister company gift bag boutique which offered handbags and purses along with many make up accessories . along with pajamagram which sold gift pajamas and tastygram which offered gourmet food gifts the creation of this sister company brought the total number of companies under the vermont teddy bear umbrella to five . gift bag boutique and tastygram stopped accepting orders as of june 26 2008 . 3 for valentine s day of 2005 vermont teddy bear caused widespread controversy by offering a crazy for you bear which wore a white strait jacket with a red heart embroidered and a tag entitled commitment papers came with the bear . mental health groups from all over the u.s. asked for the bear to be pulled out of production vtb kept the bear up for sale but sold out quickly and elizabeth robert the company head resigned from the board of vermont s largest hospital fletcher allen health care . 4 in may vtb agreed to be acquired by a mustang group led investment group for 6.50 a share . 5 advertising edit vtb was listed amongst a broad range of direct marketers pitched by the show s hosts themselves who were taking out more ads on talk radio in 2010 according to dan metter director of talk radio sales of premiere radio networks . conservative radio hosts were seeing an uptick in listener numbers and advertising in the lead up to the year s midterm elections . premiere is the syndicator of the top three talk radio shows hosted respectively by rush limbaugh sean hannity and glenn beck . 6 references edit a b c d vermont teddy bear co. sues disney . los angeles times . ap . may 28 1997 . retrieved 6 april 2013 . pope john march 30 1996 . they hope to create a bear market for gun owners . los angeles times . retrieved 6 april 2013 . gift bag boutique homepage . retrieved 2009 02 09 . and tastygram homepage . retrieved 2009 02 09 . teddy bear chief quits board of vt. hospital . los angeles times . ap . february 10 2005 . retrieved 6 april 2013 . in brief also . los angeles times . may 17 2005 . retrieved 6 april 2013 . wilkerson david b. talk radio s a hit in polarized environment ad sales are rising for clear channel s premiere radio networks marketwatch sept. 22 2010 6 00 am . edt . retrieved 2010 09 22 . coordinates 44 21 40.5 n 73 13 48.64 w 44.361250 n 73.2301778 w 44.361250 ; 73.2301778 v t e teddy bears bear manufacturers build a bear workshop chad valley j. k. farnell gund ideal toy company margarete steiff gmbh merrythought teddy atelier stursberg teddy hermann ty inc vermont teddy bear company types of bear ag bear beanie babies boyds bears care bears coffee bean bears forever friends freddy teddy gund snuffles holiday beanie babies me to you bears werebears teddy bear museums teddy bear museum dorset teddy bear museum teddy bear museum of naples famous teddies aloysius archibald ormsby gore benjamin bear berlino duffy the disney bear fozzie bear freddy fazbear grizzly teddy lotso microsoft bear misha nassur nev paddington bear pooky pudsey bear rilakkuma roosevelt rupert bear rupert family guy smokey sooty superted teddy mr. bean teddy ruxpin uszatek mr whoppit winnie the pooh yogi bear film and television the adventures of teddy ruxpin bear behaving badly becky and barnaby bear c bear and jamal colargol disney s adventures of the gummi bears issi noho old bear stories paddington the secret world of benjamin bear superted ted ted 2 the teddy bear master teddy edward the yogi bear show boonie bears books corduroy little bear old bear and friends teddy dressing the berenstain bears uppo nalle winkie winnie the pooh music let me be your teddy bear psycho teddy teddy bears picnic the teddy bear song video games build a bear workshop hubert the teddy bear winter games naughty bear op ration teddy bear related topics the bear club peter bull gummy bears round and round the garden sgul teddy bear hospital richard steiff sudanese blasphemy case teddybear airdrop minsk 2012 teddy bear parachuting teddy bear review teddy bear toss teddy grahams theodore roosevelt retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title vermont teddy bear company & oldid 704300481 categories newport city vermontcompanies based in vermontshelburne vermonttoy companies of the united statesprivately held companies based in vermontteddy bear manufacturerscompanies established in 19831983 establishments in vermonthidden categories coordinates not on wikidata navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 10 february 2016 at 19 51 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; 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