The Margin: Barbie baby-name searches are spiking — and women already named Barbie are here for it

“We’ve seen a clear increase in traffic to our baby-name page for Barbie,” said Rebekah Wahlberg, associate editor and baby-name trends specialist at BabyCenter.

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This reflects a huge increase in parents-to-be showing interest in naming their bundles of joy Barbie, but it’s still too early to determine whether there’s been a bump in parents actually registering on BabyCenter.com or other sites that they’ve officially given their babies the name. 

“So, while actual registrations from parents for the name haven’t peaked yet, we can say that interest in the name has increased where there was little before,” Wahlberg said.

In the meantime, BabyCenter has catered to name-seekers’ curiosity by drawing up a list of Barbie-inspired names, such as Barbara — Barbie’s first name (her full name is actually Barbara Millicent) — or, of course, Ken and Kenneth, after Barbie’s beau.  

And both Nameberry and BabyCenter note that Barbara has long been a popular name. Barbara has been in the top 1,000 girls’ names in the U.S. since the Social Security Administration first started tracking baby-name data in 1900, and Barbara even ranked among the top 10 most popular names for girls from the 1920s through the 1950s. 

Here’s where Barbie comes in: Sophie Kihm, editor-in-chief at Nameberry, noted that the Barbie doll was named after creator Ruth Handler’s daughter, Barbara. Barbara Handler was born in 1941, when Barbara was ranked No. 2 among the top names for baby girls in the U.S. And 18 years later, the Barbie doll debuted in spring 1959 — just as the name Barbara slipped out of the top 10 girls’ names for the first time since 1927. 

“Barbie was a very appropriate name for a doll meant to represent a young woman in 1959,” Kihm told MarketWatch. “Barbie was strongly tied to the post-war period in America, and by the time the doll hit shelves, the typical formal name, Barbara, was beginning to feel tired.” 

Barbie has never quite reached the same height of popularity that Barbara did, however, perhaps due to the fact it was so closely identified with the doll. Barbie only ranked in the top 1,000 girl names from 1961 to 1968, in the decade after the doll’s debut. Today, it’s in the 5,000s. 

“Barbie is inextricably tied to the doll, which used to deter parents from using the name when Barbie was synonymous with ‘bimbo,’” said Kihm. “But the movie gave Barbie a feminist makeover, and parents may view this name in a different light.” 

Women who were named Barbie before it was cool told MarketWatch that they have been enjoying their own empowering boost since the movie came out. 

“It’s been encouraging to see people mention Barbie in a positive light, rather than as a dig — ‘Oh, you play with Barbies?’ – that would be more frequently thrown around when I was younger,” said Barbie Chiu, 25, from the San Francisco Bay Area. 

Chiu said kids would give her a hard time when she was growing up, and no one ever believes that Barbie is her real name – something Barbie Cervoni, 41, a registered dietitian from Long Island, N.Y., knows all too well. 

“One of the annoyances of having the name Barbie is that no one believes you,” she told MarketWatch. “My whole life, even to this day, when I introduce myself to new people, I get a furrowed eyebrow, and I often get a followup question like, ‘Is that your real name?’ or ‘Where is Ken?’” 

Cervoni, who is also a certified diabetes care and education specialist, said being named Barbie often pushed her to work harder to prove herself in the medical field –– especially because she is tall and blond, like the iconic figurine. “It has made me work harder to dispel those myths of what Barbie is, which is also what the movie tries to do,” said Cervoni. “And help people to understand that, the way we say you don’t judge a book by its cover, you also don’t judge someone by their name.”

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But to be sure, both women have also appreciated their special name, which is equal parts familiar to almost everyone, yet rarely encountered as someone’s name. “As an adult, I like knowing my name is unique and that I’m usually the only person in the room with that name,” said Chiu, adding she also enjoys “never getting my Starbucks order mixed up with someone else’s!” 

Cervoni agreed, noting no one ever forgets or mispronounces her name. And when she worked in pediatrics, it helped her young patients warm up to her. “When I meet a little girl, and someone says, ‘Look honey, this is Barbie,’ their eyes just light up,” she said. “It’s easy to create rapport, because Barbie is something that they think is this imaginary, fictitious person they play with, and now all of a sudden, there is this real Barbie in front of them, and it’s exciting.” 

Both women have also enjoyed friends, family and neighbors getting swept up in the “Barbie” movie hype. And the “Barbie” movie has been as empowering to them as it is to Margot Robbie’s titular character. 

“I haven’t gotten around to watching the movie myself — still a bit scarred from childhood teasing — but I’m glad the name puts a smile on peoples’ faces,” said Chiu.

“It’s exciting to see the name change from a punchline to a symbol of empowerment and progress overnight,” said Cervoni. “I always felt like I needed to prove the stereotype wrong, and it’s nice they’re changing the way that Barbie is perceived, and hopefully it sticks.

“It hasn’t always been easy [being Barbie], but this movie coming out has made it more fun,” she added.