Latest News
09/18/07
Product Safety
The safety of our children is a major priority for Nea Matia Inc. and SophiaDolls. As a result we have adopted a strict product safety assurance program for all of our products.
09/14/07
The Goddess Within
Beverley Danusis is a goddess. She is also the creator of a new line of dolls designed to help pre-teen girls build self-esteem and positive body images and find the goddesses within themselves.
The SophiaDolls, nine years in the making, will be introduced to the world March 8 when Danusis, a Fort Wayne resident, makes a special hourlong appearance on shopping channel QVC. But northeast Indiana women will have a chance to order the first edition of the dolls, to be delivered in time for Christmas, at Woman's Night Out on Sept. 20 at Headwaters Park in Fort Wayne.
01/06/07
In The News
Up close: Beverly ("Lee") Danusis, 60, Fort Wayne
Dollmaker with a dream deferred
Source: Rosa Salter Rodriguez The Journal Gazette
Beverly Danusis used to work in the cosmetics industry, so when she lost a good friend to suicide and then struggled with her daughter, Beth, over issues involving body image, she realized that the messages our culture sends to women about beauty and self-esteem needed a major makeover.
"Look at that," she says, pointing to one of the popular Bratz dolls - one with an oversized head on an impossibly skinny body. No real woman, she says, looks like that - except perhaps, someone emaciated from an eating disorder.
"It teaches unrealistic body image," Danusis says. "And the name - Bratz! ... She teaches you to be bratty, not to be confident. ... And this is what we're teaching our daughters!"
