THIS. I'm relatively new to Kapow Toys, but for the past year they have been the best place to get Transformers for me. With no Combiner Wars wave 2 coming, and evidence of Hasbro's limited support in the UK waning, it's like the 80s all over again. Thankfully with the GBP quite good against the Yen, I just got Unite Warriors Superion from Kapow for little more than I'd have had to pay for the individual components in a UK store..

 

Well, hey, it's not like they want to sell toys in the UK anyway.

 

Reply 62 for those with non standard posts per page.

Ta, knew i'd seen the link on here somewhere!

 

"I can't be bothered with that"..to quote a famous brit

 

I most certainly HOPE not as my feelings attached that man are not pleasant. He was an impediment to the brand.

On a more pleasant note, I'm happy to hear that KapwToys.com has had positive effect on the fellow fan community over on the other side of the pond. I've never like how Hasbro has treated you guys.

I can think of nothing more disheartening nor hellish then to be a collector robbed of the ability to collect.

 

This actually has massive implications for the UK toy market, not just for transformers fans.
Hasbro are possibly one of the UKS biggest toy providers (lego is the top) and for them to just not bother having a presence at the UK toy fair is basically ruling out smaller toy stores and online retailers from having access to see the upcoming toylines and place orders for the upcoming seasons.
Yes hasbro will still be on the sell to these retailers but to just say its not an important enough market is just downright arogant on their part.

Yeah off you go to germany hasbro, see how much the eurozone can afford to buy fromyou...have fun with greece

 

Meh, they rarely show anything new there anyway.

 

Lazy bastards! Why is the UK always neglected with everything? This is ridiculous! They better start doing more over here soon, we are just as important as the US, in fact maybe more, they wouldn't exist without us!!

 

This is kind of annoying me, for multiple reasons.

Firstly, it does suggest that the UK is less important than the rest of the Toy Fair venues. HOWEVER, London is the first venue of a global tour, we arent SUPPOSED to get leaks, the official press release pics are always after New York. So other than the fact that a bunch of entitled nerds that expect an info dump on day one will have to wait a week longer, theres no major loss of service for any of us. In fact we at this point know exactly which events each year will showcase new stuff.

Secondly, that this in any way signifies a return to the 'wilderness years' of transformers distribution. We have had hands down the best year for Generations releases in a decade, not complete but a shitload better than the last few years, there is NOTHING to say this wont steadily improve.

Lastly, I love Kapow, and I consider Andy a friend, but the biggest issue with UK distribution right now is the people buying the toys. Collectors willing to shank each other to get the latest figures 5 seconds after they release. If more people had held off buying from the online retailers, and instead waited a few weeks for brick and mortar stores they would have flown off the shelves. The Protectobots are finally saturating retail, what response do the fans give? ALREADY BOUGHT THEM! BORED NOW! WHENS WAVE 4 DUE!!!! Because you can wipe out Kapow or any other retailers figures, but it doesnt count towards the UK sales as far as Hasbro are concerned.

So few people in this fandom have any sense of the big picture, its just entitlement and butthurt when companies dont bend over backwards to cater to them. Here's an idea. Give them cause to!!!

 

The problem is the complete uncertainty whether certain toys, or specific waves, will ever become available at European retail.

Think of all the people who held off from ordering wave 2 of Combiner Wars online because of the MASSIVE launch of wave 1 all across Europe.

Only when wave 2 was sold out at most places online, we got confirmation that the figures wouldn't be distributed in Europe.

As long as we don't get reliable confirmation from Hasbro which figures will be available here and which ones won't, a lot of collectors aren't going to take chances and order online. Not because they need those figures "now" but because they prefer to buy them before prices have skyrocketed due to limited stock.

 

Respectfully, I disagree with you completely.

The question of whether we ever get any waves at all has been an issue since day 1, but when we do get figures, what happens?

This is not an isolated incident, this is a symptom of TF sales going back several years, the WFC, FOC and IDW wave 1 being prime examples. If online retailers had not provided that stock as an option, it would have sold out in brick and mortar stores. Fans want generations so will always take the first available opportunity to load up on it. The days of going in to a store and buying 1 figure are a rarity, now people buy 2-4 figures online and ship in bulk. This harms sales in brick and mortar stores, its simple economics.

As for Combiner Wars wave 2 specifically, using Kapow as an example, they pre-sold out. Then they came in stock and sold out again in under a day. Im pretty sure their restock went quick too. Its not like anybody passed them up for retail. But then theres plenty of people in this fandom that think if they refuse to buy figures at retail price they will get them in bargain stores for a fraction of the price (true story courtesy of the TF Youtube community on FB), so who knows what some of them are thinking. Im sure there were those that waited in good faith, but the second this news broke (months ago), people did not act. There comes a certain point where you have to say 'this is kind of your own fault'. I remember hearing the wave may get skipped in around February. What do you expect Hasbro to do? Order retailers to clear the shelves because wave 2 is coming?

If people dont buy, retailers dont want, so Hasbro does not provide.

TF's may be thriving, sales of UK/European stock are not

The thing that truly bends my mind is the fact that people have well and truly lost their rags over the stunticons not coming to retail. Theyre still easily purchasable, the prices arent THAT bad, hell, if they wait 2 months theres a Takara G1 accurate one coming! I do feel like a bit of a hypocrite, or maybe im just that annoying guy that brings a logical knife to an illogical gunfight, but if people want figures, they can get them, right now, the UK has never been short of avenues for this, plenty of global options. But if you want toys in retailers, then buy them in retail only and hope enough other fans do to. And just accept they skipped a wave for heavens sake. I mean come on, Amazon.com had them listed for a month and a half at a price that importing them would have been pretty much standard retail. How many people bothered with that?... show of hands?

Sadly, I think there are enough greedy people that dont give a shit about this issue and will piss and moan about it on here with no comprehension of the actual facts that stores will never recover, online sales will thrive and this debate will never end.

Sorry to in any way belittle other TF fans, but its true, we can set the world to rights here and now, but some people just want all the toys and want them yesterday.

Im gonna bow out of this, I said my piece and I respect your viewpoint dude. Im just sick of the futility of it all.

Oh if you look here, theres preorders for wave 2, dropping any day now.
Combiner Wars, Masterforce

Or theres this
https://www.ordersixtysixtoys.co.uk/categories/Transformers/Combiner-Wars/

Just saying, took 2 minutes to find

And prices never skyrocket, people just look in stupid places (amazon marketplace/ebay) expecting rock bottom prices in the secondary market

 

What Nevermore said.

 

I think your missing the fact that we fans at best make 1% we don't make a dent in what toy stores shift in total. they don't really care if they loose a small amount in sales to a small online store, they are after kids and kids don't even know what a case assortment is.

Its the same for Hotwheel's. In the US they get tons of lines that we would not even know existed if it were not for the internet. We only get the cheap mainline (minus the Super Tresure hunts for some reason unless its imported US stock) and maybe some tie in stuff. The premium cars will never make it to the UK because they are not interested in collectors.

 

Depends on how large a share you think adult fans make up. It's not a discussion that ever ends well, but personally I think we're a minority, thats not to say we couldnt be the tipping point on wether we got wave 2.

Although with wave one hitting the UK so early it seems like many people did buy in store and we still didnt get wave 2. So either we dont make up a large enough market to get Hasbro to ship consecutive waves or Hasbro just always over produce waves.

 

"Hasbro Abandons UK, No One Notices"

 

To say that fans who have bought from Kapow Toys have brought this upon themselves is both unfair and incorrect. I myself am looking at the upcoming releases, particularly Combiner Wars, and choosing which version of a toy I would rather own. Fact is I bought Prime, Silverbolt, Alpha Bravo and Blackjack from a UK brick and mortar store in January. (weird, they only sold toys, not bricks or mortar..)

That same chain of stores just opened a new branch near me recently, and to say their TF aisle was lacking would be an understatement. My local Sainsburys had more up to date waves of toys.

With that in mind, is it any wonder people shop online, where the products are actually available?

And as for "kids don't know.what a case assortment is", of course they don't. But even as a small boy I knew we were getting shafted when we only got 4/5 Dinobots, 3/6 of each faction of Pretenders, and so on. Sure I didn't know about waves and distribution withing those waves, I just knew I didn't have access to.characters I cared about and wanted to be able to spend my pocket money on! And I doubt kids today would be so different.

TL;DR: I am really glad that the Internet exists, because physical shops either don't, can't, or won't sell what I want to buy, and I feel sorry for the young fans over here who thought they'd be able to walk into their local store and complete their Combiner.

 

Yes.

He needs to be identified and come to BotCon.

 

This. It's easy to constantly spam "be patient" when you're not the one who misses out waiting for something that never happens.

What UK fans should be doing is looking for ways to get parents acquainted with ordering from places like Kapow. Your regular retailers can't be bothered to compete? Fine, let them take a financial hit. If enough people can do that, they'll either get their act together or the alternatives will be able to expand their operations.

 

yay, more reasons to f(rickin*) hate Hasblo!

I feels for yas, UK-Transformer fans!