Dear Hasbro,I just made my 4,000 on TFW2005,in less than 9 months. Oh yeah,Please make Movie Scrapper/Mixmaster.
Don't forget the PotC shelfwarmers - heck, there's still a ton of unsold loot from Dead Man's Chest in my local Woolworths.
BTW, I'm still waiting for eBay auctions with titles like: Transformers movie Deluxe Swindle! VHTF! Sold Out! - Starting Bid $49.99
I worry that we'll have a huge swing the other way thanks to all the scalping...right now with the low TF orders the scalpers are picking stores clean...followed closely by the collectors...chains panic with empty shelves and overcompensate...waaaaaaaayyyyyy over-orderring thinking that TFs are going to be X-Mas GOLD!!! They all get their orders and stores are SWAMPED...and the scalpers who are now stuck with tons of product RETURN said TF's creating a huge glut of TF's on the shelves...said retailers go back to thinking TF's are a bad investment again...shelf space gets reduced...orders for Animated are lowered...and we all have a rough time finding Animated in a few months With all the scalping we really have no idea how well the kids are liking this line...so increasing the orders is actually very risky.... Yesterday I took a 200+ mile (each way) road trip with some freinds and barely lucked into some of the newer deluxes (that were being stashed by an employee for a scalper...I took them and paid when the emplyee was in a different department) and still didn't see a single G1 style Jazz, Thundercracker or Rescue Ratchet...Must have hit over 2 dozen WalMarts & Targets.
Honestly, I dont think it will be THAT bad if the store order a bit more than their usual holiday lot for Transformers merch. There are A LOT more kids looking for Transformers due to the movie than in previous years when the cartoon barely made it on the air. There might be a bit of a glut, but I don't think it will be as bad as you're making it out to be.
I'm actually kinda surprised to see the Walmart next to my college, and the one not too far away from my house both have a good amount of TF's. I'm thinking about going to the one and picking up the Leader Metroplex that I saw there last week, and maybe Leader Brawl if they still have him there. Though I'll probably buy the laptop that I've been planning on buying this weekend, and thus not have any money to spend on TF's. Here's my pipe-dream letter to hasbro: Dear Hasbro, Please reissue G1 Omega Supreme, make an Animated version of him, and also make a Supreme class sized Classics update of him for the Univers line
I kind of tend to lean towards this line of thinking. I don't know if it will be that dramatic but I think in a month or so you will see TONS of Transformers that aren't moving that fast. After the DVD is out for a month or so that is basically the drying up point for the movie toys. I am not a fan of the movie toys at all but I know it sucks for those that are right now. I personally am trying to find a Thundercracker for my cousin and checked three WalMarts and two Targets with zilch luck on any movie toys but one Starscream. Kind of sad really that Hasbro's retailers didn't order enough of the product but then how would they know that this would happen?
Well, with how poorly movie toys usually sell (look at the last couple of Spider-Man lines, Batman Begins line and even the FF and X2 line from awhile ago) and it's no real wonder why retailers may not want to glut themselves at first. Now that the line's a hit though... well, we may see a surge, but I don't think the demand is going to dry up after the movie is out. Sure, it may dry up initially, but at Christmas time all those kids who couldn't get toy x,y,z are going to be asking their parents for it. Christmas is the last big push for the movie IMPO.
I've just seen it happen before with Ninja Turtles and with POTF Star Wars Figures...Once the scalpers can no longer keep the shelves bare they stop buying as insanely...and once they aren't able to sell the ones they have they return them...and that screws up replentishment on future waves and affects the buyers who aren't looking at anything but what the stores say they have "on hand"
Lets hope the scalpers were dumb and didnt save receipts. Most stores limit the number or non-receipt purchases now.
Funny. Not at our store... the new Home Depot manager we got says "RETURNS BAD! NO MORE WITHOUT RECEIPT!" and even if you have a receipt he's making it very difficult. And guess what? He doesn't care if it's Target policy or not! Great new manager we got huh? I should have followed Roman over to the new store and than my O-ETL would be my stores old front end...
