The Plastic Empire Podcast Interview with Chris Sterett of Dr. Wu

Discussion in 'Transformers 3rd Party Discussion' started by prime-el, Jul 9, 2016.

  1. daddytron

    daddytron Made of too much clear plastic

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    How do I read inside the spoiler brackets on an iPad? I'd rather read the Cliff notes than call Chris lol.
     
  2. kollekxon

    kollekxon Well-Known Member

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    Solid show, I got more out of this podcast than the last episode, this was more focused.
     
  3. Shiro1

    Shiro1 Well-Known Member

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    Cool show. Pedro was much better this time around. Well done Pedro.

    Thanks again to Chris. Very informative.
     
  4. Scaleface

    Scaleface Well-Known Member

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    We just post them without spoiler tags. This isn't the ending of a movie, it's a interview about a business!

    -Keith X is NOT The Middleman.
    -3rd parties USED to be made at the same factory, all the casts were kept in the same closet.
    -According to some designers, there is sabotage and stealing of casts going on, personal stuff etc.
    -Companies that are doing well now used to go under different names, and made crappy stuff in the past.
    -In the past, companies used to piggyback on other companies' casts to save money. This was back when they used to share factories.
    -Fansproject wanted to work with The Middleman, who is wealthy and has contacts with the film industry, to make their own original cartoon series. Unfortunately this fell through.
    -The middleman has a stranglehold on certain companies, and can dictate to them what they can and cannot make.
    -When 3P has finished with their old molds, they sell them off to other people.
    -Fansproject is looking to improve their products even more.
     
  5. Nighthawkblack

    Nighthawkblack Well-Known Member

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    I think the summary is onpoint but a few details are missing from what I gathered.

    The short my take was- there is a "middle man (more like a distributer)" that didn't need to be there by design but monopolized due to high supply and low demand during certain periods. May have also negotiated exclusivity during those times.

    The middle man idea he spoke of was not someone that you have to go through or else it doesn't get made but rather some companies had to go through someone during certain periods of time as a result of demand and supply. So when order numbers were low from etailers say 250 in aggregate, and production runs were for 1000 etc, you would be stuck with a ton of product. Chris was saying they would sell their entire run to this quasi middle man who had resources to buy the whole run so they in turn could have the capital to do a new project.



    I hope companies like FT KFC can lower prices and/or persuade etailers without compromising margins for everyone involved since there is enough demand for their products to go straight to etailers. I want to see the 3p scene survive but I couldnt afford all the TF characters in the catalogues when they were 5 to 75 bucks so I certainly can't afford them all when they are 65 to 235. :( 
     
  6. eatingcake

    eatingcake Well-Known Member

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    you can try this, works on Android, so it might work for Apple products.

    you press and hold to highlight it like you do when you highlight some text for copying. this will cause the text to appear and not blacked out.
     
  7. Weezie

    Weezie Well-Known Member

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    Sorry, I didn't think about people using an iPad. I went back and removed the spoiler tags.
     
  8. Scaleface

    Scaleface Well-Known Member

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    Chris,

    1. At one point you started going into a talk about how several old companies that had bad reputations just changed their names and still produce MP toys that everyone loves today. You ALMOST started telling us the names of the companies, and then the hosts kept interrupting you, changing the topic. Can you tell us what companies they used to be (if you can't tell us who they are today)?

    2. Can you give us an example of two different third party toys from different companies that shared a cast?

    3. Can you please help expand on the mystery behind the Star Rescue Team dinosaur and rescue vehicle combiners? As far as I can tell they were designed by the same guy who designed TFC Hercules at about the same time, and they were linked to a Chinese kids cartoon. There seemed to be plans right from the start to see them repainted in G1 Protectobot and Dinobot colors and cross sell them to TF collectors. What happened to this guy and his ideas? Why did the toys end up coming out from Jin Jiang Toys years later?
     
    Last edited: Jul 24, 2016
  9. Scaleface

    Scaleface Well-Known Member

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    Just listening podcast, what Chris said was in ?2013? the Middleman wanted to make the cartoon, he had writers, director and stuff ready to go, and asked Chris to contact FansProject about making a toy line for it. Chris thought FansProject would be all about it. Chris contacted FansProject and they didn't have time because of a big contract that had going.
     
    Last edited: Jul 24, 2016
  10. Weezie

    Weezie Well-Known Member

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    I think this clarifies where those Takasa Tony Masterpiece KOs could have come from. People were originally saying the figures were rejects that the workers were taking from the factory and selling. It seems more likely that the molds themselves were stolen or bought from the Takara factory, which the KOers used to make their knockoffs.

    This would also explain why so many of the Takasa KOs are high quality (at least for KOs) because they're not copies of copies (as KOs often are) but are literally made from the same mold as the Takaras.
     
  11. Shiro1

    Shiro1 Well-Known Member

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    Not even God himself could persuade them. :) 

    Ah yes, but what about the MP-11 mold that is still being used by Takara and also being KO'd?
     
  12. Weezie

    Weezie Well-Known Member

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    Jesus is a 3rd party fan :D 

    I think there are several molds made from the master copy, not just one. It's not impossible that the KOers got a hold of one of them.
     
  13. Slave IV

    Slave IV more wealth than you can imagine!

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    I thought a lot of Ko reviews point out different spruce marks that indicate different moods being used?...
     
  14. Scaleface

    Scaleface Well-Known Member

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    Some KOs are new molds, some are not.

    The specific example he gives was a Dr. Wu face that Dr. Wu was done with so he sold it to Chimungmung who mass produced to for his store.

    chimungmung Toy Shop
     
  15. Scaleface

    Scaleface Well-Known Member

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    Well, answering my own question here, but I'll post it publicly so others can see the answer, I listened to a ROC podcast where they were interviewing Jay Corbet, where he did say that the vendors were making requests that the 3P companies curb the duplication, since it's killing them to carry 4-5 versions of the same character at the same time! That is the reason by Corbot V is trying to make characters no one else is making.
     
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  16. edgecrusher

    edgecrusher "She wanted nothin', and I delivered." TFW2005 Supporter

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    Well the parallel you're drawing there (whether purposefully or accidentally) is not quite right. To be more specific, companies aren't going to do it out of the goodness of their heart because they care whether retailers have limited stock space. If anything, a top tier produce has all the more reason to release a figure that others are doing because (a) they can steal sales with their higher quality version, (b) they can even harm a competitor if they time it right, and (c) they have leverage over the vendors (i.e., either you carry ours [in addition to or even instead of] theirs or we'll cut your distribution allotment of our other future products). The reason some lesser companies do unique figures is because they need to establish a niche and differentiate themselves, and their figure is going to sell better (thus giving them the revenue to afford the next figure's production) when they're the only one with a figure for a given character than when they have 3-4 competitors doing the same character in their own styles. Having a top tier designer release a figure of the same character immediately crushes your sales.
     
  17. Chrisola

    Chrisola Solid crotch ratchet

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    That makes sense...but...

    The top tier companies can guarantee sales by making unique figures, then hitting us with variants later. Particularly when there are so many variants the differences between each companies release become so minor we can all get hyper critical (IDW, G1 toy, G1 cartoon -every company is working from the same sources) and in the top tier, now XTB and KFC have stepped it up, even the QC isn't really a deciding factor.

    Look at FansToys Lupus - it's the only MP Weirdwolf even on the horizon, so with it a) being a good and faithful version of the character b) being from a top tier company c) fitting in well with existing MP scale headmasters, it's a no brainer for collectors (who want it all) and fans to buy it - unless they really don't like it.

    Now if FT-28 had not been Sixshot (and thus have awesome looking competition in DX9 and GCreation), but had been an MP G1 Jazz (for example), everyone would likely lose their shit and sales would be off the charts. They would likely get buy in from 90% of MP collectors and Jazz fans, as there is really nothing else close to coming out, and FansToys are just that good to be the definitive version for most people (which is exactly what they're playing on when they do their trick of announcing just before a rival company releases).

    Then, way after the other Sixshots were out, they could go ahead and release their version, and people who were either on the fence, brand loyalists, or are now dissatisfied with an older figure (it happens) would buy him up in spades, and so Fans Toys likely make more money than they'll get trying to poach sales off an imminent release of DX9, which is looking like a fantastic figure, from a great company.

    When you have a good product and good reputation and fanbase, be first - grab all the cash, then jump in later to steal sales off the competition. Who cares if another (to use the example) MP G1 Jazz hits in 2 years? You were first and you got 90% of the market - cash is in the bank.

    OR...

    Us fans \ collectors have deep pockets on the whole, but there are limits...maybe it's a blessing there are so many variants of each character, otherwise, we'd all run out of money, so maybe that's the master plan of the Plastic Illuminati.
     
  18. Hoffman

    Hoffman Well-Known Member

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    I can see both sides. As a retailer, multiple options for the same product does make purchasing decisions more difficult.

    As a consumer though, options can be good.

    Ultimately retailers may just have to start making decisions about what brands they want to carry maybe discontinue companies that don't sell as well. That's the point of competition. If your product is consistently less in demand, people will stop purchasing it.
     
  19. Weezie

    Weezie Well-Known Member

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    Is Dr. Wu still going at this point? There have been rumours that they're finished.
     
  20. ChromeMagnus

    ChromeMagnus Well-Known Member

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    That's my question as well. I'm curious.