That's true. After the mess of the first GI Joe movie some Wal-Marts decided they wouldn't stock anything GI Joe again while other Wal-Mart stores stocked the Renegades line.

Until there is more of a pattern it's too early to say what this means for fans of the Transformers Prime toys.

 

They said the same thing at my Walmart about DOTM figures and then all the other Walmarts kept still getting them in yet my Walmart had none on the pegs for 1 year.

This may be YMMV as I saw Kup , Rumble and 2 Vehicons on the pegs a few days ago at Walmart.

 

Internet Ordering is all I do now. Pre Orders and Ebay. It saves the headaches and fills the gaps easily.

 

Same here. Mine never stocked the newer Kre-Os (much to my annoyance) yet other Walmarts farther out in this area have, I believe.

 

BINGO!

Have Walmart stores stopped getting Prime refreshes? Maybe, but again, if the line is "changing" (from the stores perspective, new packaging and new SKU=new line even if the actual product doesn't vary much. See Star Wars for the past 8 years) then stores aren't going to want a bunch of "old stuff" blocking "new stuff".

Especially if Beast Hunters starts hitting next month ("spring" toys usually start hitting right after Christmas with new resets, but often slip out sooner because stores get product before the reset and shove anything and everything out for Christmas).

 

Ditto. I used to love to go "on the hunt," but now all it does is frustrate me. Has the internet spoiled me or do stores just have less? I imagine it's a little of both. Plus, when you have almost every piece in a line, sometimes it's hard to find a specific one on the store shelves. Internet ordering FTW.

 

I see it as a good thing. I have almost everything I want that's out right now. If they stop ordering Prime stuff, there will be plenty of room for Beast Hunters when it comes out. In the meantime, we may see FOC Grimlock on shelves before Christmas.

 

no, it's not just you. distribution is plain bad.

EDIT: just checked out my wal-mart, they didn't take down their stickers yet but they did fill the pegs with batman merch instead. dammit.

 

Makes sense figures are not selling for $14 lets double the chances of them not selling and nobody wanting them by raising the prices even more to $16 or more dollars. I mean really if that is the reasoning behind it it seems backward to me. What happened to clearences, sales on items they have a hard time selling?

 

Clearence is only after they've made their money back, or as a last ditch effort to move stock. They raise prices if it's not selling so they units they do sell bring in more profit, making up for the unsolds.

 

They won't be "dropping the line" per se -- they just won't order any more figures. Wal-Mart probably has tons and tons of Prime cases they still need to move so they will be well stocked for the holidays.

And technically, it is the death of the line because Hasbro themselves killed it to move forward with Beast Hunters  

And Split Lip above me is right, clearance will come when we're on the verge of Beast Hunters and stores have a lot of inventory they need to start moving ASAP.

 

It doesn't sound like the end of the world. As others have said, this is probably nothing more than a set up for TF Prime: Beast Hunters. New product codes, new SKUs, new everything, so Prime is logically being phased out for Beast Hunters.

 

It doesn't make sense because it was probably explained wrong to the other member. The reason why prices are higher now is because of production costs. Petrolium is needed to make the figures and part of the packaging, and the price for petrolium has gone up, as have other raw materials. The only other reasons prices would go up is if demand was high or production would be in very limited numbers, but that is not the case for Transformers Prime or Generations toys. When demand declines, so does the price, when demand increases, the price typically increases. That's basic economics every company understands. Hasbro is in a bit of a pickle as are other toy companies because the cost of resources have increased. They had to raise prices to recoup costs. This hurts when the economy is weak and consumers are looking to find less expensive toys for their kids. Even 3.75" figures are now $9.99 and sometimes even more. Hasbro saves money be producing repaints, that only gets them so far as well.

I don't think Walmart's are having any difficulty selling TF's. I think they're tired of some characters like BB peg warming from over-production. This happened with 200X Masters of the Universe where there were He-Man and Skeletor variants clogging pegs and consumers had a hard time finding other characters. Stores can't restock if their pegs are still full of remaining figures that are not big sellers. And it's still too early for clearances.

 

This is a good thing technically. Most of the Prime figures will show up at Ross and Marshalls sooner rather then later. Then we can all build a Massive Vehicon Army!

 

Yea we really need to wait on the Black Friday shelves. It's entirely possible that some of the stores not stocking right now are holding inventory for the holiday rush. If Transformers is a hot property in kids toys it would be crazy not to have stock in hand so parents don't go somewhere else.

Locally they don't have anything on the shelves except for some of the Cyberverse figures and a few Bumblebee figures. Really hard to imagine that's all my local Wal-Mart would have for Black Friday.

 

That is very possible. I went to one of my local Wal-Marts around me and they had absolutely nothing except a couple of Bumblebees from the Prime line when they typically have a bigger variety. Sounds likes a reasonable explanation to me.

Looks like I will start paying closer attention to the internet until I can find a Smokescreen to add to my collection.

 

Ah, about Black Friday; That was also another thing I've been bringing up to folks when speaking to them in regards to Transformers at Walmart.

So far nobody seems to know anything on whether or not Transformers are going to be a part of the Black friday sales. So far it's only clothing and electronics deals this year. and a few select toys. none being Transformers as of yet. However that doesn't mean there won't be any.

I'd expect Prime to be in the Black Friday category since it's being discontinued. Just like what they did with Powercore Combiners

 

My Wal-Mart just updated itself with the wave of kup, rumble and vehicon...sure they're not the quickest to do so, but they've been on top of things like wave 4 in my area. I doubt Wal-Mart as a whole is going to drop the whole line, but they will calm down on what they order and put out to maintain a better balance. going through my aisles today I found 4 vehicons and only 2 Bees. Amazing right?