The Globe and Mail has posted a brief article about the financial fortunes of Hasbro. The headline is that strong overseas performances, an 11% rise for Hasbro International, have made up for slow performances at home; with strong growth expected in 2014 with the Transformers Age of Extinction toyline and a tie-in toyline for The Amazing Spider-Man 2; and this is expected to continue in 2015 with toylines for Star Wars Episode VII and Marvel’s Avengers 2. Analysts are calling it a visible catalyst for sustained revenue growth.
madman1366
Last time Hasbro commented they estimated collectors account for only about 5%. Personally I think that is a joke of an estimate
The only way to know for 100% sure is to ask every person that buys them, who is it for? Then, hope the people don't lie. In spite of how far collecting has gone in terms of popularity and acceptance some people I'm sure still keep their habit in the closet and are afraid to let people know they collect toys.
Whatever Hasbro's method is has to be full of way too many flaws to be considered accurate.
I believe you can safely say that collectors buy at least 1/3, kids at least 1/3, and the last 1/3 is where folks can argue what's what.
Autovolt 127
If GDO is what it takes for Flywheels and Battletrap to be Springer and Sandstorm repaints/retools so be it!
Kickshift
They'll enjoy growth so long as they don't sell out to Disney.
Underwear
Just for the info for folks here, Hasbro Asia is the official distributor of Taktomy TF toys.
I've witnessed Hasbro workers unloading carton box with the Hasbro logo on the box, lo & & behold inside those boxes Takaratomy TF items.
I recall during the Henkei years, the retail mall where I usually shop for my TFs, the mall staff working were waiting for the Hasbro workers to arrive & deliver the Henkei stuff.
RatTrap1985
I wouldn't mind going back to the days of beast wars. I hate that they're like 4 different Bumblebee releases to everyone other character. I like the weird one off characters that we used to get back then.
Timothy.R
is there any hard data on the percentage of collectors vs kids sales?
i always see people using that in their arguments (including myself) but i've never actually seen hard numbers.. and i know that i've certainly never been polled.. so, if there are any numbers.. it's gotta be only a sample size. . but i've always been curious about the percentage, and i've always wondered, if they have any numbers how they came about those numbers.
also.. when i was a kid my favorite toys were toys that either had a good deal of articulation or had a bunch of accessories, not stupid mech tech type accessories, accessories like the ninja turtles came with.
and, it seems like i've said this a lot lately, but there is a TON of transformers out there for kids as it is.. like the rescue bots, and specifically the cyberverse line.. so why to the deluxes, voyagers, and leaders have to be compromised to little kids? not everything needs to be tailored to children 5 years old and under.. there are still kids out there who want the same sorts of things that we want.. why aren't they taken into account? like i said, there is already plenty of stuff for younger children.
adambman
I wonder if anyone will bother with the Deluxe Reflector now that the tiny version's coming with Legends Class Sharpshot/Shrapnel. Still, Waspinator's got a Generations Deluxe figure that's soon to follow the little one that came with Legends Starscream recently. The only thing is, Hasbro hasn't reused any molds that predate the current Generations FoC/Thrilling 30 line, though Takara and hopefully as you point out, GDO, might come up with something. I'm still thinking of picking up Hot Spot.
Still, if there's a message in the above paragraph, it might instead be that waiting to see how the Generations main line plays out could bear some even better fruit. Who knows? Maybe sometime, say after the Movie toys, there could be an all new larger Reflector mold, but the upcoming little one has some cool cross play potential, I think.
This seems to be a good news story for all of Hasbro and not mutually exclusive or inclusive of the GDO line's future. The observation that we might not get a main line Hardhead retooled from Warpath through Hasbro is valid enough. Blanking off Warpath's main gun and beefing up a shoulder weapon would really make that retool shine as much as possible. Perhaps even FunPub might pick this up in 2015, still I wonder if they or GDO would put that much into Hardhead. Who knows? Perhaps Hardhead could get a token/passable GDO figure, and like Springer, get a great toy not so long after. Or as I said with Reflector, they might skip the retool. Either way, Hardhead's being featured fairly prominently in the comics lately. Speaking of Springer, the Voyagers have been getting a lot of attention in the Generations line and I can't help but wonder if we might see more soon after the Movie toy circulation has peaked. Maybe if the main line is busy enough, GDO could become home to things that fans have anticipated like Flywheels, Battletrap or Rotorstorm from the Whirl mold. For the latter, he'd need a new head, forearms/hands plus probably weapons and knees to make it perfect. The catch here is that again, this might be too much retooling for GDO, but some fans think that their decos are too similar for a main line release. To that I say, similar colour schemes wouldn't put many fans off buying Generations Dinobots, Constructicons or Predacons (where some team members might share parts of molds).
Megabattimus
Of course. sigh
Being a Transformers fan in Australia is suffering.
LegendAntihero
I could actually use an Optimus. Unlike your store, it's been the hardest one for me to find although I have seen it a few times.
madman1366
If anything, the biggest thing leading to the down sales has been the retailers. Wacky pricing, the lack of advertised sales and failure to keep fresh stock coming in has done every bit as much if not more to hurt the sales than the lousy economy has. We've seen sales go up in some of the worst moments our economy has seen, so I don't believe that alone is the biggest factor.
I went through this with my bosses at work. They harp about driving sales and I used Transformers as a good example of why they make it impossible to do that. The Generations IDW series first came out and we sold out in a day. For the next month and a half, we had ONE Optimus (old) and nothing else. Nobody ordered them, no more came in. Even when they had a feature end display….NOTHING. Hard to sell nothing, and that happens all over the store. When they went on sale (for less than $1 off) still nothing. We were wiped on all but voyagers.
Purple Heart
Hmm, true. Maybe thinking on our bright side, we could see more general releases of toys, Like Gdos, except we'd never have Gdos…id be willing to import some things..
Aernaroth
Takara, IIRC, sells only to Japan. While you might see some Takara products imported into other asian companies, I imagine the Hasbro releases would maintain primacy. Though we may see more cooperation between the two companies for things that blur the lines between their individual efforts, and mutually benefit both organizations.
I sincerely doubt Hasbro expanding it's actions in other asian markets would be something that would put much stress on their relationship with TakaraTomy.
Purple Heart
Well yes, Hasbro is and always has been a kids based toy company, and im glad, if the fandom always got their way….welll…
but what im interested is if hasbro distrubuting area will cross with Takara's.
Aernaroth
The quality of figures is still above where it was 20, or even 10 years ago, and the movement to a more "cost-effective" model for action figures is an industry one, not just with Transformers or Hasbro.
That Hasbro has seen a 22% rise in sales across Asia and Latin America this quarter is more than good news. That rise is nearly double their overall revenue rise, and significantly more than rises (or rather, decreases) in North America. It means their attempt to expand their market have been basically effective, and that they are gaining access to a market of billions, rather than a few hundred million people. That previous market may still have more buying power, but from what I understand of the toy industry, volume drives success for a company like Hasbro. Especially given many of their child customers outside of North America may not have access to the same digital distractions that are currently competing with Hasbro's offerings.
We are a quantifiable portion of the sales of Transformers, yes. And that quantity is somewhere between 10 and 20% of total sales. So at best, we make up 1 toy bought for every 4 a kid buys. Contrary to what you might think, the generations/classics/whatever you want to call it lines have been pretty popular with kids, I've definitely seen a number of kids pick them off the shelves due to their "whoa" appeal. Rabid as the fanbase is about the classics line, I don't think we consume enough to overcome that disparity in sales between collectors and kids, even with the thrilling 30 line. It still remains in Hasbro's best interest to release figures that appeal to kids first, even if they do so while throwing the fandom a bone.
Hasbro would be stupid at this point to ignore what is still the world's largest economy, so your prediction we'll all be forced to import in the future if lean economic times in north america continue is spurious. If that were the case, people in Europe would have had to import for basically the entire history of the brand. But what it MAY mean is that they may not offer the same vast selection of figures we've become accustomed to in the post-movie years. It may be back down to a single line, with a few "collectors items" here and there. Or, alternatively, it may be that if the brand wanes in popularity again, that it will be forced to rely more and more on collectors, and that we'll see more weight on "fan-friendly" items as seen in japan instead of those geared towards kids.
Underwear
Just for your info there are lot of members from "strong market" countries on this forum.
It's either they don't post that much or don't state which region they are from. For example me & another guy t'cracker we're both from Asia…
Purple Heart
Well, let the continuous bitch ensure my fellow fans!
DarkPrinceofKaon
Yeah, Yeah true, but they have been doing to us and we (the fandom) have been doing it to them.
When you have a recession this bad sustained for this long with endless forecasted fiscal certainty, people are just not going to spend money.
Everything is being scaled back in the West: job markets poor, hours are being scaled back, people are dismayed. People aren't shopping for luxury goods in force right now. When enough parents don't buy toys for there kids it's going to leave an impact.
As for "our part", the quality of the figures has gone down, waaaaayyy down. Lets not kid our selves on this. And for those who don't except this drop in quality, they pass on the figures and save their money (as they probably rightfully should if they are disgruntled in Hasbro's offerings).
So here we are…we are the collectors and a quantifiable percentage of us isn't supporting the collector line ("thrilling thirty"). It's going to make an impact. They have already admitted to us in one way or another that we make a marginal profit for them because of just how much they have been directly marketing to us. Who you market to is your targeted customer base.
Regardless of what or how this has happened, looks like they are targeting their marketing over seas. This rightfully SUCKS for us because if we all still want to continue collecting, we are all going to have to start paying out the nose on importing. This is a dark day indeed…
Noideaforaname
It kinda seems most of us board members live in "weak market" countries, while there aren't as many members here from "strong market" countries. Probably doesn't mean much, but still a weird correlation.
Kingfish333
Good news. Hasbro can continue to answer the 3rd Parties.
Aernaroth
A Hasbro Stock news story? Oh no! Hasbro is doomed for good and it's all because of <Insert Transformers business decision here>!
…Wait… Stock prices are… up? Global sales estimates are strong? But… but… but… they're not doin it rite…