Hollywood Fred Meyer had a full compliment of RID on Sunday. Jazz, sideswipe and Drift. Hope FM start stocking CW.
Probably cause he can't get rid of the old stuff... Congrats very nice! Now to get MP's out of them hehe.... Geez, I hope they're not like Sideshow...
Thanks...there is no telling what they have planned for them. Hopefully they release toys of them. Here is some humor for you guys.
Man, another vintage toy shop. This is getting to be a crowded market... really wish someone would open a toy shop that specialized in more modern stuff, so we could have one decent modern toy shop in the area. I guess it's because I'm not really in the vintage market anymore so these stores really don't do anything for me. Is the market in this area even that big to support three such stores?
A bit off topic but was anyone interested in the SDCC exclusive Combiner Hunters comic? I ended up buying an extra by accident so I have one available that I got signed by Mairghread Scott, Sara Pitre-Durocher, And John Barber.
I agree! I would love to hear of a local store opening up that caters to the current fandom of 3rd party figures as well as Takara / Hasbro. I enjoy the vintage stuff too. I would support something like that for sure.
Yes, when has America ever benefited from competition in the marketplace? Um. Okay, then. At least this I agree with! There's one decent modern toy shop in this area? Where? I'm not aware of it. ~ Botch the Asshole Crab
In Regards to Showroom Collectibles the toy store in Vancouver i personally don't think that its a bad place i don't understand why so many people hate that place or even the owner. i shop there once in a while and he works with me on prices i got a masterpiece soundwave from him it was used but complete and he sold it to me for $145. sure his new/current stuff is a little higher like his marvel legends are $25 and is star wars black series are $25 but barnes and noble sells them for the same price no seems to care. i asked him why is prices were higher on these and his answer made alot of sense he can order things wholesale but since hes not ordering thousands of dollars a month on new things he doesn't get a good discount. think people in the group forget that hes a business he needs to make money and there isn't any other stores in Vancouver like his so i think what showroom collectibles is going is great. not everything in there is over priced all there used things are really decent like there lego its the cheapest in town. Just go in there talk to him hes really easy to work with he told me pretty much everything in the store is negotiable idk what other store you can walk into and make an offer on something with out getting looked at funny the next time your in toys r us or things from another world ask for a discount see what happens. i haven't posted in the forum before but some told me about what was being said and i feel i need to stick up for Showroom Collectibles
Don't know why I got such a shithead response from you, but it was a legitimate question as I've only lived here for about a year and a half. Maybe there is some huge vintage toy collecting scene here I'm not aware of, but most markets can't support even one such store because there isn't enough customers to make it viable and Portland now has three. This is the second one to open this year so I was just curious as to why they are all choosing Portland and was hoping someone who lived here awhile could shed some light on it as I'm not a vintage toy collector, nobody I know in this area really is and don't follow their scene. Dr. Tongue reopening I get, because he was in the area before and seems to have an already established customer base, but Rogue Toys has got an uphill battle ahead of them imo.
First, Welcome to the boards. We've got a good group of local folks dedicated to helping each other out when it comes to finding TF's. That said, you've picked a real sore-spot here. Many users here have their own personal stories that they can relate, but to make a long story short, people around here do not like that shop and its owner because he has often been seen scalping popular stuff from the aisles of local retailers to supply his store. I think if he just dealt in used items, or if he actually ordered his products from manufactures like the other comic/collectible shops do, there wouldn't be any issue. No one would begrudge him for markup if his sources were legit. You can't buy something I wanted right in front of me, then try to sell it to me (for more than I would have paid), and expect that to go over well. So again, it isn't what his prices are, it's where he gets his stock. Which is from the retail shelves where we are trying to shop!
If it helps, his signature IS "Botch the Asshole Crab" Just sayin' In all seriousness, though, put me down for one more who would like a decent import shop that would carry Takara, 3P, and other import stuff(Star Wars, Revoltech etc). We couldn't even get one of those shops here when we WERE a viable port town, but now that the major shippers in the area have pulled out, our chances are less than slim. I used to like to check out The Compound for the hell of it every now and then, but I could never find enough there that was at a price I thought was reasonable.
Last time I was in Compound their vinyl and toy section had decreased a ton. They told me they lost their distributor for the stuff and are going to focus elsewhere. They also told me there are too many places like Hot Topic snatching exclusives and making it harder to compete, which I can understand. Vinyl stuff has really exploded in popularity in the last year. We did have Simply Toyz for awhile but I think he kind of killed himself business-wise -- poor store location, really poor hours (I think he actually closed all weekend!), but he had a killer selection and great prices. I miss him. Last I heard he was going to reopen and then just didn't. I guess I'm just shocked there are so many vintage toy collectors here because I've certainly not met any
Well that's a shame. Their toy section was never that large to begin with. I miss seeing some of that cool/weird stuff like those laser-cut metal folding cubicle model.
Well i cant speak for the owner but why don't you all go to his store and tell him how you feel instead of talking behind his back, go to the source get all the facts don't listen to what others have to say find out for yourselves, have all of you been to the shop? look im not trying to start anything im saying give the place a chance its only been there for what a year people make mixtakes the store is still new its not to often these types of store pop up and stay open. also how do you know that hes not buying things for himself or friends maybe hes collects things and hunts for friends just like us, all of you are judging someone without the facts. I wouldn't think there would be much profit paying full price for something then selling it for just a little bit more then he paid since the store has over head i doubt there would be much profit left and we all know the value drops really quick after its release. and even if we have to pay $5 to $10 more for something and least he can get us stuff by ordering it we all know how hard it is to find things locally there's so many scalpers that clean out all the stores all i have ever heard is him going to toys r us. I like to give people a chance quit jugging people with out the facts if you have something to say say it to the person your talking trash about.
I'm pretty sure you're the owner based on how you post, because your posting style (and somewhat poor grammar) pretty much mirrors how he writes. Also, because you made an account just now, which is one crazy coincidence. I know he reads this thread to find stuff, or has others read it for him, which is why I stopped posting sightings. I'm not doing the work for him. You know why people don't like his (your) store? Because he constantly goes around to other stores in the area and scalps stuff to sell at obscenely high prices at his store. He's at Toys R Us damn near every Saturday (and who knows how many other days), and the employees all say he's rude and they just try to avoid him. He's selling scalped Barnes & Noble SDCC figures (the ReAction figures) for $40 in his store when you can still get them online for $15!! The prices in the store are higher because 80% of the time he's selling stuff he bought at Target or TRU. He can claim it's not the case but when he's constantly at TRU and constantly flipping through Marvel Legends and Star Wars Black figures, it makes you wonder, and yes, I did see him the last time I went to TRU at opening flipping through both series looking for anything good. I've even had people at Walgreens who have told me "Oh, that exclusive? Yea, we had it but the guy who owns the toy store bought them all as soon as we got them in." This guy has made toy hunting a solid hell in this region for the past year. Why on earth is he cleaning out Devastators in this area if he can just get them from the distributor? His wholesale price has to be lower than $160, because TRU marked the price up $10. If he was buying for himself or for a friend, surely he can get better prices than TRU. I have a friend who runs a very small toy business (not in this area) who can get a Devastator cheaper than $160 from the distributor, and he doesn't even have a storefront. In fact, all of his prices are cheaper than Showroom and like I said, he just has an eBay business and no storefront so he probably does even less ordering. He's bragged to people I personally know that he has connections at Tigard Toys R Us to get whatever exclusives he wants to sell in the store. When I was personally in his store, he constantly bragged about how he's taken advantage of the latest Toys R Us sale or used a clearance sale at another store to stock inventory. He's proud of scalping and will gladly talk at length about how he's cleaning out local stores. He can rattle off a list of what stores have what clearances going on at any time because he's been to them. I can look through the Showroom Collectibles Facebook page right now and see tons of scalped items like Amiibo, Walgreens exclusives, and Target exclusives (and I doubt someone just "brought them in to sell" considering they would be taking a huge loss on brand new stuff). Last year he scalped the shit out of Prowl and Sunstorm, that's when the posts here started and many members who were around a year ago remember that. He's not doing anyone a service by grabbing these figures, he's just making it so you have to pay his marked up prices. You claim "Why would someone do this to make a little bit of money?" because if these don't sell, he can just return them and get his money back. It's a win/win. And yea, I get the guy is running a business, but the prices he offers to buy stuff at are insanely lowball. There's leaving overhead to make a profit and then there is trying to take advantage. Look at the example someone posted earlier about how he offered $75 for a grand worth of Transformers. And TFAW does offer a discount for loyal customers (up to 20%, which kicks ass), so don't try to drag their name through the mud or compare them to this store. I encourage people to go ask for a discount at TFAW and see what happens, they will gladly talk to you about their discount program. Hell, that's how I found out about it in the first place! I've been in Showroom Collectibles before, I did give them a shot to see if they turned it around because yea, people do make mistakes. He has somewhat decent prices on older but still modern toys, like Toy Biz Marvel Legends figures. I didn't see any scalped stuff in the store during my trip, so I thought he had turned it all around and stopped doing that. I encouraged a few people I know to give him a second chance, saying "I think he turned it all around!" I brushed off the fact at the time he kept talking about Toys R Us exclusives constantly and asking me if I'd seen any (I forget what he was looking for at the time). I looked stupid because not even a month later someone saw him scalping at TRU. I won't support someone who is just making shit harder for people in the community. If I want to go to Toys R Us, I have to drive from Vancouver to fucking Clackamas because of this guy in order to have a hope of finding something good. Jantzen Beach is well known to everyone here as just a dead zone now for new figures. Like Wraith said, don't clean out store pegs and then try to sell the same thing at twice the price, that's not going to win you any friends. It's a shame too because honestly, I'm the sort of guy who would go in every week and throw $25 - $50 in his store to fill holes in my collection depending on what I needed. I'd buy new release figures there if I knew he wasn't scalping to get them, even if I had to pay more because I like supporting local businesses. But as of right now, all his store is doing is hoovering up anything decent at any surrounding store, making life miserable for other local collectors. Gee, I wonder why his hours are such that he opens one hour later than Toys R Us, and why people keep seeing him there exactly at opening making a beeline for certain stuff. So yea, to answer your question I have been in his store, he brags about scalping, I've seen him cleaning out Toys R Us to see those same exact figures show up on his eBay page and someone else saw them in-store. I even found the post: You were so quick to write Wraith back I'm almost positive you're the owner at this point because you're way too heavily invested in this to be someone who "shops in there every once in awhile." Drop the act. If you want to scalp stuff, be honest about it, but don't expect everyone to support you and don't try to hide it. You've got those Funko ReAction figures front and center in your store with a $40 price each when they were a B&N SDCC exclusive at $15 each and were selling at Lloyd Center a week ago (and are still available online at B&N for $15 each!) I'm sure you'll be at Jantzen when Bluestreak hits to grab as many as you can, history will repeat itself from last year. If that's how he wants to run his business, great, but don't talk down to people for not wanting to support it. I was just going to not post anything but your second post was just too much For someone who claimed to shop in there "every once in awhile" you sure know a lot about how his store operates and you're real insistent on getting us to go there, then you tried to start something. "Look I'm not trying to start something" is always code for "I'm trying to start something."
First off im not the owner of the store im just a collector and like to support local business and 2nd i have a life outside toys i don't sit at my computer 24/7 so im sorry if im not responding to you fast enough. Have you gone up to him when hes at toys r us and confront him tell him how hes making an impact on the community. also if hes buy devastators wouldn't he be selling them in his store? i mean i haven't seen them posted anywhere and i was just in there yesterday and i didn't see any so maybe hes buying them for other people such as friends or for himself because if hes buying them at cost from TRU how would he make any money? your just jumping to conclusions. And yes i joined today like i said this was my first post and i wanted stick up for them. the rest you said i cant comment because i really dont know anything about that.
