Why doesn't Takara price their MP figures more competitively with 3P?

Discussion in 'Transformers 3rd Party Discussion' started by SegaSnatcher, May 16, 2020.

  1. BIOMEC

    BIOMEC Terrorcon, aka "Ratchetman"

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    A new benchmatk? No offense but there are better figures than him. UT's movie figures set the new standard in my opinion and their Dragoon is the pinnacle of such standard. Despite that, Roadking is still a very impressive toy and he is a great addition to my collection.

    They are quite pricey, but I still buy their figures because for the most part, they are superior to 3P regarding design and engineering. Quality wise, not so much...
     
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  2. Electro Rush

    Electro Rush Just a guy waiting for the perfect Whirl

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    Takara does not view the third party figures as competition.. at least not officially. In fact, its probably in their best interest to not acknowledge their existence at all.
     
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  3. bri888

    bri888 bte888

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  4. octobotimus

    octobotimus Bad company ruins good morals

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    All of which were lower than $200 when released.
     
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  5. Slave IV

    Slave IV more wealth than you can imagine!

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    I think some people mentioned already that Takara MPs used to be much cheaper than most 3P MP style figures. But most MPs then were much shittier. Now that MP is on par or in some cases better than 3P, I guess they feel they can up their prices to cash in even though they probably have better economies of scale which means even more profit for them.
     
  6. SegaSnatcher

    SegaSnatcher Well-Known Member

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    Sorry I should have specified for G1 figures.
     
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  7. Reygn

    Reygn Banned

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    And when concerning the pinnacle in general, it's only going to be raised, wuth the likes of TransCraft's Bumblebee and Optimus, and GCreation's Grimlock. When speaking about G1 specifically, the efficency and durability of TE-01 is unmatched, that is the new bar.
     
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  8. HunterGreen2005

    HunterGreen2005 In-Stock

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    ^

    I thought I also read somewhere that MP started off at a pretty low price point to test the waters, and when Takara was please with the results, they jacked up the prices and quality(?) to be in the same end game collector market as people that collect Soul of Chogokin level of toys.
     
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  9. lordcryotek

    lordcryotek M'Hael

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    Takara can charge what they want because their fan base is blindly loyal to the point that they'll pay almost any price, and then praise them for releasing figures that break and chip right out of the box (and in some cases crumble...). Fans Toys is starting to catch on to Takara's model...
     
    Last edited: May 17, 2020
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  10. Geterman

    Geterman Second Coming of Primus

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  11. SegaSnatcher

    SegaSnatcher Well-Known Member

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    Honestly if it weren't for 3P I probably wouldn't even bother. Though, I did recently purchased Takara's MP-17+ and MP-39 just because there really isn't any alternatives as good or better.
     
  12. Thalyn

    Thalyn Well-Known Member

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    Licencing and certification are going to be the major variants.

    Licencing has already been touched on, but no-one has really mentioned that HasTak needs to pass various country-specific rules before they can even sell them there legally. The tests for these things aren't necessarily cheap, nor are they likely to be actually needed, but the one time that some dumbass twists off a piece with their gorilla mitts, wonders how far it will get up their sinuses, and winds up in hospital is going to be the time where HasTak wants that extra legal ass-covering to be in place. And I'm not talking about a 3 year old here (I'm also not talking about a one-off occurrence).

    Add to that the way that there isn't a single world-wide certification (there tends to be at least EU and US certifications for everything, and probably more for various Asian countries - plus Australia likes to make things even more difficult by wanting their own) and the costs add up. 3P companies don't have to deal with most of that, since officially they're only available in China.
     
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  13. Lex79

    Lex79 Well-Known Member

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    As others said, Takara is competing with Bandai, not 3p.
    Should 3p companies really start to affect their revenues, I guess their response will be more on the likes of "ok, it's time to crush these thieves once for all" rather than "we have to up the quality and lower the prices to compete".
     
  14. God Orion

    God Orion Well-Known Member

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    I think they are pricey because people keep buying them. I did for example. I thought that a figure being so expensive (MP-44) would be absolutely perfect and flawless. But I was wrong. It's far from perfect.
     
  15. Knightdramon

    Knightdramon Hasbro LIES to the US

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    3P aren't Takara's main competitors. As highlighted by others, it's Bandai.

    Folks that collect figures other than transformers have noticed the trend already; when Takara is making an MP figure nowadays, they are aiming for it to be the ONE figure from that character you need. All the accessories that showed up for 1 second in one episode, a display base/storage for all of them [on larger figures]...those are all Soul of Chogokin features that Takara is mirroring.

    Through interviews with Hasui, when the MP line was rebooted circa MP10, the budget per figure was very limited to the point where he was unsure if he could include MP Sideswipe's shoulder cannon. That's also why that era of figures had extra accessories with amazon releases. With the line being such a success, they can just include everything in the package, and charge a premium.

    Official Masterpiece figures also have that general intuition and fluidity of transformation that is largely absent on the 3P world. MMC is kind of there with some of their perfection releases, UT and DX9's latest releases are...the rest, not so much.
     
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  16. Ikkstakk

    Ikkstakk Well-Known Member

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    Seems an odd thing to get preoccupied with anyway. If you prefer 3rd party, why worry about what Takara does? "Start pricing more competitively before it's too late?" Too late for what? For Takara to lose enough money on Masterpiece that they cancel the line? That won't stop 3rd parties from producing.
     
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  17. cybeast

    cybeast Freelancer Pun Maker

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    It is sometimes not a case of "They won't", but rather "They can't".

    Takara (and Hasbro), unlike 3P company, needs to adhere to strict rules regarding toy production (drop test, swallow, choosing safe paint, etc etc), there's also licensing for alt mode, working within budget, all of that, and still needs to ensure that it can be mass produced, unlike 3P who doesn't need to concern all of that, and their product release is... hundred? Thousand? At most.

    There's also case of making sure it's following the rules of the country it wants to be in like... uhh... orange cap on Megs?
     
    Last edited: May 17, 2020
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  18. octobotimus

    octobotimus Bad company ruins good morals

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    Isn’t the whole thing around production that the more you make the cheaper it gets to make... thus a lower cost? That example would mean 3p should be more expensive rather than TT.
     
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  19. cybeast

    cybeast Freelancer Pun Maker

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    That point was made as in "Takara/Hasbro needs to ensure their design needs to be easy to mass produced, thus lowering the price".

    Now imagine, if TT/Hasbro only make MP in quantity akin to 3P, but with added cost of license, safety test, etc etc, the price might shoot up twice or thrice higher.
     
  20. bri888

    bri888 bte888

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    Yeah lower by 5 cents or a few dollars.