I once heard that the reason things like Beanie Babies, Depression Glass and other "trend collectables" people thought would explode in value never did is specifically BECAUSE people horded them. So they would never become rare or hard-to-find.

It was things like old comics, baseball cards, that ended up having huge value because they WEREN'T believed to have been worth much when they came out, so they were often tossed out or destroyed in bike spokes.

 

Same with comics, the hoarding caused the crash, (Which also happened to Baseball cards and other trading cards around the same time)

 

At least with comics or beanie babies you could either read them or have a cute plushy.

 

Yes and no... Yes, lots went stupid and bought all they could with the hope to cash in, while not caring about the items at all, it was all about scalping... And it still happens a lot if not even more now.

The "no" is that it's not the hoarding that cancelled out the value, it's the mass production. By the companies... They over-saturates the market just like these Pop figures, rending them worthless for something like 99% of them. There's just too many of them so aside the few that weren't mass produced like crazy, none gained any real value. The companies rely on a craze and write "collectible" on the box and then wait for the money to roll in from those that buy into Itz, and sadly, these companies know that the hype sells and work as fast as they can to cash in as they know the bubble won't last.

In reference to such fads, I can say that I did buy a few Precious Moments a long time ago because they are simply cute and it was a thing towards the kids that were very young at the time. I knew that the odds of them gaining value was slim but never really cared about that, and did find that the were overpriced and got most during sales anyways. But I remember how crazy the craze was for some people.

 

Forspoken Has Seemingly Been Found In A Landfill
Abandoned Forspoken SteelBooks Found at Dump

 

Forspoken or forsaken?  

 

I was in gamestop with my daughter and it was right before closing time. The guy working there walked over to us and asked "do you want some LOL dolls?" and my daughter went "YES!" and he shoved a few in a bag for us and said "we were supposed to throw them in the dumpster, but I didn't want to waste them". Apparently, it's quite normal to throw out unopened, perfectly fine merch??????

 

Yeah it's illegal to dumpster dive at some Walmarts and other similar stores because of stuff like that. (plus many of them now compact their trash before it goes in the dumpsters) There are videos on youtube of people dumpster diving Dollar store trash though. But back in the 80's and 90's people used to do it a lot and find interesting stuff.

 

If ya gonna dumpster dive, of all the stores out there why a Dollar store?

 

They throw out a lot of crap and they don't have security or compacting dumpsters like the bigger stores. You enter one of those your risking your life.

 

They are more miss than hit for me. I try to get the ones that resemble the referenced characters the most despite the weird pupiless eyes and body proportions. Ex:

 

It's depressingly normal for retailers to toss out perfectly good stock they don't think they can sell, in order to be able to write it off as a loss and make room for new items with a better chance at generating profit. Sometimes (books, clothes) they're required to destroy it as well in order to claim a return/write it off, though other times they'll just sell their stock to a liquidator at a greatly reduced price.

 

There are plenty of organizations that would take free toys and give to kids in need. But, just reminded of when the local play it again sports got a new owner and he threw out more than half the inventory because he didn't think it'd sell. I was like I'd have taken that sports equipment off your hands. I asked him if it was out back in the dumpster still and he said it was gone. I was so disappointed because I had shopped there a lot and the selection was always so good. All that stuff he threw out was donate able. Word for word he said he threw out at least 100 pair of hockey skates. The local rinks could have used them as rentals during lessons if anything, they put them better use than the dumpster.

 

You're not wrong in that a lot of this stuff is useable and people would love to have it donated, but there's a various corporate (though maybe not social) reasons that businesses don't do that. That employee who gave you stuff could have gotten in big trouble for giving you those items instead of destroying/disposing of them, depending on their managers/store policy. I completely agree its extremely wasteful, but that's the current state of the system of retail.

 

Not just retail. Food waste at restaurants is a very similar situation.

 

Reminds me of a story I read about a guy who worked at a shoe store in a mall. Dude comes in asking for new shoes for a job interview and doesn't have a whole lot of money. The worker goes into the back, finds a perfectly servicable pair of shoes in the guy's size that were getting thrown out, and sells them to the guy for a deep discount.

The Manager gives the worker shit for not trying to upsell on an expensive pair of shoes on the sales floor that the customer clearly wouldn't have been able to afford, and the employee quit on the spot.

 

Funk went EA on Mondo.
https://www.thewrap.com/funko-mondo-layoffs-posters-cease-production/

 

I have never bought one. My son got one as a gift that he has never played with.

They don't look like the characters they're supposed to be and they don't do anything.

 

That downward spiral started the MOMENT they decided to fall for the 21st Century Ponzi scheme (NFTs)

As soon as you get into that you IMMEDIATELY sign the death certificate on your company

 

I used to work at a Dollar Tree. We had a big problem with people dumpster diving. We would get in in the morning to find trash all over the place. We even put a lock on the dumpster in hopes that it would deter the people from dumpster diving. Nope. They broke the padlock, tore the lid off, and made a bigger mess.