Quite a model change from Hasbro this if true:

Hasbro Doubles Down On The Direct Market With Individual Figure Orders - Bleeding Cool Comic Book, Movies and TV News and Rumors

Apparently they are allowing direct market customers to order particular toys rather than case assortments.

Someone ask them about it at Botcon!

 

This would be great for etailers like BBTS that know their target demographic wants the new stuff each wave and not carry overs from previous waves. It would prevent stuff like charging extra money for the newer figures just to offset the cost of older stuff in a case.

 

This is fantastic news!

 

Indeed!

 

this is great news!!

 

So Target can order whatever figures they want?

Aren't they the ones who pick like a a billion Bees?

 

I read a few days ago that Hasbro will be doing this with the Star Wars Black Series 6" line. It will be great for them to do that with TF's as well. If this pans out, we will all have a heck of a lot better time getting the stuff we want at a reasonable price with little to no hassle. Good days ahead!

 

this will work really great for stores like BBTS who does pre-oders. They can put up all the single pre-orders and once they have them complete, they can then tell Hasbro we need 200 of this toy and 50 of this and 2 of this lol Instead of buying cases and cases and none of certain toys get bought. And they dont have to jack up the price so high on the ones that people want to offset the ones that dont and just sit there in the box.

 

Great news if they'll start doing this for Transformers!

 

Not yet. The article states that this does not yet apply to brick and mortar stores.

Still, I think it's an excellent step in right direction and hope it expands to include the likes of Target and TRU.

 

Imagine it - a world where you could pop onto Hasbro.com and just buy your Prime, Grimlock, and 10 vehicons, and be done. No hunting, no hassle - just one-shot it.

I can't wait to see how this works. With any luck, they will not use Digital River for any part of it...

 

So far its just Star Wars black and Marvel Legends. Diamond (comics distro) and presumably BBTS/EE will be able to order solid cases.

I'd guess it'll be something like a normal wave comes out and then a month or two later they open orders for solid cases to be delivered 3-4 months later.

 

I wonder if this will have any effect on secondary market resale value? Not that I really care, just mildly curious. Seems to me this could possibly have an effect on the total run of a particular figure unless the figures production number was determined prior to sales. I also wonder if this could lead to a particular retailer cornering the market on a specific toy if that toy had a limited run. That would possibly create inflated prices for what would basically amount to an unofficial store exclusive.

 

This is a very promising development, hope it bears fruit.

 

I'm skeptical. Hasbro has said before that they budget waves of figures, rather than putting a budget on each individual figure. I suspect this is why the best new molds get shipped with a cheaper-to-produce repaint/remold like Doubledealer or Goldfire and Dreadwing. This way, most of the wave's budget goes towards producing the new molds, with the repaints soaking up what's left to create an assortment. So, my concern in theory is that while we'll get more paint apps on repaints, the new molds will suffer greater budget limitations.

And then of course there's stores like Walmart who know jack shit about demand for individual figures, which will cause a resurgence in Bee-hives.

 

Yep, I was EXTATIC to hear the news! It'll make it much easier to order confidently when I don't have to worry about the characters I know will just sit.

 

Someone at hasbro must have fallen and hit their head! This is far too sensible, let's see some more idiotic case revisions and the like  

 

PERFECT MUSIC TO MY EARS!!!!  

 

Actually, I don't. While I think this is a good thing for online vendors, their needs are rather different than the brick-and-mortars. If the brick-and-mortars can buy only specific characters, as opposed to waves, I'm confident it will mean that a great many fan-centric characters will never appear at retail, in favor of toys that kids like, but which we don't care about so much.