I would reissue the original Dinobots.

I've read rumors that a lot of the molds were lost. I have a feeling that they just don't want to reissue swoop because of how fragile it is.

They should reverse engineer the original molds, and even do some crazy quality upgrades, like make all the chrome plastic parts real metal, and reinforce weak parts. If they made an all metal Swoop, I would buy 23 of them. I guess it will never happen though, because it would practically triple change into a switch blade.

 

^swoop's beak is the fragile piece, not the wings unless you bend them backwards

 

^ Yeah, it's a shame. I don't know how that could be fixed really.

 

Cancel it for 1 year. Maybe 2.
And the next show should be sold into syndication.
(1) ea. figure per character per case.

 

Improve the quality and size of the toys to more closely match the new price point. Plus they need to get off of the BB kick they have been on since 2007. Lastly due to a downturn of the economy I don't know of many quick fixes to the overall situation.

 

Robot Points would better. Clip and send in. With online codes it would be to easy for someone to enter random codes & hit a valid one. Then the person that really gets that code is screwed. Would also be a way to clear out old stock Hasbro has. Maybe have a catelog online showing options. Person registers an account (puts in their address) & selects a figure or whatever valued at so many points. That figure is put 'on hold' for a certain amount of days. The person puts their account # on the mail in form & sends it in. When Hasbro gets it, the figure/item on hold is mailed to the person. If the person fails to mail in their points within a certain amount of time, the item is put back in the catelog.

 

A rewards system would be a good thing to boost sales from collectors and may tap into the kid market too. How to do it would be the difficult part. Looking back to the G1 days, Hasbro could resurrect the old Robot Points name (as suggested above) and apply it to their website via codes like they've done in past series. Since you'd have to buy product to get the points, I think they should offer things that add to the play value of the toys. (instead of more non toy stuff like T-shirts and posters.)

Things like special repainted figures, out of country exclusives like Asia exclusives. (anyone remember the Pepsi Prime promotion around the first movie?) Maybe that would be a way to set up promotional figures of Kreons, or even the Prime Microns. Weapons like the Prime Iacon artifacts could be offered. (who would like a Forge of Solus Prime?) Cardboard display backdrops that would let kids and collectors play with/display their figures in favorite environments like the Prime Autobase and the Nemesis' Bridge. (I'd love to have these made available packaged with the toys themselves.)

Even exclusive figures like the Dark Energon Figures or Reissues could find a home in a system like this. After all, not every cancelled toy makes it out to the market.

With multiple items available costing a different variety of points, one could reasonably expect that more product would be bought in order to collect the points for the offered goodies.

The great aspect of a program like this is that if it worked with Transformers, Hasbro could use it for their other lines like GIJoe, Star Wars, MLP, ect...

 

The biggest help to the toys would be better cartoons. Start the series over, using G1 models only, no artistic licenses, no comedy, just robotic voices and artwork done in Japan. It can even be cell shaded somewhat like Appleseed.

 

Really toy figure technology has gone way up since the early 80's. Might as well do a whole new set of Dinobots in the Classics line. And lets finally get poor Sludge a little love. When was the last time he had a figure?

Actually if they are playing G1 on the Hub, bringing back Classics would be a very good idea.

 

Hasbro should have to do some job shadowing at Lego's desk. When Lego announces a new product...what do you know...it's available. If you cant find it at TRU or Walmart or KMart or Target you can get it at the Lego store. If all that fails (very unlikely) you can order direct from Lego on line. They make their products available for a long enough time that you never have to worry about getting scalped on a current production toy.

Hasbro: Make...the products...AVAILABLE

All of them. In non lop sided proportions. Damn

 

It would be a lot easier these days to run a program like this, since you could tie it into a website, and give increasing "privledges" to users in terms of discounts, access to online content, and vanity account items depending on the amount of product purchased and redeemed online.

 

There are a lot of sensible ideas being discussed in here, but nothing that hasn't already been said before in some form or another. It's a shame Hasbro hasn't shown any indication of interest since many of these ideas seem realistic enough to be implemented into their business model.

 

Just keep in mind that in order for a line to really be successful for Hasbro, it has to appeal to the kids, and their parents. They aren't going on websites, following every release, and aren't tracking things down via online retailers. That's part of why getting everything on the shelves is so important. If they don't see it in stores, or an ad, they probably won't know it exists.

 

Does Hasbro determine the content of the Cases they send to stores, or do stores get to pick what they want to be in a case?

 

It's most likely a negotiated process, or one that both sides have input into.

 

Cyberverse is one of the best lines going to me.

 

When the shelf gets low, the guy on the sales floor orders TF's. He / she has no say in how many of what character is shipped to the store. They just order a case and that's it.

The store gets what it gets.

 

Let the Fans determine the cases.

A whole case of X8 Vehicons.

 

Short answer: Take a hint.

Long answer: Realize that their current strategy isn't working. There have been fucktons of threads about what Hasbro is doing wrong, and they are allways met by the same critizism from the same people over and over again who thinks that nobody but the people at Hasbro should have any say about anything because Hasbro is perfect in each and every way and can do no wrong.

Ignoring that crowd I can sum some of it up:

1. Don't botch releases (FE)
2. Do what you can to improve distribution
3. Individual bar codes on the packaging
4. Continue successful sub lines like classics (G1 cartoon resembling toys, not game based toys)
5. do some more market research as to how much they can charge for each size class in the different markets
6. stop shoving repaints down our throats (Hasbro said the cost of a new mold vs repaints was marginal at the panel earlier this year, but it seems like people are in denial about that).
7. Put some TF shows on CN again - why choose the hub when you can run different TF shows on both networks? Even re-runs of G1 could boost commemorative/classics sales.
8. Fire Aaron Archer. Time to get some new blood in
9. Sign a contract with a decent firm like what Griffin Bacal was back with G1 instead of doing things inhouse.
10. Stop rotating people in the boys toys dept. Let the people who are good at TFs work with TFs longterm.
11. Cancel the current contract with the TF club and find a suitable GLOBAL partner who can run the TF club.
12. Re-instate mail-aways
13. Have much more variety in every wave and let those waves last longer
14. Develop a new inventory software, keeping track of what has sold and then offer the retailer to restock the toys that have sold the most on a weekly or bi-weekly basis.
15. Produce more toys that are collector oriented. Yes, we are not their main audience. BUT you can produce toys that satisfies both kids and collectors, so capitalise on that.
16. Promote the Brand more in foreign markets.
17. Stop slacking: 3D parties are for the most part picking up slack. Stuff that Hasbro could have done better had they just bothered to do it. Each 3D party toy design should be a sobering slap in the face of Hasbro and a reminder of what Hasbro could have made money on.
18. Stop re-releasing some of the more popular molds. Just for a while. Just this year soundwave has been/will be released as:

Shat. glass Soundwave (2012)
Commemorative reissue (2012)
Linkin park soundwave (2012)
Encore Soundblaaster (2012 - ok, takara...but it still affects the US collectors market)

It's a bit much, especially with the MP version comming out.

I could go on, but I'm too tired. NN everyone.

 

I agree with whoever said the retro Bot Points idea. Mail-away exclusives instantlly become cooler just by being exclusive. Plus, there's nothing better than waking up in the morn' and seeing a Transformer package on your doorstep. Nothing.