Spotted Online – A Fan’s Rant Against Hasbro
Windcharger, Rumble, Frenzy, Warpath, all of these and more are either impossible to find or — if rumors are to be believed — just not going to make it to shelves in the US. I know I’ve posted a few times about my inability to locate some of the newer Transformers toys, but my few posts are nothing compared to this thread at TFormers.
It kills me to see that Transformers sales were down last year when in all reality they didn’t seem to really be trying to get their product out there. And it’s not just Transformers. Anyone who collects Iron Man or Marvel Universe figures I’m sure can all relate to the hell it’s been trying to find some of the new product that was supposed to be out in stores by now…but has had nothing but emptiness for the loooongest time. I’m not getting the strategy here.
Hasbro snuck a peek at a page from Mattel’s playbook.
I will be very sad if Warpath never makes it to the stores around me. If these new figures don’t make it to shelves before the new movie line, then they’ll probably just hold onto them until next year. Which is really sad, because the last thing I want is more movie based TFs, I’ve been so happy to find great comic and cartoon inspired figures for the last several months.
On a similar topic, I was at Target last night and all of the Reveal the Shield figures were on clearance, not just a sale, but actually stamped with a red clearance sticker.
It seems like the Big 2 of toy making (Hasbro and Mattel) are having the same problems, getting new product on store shelves and into the hands of willing and able buyers.
I’ve started to wonder if it’s really Hasbro and Mattel’s fault at all, or if they are starting to get push back from the big box retailers who aren’t finding it profitable to stock some of these toys on their shelves.
Then again, it’s not like Target, Walmart, etc. are using the aisle space for something else. Instead their pegs are just sitting empty. The whole thing just seems strange considering there are customers dying to give them their money. Hopefully something will change sometime soon!
I don’t think Hasbro do themselves any favours with their packing-bias, either.
I understand some characters are more popular and so they expect to shift more of that particular toy, but it’s crazy to see how rare some of the figures are, simply because they only include one for every three of another they ship.
I see plenty of the same old pegwarmers but never the ones I want thanks to them being ”rare” and the only people who seem to benefit are scalpers.
@The Blot – “I’ve started to wonder if it’s really Hasbro and Mattel’s fault at all, or if they are starting to get push back from the big box retailers who aren’t finding it profitable to stock some of these toys on their shelves.”
I think it’s partly retailers, but a lot of the problem has to be Hasbro/Mattel and the way they pack cases. When a case includes four of an older figure and only 1 each of a a number of new figures those pegs are gonna fill up pretty fast with overstock.