When a car company has two cars that are similar in size/design/feel to each other, one of the two cars is usually neglected and eventually put out of production. This is because there is they compete with each other for the same market. If rival car companies have two cars that compete with each other, the two companies fight it out tooth-and-nail to design and produce a better car.

Where am I going with this?

Hasbro has both Star Wars and GI Joe, as well as Indiana Jones. All of these are hallmark 3 3/4 lines from the 1980's that have returned.

I think the lousy GI Joe distribution is because Hasbro puts more emphasis on SW and, for the moment at least, Indiana Jones. There isn't a single IJ figure which I haven't seen in the stores. As for the Joes, there are almost entire waves that I've never seen in a store. If Hasbro's only bread & butter was GI Joe, the figures would be everywhere in great numbers- like they were in the 80's. However, with SW and IJ selling better (that's just a guess on IJ), GI Joe gets the redheaded stepchild treatment.

Just a thought.

That...and the fact that cases breakdown as:

Star Wars- 12 figures/case
Indiana Jones- 12 figures/case
GI Joe- 8 figures/case

Right off the bat GI Joe figures are 1/3 less per case than the others, add to that the fact that most cases have one of each figure and you have angry customers and empty pegs right next to the overflow that is Star Wars and Indiana Jones.

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This makes sense. I'm sure part of the deal Hasbro has with Lucas forces them to emphasize Lucas properties over competing brands in similar scale. He's got the leverage to do that, why not?

Star Wars and Indy have movies to help push those lines. Look at the new Star Wars promo for Clone Wars, midnight stores opening for the new toys and then another for when the movie opens. Hasbro has more invested in Indy and SW. Joe will get his due, next year, when the movie opens.

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In my town

I only saw half of wave 8 (Jet Pack Duke one) they where here for a week. Now we just have wave 1 comic packs.
Indy no restock since the movie
SW no restock in a month

Distribution here sucks no matter what you collect.

LOL

Wow. That's it. Its offiicial. We are now blaming George Lucas for spotty GI Joe distribution.

And Bludd's arm

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I talked to a Hasbro rep in Wal Mart here in the Denver Metro area. She blamed the WalMart BUYERS (ie the people who buy the toys for the stores to distribute) for the shortages. So its a everyone blames everyone else thing going on.

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Actually the buyers are where the blame lays.

Some stores ALWAYS have Joes in stock, others restock once every 2 months. You can't bame Hasbro for how the stores order or restock.

But people still do.

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I respectfully disagree about that. Hasbro doesn't even keep its own website stocked with product. They can shoulder a bit more blame than the stores- just my opinion.

Hasbro is an abusive crack dealer and we're all addicted.

Master Collector is a more abusive crack dealer with better, more expensive crack and even less business skills. The crack is really better, like crack wrapped in bacon.

Which is the fault of the buyers for the Hasbro Toy Shop division which is COMPLETELY seperate from production and distribution.

Again: It's the buyers.



Well the abusive and expensive parts are right, but I'm not sure about the better part. A lot of Master Collector's stuff would get laughed at if it showed up at retail instead of being an exclusive.

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I think that might be the first step towards reducing the distribution difficulties. Make each wave 5 figs at 2 per case, with the last two spots for redistributing harder to find figs.

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From my understanding...

The store buyers make orders for product. A rep from manufacturers pay an occasional visit to a store to set up things and to see how things are going. When a rep visit a store the look around at the product, take notes talk to the people in the related departments.

I blame everyone.

Distribution sucks bad in all areas. A month ago I was in target for tooth paste. Looked around notice items through out the store stock was pushed to the front to make like they had product. Fact is there was gaps through out. Even tampons. Stores are ordering less. Sales are down so they don't order more. They all [LASER BLAST] about less business. They never figure out that people are buying less cause nothing is in stock. Go to store look for things that aren't toys and you'll won't find what you want. Try finding a shirt. A store will order 25 in Small, 25 in Medium and 25 in large. Medium sales out first. You're a medium store only has small and large. They won't order more medium until the sale all sizes or the next seasons fashions come in.

From what I gather with my own questions to Hasbro and many others over the weekend, it's just simply due to screwing up. Hasbro based the idea of how these would do based on previous sales. They underproduced. Stores have placed orders, but there's just nothing there to supply them.

Hasbro does not want to over produce because that's lost money obviously. They're still fighting to try and get that perfect amount in store. It's still not exactly an overly major seller, but it is very popular. They didn't say that, but reading between the lines of questions, that's just what I gather. It's right on the line of where it can be over produced or under produced. Right now we're seeing it under produced. Every so often it jumps to the other side and then we end up seeing too many like the comic packs.'

Pretty much everyone was asking why they can't find them and what can be done to get stores to up their orders. Hasbro's reply was "They are ordering but the figures are just not there to supply them". They said they are working hard to get the production numbers up.

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They said exactly that in the last Q&A. Also I know a few people in Wal-mart who told me the orders for joe cases were flat cancelled due to lack of product only to be filled a year later (Reason we are now seeing things like wave 2 and 3 from last year so much), which to me is just plain weird.

Also orders to the comic shop are being cancelled as well, totally different distributors same story.

Can't blame the buyers when nothing is on the shelf for them to buy. I can understand a bit of being cuaght off guard but after a year its seems like they should have caught on. Personally I still hold the theory that its an attempt to make a false popularity with inflated E-bay prices from the scalpers.

Hold on - that's just crazy. Why would George Lucas care about Bludd's arm?

Now if Bludd had like 6 arms and a couple of them spun around really fast with light-sabers, maybe. Or if Bludd's arm was left here by aliens in the 1950's... I'm just saying.