[Jmacq1]

Well, Hasbro's not at NYCC proper, but they're hosting an event in conjunction with it next Wednesday night....A "Preview Night Party."

[Tarquinius]

I tend to agree with everything you said Snowflakian. It seems sensical from both a consumer and producer stand point.

The biggest point being is that MU should stick around. However, I'm a bit concerned with ML competition now or basically the 3.75 6 inch debate.

Historically, Hasbro has always seemed to favor 3.75 figures which are both highly articulated and detailed. I think its major consensus to say that Hasbro produces arguably the best 3.75 figure out there (GI Joe, Star Wars, MU etc).

However, as we all know two recent things have been developing
1) the increasing production costs
2) the advent of more Hasbro 6 inch figures

By no means am I blaming 6 inch figures (infact I love what Hasbro has been doing) however arguably I think it creates some inner brand competition which is never good (inmo).

A kid who has 20 bucks can either buy 2 3.75 toys or one 6 inch toy. I won't pretend to fanthom which the kid will pick, but ultimately the kid has to make a choice and this creates one of many steps towards pegwarming and bad distribution etc etc.

Same scenario with a collector, except on a bigger scale. We have more money, but we also have more interests and more diverse loyalities towards lines and brands. Speaking from experience, I love Marvel and I started with MU. However financial obligations permit me from buying ML figures in mass.

In my opinion, if Hasbro's production costs are going up and they are trying to balance all of these lines that means they can only produce so much for every line. And consequently, from a consumer stand point we can only buy so much.

Consumeristic Natural Selection.

[Snowflakian]

Hopefully natural selection pushes them towards the joe scale though.

Looking at it from a gift perspective, or even gift cards, when I was a kid and now a collector, I lean the most I can get for my money. The same happens when I shop for my cousins for gifts. At a 25 buck limit per kid, I always buy em 2 of their favorite heroes that year per gift. At least until they start suggesting they want something else.

[Tarquinius]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowflakian

Hopefully natural selection pushes them towards the joe scale though.

Looking at it from a gift perspective, or even gift cards, when I was a kid and now a collector, I lean the most I can get for my money. The same happens when I shop for my cousins for gifts. At a 25 buck limit per kid, I always buy em 2 of their favorite heroes that year per gift. At least until they start suggesting they want something else.

I hope so too. Like I said, arguably...Hasbro makes the best 3.75 figure.

I'm really torn though because I really like what they are doing with the ML series as well. And my inner Marvel nerd is being catered towards in every direction.

I want both lines to succeed and do well but...within this economic climate I don't think a 3.75 AND a 6 inch version of the same brand (Marvel) can survive long term. (However, I think movie lines can pull it off because they are not necessarily long term)

[Snowflakian]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tarquinius

I hope so too. Like I said, arguably...Hasbro makes the best 3.75 figure.

I'm really torn though because I really like what they are doing with the ML series as well. And my inner Marvel nerd is being catered towards in every direction.

I want both lines to succeed and do well but...within this economic climate I don't think a 3.75 AND a 6 inch version of the same brand (Marvel) can survive long term. (However, I think movie lines can pull it off because they are not necessarily long term)

Yeah, see and that's what I want to change too in a way.
I want movie lines to switch to long term by tapping what they haven't done yet(X-men, though maybe movie license rights could be an issue) and also consolidate the ones marvel is doing by using package refreshing for them as merged. Then they can fluff it out with movie concept designs of their own for those that haven't had movie appearances yet or may never as well as branch out the ultimate comics side of things maybe.

MU needs to stay around though for the 616 side of things definitely for the kids/collectors and it also helps give comic accurate figures of characters from the toons too while the excess film lines can also cover some of this. For example, the spider-man movie line could shift gears to cover Ultimate Spider-man toon based figures. They could do a movie conceptualized style of his team, and even toon colors of figures of the characters that were used in MU that did their 616 versions.

Then ML needs to buckle down to about 3 waves a year. A new one every 4 months. Not counting the variants, this lets them refresh the cases to maintain that 4 month spread and let the variants spread out more instead of being so rare.

This consolidates the marvel shelf space to only 5 main action figure lines(MU, ML, Spider-man, X-Men, and Marvel Cinematic) besides the much younger figures like what's replacing Squadies. Many stores are already doing this anyway with the Cap, Thor and IM2 lines taking up Avengers line shelf space.

This path also makes all 5 mainstays for the forseeable future and allows a lot that can be used for comic packs and multipacks.

[Tarquinius]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowflakian

Yeah, see and that's what I want to change too in a way.
I want movie lines to switch to long term by tapping what they haven't done yet(X-men, though maybe movie license rights could be an issue) and also consolidate the ones marvel is doing by using package refreshing for them as merged. Then they can fluff it out with movie concept designs of their own for those that haven't had movie appearances yet or may never as well as branch out the ultimate comics side of things maybe.

MU needs to stay around though for the 616 side of things definitely for the kids/collectors and it also helps give comic accurate figures of characters from the toons too while the excess film lines can also cover some of this. For example, the spider-man movie line could shift gears to cover Ultimate Spider-man toon based figures. They could do a movie conceptualized style of his team, and even toon colors of figures of the characters that were used in MU that did their 616 versions.

Then ML needs to buckle down to about 3 waves a year. A new one every 4 months. Not counting the variants, this lets them refresh the cases to maintain that 4 month spread and let the variants spread out more instead of being so rare.

This consolidates the marvel shelf space to only 5 main action figure lines(MU, ML, Spider-man, X-Men, and Marvel Cinematic) besides the much younger figures like what's replacing Squadies. Many stores are already doing this anyway with the Cap, Thor and IM2 lines taking up Avengers line shelf space.

This path also makes all 5 mainstays for the forseeable future and allows a lot that can be used for comic packs and multipacks.

I agree with everything you've said.

Playing devils advocate here, the only debate that could be made against that is that the number of waves per year may not justify the production costs (I have no idea what the numbers are to be exact)

But in my opinion....if Hasbro could streamline everything like you've said, then that would create a permenant avenue for them to work with. Right now the way they have everything is so disoragnized as you've pointed out.

[Snowflakian]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tarquinius

I agree with everything you've said.

Playing devils advocate here, the only debate that could be made against that is that the number of waves per year may not justify the production costs (I have no idea what the numbers are to be exact)

But in my opinion....if Hasbro could streamline everything like you've said, then that would create a permenant avenue for them to work with. Right now the way they have everything is so disoragnized as you've pointed out.

Yeah, the main hiccup is how to get the right movie wave on shelf before the movie hits.
Thankfully though, that's what package refreshing allows. Sadly though you bring up a very good point about costs. I barely touched on that with the point about repacks and repaints, but I'm not sure if even that would be enough to recoup spots if one of the new "Mainstays" couldn't hold cost.

[Tarquinius]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowflakian

Yeah, the main hiccup is how to get the right movie wave on shelf before the movie hits.
Thankfully though, that's what package refreshing allows. Sadly though you bring up a very good point about costs. I barely touched on that with the point about repacks and repaints, but I'm not sure if even that would be enough to recoup spots if one of the new "Mainstays" couldn't hold cost.

At some point I have to think though that having compact and organized lines will help compensate for production costs by having a consistent, well informed product that people can come to expect and love

[Snowflakian]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tarquinius

At some point I have to think though that having compact and organized lines will help compensate for production costs by having a consistent, well informed product that people can come to expect and love

That's definitely a benefit.
I end up being who most of my family turns to when it comes to toy questions, and the main reason for that is because of how often the lines keep changing. Extrapolating that to the general public and outside of those that follow this stuff, the average consumer is getting lost on what's what until a massive movie like avengers hits that's hard to miss.

The other lines though not so much. They see avengers and get the connection, they see the others and sometimes wonder "is this what my kid was asking about?" So mainstays would definitely solve that. It'd make it easier on the average consumer to know what they are looking for and understand what to expect.

Like the toy biz older days and playmates older days before the bust. They had mainstay lines with repacks. They were doing fantastic. The problem with the bust though came with the oversaturation of figures and lowered articulation which led to ML being the only main Marvel line for period of time.

With the Joe Scale, we don't have to worry about oversaturation, and overall, the articulation is still better than the toy biz era pre-ML. This is making collectors and kids buy figures, and even rebuy figures they already have. The other nice aspect to this is if hasbro only has the license until 2018 or so, that gives them between 2013 and then to do the mainstay line way. Flood the market, cause the oversaturation effect with everyone covered by 2018. Then bow out or revamp the entire approach.

At that point, only new movies will push product. The older movies have been covered, and the majority(hopefully) of 616 will be covered.

So pretty much Hasbro needs to throw all the cards on the table. Maximize profit you can get from marvel, and just feed that fan/kid frenzy until flooded with new figures and options. 6 years of that should be strong profits and sales, with the final year starting to reflect the similar toy biz figure flooded bust. Which could then justify not renewing the license. If they do renew the license though, they can recoup costs through other avenues like toy biz did with the merged marvel figure line repacks that helped keep them afloat after some mixed articulation decisions that didn't move.

[Tarquinius]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowflakian

That's definitely a benefit.
I end up being who most of my family turns to when it comes to toy questions, and the main reason for that is because of how often the lines keep changing. Extrapolating that to the general public and outside of those that follow this stuff, the average consumer is getting lost on what's what until a massive movie like avengers hits that's hard to miss.

The other lines though not so much. They see avengers and get the connection, they see the others and sometimes wonder "is this what my kid was asking about?" So mainstays would definitely solve that. It'd make it easier on the average consumer to know what they are looking for and understand what to expect.

Like the toy biz older days and playmates older days before the bust. They had mainstay lines with repacks. They were doing fantastic. The problem with the bust though came with the oversaturation of figures and lowered articulation which led to ML being the only main Marvel line for period of time.

With the Joe Scale, we don't have to worry about oversaturation, and overall, the articulation is still better than the toy biz era pre-ML. This is making collectors and kids buy figures, and even rebuy figures they already have. The other nice aspect to this is if hasbro only has the license until 2018 or so, that gives them between 2013 and then to do the mainstay line way. Flood the market, cause the oversaturation effect with everyone covered by 2018. Then bow out or revamp the entire approach.

At that point, only new movies will push product. The older movies have been covered, and the majority(hopefully) of 616 will be covered.

So pretty much Hasbro needs to throw all the cards on the table. Maximize profit you can get from marvel, and just feed that fan/kid frenzy until flooded with new figures and options. 6 years of that should be strong profits and sales, with the final year starting to reflect the similar toy biz figure flooded bust. Which could then justify not renewing the license. If they do renew the license though, they can recoup costs through other avenues like toy biz did with the merged marvel figure line repacks that helped keep them afloat after some mixed articulation decisions that didn't move.

Again I agree with all of that. Its a shame to think that with a toyline sometimes you need to plan the end of the line to understand the rest....but that is business.

Hasbro under Vonner had a really good model I thought. They did a good job trying to release comic recent costumes and characters. I mean the BE Iron Man toy was released within the same year as it's comic debut (I believe). FF Spiderman and FF Doom as well have been fantastic in it's turn around.

That is a good strategy to allow the line to be fresh and relevant. Unfortunately, I don't think we will see much of that now.

On another rant, I'm really peeved about the use of extra-curriculars in this line. We went from fury files, to stands to comic shots. That is just POOR execution with no excuse. You won't hear me tearing down this line much, but that is my biggest complaint. It truly shows Hasbro's uncertainty and confusion with this line.

[Snowflakian]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tarquinius

Again I agree with all of that. Its a shame to think that with a toyline sometimes you need to plan the end of the line to understand the rest....but that is business.

Hasbro under Vonner had a really good model I thought. They did a good job trying to release comic recent costumes and characters. I mean the BE Iron Man toy was released within the same year as it's comic debut (I believe). FF Spiderman and FF Doom as well have been fantastic in it's turn around.

That is a good strategy to allow the line to be fresh and relevant. Unfortunately, I don't think we will see much of that now.

On another rant, I'm really peeved about the use of extra-curriculars in this line. We went from fury files, to stands to comic shots. That is just POOR execution with no excuse. You won't hear me tearing down this line much, but that is my biggest complaint. It truly shows Hasbro's uncertainty and confusion with this line.

On one side I tend to agree. They do have a tendency to shift around MU a bit too much on package contents. On the other hand, there seems to be more to those changes because of the market and cost than we know for certain.

Hasbro has shown at times a strong aptitude for thinking ahead though in other ways. Take for example the limited articulation on the avengers line. Many of these costumes might be the same for Avengers 2, so the only way to push purchases on those is to up the articulation the figures didn't get before. Black Widow and Fury being the exception as they could get tweaked costumes. Cap and Hawkeye probably won't though, and Thor is anyone's guess really come Avengers 2. Ironman is another one that'll probably have new armors, but his own movies mean an ungodly amount of armors again anyway to draw from. Cap also has the problem of potentially his second movie having a toy line, which means more past and present Caps. So they'll have to figure out how to differentiate them. Hopefully this means a stronger comic subline within the movieline to pick up what's missing and fluff out the lines better. Stuff like Comic Red Skull, Sin, 90s Armored Cap, and whoever else that can fit. Including maybe a Howling Commandos Fury, or new 616 Fury.

That's one thing I do have to give Hasbro credit for with Marvel. They do seem to think ahead on how they are going to sell you the same figure/character you already bought a year or so before.

[redx24]

im calling PETA on this thread.

[Iceman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tarquinius

On another rant, I'm really peeved about the use of extra-curriculars in this line. We went from fury files, to stands to comic shots. That is just POOR execution with no excuse. You won't hear me tearing down this line much, but that is my biggest complaint. It truly shows Hasbro's uncertainty and confusion with this line.

Hear you there. At least the stands were useful. The codes for the Fury files never worked, much like the IM2 armor cards but at least they had some nice art. The comic shots are just a glorified piece of packaging.

[Snowflakian]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iceman

Hear you there. At least the stands were useful. The codes for the Fury files never worked, much like the IM2 armor cards but at least they had some nice art. The comic shots are just a glorified piece of packaging.

I do miss the little messages in the envelopes though.
The stat cards are whatever really, but those little messages were like awesome little foreshadowings of what's to come and often even added to the fun of different marvel storylines.

Sadly that's part of the problem with the shift in packaging though.
When they were solid Fury, Rogers, or Osborn, they were easy to write for. Now that the back character varies so much and there's no underlying theme, they make no sense.

It would be sweet though if they found a way to pair them up with whoever was on the back. Like their take on whichever character it was. Like Rocket Raccoon or Deadpool or even Professor X, commenting about whoever, and so on down the line.


(Did we just salvage this thread into ideas about how to better monetize and punctuate the MU line as a whole? Movies and toons included?)

[Shin Densetsu]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tarquinius

Again I agree with all of that. Its a shame to think that with a toyline sometimes you need to plan the end of the line to understand the rest....but that is business.

Hasbro under Vonner had a really good model I thought. They did a good job trying to release comic recent costumes and characters. I mean the BE Iron Man toy was released within the same year as it's comic debut (I believe). FF Spiderman and FF Doom as well have been fantastic in it's turn around.

That is a good strategy to allow the line to be fresh and relevant. Unfortunately, I don't think we will see much of that now.

On another rant, I'm really peeved about the use of extra-curriculars in this line. We went from fury files, to stands to comic shots. That is just POOR execution with no excuse. You won't hear me tearing down this line much, but that is my biggest complaint. It truly shows Hasbro's uncertainty and confusion with this line.

Do you know who took Vonner's place on the Marvel Design team? Just curious.

I am not sure what to expect for next year, this year was a very mixed bag. We got some figures that fans have wanted for a while, like Kraven, Beast, Beta Ray Bill, Professor X, a new Punisher, and countless others. The Comic Packs are hit and miss, some are great, like the Daredevil set, and Thanos pack, but some are disappointing. Cap with Falcon...okay I dig that fans who wanted a Classic Falcon can get one but THAT Cap mold, AGAIN?!

BE Iron Man is an awesome mold but repainted way too much in a short time frame. Comic Pack, 3 Pack, TRU Avengers wave TWICE...that's ridiculous. Also that Tony Stark head should have come with the 1st release.

Also as stated in other threads, in my area Marvel Universe has become the Gladiator line accompanied by 1st appearance Wolverine.

Avengers to me, seems like a mishandled line. For the most part, you just need the Target 8 pack and you're set.

I wouldn't mind Marvel Universe including a few movie-verse figures every now and then, like how Toy Biz and Hasbro once did on Marvel Legends.

[kostej]

Well, for a small peak into the future, let's wait one more day for Marvel Preview night, it is supposedly coming offsite one day before the start of NYCC - that means tomorrow. Maybe we will get some hints for 2013.

[Prem1x]

IRT the 4" vs 6" debate, its seems to me that Hasbro should concentrate on the 4" line being the mass-produced store presence. The 6" line should be some sort of subscription or on-line only series. If the Legends collectors want them that bad, they will pay. It just doesn't make sense to me to make retailers reserve shelf-space for both.

[tlasjr]

I think in order to properly quantify the 6"v4" cost debate some one needs to determine the amont of plastic in each. They you could do an effective cost benefit analysis of increasing the size.
Any volunteers to melt down the same figure for mu and ml and measure the volume?

[Tarquinius]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tlasjr

I think in order to properly quantify the 6"v4" cost debate some one needs to determine the amont of plastic in each. They you could do an effective cost benefit analysis of increasing the size.
Any volunteers to melt down the same figure for mu and ml and measure the volume?

I understand. The whole conversation has been conducted without empirical data. Even if we did do your idea though, we still wouldn't know all of Hasbro's overhead cost for R and D, marketing, payroll, shipping costs etc etc etc...so we will never know the true variance for cost.

So we are stuck working with absolutes...that there is only so much shelf space, so much money a consumer can spend etc.

[synapse17]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tlasjr

I think in order to properly quantify the 6"v4" cost debate some one needs to determine the amont of plastic in each. They you could do an effective cost benefit analysis of increasing the size.
Any volunteers to melt down the same figure for mu and ml and measure the volume?

Couldn't you just weigh the figures and you know, subtract?

[Snowflakian]

Quote:

Originally Posted by synapse17

Couldn't you just weigh the figures and you know, subtract?

Plastic grades and types vary in density, cost, and production. Which would throw the weight off anyway, plus still give us inaccurate data.

So yeah, we have to weigh them on a cost vs amount of characters approach.

[tlasjr]

You guys gave me MUCH too much credit. I was just looking forward to the you tube video of someone melting down their Bucky Caps.

My legit question is if the sculpt is stored as a 3d design file why cant they make both figures?
I mean the two biggest costs everyone says are sculpting and tooling. If a computer can handle both of those in 5 min. for the auto industry, why cant the same work for the toy industry?

[Jackieboy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowflakian

Plastic grades and types vary in density, cost, and production. Which would throw the weight off anyway, plus still give us inaccurate data.

So yeah, we have to weigh them on a cost vs amount of characters approach.

i would have thought with the amount of recycled plastic thats generated globally,Cost would not be much of an issue.

[Snowflakian]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jackieboy

i would have thought with the amount of recycled plastic thats generated globally,Cost would not be much of an issue.

Well the issue isn't the cost per se. The issue is we don't know what the cost is at all. lol

[Jackieboy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowflakian

Well the issue isn't the cost per se. The issue is we don't know what the cost is at all. lol

it costs guys like you and me an arm and a leg thats for sure