Scalper Stories
 

I first of all would like to say I HATE scalpers they are pieces of **** & they have no place trying to profit off of our interest in anything. Jacking up the prices & snatching everything off the shelves to do so is bs & collectors & kids should have a right to get things the way they should be & not have to pay another cent more than the MSRP.

That being said, I just want anybody here to post any experiences with scalpers whther it was face to face or just getting screwed out of it while you couldn't buy figures at the moment.

I hear you but how about us collectors that grab up all the new stuff before kids who the toys are made for can get their hands on them?
To each his own.

In the toy world, a scalper is someone who beats you to the punch, when in reality, it's always the early bird gets the worm.

The difference between a scalper and a collector, is most instances a collector is only buying one juggernaut for their own display/entertainment, while a scalper will pick up Everysingle juggernaut and sell them back to use at 250% market price, plus shipping sometimes. and I've had mostly bad experiances with them.

I mean, an example, Thanos wave came out, I went looking and I went to a walmart out of town, and lo and behold, I get there literally 5 seconds after a scalper was there. He was there, with a cart, and he had EVERY figure from Thanos Wave in multiples. I was like "Dude, your buying them all, cant you atleast leave 1 of each so I as a collector can just pick up one of each for my collection at retail?" and he pretty much told me if I wanted them so bad, to look for them on Ebay in 2 hours.

!!!! I would have knocked that mother _____ out!!!

I agree with the collector-scalper difference. I am collector. One of each. Not looking to sell or rip anyone off. I have fallen prey, I must admit, but it was no one's fault but my own. When the Clear Vision, Warpath, Ms Marvel, Daredevil variant wave hit...I SWORE they would never go retail...so I paid $80 apiece for them. (It was tax season so I had a little extra flow.)

Within 2 weeks they were $15 apiece on ebay, and within another 6 weeks they were retail. I got burned, but I lit the fire. Never again.

an amendment to my collector scalper thing. There are moments where I have purchased figures more than once. I have a double of Spiderwoman and Black Widow and Kitty Pryde sitting on my shelf on card, while I also have a couple army builders. I will army build but not to the extreme of 160 Cobra BATS I once saw. Mostly 3-4. as for the Mint on card figures, these I pick up with the belief that at a future date I will trade them to sombody who is looking for them and has somthing I am looking for, so that works.

I cant find SHlT at any store because of scalpers. Its a dog eat dog world, Im thinking of selling everything and getting out of this hobby because I cant find anything anymore and Im afraid I might kill a scalper if I ever bump into one at the store. Times are changing turn on the T.V. and take a look.

Oh its total bull. I have never come face to face with one, but I have been in many situations where I look at the pegs and can just tell they have been scavenged to death. It's a damn shame really, but what can you do?

I might get into trouble if I find a guy with a cart full.. I honestly could see me running off with his cart.. hope im faster.

the worst act of scalping was something i witnessed whilst i worked at target. it happened right around when the first transformers movie came out and bumblebee was going for some coin, $35-45. i had just stocked the toy aisle some transformers and in that restock was three bumblebee toys. i was walking around the area finishing up when i saw a kid walking around wit one in his hand, i thought "finally a kid got one" because we were getting calls all the time for when we would get bumblebee toys from parents. then i saw mr scalper, this guy already was a pain in the ass, he'd try to get stock people to sell him stuff before the street date and would try multiple times during the day to try and get one of "new" employees to do it for him, coming up with a different story each time to try to get his hands on a case of what ever that was not officially released yet.. the guy is a dick. anyway i spot him cruising the transfomer section with a cart of every bumblebee in every size with his eyes locking in on what this kid has in his hands. the kid puts it down on the shelf to go get his mom and within 3 seconds the guy grabs it, drops it in his cart and makes a mad rush for the check out, while the kid is all excited saying "mommy i found one!". i was floored. i mean that takes a certain level of douchebag to take from a child. kid comes back and starts crying when he can't find it, i went ahead and called all the other targets and found one and had it sent to our store. told my coworkers what happened and they were about as pissed off as i was. the following day when the kid and parent showed up we had assembled the entire so that the kid could pick out which one he wanted. his eyeballs exploded.
anyhoo the scalper guy got himself a nince rep at my store so everytime we had something he asked for it either we wouldn't sell it to him.

wow. that's douchebaggery to the max. if i could do it legally, i'd hit him in the nuts with an aluminum bat.

Sometimes I wonder if I look like a scalper to the employees of TRU/Target/Walmart around here >: ) I do make a weekly toy run to those places and see the same employees all the time. It would be pretty hard to forget a grown adult, week after week, browsing the action figure aisle.

I haven't bought multiples though. I do have a few extra, unopened figs for a rainy day trade, but they were bought on separate occasions.

makes you wonder what life (or lackthereof) this man has. Pathetic simp.

I dont buy into any of this to be honest with you. If most of these people on this forum found a figure that was extremely valuable, they'd either trade it for value of what it is going for or sell it at that price. A lot of the forum members here hunt for items and will buy double to sell or trade the other so calling someone a scalper when you may indeed do the same thing isnt necessarily fair. If you stumbled upon 5 regular Visions at a store or 5 xforce Warpath would you not buy them all? Wouldnt this be considered scalping even if you are picking them up for trade bait or selling them for double profit, 20 bucks even though they are going for me? Come on, lets all be realistic about this.
I can usually never find any new items because everything is gone but im not going to cry about how the scalpers bought everything up when in the end, its the kids who are actually buying them to collect or play with that are missing out.

I wouldn't say I condone scalping, but in a way I really don't care what people do with their money. If some poor sap wants to revolve his life around when stores get shipments & drive all over town, all to make $6 profit on a $9 toy, then their life is weak to begin with.

I'll buy a second figure on occasion, but it'll mostly be for trade bait for an equally priced figure that I can't find myself... like the spare Cable I bought to trade for Cyclops. If I love the figure, I'll buy a second to keep MOC, but I can count on one hand the number of figs I've done that with (WFC Soundwave is one).

Ouch..

Nope.

VERY TRUE INDEED!!! Do forget so called "scalpers" have the money for sure. Otherwise, they could not buy up all those hot items.

The kid put bumblebee back on the shelf. Kid should have kept in his hands. Proceed to parents to put in their shopping cart. That guy did not snatch it out of the kid's hands. I could see if he did that then different story.

Man, you hit the nail tight on. Anyone who collects/sells/trades knows what value is. They would be FOOLISH to leave behind any items that could help them fund hobby or other things.

We can use baseball, basketball, football cards as examples. Would anyone in their right leave behind rookie cars, first issues, limited editions ??? HELL NO. Micheal Jordon, Shaq, Kobe, Lebron, steve Young, Dan Marino, etc.... The list goes on and on. Would these be left behind??? HELL NO.

Same. Not here. I have the money to buy what I need. Nothing more, nothing less.

Where ya at? I could maybe help you out- Gladiator 1st Woverine and Apocy are all out here.

I actually met afellow MU collector at target by my having three figs in my hand that the dude wanted- only I'd gotten there a minute ahead of him- I gave him the Union Jack (it was an extra I wanted for a mod) and he was mightly happy- but I was not giving up the variant Vision or variant Warpath- I needed those!

I've since run into him at target and we're totally cool.

theres this guy in nj, who pays off people at targets, toys r us's and walmarts to hold them for him, so i just order offline now.... :o(

Toys R Us fired a ton of idiots over that crap- and employees that were cherry picking cases, buying with their discounts nad selling them on ebay.
Every year the "hot" christmas toy would get scalped that way too..

Bastards.

i don't have sympathies for iPad scalpers either. they got beaten by clubs and such.

I hit the walmart every few days to hunt. I happened to be hunting (at this point) for DCUC wave 16 (yeah I know its not MU but its the same principle). So eureka they had all of them. So i did pick up 1 of each for my collection. As I'm standing there with arms full a guy and his three year old approach. He sees what I have and starts using his kid to guilt me into giving up some of the figures. There were doubles but he really wanted the riddler which there was only one. He kept saying, "its for my kid. Come on man don't be heartless". I told him I thought it was really sad that he was using his kid against me. Meanwhile his three year old was all into the Generator Rex and toy story stuff. Didn't even seem to care about DCUC. But of course being the super nice guy that I am, I gave up the riddler. Had to buy him off ebay. Fool me once...

I got ripped off out of all of the Thanos wave, no longer than a week ago, at least I got something out of it. Here is the story. I go to a semi local walmart to check up on Marvel Universe figures. When I got there, there was only a Constrictor and Dark Hawkeye left. To me, this was amazing because I have NEVER seen any of these figures before at local or semi local walmarts. I was so stoked I went to leave with Constrictor in hand, and saw a walmart employee with a cart full of toys. I go up to her and ask if she has anymore Marvel Universe figures. She replys with "No, sorry, I just put 3 boxes out". My jaw dropped, because I am assuming there are 6 figures or so per box? [If anyone knows, I'd like to know] and there was only 2 left.

I know this doesn't mean there was a Thanos, or a Yellowjacket on the pegs, but...damn, what if there was? Sigh =(

The difference between a scalper and a collector, besides the obviously stated bits (And no, I know of no one who will buy up rare figures just to sell on ebay, as has been accused of everyone in this thread by someone's earlier post), is that most collectors I know will happily step back and let a child have his choice first.
Most collectors I know also refuse to engage in such activity, and indeed will help others out.

The worst case I've personally delt with, was some douchy kid at botcon 2009, on the TCC board. We'd made an arrangement beforethe con for the Leozak figure. He was going to sell it to me at a specific price. Then he turned around and tried to sell it to several of my friends saying they could have it if they beat my price. Naturally, they turned him down and told him off (Well, at least one of them did).
Then, when he finally gets the figure, he raised the price on me, and then gouged me with shipping (Charging me $15, when it ended up costing $4) on top of what he was overcharging me above the original agreed price. Now, the figure ends up going for half of what I paid, in total.