[Xsoldier]

Scalping/reselling is just a part of the big machine called capitalism. Even in states where scalping is illegal, (like mine was until 3 years ago), reselling toys doesn't fall under that realm of the law. Actually most things don't. Speculating the market, and purchasing large quantities of an item with the hope of reaping a profit happens all the time with commodities. Nobody says anythin about it. Speculators are why Oil is so damn high right now, it has nothing to do with the actual US supply of oil. Heck we get most of that from Canada. But with Commodities, you can't return them 2-3 months later when they didn't sell on ebay or in your online store.

Now, I am not a scalper. I pick up 2-3 figs for myself, my son, and for a disabled friend. (I even pick up stuff I don't collect for him.) If I can't find things I look to the b/s/t threads on some boards I frequent and pick up stuff to do a trade. Sometimes the person backs out and I'm stuck with it. (until I learned to keep all my reciepts.) Collectors of all types may collect 2 of a fig, or pick up some for friends. We can't assume everybody is a scalper/reseller. I love to see capitalism work. I don't enable them by paying their prices either though.

I do know they exist. We have a local shop here who has a crew of about 12-15 people who camp all the stores every morning within a certain radius of their shop. They do it not only to get popular items, but to monopolize the product in the area. This to me is above and beyond wrong. They also save all their reciepts and return their bloated inventory to targets primarily because of how their system is set up. They even take their pegwarmers from the cases they order back to target. This screws inventory up so bad. It is also a reason you see the 20-30 Ironman/spidey/goblin thing going on mostly at target.

Retailers don't care much who buys their toys. They sold them. They are gone. REturns are a different story. They have no way to track reciept returns at most stores, identifying habitual offenders. I think the return policies need to be examined so they can control their inventory better. Target should just go to individual sku's so they can stop getting screwed by their own system. I had one Target here with 9 more figures in the system than they have ever had on order/on the shelf before.

Again, there is no law against reselling. There is one against fraud. This is where repackers need to be looked at more, but scalpers also fall under this category in a way.

I remember standing out at Best buy one black friday night, and noticed the 5 guys who camped out for two days did it for a reason. The way the store hands out a claim ticket for the quantity of certain items they had instock, the guys at the front of the line took 1 each of every single one of them. Then after the vouchers ran out, proceded to go through the line until people would give them cash for the voucher. When there is a 80-150 savings on an item, I saw a couple people fork over 30-50 bucks for a voucher. Yeah, I was pissed. I don't do campouts at Bestbuy any more. The cops were there and watched it happen. (yes while scalping was still illegal.) I also thought it was a certain level of genius. They were first in line and got what they wanted...then paid for it with other people's money. Were to days of rotating shifts camping out worth it??? maybe to them. I had to ask one of them, how much they make doing it. He told me his crew was about 30 people and they camped 6 bestbuys and get about 8-10 grand a year. That is just STUPID!! The folks on the comic shops scalp crew...yep all of them were a part of that crew as well. That is how I found out about them. Some people like to talk.

All we can do is not pay their prices. We have to be aware of hoarders too, the ones who just hope to pay for their kid's college someday. These aren't 80's toys. Sucks for them, they should talk to all the beanie baby fans from the 90's. LOL

Scalping/reselling is real. It is bad enough in my area the targets put stuff out at various times in the day, and the Tru's always hold stuff in back to put out later after the "Crew" is done and gone. I'm thankful for communities like this, how hard would collecting be without the internet though?