[Steevy Maximus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Autobot_Goldbug

I'm afraid they do not anymore since my Epic were made in Vietnam
Hasbro did destroy molds when they were moving some operations to there from China. Apparently it is too expensive to store the old molds.

To be more accurate, storing the molds have to make sense from a cost/usage angle. Hasbro DOES actually store quite a bit (especially for Transformers) because they usually have a perceived value in keeping those molds for later use. If you’re not going to use a mold in a reasonable amount of time, there isn’t a financial benefit to keeping the molds around.

Quote:

Originally Posted by AFU

C’mon! Hasbro has those old molds…But, maybe they can use those old molds (save money) for limited runs for certain characters…X-Men, Fantastic Four, Ironman, and Spiderman box sets could be a good starting point, considering these are top sellers .That why they would not have to launch a complete and different line at the same time saving money because they already have the molds! Detailing the figure is all they would need to do, one less step out of the manufacturing process.

Just “having the molds” isn’t the biggest cost factor. LABOR costs have actually increased substantially since the late 2000s/early 2010s. That’s been an HUGE reason for the shift away from China to Vietnam for a large number of products. And in an assembly line system, the more complex a product is, the greater number of persons are needed. The average MU figure is significantly more complex, with more articulation and deco, than the given Epic figure.
These figures aren’t all made by machines or pop out the molds assembled and ready to go

Just from my limited experience and knowledge, the “cost” to produce a given 4” Epic Universe figure and an ActionVerse figure are probably close to the same, given the same articulation and comparable deco (ActionVerse probably costing a few cents more due to increased size and the accessory tree). So this comes back to a prior statement I made:
Hasbro has some 4 years of sales to draw from. If sales aren’t growing (adjusting for the typical spike seen with a movie buy in), they don’t have a strong incentive to NOT try a different approach. Especially when they can goose things with potential film support (though, it would NOT surprise me if some of the movie stuff ended up Epic World scale just due to production lead times).

Character selections will probably still suck, though I’m HOPING that this style is used for the upcoming films to bolster the selections.