Thanks to TFW2005 member vbjjune, we have our first US retail sighting of Titans Return Leader Class Soundwave! Just in time for the Christmas shopping, Soundwave was found at Walmart in Conroe, Texas. Be on the lookout for more sightings!
Happy hunting TFW!
NeilJam
Stores get other display cartons full of one exclusive for WG. Not sure how many figures come in those. The store probably didn't have space for the display so they dispersed them throughout the store.
MartyFeeb
Your faith in Hasbro is unnecessary (i.e. they have no faith in you ).
1) Those depts may not manage specific toy lines to the point where they might notice such a trend… (because if they HAVE noticed, certainly you'd see a change in how bad these toys are carried across different store chains). But here we run into the specific philosophical argument of: do we blame stores or Hasbro corporate for stock problems? And despite what Hasbro-loyalists will tell you, there are good arguments for either side.
2) Large companies generally DO lose sight of small items like local store inventories
3) We're talking hypothetical losses (like Piracy dollars) with no real value to actually go after – hence, even if Hasbro was mildly aware of potential losses, without a definitive figure to chase down, it's unlikely they would act on a hypothetical loss (and any loss they measure could incorrectly be attributed to factors such as "not a movie year").
A company as large as Hasbro can be inefficient and still make a substantial profit – hence no urgency in plugging holes such as this, and hence why year in and year out, it's the same "where the heck is this figure? When will my store carry it? Will it EVER appear on shelves?"
If we miss out on Leader SW because of poor stocking… well, Hasbro won't specifically feel it, because they just have too many other products to manage and are likely NOT watching specific SKUs like that. In fact, stores like Target continue to put ALL figures in a specific size class (i.e. Deluxe) in a single SKU, making it impossible to track which figures actually sell. Without this data, how can stores (or Hasbro) possibly improve on stock variety? (At least Walmart has started tracking specific figures, however – but that's a great example of how changes CAN be made, but are not happening fast enough to affect what you see, or don't see, on store shelves).
Long term: bad stocking contributes to declining boy-toy sales. But who can really say how much? Or to what dollar amount? And as long as they continue to turn a profit, does Hasbro really care that Iowa doesn't have decent voyagers? It's just so easy to say, "Well, TF sales declined this year… but then we didn't have a blockbuster movie, so that's it!" And to a degree, it's true… but man, I wish they paid attention to actual stores and did something to improve things!
Anyway, just my opinion. Feel free to disagree or believe in Hasbro!
Hoffman
That's quite disingenuous. These companies have entire departments for accounting, sales, supply chain, etc. Of course they would notice a 20 million dollar drop in sales to retailers.
Sylent
I'm not 100% sure and can't prove it, but the number of DD's clogging the pegs just didn't add up. A case has 8 figures, but my local store had 18 DD's. They had so many that they were in 3 different sections in the store: regular figure pegs, end cap and seasonal. I wonder if they're all still there. I have since stopped going to that store since they hadn't gotten anything seemingly in months. Namor and Punisher never even showed up.
MartyFeeb
Are you sure they're returns? EVERY WALGREENS I go to has an overstock of yellow DDs. I think they just went nutz because of the semi-exclusivity…
Or email Hasbro some complaints. Sometimes I think we don't complain to the company enough for them to do anything. They're a behemoth corporation – they don't notice sales hemorrhages like this. If they lose 20 million because of poor inventory/supply, they wouldn't even notice. There's literally no one there who's working on this problem because it doesn't exist to them.
Ergo, we really should bombard their email servers with complaints and calls to action, so MAYBE they appoint someone to investigate and correct some of the issues. They're supposed to work with Target/Walmart/TRU, and clearly, when shelves sit empty for months (it happens all the time at Walmart), Hasbro should make a few calls and get a fire burning under some inventory manager's @$$. Heck, in the old days, they cushioned retailers by allowing them to ship back unsold merch…. so something has to be done… right?
But that's a paradox: TF toys don't sell well enough to justify proper inventory management… because inventory is so bad that they don't sell enough!
Or maybe the majority of collectors (who spend more than the average toy customer) have already given up on local retail. But that's not true either, as the stores would have stopped selling Generation toys long ago – no, they sell well enough to constitute shelf space… but when that space is left empty or with 2 figures for MONTHS… they're just doing it wrong.
fujishig
Well you'd think this would curb some of the scalpers who buy up stock then return it months later when it doesn't sell, but who knows?
Chillyn
Good warning. Man, we can't win lol
fujishig
Hey, if you're going to buy full priced Skywarps and MotorMasters and give them to charity, I'm all for it, but that'd be an expensive public service just to get stock moving… especially when another collector sees your store barren of shelfwarmers and credit card shifts all his store's stuff there.
Seriously, though, stores are tracking returns a lot more closely now. I know TRU requires an ID even if you have a receipt, and there's a company that tracks returns across multiple retailers to look for patterns.
Chillyn
No arguments there! I love your idea.
Autovolt 127
Or…Or you could give them to charity, plenty of kids who might not get anything for Christmas, might want 'em.
fujishig
I don't think Soundwave has been in stock on Amazon regularly, has he (I realize he is currently)? Usually when I checked it was a third party seller for like five bucks more.
Plus the b&m stores have had such good deals on deluxes, I've been looking there a bit more.
Chillyn
Ha indeed, that's why people take matters into their own hands. I think the demand for transformers is big enough that they should listen. I get they have a lot on their plate but it's up to them to sell their product. Nobody is going to buy overstock from last year. We all know this
Dachande
No, I do still stop at stores to look, so I understand where you're coming from.
Still, the toy department management has a lot of other lines and items to worry about keeping well stocked, like stuff that probably moves more than Transformers.
They're doing their jobs, just not up to a TF collector's standards
Chillyn
So you don't have a dog in this fight. The order fillers aren't doing their jobs. Some of this falls on suppliers, but places like target and Walmart have ways of dealing with overstock. Mostly they just don't give a fuck about restocking the latest waves. I've talked with them and they just shrug their shoulders and say it is what it is. I've talked to one lady who is cool and ordered more inventory for me, but that was because they had no deluxes….for almost a month. When I told her she was clueless. So yeah, if people did their jobs the consumers could actually get the product they want. Here! Take my money!!! Lol
Dachande
I order online, so….
And what people aren't doing their jobs?
Just because one store doesn't have the latest waves doesn't mean others don't.
Chillyn
Then have fun getting screwed at your store. Hope you have lots of gas $$$. If people did their job, we wouldn't have this problem.
Chillyn
You guys are probably right. It's not a very nice move lol but I'll admit I've contemplated it a few times. But really what's the harm with doing this with like 3 figures and taking them somwhere that doesn't have them. I've seen 8 menasaurs at one target and another across town has none. I wouldnt take them back somewhere that has its own surpluss of the same figure.
Sylent
Theoretically, that's a douchey move. Someone did that at my local Walgreens with their exclusive Marvel Legends Yellow Daredevil and now they won't order new product because they can't clear the pegs.
Re: Soundwave, I've never seen him outside of a toy show.