Small Scale Military Headquarters

This announcement came through their newsletter:

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<b>So long to 21st Century Toys</b>
The Flying Mule deeply regrets that we will no longer be carrying products from 21st Century Toys. Despite our best efforts, we have been forced to drop this line by factors beyond our control. We wish 21st Century Toys all the best for the future and we know we'll certainly miss being able to offer these great products to our customers.
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The marketing savvy of 21c shines through in their every move.

PS: It's actually worse than I thought. They have now removed ALL the 21c products from their catalogue. Something must be really amiss here. 21c seems to have the unique ability to piss everyone off everytime.

Saw that they had removed the 21c items from their store today. Interesting, and too bad as their prices were good. It seems like most retailers have their 21c tiff (heck, Badcat had one a couple years back over the Avenger fiasco) but then things get patched up

Not good! Whats up with that?

I think it was a supply problem.. I talked to the owner and he said he hadn't been able to get restocks on a normal basis.. I guess you can't sell them if you can't get them, which is a real bummer because he had a fantastic deal on the Me-262 Nightfighter and I was waiting for them to restock..

This reflects pretty badly on 21st. Not good having an online retailer drop your line....

-Ski

This reflects pretty badly on 21st.

I agree, I mean with WM drastically reducing and in some cases completely eliminating 21st products from their stores, you would think 21st would be bending over backwards to accomodate the small retailers, go figure..

I wonder if this is in to relations to the Olympics games in China this year. I know china is trying to reduce smog from it coal producing power plants. Just a thought.

Quite frankly, I've never heard of Flying Mule before and just figured 21c didn't consider less then pallet loads to be worth their time.

A friend of mine was just over to pick up some of my old kits for himself and to pass on to airmen just returning from the mideast. When I'd mentioned Flying Mule to him, he was shocked. He told me that Flying Mule is #3 as an e-tailer for this stuff, behind Badcat and one other I just don't recall (not MTS). I was equally surprised he knows about BadCat.

This is starting to look more like 21c is unable to take care of their own customers. Not a good trend.

On the plus side he also let me know (when he saw the 1/144 armour that I'd recently received from the Monkey Depot's clearance) that the local comic shop is carrying 21'c 1/144 stuff. I've never, ever seen a reason to go there, I just might now.

So...mebbe we were bashing Walmart all this time..but the true cause of the supply problem is...21st?

I mean...if they can't even fill the order of an online retailer...what's the chance of 21st actually supplying a Nation-wide mega store like WalMart?

Huh.

Or maybe it's not a supply problem at all?

GooglyDoogly wrote:So...mebbe we were bashing Walmart all this time..but the true cause of the supply problem is...21st?

I mean...if they can't even fill the order of an online retailer...what's the chance of 21st actually supplying a Nation-wide mega store like WalMart?

Huh.

Or maybe it's not a supply problem at all?

GD, I read this post and did not even think of it. I hope you are correct.

Dreaded double post.

I think there must a bigger problem going on over in china,, lets take a look AT has not released anything new in how long, same thing with bbi…where is the 1/32 SBD??????
My idea is that due to China shutting down unnecessary coal power plants to control air pollution is effecting toy production. After all toy production is at the bottom of their list. Lets also look at the raising costs of plastics and transpiration, along with a real week economy. Those could also be affecting orders. ….Just a thought

Also the toy fair this year was a bit on the week side. bbi was a no show along with AT.

here is some more info I found

http://www.economist.com/business/displ ... d=10853627

Here's another link that might indicate how things are now headed generally.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1205695 ... side_today

VMF115 wrote:I think there must a bigger problem going on over in china,, lets take a look AT has not released anything new in how long, same thing with bbi…where is the 1/32 SBD??????
My idea is that due to China shutting down unnecessary coal power plants to control air pollution is effecting toy production. After all toy production is at the bottom of their list. Lets also look at the raising costs of plastics and transpiration, along with a real week economy. Those could also be affecting orders. ….Just a thought

Also the toy fair this year was a bit on the week side. bbi was a no show along with AT.

But then again...why did Flying Mule just dropped 21st, and not BBI, or AT?

hworth18 wrote:I think it was a supply problem.. I talked to the owner and he said he hadn't been able to get restocks on a normal basis.. I guess you can't sell them if you can't get them, which is a real bummer because he had a fantastic deal on the Me-262 Nightfighter and I was waiting for them to restock..

I was waiting on the Me-262 Nightfighter to

Good. They should cower in the dark until they redeem themselves with an a10.

Yeah, I'm not too happy with 21st's inconsistency and false hopes.

chunks wrote:When I'd mentioned Flying Mule to him, he was shocked. He told me that Flying Mule is #3 as an e-tailer for this stuff, behind Badcat and one other I just don't recall (not MTS). I was equally surprised he knows about BadCat.

I'm curious as to the basis your friend used to come up with this ranking/analysis? To my knowledge, no online retailer is posting their sales figures publicly (nor should they) and 21st Century would never publish such numbers either.

coreystinson wrote:

chunks wrote:When I'd mentioned Flying Mule to him, he was shocked. He told me that Flying Mule is #3 as an e-tailer for this stuff, behind Badcat and one other I just don't recall (not MTS). I was equally surprised he knows about BadCat.

I'm curious as to the basis your friend used to come up with this ranking/analysis? To my knowledge, no online retailer is posting their sales figures publicly (nor should they) and 21st Century would never publish such numbers either.

Personnel perception, I think. If someone where to ask me to name the top three, Flying Mule would not be one of them since I'd never heard of them before.

Losing an option for stuff is never good but frankly this means zero to me. When 21C goes to Etailers I never find it too tough to get my hands on something, and the price differences are usually minimal. Whatever happened here (and we have one side of the story), I can't imagine why I should care..

Flying WHO? Never heard of them