Small Scale Military Headquarters

Well thank goodness for these unepected items from Hasbro. Could not come at a better time, given the 21st drought. With the end of IJ in sight, starting again to look to 21st to keep my 1/18 interest up. Not hopefull of seeing the KT or 88 in the near future, given obviously there is no pressure to get them on the shelves as they could have them before last Christmas. How they keep going without cash flow is beyond me, my money has been waiting for them in pre orders for 4 months.
IJ has given me 5 trucks, 3 troop cars and 40 bike riders. Awaiting a couple of canvas top trucks and a Vogel figure, plus Dr Jones senior which I intend to paint white to see if he looks like a scientist. After that all will be quiet on Australian front.
Any thoughts?

Agree

IJ has been a welcome relief.. Who would have thought that this is where we would finally see decent transport vehicles, motorcycles and Russians!

Now they just need to issue another series of Russian troops with the GI Joe PPsh and a proper helmet..

I've been saying the same thing ARMY GROUP 1.

How does 21st say in Business? how are they making money on their products when theres no products out there? and when there is new stuff it only shows up in some little town?

Just think if hasbros indy line just showed up in a couple of places or the gi joe line. Hasbro would go out of business.

I still think a bigger company should buy 21st then we would be seeing the KT & the 88,plus the new figs

21C is really tring to fit in a tiny, specialty niche. I think they have lost huge revenue when WM quit carrying 1/18 AC and vehicles. I think what has hurt them has been the terrible WM distribution coupled with their poor choice of case selection on figures and 1/32. I don't think they can be compared to Hasbro.

My guess is they have a few problems which contribute to this: large amounts of existing inventory they must move to remain profitable and perhaps an economy of scale that must be met at the factory.

For the last year I have mostly seen case assortments of just two DD germans, the parade uniformed guy and the officer with the leather coat. They have sat and rotted on the pegs. I am thinking that for efficiencies sake they produced 10K each of these, packed them ten each to a case to turn a profit today but killing the supply chain for tomorrow as these don't move at retail.

What I don't understand is why the dual packs haven't made their way to any etailers. I would love to scoop these up in mulitples but have never seen them. We have those damned DD figures in the way, and I refuse to buy any more because they will just be replaced with more of the same.

I found a BOTB figure today at a Wal-Mart I haven't been to in almost 6 months... just because they never had anything. But he's the really cool guy with tripod-mounted MG.

I like him A LOT.

It put a smile on my face and I grabbed that angry, binocular-wielding German and gladly paid for him! If that happened everytime I went to Wal-Mart, I think I'd dream much less and buy a lot more. I am also looking for the dual packs, I need some more troops, bad. Those new guys with their fancy legs and heads need to show up too...

I have found that the Indy figures have given me something to use to make custom figures It's nice that the heads are compatable to the Star Wars figures, problem is the lack of Human SW figures at the moment Yet with the lack of new 21st C figures, I am finding new ideas to use other figures to change out parts with parts.

My latest Endevor with figures is to use 21st C bodies and World Westling figures heads. I also found a figures head on a "Hulk" human figure that goes pretty well on 21st C bodies. And now, I'm off to another Wally world to find a couple more wrestling figures to behead for 21st C improvement and upgrading

I hope to post photos of some of these new figures in the customs/Mod.s forum in the next couple days on a new thread

General Blasto

I always wondered if 21st went silent around IJ as a business plan as to not compete with something that they would have to share profit with so to speak - you know nothing new - no big expenses other than what was already on the shelves and on trucks. Makes sense to me - 21st can take credit if they want