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Blind Bag discussion!


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Wah. My second fear is coming true. Two single packs (blind-bagged no less) are going to cost much more than a 2-pack where you at least know what you're going to get.

Are retailers actually going to charge $5.99? I know it's the *suggested* retail price, but $5.99 isn't too far from the price of a full 5" action figure.

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It does seem a bit high, I was expecting 4.99. Still buying a case biggrin.png

Yeah, I think $4.99 would be the most reasonable -- it's possible retailers will sell it at that price. TRU minimates are usually sold at $7.99 so $3.99 for a single was wishful thinking on my part. $5.99 feels like specialty market pricing -- at that price I never bought single-boxed figures, except for the unique ones I managed to find.

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I believe Zach already said no Marvel blind bags planned at this time.

I really hope "at this time" doesn't change. But it seems like a statement that's just delaying the inevitable. The blind bags have cured my completist buying habits for non-Marvel minimates. Just hoping it doesn't do the same for Marvel as well. Or, at least if it does, it just stays on the movie side of things.

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At that price point, if it does come to Marvel, I'll have to be out. Buying cases to insure a complete set and then having all of those extra duplicates just wouldn't be feasible for me. I don't see being able to unload the extras as something that will be easy to do, considering most of us on here would be in the same position.

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That price point may be a killer. It's a LOT to pay for a blind bag figure. I'd be pretty annoyed to spend that much and get stuck with (just to pull a random example out of thin air) four Krusty the Clowns.

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I'm thinking they'll be unassembled in the bag not only because it makes breaks less likely, but adds the "fun" factor for kids to assemble. Not sure what the ratio is going to be, but if the turtles aren't evenly packed, I'd think both kids and casual collectors would get frustrated at having 1 Don for every 3 Leos, especially at 5.99 a pop. That's $12 for 2 figures compared to approx $8 for a 2-pack, with dupes guaranteed by buying $72 worth of minimates in a $108 case, just to get the 1 per case figure. So what else do we hope for in the bag? A stand, definitely. Checklist/poster/assembly instructions? Probably. Enough to swallow 5.99 without a fuss? Doubtful.

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Let's face it; if Walmart decides they want Marvel Minimates in blind bags, they'll find a way to make it happen. Walmart will contact Marvel just to get it done if they want it bad enough. Money talks.

As for the suggested price point, it's just that; suggested. My LCS sells Minimates 2-packs at $8.99 each. The owner's never had much faith that they could command a higher price locally and he's been knocking a dollar or two off the MSRP ever since the DC Direct days. I suspect retailers will skim a little up front at full price just to see what the market will bear and then lower the price if needed to move the rest. Depends on demand, as with everything else.

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I really hope "at this time" doesn't change. But it seems like a statement that's just delaying the inevitable. The blind bags have cured my completist buying habits for non-Marvel minimates. Just hoping it doesn't do the same for Marvel as well. Or, at least if it does, it just stays on the movie side of things.

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I honestly don't get all of the doom and gloom on these. So far, I've seen no indication that the blind bag scenario will be any worse than the single pack dump cases we've seen before: even distribution of the characters most people want, a couple shorter packs, and one chase per case. That's it. No nightmare scenarios of 1/144 chases or mystery rares you don't even know you're supposed to be looking for. Zach's been pretty forthright about how they're handling these, so it seems counterproductive to draw these dramatic conclusions about DST having a secret plan to make collecting Minimates impossible just to spite us. I don't feel like DST is trying to screw the collectors, and it sounds like they're making their best effort to construct these blind bags in a way that minimizes the pain. I'm guessing most of us would have bought a case anyway – in this instance, yes, it will be a little annoying to get dupes that aren't army builders, but a case will get you a complete set, as Zach has said. You can sell your dupes to the folks who refuse to participate in the blind bag model, and everyone is happy. Also, I'm sure nobody will be complaining about having extra nunchucks and katanas laying around cough cough Hand ninjas cough.

Say these were like the Aliens dump: single window boxed with a one-per-case rare that was just as hard to get as in the blind bag scenario (assuming you don't have a hookup at the comic store who is willing to pull the chase for you on shipment day). Would you be just as opposed to the setup? Because it seems a little silly to take a principled stand against buying these simply because the words "blind bag" are being used. If you're a completist, you're probably buying a case regardless. If you're not, and you're just in it for the Turtles, I'm betting the odds are in your favor to get them, or at worst be able to easily trade for them.

Edited by Lobsterman
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I don't think there will be very much of a market at all for the overpacked figures. It will most likely be the same case as the shared figures between a TRU and specialty wave. The stuff that's shared has little to no demand while the short packed figures see their prices rise.

And I don't feel like comparing a blind bag case to an army dump is exactly apples to apples. Buying the army dump case nets plenty of dupes, sure, but those are army builders that carry a higher demand for people that want multiples. Maybe I'm wrong, but I doubt that there will be much demand for all of the blind bag extras coming from others that are trying to move the exact same amount of unwanted product.

Buying blind bags just isn't fun to me. I'm not trying to suggest that it's an evil plot by DST to screw the collectors. But for me, it's just an unrewarding experience that forces me to waste money on things I don't want multiples of to get the things I do. I just want to buy minimates and not have to jump through hoops to do so.

It will obviously make DST plenty of money. And that's why they show up to work each day.... to make money. Nothing wrong with that at all. I'm just voicing my opinion on the practice of making customers gamble with their money when they only want to buy something.

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Blind bags give you syphilis. It's science.

How many MIP collectors buy blind bags?

Completists are the ideal consumers. "Collect Them All" is the toy manufacturer's mantra. Blind bags discourage completists from even starting a collection.

If the main characters are Marines or Starfleet (IE - uniformed) then I don't mind having multiples of them. But what am I supposed to do with spare Turtles? I'm not using them for quick custom fodder. Are there really TMNT collectors out there who want the (abundant) Turtles but not the (relatively rarer) villains? Because I was exactly two characters into collecting Star Wars figures (Han & Chewie) when I decided I needed a bad guy (Stormtrooper).

Like I said, if the Big Box retailers want blind bags, they'll get them but I don't see DST offering them as traditional 2- or 4-packs because the mass market hates being undermined by the specialty market.

I don't drink beer nor do I eat pizza and blind bags aren't going to change that. They might trick me into buying them once but if I really want peanut butter and milk, I'm going to be pissed.

Condoms are blind bagged. Will the Minimates be lubricated?

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