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Is there a kit supply shortage too?


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I’ve seen inflated prices on second-hand kits for years, not just during these last 12-18 months. A lot of modelers are pricing kits from their stash at near-retail prices. For example, I recently saw an Italeri 1/48 A-10C offered at $50 and a Tamiya 1/48 F-14A at $105. Granted, these sellers might say, “Well, I don’t have to sell the model, so if no one wants to buy it, I’ll just keep it.” But if you’re taking the time to list the model, isn’t selling the model the point?

 

I wrote about pricing kits several years ago.  LINK
 

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Am I the only one who can't see a new tool Academy F-14 1/72 in stock locally for a decent retail price? Yes I know its online but really had no issues with obtaining Academy stuff in the LMS before.

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Out of production always runs the prices up.  eBay and the forums use to be full of kits bought at Hobby Lobby with the 40% & 50% deals that we’re selling around retail.  Seems they used that promotion as a lost leader. 
I was looking at sold items on eBay one night and saw where a 1/32 Tamiya Thunderbird sold for $500.  Yea, I thought about selling mine at that point as well. If the opportunity came along, I still might.  
Look at what the Kitty Hawk kits did when they announced they were closing up.  I was shopping for an out of production syfi kit last month.  Plenty of BIN kits in the $50-$85 range but I was patient.  Someone posted one for a $17 starting bid. No one else bid, it was mine for less than $40 shipped. 

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Some kits get a better second hand price than others.
You get some, very few I might add, selling the kits for what they are worth then you get many sellers trying to collect as much money as possible out of their little nest egg. As Kurt H. said above he tries to rinse as much as he feels he can out of them. Because why not.

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8 hours ago, Finn said:

This video tells how things are affecting this hobby store but it goes for all model stores:

 

https://youtu.be/dIMtYnT6QKM?t=1

 

Jari

Pretty much sums it up.

 

I saw a ship wait to berth then the consignment (40ft container) didnt have a chance to get unloaded for some reason to do with having no space to put it on the dock go on to Rotterdam to be unloaded then sit there for a few weeks before there was a truck free to bring it to the UK.
Like Andy said a trip that used to take a couple of 2-3 weeks is now taking 3 months before you actually get your hands on the contents, and its costing 10 times as much now as it did then.

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37 minutes ago, habu2 said:

Shortage? What shortage?

 

 :beer4:

 

pTU7xyS.jpg

The calendar front and centre would suggest that pic is two years old - unless it's just a collector's item, of course! 🤣

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10 hours ago, andyf117 said:

The calendar front and centre would suggest that pic is two years old - unless it's just a collector's item, of course! 🤣


ok you got me, the pic is two years old - but the calendar is actually from 1991. I collect calendars too, I have a matrix that shows the years that calendars can be reused. For instance in 2021 you can also use calendars from 2010, 1999, 1993, 1982, 1971….. every day of each of those years is identical i.e. on the same day of the week. 

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4 hours ago, habu2 said:


ok you got me, the pic is two years old - but the calendar is actually from 1991. I collect calendars too, I have a matrix that shows the years that calendars can be reused. For instance in 2021 you can also use calendars from 2010, 1999, 1993, 1982, 1971….. every day of each of those years is identical i.e. on the same day of the week. 

You obviously mean the calendar featuring the F-15 - I was actually referring to the Sports Illustrated one underneath it...😜

....I see you have at least half-a-dozen more of those on display - some of us wouldn't even risk owning them, collector's items or not!

 

The other giveaway was that all the open ones are on December, and it's only mid-November - in this part of the world, anyway! 🤣

 

Interesting snippet about being able to re-use them, though - I might still have some old Mildenhall Air Fete ones tucked away somewhere!

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11 hours ago, habu2 said:


ok you got me, the pic is two years old - but the calendar is actually from 1991. I collect calendars too, I have a matrix that shows the years that calendars can be reused. For instance in 2021 you can also use calendars from 2010, 1999, 1993, 1982, 1971….. every day of each of those years is identical i.e. on the same day of the week. 

I think it will turn out that this will be thee most useful piece of information to come from this thread of conversation.

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On 11/15/2021 at 9:13 AM, ElectroSoldier said:

I think it will turn out that this will be thee most useful piece of information to come from this thread of conversation.

 

let's see if this works...

 

calmtxss-rgb.jpg.295ebfd77f8cb9ca28bf0620cad9ad32.jpg

 

This matrix shows the day of the week on January 1st across the top.  The blue columns are for leap years, the green columns for non-leap years.

 

2021 is a non-leap year (green column) and January 1st was a Friday (top row), so any year in the column with 2021 will be an exact match for 2021. Obviously this works for years before 1967 (and after 2050) but this was the useful range for me when I worked it up.

 

I'm a bit of a math freak in that I "see" math.  If you squint your eyes you can see diagonal lines (in both directions) in the chart, those are visual representations of the pattern of year intervals as "seen" in a 2-space map. Like I said, "freak".

 

.

 

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5 hours ago, habu2 said:

calmtxss-rgb.jpg.295ebfd77f8cb9ca28bf0620cad9ad32.jpg

I'm a bit of a math freak in that I "see" math.  If you squint your eyes you can see diagonal lines (in both directions) in the chart, those are visual representations of the pattern of year intervals as "seen" in a 2-space map. Like I said, "freak".

Well, I didn't need to squint - I immediately saw the long left-to-right descending diagonals (1978-2050 first)...

....quickly followed by the distinct 'pairs' pattern for all the other left-to-right ones - years, blanks, years...

....what's also interesting is how most of the ascending right-to-left ones go up in 'steps' of three, interspersed by the 'single' years with gaps of three...

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It’s all about patterns. The unbroken L>R descending are all 6 years apart while the R>L descending have a 5-5-6-5-5-6 pattern (a repeating pattern length of 3). The vertical non-leap year intervals are 11-11-6-11-11-6 (again a pattern length of 3) and note 11 is 5+6, the intervals that appear in the diagonal rows. With 7 days in the week, the only place 7 shows up is in the leap year columns where the interval is 28 (7*4) the 4 comes from every 4th year being a leap year.  
 

Did I mention I work for a company whose initials are OCD?  It’s a curse…..…

 

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7 hours ago, habu2 said:

Did I mention I work for a company whose initials are OCD?  It’s a curse…..…

My wife sometimes suggests that I suffer with OCD - I strongly dispute that...

....if anything, it's CDO - similar, but with the letters in the correct alphabetical order... 🤣

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After seeing countless images on the 'net as well as the 60 Minutes segment on the backed-up ports this past Sunday, I can't help but wonder how many of those containers have model kits and supplies in them.  

 

In my stash, I have 52 kits.  On average, I build somewhere between 3-4 kits a year if I'm lucky.  That means I have enough kits to last me for the next 17 years (I'm currently 51 years old).  I seriously don't think there's a kit out there that I desperately want that I don't already have.  Do I want to buy more kits?  ALWAYS!!!!  It's fun to do!  Do I need to at the moment?  Nah.  If there's a supply issue going on right now, it's an issue I can wait out for the next 17 years.

 

Paints and supplies, however, that's another story....

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My original point of the thread was a bit of sarcasm. But has branched OT. 
Yes, I realize the shipping issue will affect the hobby. However the prices for second hand kits is through the roof too. 

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5 minutes ago, ST0RM said:

My original point of the thread was a bit of sarcasm. But has branched OT. 
Yes, I realize the shipping issue will affect the hobby. However the prices for second hand kits is through the roof too. 

I think some of the price rises were driven by those taking up and/or returning to hobby during the pandemic, which led to an increased demand...

....along with those already involved having more time to devote to it - here in the UK, some eBay sellers have been/still are asking stupid money...

....but there remain bargains to be had - recently I was pleasantly surprised to get a hard-to-find helicopter kit plus conversion set for a good price!

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2 hours ago, ST0RM said:

My original point of the thread was a bit of sarcasm. But has branched OT. 
Yes, I realize the shipping issue will affect the hobby. However the prices for second hand kits is through the roof too. 

People have a lot of spare money at the minute.
A lot of Americans are getting more from lockdown payments than they would otherwise have if they were working. Anything given has no value, which means in the case of cash you are much freer with the money.

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