The Energon Pub

News Credits: 1 · Mon Oct 20, 2008 12:09 am

Destroyed?! If there is no safety issue, why waste these toys?

Rather than destroying the toys, they should be given to charities for children whose parents cannot afford knock-offs, much less Hasbro's ever-rising prices. The holiday season is coming up; perfect chance to do this.

*Sigh* Suddenly Hasbro reminds me of the seagulls from Finding Nemo......

News Credits: 12 · Mon Oct 20, 2008 12:33 am

Gandalf wrote:Destroyed?! If there is no safety issue, why waste these toys?

Rather than destroying the toys, they should be given to charities for children whose parents cannot afford knock-offs, much less Hasbro's ever-rising prices. The holiday season is coming up; perfect chance to do this.

*Sigh* Suddenly Hasbro reminds me of the seagulls from Finding Nemo......

What else could destroyed mean? Why waste money paying people to destroy the KO product when you can give it to toys for tots, write it off as a loss, and let the kids do the destruction for you. KO's last what 1 week out of the box? Unlees they're good KO's then they be destroyed shortly after Christmas.

Now if we can get Hasbro to go after the guys making the accurate G1 KO's then we'll be all set.

News Credits: 409 · Mon Oct 20, 2008 1:43 am

robofreak wrote:
Gandalf wrote:Destroyed?! If there is no safety issue, why waste these toys?

Rather than destroying the toys, they should be given to charities for children whose parents cannot afford knock-offs, much less Hasbro's ever-rising prices. The holiday season is coming up; perfect chance to do this.

*Sigh* Suddenly Hasbro reminds me of the seagulls from Finding Nemo......

What else could destroyed mean? Why waste money paying people to destroy the KO product when you can give it to toys for tots, write it off as a loss, and let the kids do the destruction for you. KO's last what 1 week out of the box? Unlees they're good KO's then they be destroyed shortly after Christmas.

Now if we can get Hasbro to go after the guys making the accurate G1 KO's then we'll be all set.

Destroying the counterfit items is probably the legal action set up in that state or policy of the company and may not be Hasbro's policy.

I wonder if other stores are also encountering the same problem. It is a heavy blow for any store to have to destroy merchandise and it will probably teach Big Lot not to sell KO toys.

Some people have mentioned a safety recall. It's possible, especially since the majority of the KO's are being made illegally in China, so I don't expect the manufacturing standards to be in place. "Shall we use lead paint? Sure, why not, we're not following the rules anyway."

News Credits: 462 · Mon Oct 20, 2008 5:45 am

NO!!!

There are still several KOs that I need to get. They're the only way I can get some older TFs that aren't available anymore. Now how can I get them?

And I'm sure glad that I got my TM2 Megatron and Cryotek KOs when they were still available. My real TM2 Megs was broken, so I got the KO to fix it. And, since I never got Cryotek when he was available, I got that one two. I just wish I knew what those little dino figures that came with them are. One site said that were Digimon, but they definitely are not (I would know).

News Credits: 226 · Mon Oct 20, 2008 5:55 am

Sabrblade wrote:NO!!! There are still several KOs that I need to get. They're the only way I can get some older TFs that aren't available anymore. Now how can I get them?

Well if you wanted your collection to have credibility you'd hunt down originals.

May take some time, may take some money, but at least you can say with pride that your collection is GENUINE.

News Credits: 5 · Mon Oct 20, 2008 9:10 am

I'm not sure I understand the mentality of giving cheap, easily-broken crap to charity. And, of course, it would still have the effect of undermining the Transformers brand. Child is given cheap KO by a charity. KO breaks. Child/parents/whoever decide to never spend money on TFs because they're junk. Not a good result.

News Credits: 75 · Mon Oct 20, 2008 9:18 am

I think the main reason these particular KOs have been targeted is because they are based on Hasbro toys that are still being sold. At many of the Big Lots, including the one I work at, they were on the pegs directly next to the official LOC figures.

Why now? Because Hasbro has to start sometime. It was only a few months ago that the company actively starting going after bootleg companies and stores/websites that carry their product. They did not do so in the past because lawsuits are very expensive and very time-consuming. The brand is doing better than it has in a very long time and they can afford such actions now.

As for the toys being destroyed, yes, that is policy for any item being recalled at Big Lots. The toys may be donated to a charity at the manager's discretion, but I believe even that is against policy.

The destruction process is actually quite fun though. I remember we had a lighted children's globe at Big Lots many years back that was missing a country. They were recalled for that reason, and I got to smash a pallet's worth of plastic globes. Getting paid while doing so was icing on the cake.

Mon Oct 20, 2008 12:59 pm

I already have that KO and it's pure junk. You all are not missing much.

Mon Oct 20, 2008 6:16 pm

Good. Those things suck.

Tue Oct 21, 2008 11:32 am

Now if we can get Hasbro to go after the guys making the accurate G1 KO's then we'll be all set.[/quote]

WTF! No! I got a perfectly good Mirage KO. If Hasbro won't reissue the demanded toys, then they should be knocked off.

As for these Big Lots KO I'm sad to see them go. They made for good fillers in my War Within collection. I'm glad I got mind before this happened.

I think Hasbro makes enough money without taking way opportunities for fans to get TFs they won't make!

News Credits: 5 · Tue Oct 21, 2008 3:57 pm

Yeah, to hell with Hasbro making a legitimate profit, so long as a couple of guys get what they want! Am I right?

No.

News Credits: 409 · Tue Oct 21, 2008 7:26 pm

SentinelA wrote:WTF! No! I got a perfectly good Mirage KO. If Hasbro won't reissue the demanded toys, then they should be knocked off.

As for these Big Lots KO I'm sad to see them go. They made for good fillers in my War Within collection. I'm glad I got mind before this happened.

I think Hasbro makes enough money without taking way opportunities for fans to get TFs they won't make!

I don't understand why some people are so proud of filling their collection with KO's and feeling like they have accomplished something.

That's like buying a fake baseball card of Babe Ruth because the creators refuse to reissue the card and you refuse to pay extra money to purchase the original. And then once you have it, feeling satisfied that your collection is complete.

News Credits: 4 · Tue Oct 21, 2008 10:28 pm

Burn wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:NO!!! There are still several KOs that I need to get. They're the only way I can get some older TFs that aren't available anymore. Now how can I get them?

Well if you wanted your collection to have credibility you'd hunt down originals.

May take some time, may take some money, but at least you can say with pride that your collection is GENUINE.

muahahaha!!!

Credibility... are you shitting me? My reasons for getting transformers have very little to do with pride or credibility. :grin:

I get Transformers because they fascinate me and I want to tinker with them. It matters not to me if an item in my collection isn't strictly 'genuine'. If the quality is comparable, I can get just as much fun out of a KO as an official lump of mass produced plastic with a Hasbro stamp on it. There are G1 Optimus KOs out there that are superior in quality to the official Mexican made Hasbro Optimus I had as a child. Maybe they can't be considered authentic, but they can be considered accurate replicas.

Not that I actually get many KOs. Price and availability must also be taken into consideration, and overall, the quality just isn't worthwhile . Most of the time it's just not a good enough deal from my perspective.

Hasbro has every right to protect their intellectual property. They put that investment into developing new products. I can respect that. If these KO makers came up with their own stuff, Hasbro wouldn't be able to touch them. Hasbro never owned the concept of transforming toys. With all the millions of people in China, and the low cost of labour, you'd think they could do a little better than ripping off old legends figures. Maybe if intellectual property was better protected, they'd make more of an effort and come up with something original.