The Energon Pub

i just kinda clicked onto this today us brits are paying 10,20,30,40 pounds on trabsformers. but the americans are paying 10,20,30,40 dollers on transformers. with the currency things shudnt they be paying 20.40,60,80 dollers for deluxe,voyager,ultra and leader fugures?. i find this quite irratating. or should british price be 5 for a deluxe, 10 for a voyager, 25 for a ultra and 30 for a leader. its kinda unfair im no sorry we're paying like 80 dollers for our leader figure and people from america are paying 20 quid for their leader figure. this make any sense to anyone? plus sorry for not placing this in the disgrunted brits forum couldnt fing it.

It's the same worldwide.

Everyone else pays more than the USA, with the standard Hasbro excuses being "Shipping costs more", "its the currency exchange" and "it's a smaller market"

Even markets like Singapore, Australia and New Zealand which are much closer to the Chinese factories than the USA get hit with over-inflated prices.

The $US is weak compared to the Euro and Pound, so that excuse cannot be used either.

As for smaller markets; say Hasbro use one ship for only Transformers, another for Star Wars etc to the USA, then to smaller markets like the UK they could place all their different products and liens onto the one ship.

The real killer is the Canadians. They have the stronger currency, are situated on the same landmass, and share a similar market size to the USA (really they are the same market as the USA), yet they still have to pay a large percentage more than the USA for the very same figures.

I guess we are lucky with Transformers, but a trip to England kills an American's wallet.

Just kills it.

Yeah the American dollar is low right now, but it still doesn't change the fact that we got alot more of them!

Yeah we suck, but we can afford not to care, and if you wanna do something about it, just remember, we got the bombs!

Seriously though, the market here is constantly fluxuating up and down. This causes prices on comodity items like gas to rise. Larger items like cars and houses follow in suit.

But low end no esential items like toys rarely ever change. Outside of the Classics line, Deluxe prices haven't risen in years. And when the movie hit, they went right back down. They did raise the scout price though, and the Cybertron line saw the departure of the $15 Mega class for the $20 Voyager.

This isn't just for toys either, a Hershey Bar has been $.50 for as long as I can remember. And thats with or with out almonds!

Now that that's done you can return to hating us cause we're the lazy selfish pigs you wish you could be

I'm sorry for my ignorance, but I don't have much knowledge about economics. Anyway, is there a possibility that VAT could have a hand in the price-hike too? In my country every "luxury item" has 22% (et least few years ago, I'm not sure if it has risen) VAT added to the price. (and if I remember correctly, "luxury items" are pretty much everything that is not food or newspapers.)

Is there VAT system in USA? If not, it might be one reason indeed.

Its the same situation worldwide. We end up paying more for TFs when the retail price converted from local currency into US dollars.

The Chopnel wrote:I'm sorry for my ignorance, but I don't have much knowledge about economics. Anyway, is there a possibility that VAT could have a hand in the price-hike too? In my country every "luxury item" has 22% (et least few years ago, I'm not sure if it has risen) VAT added to the price. (and if I remember correctly, "luxury items" are pretty much everything that is not food or newspapers.)

Is there VAT system in USA? If not, it might be one reason indeed.

We have state sales tax which is basicly the same thing, but no where near that much! It varies from state to state, like here in NJ it's .07%, NY I can't give a quote, but it is higher, and Delaware it's lower. Still no state would ever go that high cause they know the residents will just go one state over and shop there.

Twice a year to generate some action in the local markets we cut the sales tax rate in half. You can't even move in a shop, cause it's jam packed with people from out of state.

The highest sales tax I've seen in the states was 9.5% in an area in Tennessee. For some reason they had another tax added onto the already 8.25 or 8.5. Here in Georgia it's 7%. It'd be a near riot if it were 22%.

the highest tax base I have ever heard of is in Green Bay WI....last time I was there, it was around 10.25%...it was bad! I could not imagine 22%!

Heh, european tax rates are rather high generally, I guess. And the 22% is just the VAT, then there's still income tax...which might also contribute to the toy prices, so we're not completely off-topic.

I mean, with all the taxation and other expenses (shipping, maybe customs too, employer wages, who knows what else), the retailers have to put the prices higher to make profit. Of course, that doesn't necessarily explain high pricing in countries with lower tax rates, but maybe Hasbro doesn't want to set dozens of different prices, and are using some kind of "by average" -international pricing.

Shipping cost isn't just about how many units you move to where though. In fact it cost more to move fewwer units than it does more. Seems odd but that is the way it works. Also many countries like the UK have rather high tariffs. That is import taxs that the companies have to pay before even getting the product into the country. The US has extremely low tariffs by comparison. On top of that our national minimum wage is a lot lower than some European countries. Meaning it costs stores a lot less to employee people.

Ultimately because of our lowwer tariffs, cost of fuel, and wages we can move product much cheaper than most other countries. Which is why we can sell it cheaper. Basically we are wealthy because we break the backs of our poor. Right now minimum wage in the US is $5.85 an hour while in the UK it is about $9.06 USD that is a pretty significant difference. And even when it goes up in July of this year it will only be $6.55 and in 09 it goes up to $7.25. People in the UK make more they have better health care plenty of benefits so they have to pay a little more for luxury items like toys. You have to take into consideration exactly what you have and what you would have to give up to be on equal footing. Because the prices aren't going to be equal as long as national economies are different.