The Energon Pub

Lapse Of Reason wrote:I buy rare toys and sell them for a profit and I'm proud of it. I then turn around and reinvest that money in other luxury items, usually Transformers for my own collection. I find that if I can buy three and sell two, I usually make enough extra to cover the expense for the figure I keep.

This year I bought three Botcon sets and three looses sets, plus all the souvenior sets I could get. I kept one of everything for me and made enough profit off the rest to buy a 50" Panasonic plasma tv.

Resourcefulness is a virtue, not a vice.

Maybe you should have counterpunch's I'm a douche sig. Seems he no longer needs it.

Sid Burn wrote:

Sportimus Prime wrote:Okay, me thinkeys it's best not to get all hot with each other since no one here is doing anything wrong. Fair?

If you mean legally no one is commiting a crime, then you are right.

But you dont see anything wrong with a collector buying cases of a product, and then gouging people at inflated prices?

I wrote that comment about folks posting in this thread. Things seemed a little tense last night. I have been against Scalping the whole time, and still am.

To answer your question, I see a LOT wrong with a collector or even a non-collector (who is simply in it to take advantage of the whole demand) buying entire CASES full of a product, and then gouging people at twice the retail prices, if not more. $30+shipping for a $9.99 '08 BB? $18+ plus shipping for a G1 colored movie Jazz? That's greed, and selfishness I can not tolerate. It's also morally wrong!

This can also hurt Hasbro, and the whole Transformers line. Folks who are just getting into it may just say "the hell with it", and not bother even looking for them. Hasbro can lose new customer brand loyalty that could have been formed.

tacogrande wrote:

Cyber Bishop wrote:Definition of a scalper: one that buys toys at normal or less than retail prices and resells them for double or triple the original price and claims that the item is uber rare.

They are seen hanging out at flea markets a lot.

Often don't shave, have greasy hair, and are obese. If you try to haggle with them they'll yell at you with their mouth full of mcdonald's double quarter pounder.

ROFLMAO!!
Yeah, that is the typical description of them..

OR

The "creepy Hot Wheels guy"..

zatara1701 wrote:I think the original point of this thread was lost somewhere along the way...

I see people using the "if you bought an Concept Bumblebee and started the bid at $.01, whats the big deal...blah, blah, blah."

To me, there is NOTHING wrong with that.

NOW...this thread started with a guy that has several CASES of the G1 deco Jazz, STILL IN THE FACTORY BOXES.

The big guys at this site keep faulting our toy hunting abilites and keep bringing up the site's sigthing forums... not to mention complimenting these scalpers. Here are my problems with their whole arguement...

1) As I said before, dont ASSUME that we dont know what we're doing in our collecting. Collecting in Houston is more difficult than some other markets and getting finding anything requires skill and a whole lot of luck. I am OFFENDED that you talk down to us and be so critical of us "Powers That Be."

2) The Sighting Forums... I am sure they COULD be helpful to a point, IF everyone posts everything they see in every city. All in all, they end up being more entertainment than resource. OH, and here is the brainbusting part of this equation... How in the HECK are we suppose to update your "sightings forum" if there are A-Holes like the G1 Jazz guy taking EVERY case from one OR several stores??? There is nothing for us to sight because of guys like that.


The point isnt that this guy is making money...thats the American way of life... The point is that he is blatant and an unsavory individual for his methods.

We are all entitled to our opinions, but I think you are missing the point of what we are "complaining about," and I think you have insulted the very fans/collectors that make your site what it is during this discussion.

I agree. Its pathetic that the site owner said the things he did, i expected more. To defend a selfish, asshole scalper like this makes you just as bad as he is, as you would no doubt do the same thing if you could.

Sightings thread? Useless to me as i live in the UK. Yes there is the ODB thread, but i rarely visit there or any other sightings thread for that matter as i know all the local shops, and none of them have squat most of the time. A sightings thread is useless when you already know what people have.

Collecting in my area of the world is VERY hard because hardly any of the local stores stock the damned things or have what i am looking for. I buy what i can when i see it when out grocery shopping and if i have the money. If its something rare i want i buy it off the internet but i rarely do this due to extortionate shipping charges and scum scalpers like this guy. I dont go out of my way to check sightings threads on every US-based website which will have no information that will be useful to me. I am not the only one living in the UK btw, so i doubt i am the only one who feels this way. So bottom line: Sightings thread USELESS to UK users. Id imagine it would be just as useless for Americans as well, since seeing someone say they saw something you want in NY state and you live in Florida isnt much help now is it?

Scalpers are scum, and to say that we are not resourceful enough in our collecting is a serious insult to the very people that keep this site alive and makes you just as bad as the scalpers in my eyes.

We cant all have huge websites and get everything we ever want sent to us for free from press kits and stuff you arrogant little....ARGH! I wont say anymore because i will probably get banned if i do, and i dont want that as i enjoy the community, but i will now enjoy it a little less knowing the owner is such a....well, read the above paragraph.

Look at these:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Transformers-2008-C ... dZViewItem

http://cgi.ebay.com/Transformers-2008-C ... dZViewItem

Sonray wrote:
I agree. Its pathetic that the site owner said the things he did, i expected more. To defend a selfish, asshole scalper like this makes you just as bad as he is, as you would no doubt do the same thing if you could.

Sightings thread? Useless to me as i live in the UK. Yes there is the ODB thread, but i rarely visit there or any other sightings thread for that matter as i know all the local shops, and none of them have squat most of the time. A sightings thread is useless when you already know what people have.

Collecting in my area of the world is VERY hard because hardly any of the local stores stock the damned things or have what i am looking for. I buy what i can when i see it when out grocery shopping and if i have the money. If its something rare i want i buy it off the internet but i rarely do this due to extortionate shipping charges and scum scalpers like this guy. I dont go out of my way to check sightings threads on every US-based website which will have no information that will be useful to me. I am not the only one living in the UK btw, so i doubt i am the only one who feels this way. So bottom line: Sightings thread USELESS to UK users. Id imagine it would be just as useless for Americans as well, since seeing someone say they saw something you want in NY state and you live in Florida isnt much help now is it?

Scalpers are scum, and to say that we are not resourceful enough in our collecting is a serious insult to the very people that keep this site alive and makes you just as bad as the scalpers in my eyes.

We cant all have huge websites and get everything we ever want sent to us for free from press kits and stuff you arrogant little....ARGH! I wont say anymore because i will probably get banned if i do, and i dont want that as i enjoy the community, but i will now enjoy it a little less knowing the owner is such a....well, read the above paragraph.

I doubt he knows the ebayer- he is defending the concept of a free market. There is nothing wrong with that. He is definitely not the type as far as I have observed that bans people b/c he can- Ive noticed Seibs welcomes criticism. I enjoy his site and if you are so disgusted with it- why don't you just make your own forum and put in the time that some of these guys do into the gallery and site design. Anyways, by your response you seem like the type that would ban b/c they can. SO nice of you to call others hard work useless, b/c it does not benefit you.

zatara1701 wrote:The big guys at this site keep faulting our toy hunting abilites and keep bringing up the site's sigthing forums... not to mention complimenting these scalpers. Here are my problems with their whole arguement...

1) As I said before, dont ASSUME that we dont know what we're doing in our collecting. Collecting in Houston is more difficult than some other markets and getting finding anything requires skill and a whole lot of luck. I am OFFENDED that you talk down to us and be so critical of us "Powers That Be."

It's not more difficult to collect in Houston. Or anywhere else. The same rules apply in Chicago as they do in Grand Rapids, Lansing, Fenton, Flint, Detroit, Windsor, Toledo, Columbus, Racine, Milwaukee, New York ... all places that I've searched for figures at. The same rules apply. I don't understand or know why Houston would be any different. I posted an image of Houston that had 6 stores within a 6 to 8 mile radius. Move to somewhere where you only have 1 Target every 30 to 60 miles and we'll see how difficult it is to find new figures. Now that guy I can sympathize with. Someone in Houston with that many Targets per 5 miles is in toy heaven. You've had all of the new figures show up in your area. How about cities around the country that haven't gotten past wave 1 of the movie toys?

zatara1701 wrote:2) The Sighting Forums... I am sure they COULD be helpful to a point, IF everyone posts everything they see in every city. All in all, they end up being more entertainment than resource. OH, and here is the brainbusting part of this equation... How in the HECK are we suppose to update your "sightings forum" if there are A-Holes like the G1 Jazz guy taking EVERY case from one OR several stores??? There is nothing for us to sight because of guys like that.

I feel like I'm slamming my head against the wall when I read a post like this. Somehow you guys don't understand how to use the toy sightings section. Maybe I'm the only one. As I've mentioned in this thread, I think you guys are looking for exact matches with your store, your location and the figure you're looking for. That's not how the toy sightings section is supposed to work (while it's great if it does). It's supposed to be used as a guide for when you should go out and look for a figure. No, it does not always work. I still haven't seen FAB Bumblebee in stores yet and BBTS still hasn't gotten mine in stock yet that I have on pre-order. But I know FAB Bumblebee was at the closest Target to my apartment here because my buddy Paul bought the last FAB Barricade when we were at that very store three weeks ago. We just missed Bumblebee, but I know he was here.

The G1 Jazz guy is an oddball exception. Target is going to be flooded with the G1 Jazz and G1 Starscream figures in the near future. They'll be a dime a dozen, promise. When was the last time you ever saw a store chain get 12 of one type of Voyager class figure in stock or 18 of a deluxe class figure per store?

zatara1701 wrote:The point isnt that this guy is making money...thats the American way of life... The point is that he is blatant and an unsavory individual for his methods.

If I didn't know that each Target was getting a shitload of G1 Jazz's in stock, I would 100% agree with you. But considering what a peg-sitter that figure is about to become later this year when all of the Targets put that figure out, you guys will understand why I'm defending this guy. It's not going to be a rare figure. I think the "scalper" at the basis of this conversation is stupid for buying that many and then telling everyone he has that many. That's like showing someone your Poker hand across the table from you.

zatara1701 wrote:We are all entitled to our opinions, but I think you are missing the point of what we are "complaining about," and I think you have insulted the very fans/collectors that make your site what it is during this discussion.

I think you guys put way too much weight on the "scalper" phenomenon. If you guys really want these figures, there's a way to get them at retail stores before the scalpers get there. I'm trying to help you guys out but my point is being lost by you guys thinking I'm totally defending the scalper, which I'm not. I'm trying to help you guys find ways to beat the scalper, if you will. If you don't want to listen to my suggestions and advice, then I'll just shut up and be done with this thread. I've offered to help you guys numerous times but some of you continue to think that the scalper is the ultimate reason why you can't find figures, which it most definitely is not.

Sonray wrote:We cant all have huge websites and get everything we ever want sent to us for free from press kits and stuff you arrogant little....ARGH! I wont say anymore because i will probably get banned if i do, and i dont want that as i enjoy the community, but i will now enjoy it a little less knowing the owner is such a....well, read the above paragraph.

OK low blow dude. While Ryan may not be condemning what you feel is evil, he is not whatever you were going to say he is. As someone who has met the dude, I take very great offense to that statement. Just because he is not condemning scalpers to hell does not make him a bad guy. He does provide this site to us.

Now I don't particularly agree with scalping, I collect for myself and don't plan on selling any of my TF's. I had the opportunity to purchase several cases with CC Bumblebee, G1 Jazz, and G1 Starscream but I just picked up what I wanted and left the rest.

I have just started collecting again this year and I learned how to find the stuff that I wanted from being on here and being observant. It seems to me that many of you just have bad timing. You need to find out when your local stores stock and be there then. Hunting at other times is just going to be futile right now. Hopefully soon we'll get large amounts of stock and we won't have to be having these conversations.

So I would pose to the community what do you think should be done about scalping? Obviously bitching about it isn't helping. I don't really have any ideas besides not buying from the scalpers but I sure would like to hear what the rest of you have to offer.

Sportimus Prime wrote:To answer your question, I see a LOT wrong with a collector or even a non-collector (who is simply in it to take advantage of the whole demand) buying entire CASES full of a product, and then gouging people at twice the retail prices, if not more. $30+shipping for a $9.99 '08 BB? $18+ plus shipping for a G1 colored movie Jazz? That's greed, and selfishness I can not tolerate. It's also morally wrong!

This can also hurt Hasbro, and the whole Transformers line. Folks who are just getting into it may just say "the hell with it", and not bother even looking for them. Hasbro can lose new customer brand loyalty that could have been formed.

As someone who is 'just getting into it', I can assure you that your point is entirely valid.

My general virginity regarding TF as a whole, discounting a love of sum BW, I find it difficult to further my growing love of disguised robots in that I have to continue to go farther and further to get me sum hawt Transformers action. Yes, I understand there will be some degree of difficulty attaining certain high-demand figures, but I've been to four retail stores in the past two days, three close by and one almost forty minutes out of my way, and I've only found a Beast-style Prime.

If I can be allowed to diverge for a moment, I'm fairly displeased with my job, and I thought it'd be simple both in terms of distance (four blocks down) and interest (TF love) to get back into retail, what with both a Target and a Walmart exceptionally close to my abode. I'd be in the know when what came in, and would have first choosing rights, and I'd be lying if I didn't say that the idea of buying whole cases with my employee discount should I get a job at either store. On further consideration, despite any employment outcome, I'd decided against it on the basis of it's a douchebaggy thing to do. Not only is it an unfair advantage on my end, but fans and/or normal kids in search of their favourite Autobot/Decepticon get the shaft thanks to my capitalist mindset. Undoubtedly there ARE people in that position, with a employee discount, who buy or possibly even steal these figures at such a high number that the store shelves are positively empty.

That's not to say all supply-demand stuff is bad. IE, someone mentioned buying three and keeping one figure of those three. This is generally fine, because not everyone's going to do it. But when we have an inordinate amount of individuals selling entire cases, the balance is inevitably tipped to such a degree die-hard and casual fans alike get lubelessly-molested.

For example, let's say there are fifty figures on a store shelve. Five buyers buy three figures each, so we're down to forty five. One hardcore dude gets a whole case and resells at a mass markup, that's thirty five. That's still a nice chunk for fans and general buyers. That's cool.

What instead we have is roughly five buyers buying three and three buyers getting a case.

How do we stop it?

...well, on that, I'm stymied.

EDIT:
"So I would pose to the community what do you think should be done about scalping? Obviously bitching about it isn't helping. I don't really have any ideas besides not buying from the scalpers but I sure would like to hear what the rest of you have to offer. "

Here, here.

The sightings section rules! I use it all the time and I give people **** when they don't!

Anyway, I have been able to find EVERYTHING I have wanted over the last two years since I started collecting toys again. It's not easy, it's hard work and time consuming but in the end it's fun. The rush of finding something you have looked for at countless stores and have spent countless hours in search of is incredible.

Sure people who go though the cases and pull all of the variants out piss me off but that's natural. I move on, I don't blame the worlds problems on them, I'll get them eventually.

I just thought of something else. How many auctions by separate individuals are there with tons of the same toy? 50 maybe? I don't know, I haven't counted. Something tells me that there are way more than 50 or so cities in this country with multiple mass retail stores. That should leave quite a few figures out there for people to find.

If I'm wrong about this then call me a douche and then move along.

Geekee1 wrote:

Sonray wrote:We cant all have huge websites and get everything we ever want sent to us for free from press kits and stuff you arrogant little....ARGH! I wont say anymore because i will probably get banned if i do, and i dont want that as i enjoy the community, but i will now enjoy it a little less knowing the owner is such a....well, read the above paragraph.

OK low blow dude. While Ryan may not be condemning what you feel is evil, he is not whatever you were going to say he is. As someone who has met the dude, I take very great offense to that statement. Just because he is not condemning scalpers to hell does not make him a bad guy. He does provide this site to us.

Now I don't particularly agree with scalping, I collect for myself and don't plan on selling any of my TF's. I had the opportunity to purchase several cases with CC Bumblebee, G1 Jazz, and G1 Starscream but I just picked up what I wanted and left the rest.

I have just started collecting again this year and I learned how to find the stuff that I wanted from being on here and being observant. It seems to me that many of you just have bad timing. You need to find out when your local stores stock and be there then. Hunting at other times is just going to be futile right now. Hopefully soon we'll get large amounts of stock and we won't have to be having these conversations.

So I would pose to the community what do you think should be done about scalping? Obviously bitching about it isn't helping. I don't really have any ideas besides not buying from the scalpers but I sure would like to hear what the rest of you have to offer.

I have a solution and I performed it on TFw2005. http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/showthread.php?t=147702 (Ryan, please forgive if I'm not suppose to post links to another site here.) I went to Kohl's and found that they had a slew of 08bb's and Arcee's so I bought a whole box of them and took them to the boards and sold them at cost to my fellow collectors. Of course it went over well and I was blessed to receive the favor back in return. A guy said he saw my thread and decided to pick up a couple of G1 Target Jazz's and pm'd me to to sell it to me for cost plus shipping, which I naturally took him up on so I got it today. My point to all of this is, like Ryan said, if you want something then you have to be proactive about finding it and don't forget to help your fellow man while your at it. I could have said "Yeah, I found my bb and arcee, good luck for everybody else" and that would have been ok and not wrong, but I decided to help out my fellow man and I got the favor back in not even 2 days. Plus I had a guy email me about cleaning out his collection, which rivals Ryan's, and he wanted me to have first crack. Well I got a lot of rare tf's for next to nothing compared to the secondary (Ebay) market. Lastly, I'm a manager for a fortune 500 corporation and when I coach my employees about their recognition of problems I always tell them this. Anyone can find a problem and complain about it. Where you make the difference in life is having a possible solution to the problem. I believe what Ryan was trying to say is that he doesn't support the scalpers, but sitting on seibertron.com and complaining about it all day is doing about NOTHING to stop it. So go out, be proactive, come up with solutions and remember, what goes around, comes around!!!

Edit: Do you want to stop it? Well you can't "stop" it, but you can band together with your fellow collector and help each other out. We are collectors and we should all be in this together, not bickering amongst one another about who can't find what. How about who CAN find what and how do we get it to each other. That's making a difference!!!!

Wingsbr wrote:

Geekee1 wrote:

Sonray wrote:We cant all have huge websites and get everything we ever want sent to us for free from press kits and stuff you arrogant little....ARGH! I wont say anymore because i will probably get banned if i do, and i dont want that as i enjoy the community, but i will now enjoy it a little less knowing the owner is such a....well, read the above paragraph.

OK low blow dude. While Ryan may not be condemning what you feel is evil, he is not whatever you were going to say he is. As someone who has met the dude, I take very great offense to that statement. Just because he is not condemning scalpers to hell does not make him a bad guy. He does provide this site to us.

Now I don't particularly agree with scalping, I collect for myself and don't plan on selling any of my TF's. I had the opportunity to purchase several cases with CC Bumblebee, G1 Jazz, and G1 Starscream but I just picked up what I wanted and left the rest.

I have just started collecting again this year and I learned how to find the stuff that I wanted from being on here and being observant. It seems to me that many of you just have bad timing. You need to find out when your local stores stock and be there then. Hunting at other times is just going to be futile right now. Hopefully soon we'll get large amounts of stock and we won't have to be having these conversations.

So I would pose to the community what do you think should be done about scalping? Obviously bitching about it isn't helping. I don't really have any ideas besides not buying from the scalpers but I sure would like to hear what the rest of you have to offer.

I have a solution and I performed it on TFw2005. http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/showthread.php?t=147702 (Ryan, please forgive if I'm not suppose to post links to another site here.) I went to Kohl's and found that they had a slew of 08bb's and Arcee's so I bought a whole box of them and took them to the boards and sold them at cost to my fellow collectors. Of course it went over well and I was blessed to receive the favor back in return. A guy said he saw my thread and decided to pick up a couple of G1 Target Jazz's and pm'd me to to sell it to me for cost plus shipping, which I naturally took him up on so I got it today. My point to all of this is, like Ryan said, if you want something then you have to be proactive about finding it and don't forget to help your fellow man while your at it. I could have said "Yeah, I found my bb and arcee, good luck for everybody else" and that would have been ok and not wrong, but I decided to help out my fellow man and I got the favor back in not even 2 days. Plus I had a guy email me about cleaning out his collection, which rivals Ryan's, and he wanted me to have first crack. Well I got a lot of rare tf's for next to nothing compared to the secondary (Ebay) market. Lastly, I'm a manager for a fortune 500 corporation and when I coach my employees about their recognition of problems I always tell them this. Anyone can find a problem and complain about it. Where you make the difference in life is having a possible solution to the problem. I believe what Ryan was trying to say is that he doesn't support the scalpers, but sitting on seibertron.com and complaining about it all day is doing about NOTHING to stop it. So go out, be proactive, come up with solutions and remember, what goes around, comes around!!!

Good man!

Sonray wrote:I agree. Its pathetic that the site owner said the things he did, i expected more. To defend a selfish, asshole scalper like this makes you just as bad as he is, as you would no doubt do the same thing if you could.

Oh boy. Well, I'm trying to help you guys out by pointing out some methods that you guys can utilize to beat the so-called "scalpers" to the punch. I work my ass off on this site bringing you guys incredible amounts of content (as does the rest of the staff). I'm sorry that you disagree with me. Yeah, maybe buying 18 of a figure is a bit overkill. But considering that most Targets are probably going to each get that amount, I'm not too worried about what this guy is doing at this moment. It WILL NOT be a rare figure. I weighed the variables at hand and determined that what he did wasn't that bad due to the overwhelming amount of supply of these figures that are coming down the pipe (case in point: there are 112 Target Jazzes on eBay right now ... not a rare figure for all of us to get into such a debate about).

Sonray wrote:Sightings thread? Useless to me as i live in the UK. Yes there is the ODB thread, but i rarely visit there or any other sightings thread for that matter as i know all the local shops, and none of them have squat most of the time. A sightings thread is useless when you already know what people have.

Are you submitting information? If everyone who said that it was useless would just post their sightings, it would be more useful to everyone. Out of curiosity, why don't you post your sightings? Is it too time consuming? Is the toy sightings section (not the toy sightings forum, see I knew that would be bad having both) not user friendly? What can I do to improve the Toy Sightings section for you (the one located at http://www.seibertron.com/sightings/index.php )?

Sonray wrote:Collecting in my area of the world is VERY hard because hardly any of the local stores stock the damned things or have what i am looking for. I buy what i can when i see it when out grocery shopping and if i have the money. If its something rare i want i buy it off the internet but i rarely do this due to extortionate shipping charges and scum scalpers like this guy. I dont go out of my way to check sightings threads on every US-based website which will have no information that will be useful to me. I am not the only one living in the UK btw, so i doubt i am the only one who feels this way. So bottom line: Sightings thread USELESS to UK users.

The more of you UK folks that post, the more useful it will become. The content doesn't just magically appear. Users like yourself need to post your sightings so that someone else can find what you've found to make it more relevant to the people who use the sightings section. Give and take.

Sonray wrote:Id imagine it would be just as useless for Americans as well, since seeing someone say they saw something you want in NY state and you live in Florida isnt much help now is it?

Sure it is. At least the guy in Florida knows that the figures are coming out soon. If you watch the sightings section close enough, you can see the distribution patterns. I discovered that figures show up usually in Ohio and Indiana before reaching Chicago, IL. I'm sure there's a State pattern that works for Florida as well, unless Florida is the first distribution point in the South. I think people are expecting the Toy Sightings section to just hand them the store that the items are going to be at and when that doesn't work they think it's worthless. Maybe because I'm a programmer, I'm better at recognizing patterns and such. Once I was able to view all of the data in the sightings section, I saved a ton of time not driving around to places mindlessly looking for a figure. The toy sightings section saved a ton of time for me.

Sonray wrote:Scalpers are scum, and to say that we are not resourceful enough in our collecting is a serious insult to the very people that keep this site alive and makes you just as bad as the scalpers in my eyes.

C'mon man ... really, over one guy buying 18 of Target G1 Jazz? Again, I think you guys are missing my point. Scalpers aren't the problem. I'm trying to help you guys find ways to find the figures first. Before other collectors in your area. Before Jimmy's soccer mom. Before the "scalper". I've offered to help people sift through the Toy Sightings section data in this thread and yet you think I'm a bad guy because I don't think what the scalper is doing is necessarily wrong. I'm offering to help people beat the various scenarios so that you guys can be first. If that's not the right thing to do, then I don't know what is.

Sonray wrote:We cant all have huge websites and get everything we ever want sent to us for free from press kits and stuff you arrogant little....ARGH!

This is a HUGE misconception. While it's true that Hasbro's PR company sent me about $400 or $500 worth of free stuff, there were only 2 things out of all of that that were really of value to me for my collection: Movie Megatron and Movie Prime. Everything else was stuff that I didn't want to buy (such as the Helmet, the RISK game, etc). They did send me Bonecrusher and Swindle in that giant big press kit box but I had already had them for about a month by the time I received that. I've had to buy everything else.

Let's not forget the hundreds of dollars over retail that I spent on Movie toy prototypes or production figures that showed up on eBay prior to the figures being available at retail. I did that so that Seibertron.com could have the first galleries of those figures so that you guys could see extremely detailed pics of those guys way before they were available. Most of the figures I ended up with weren't actual prototypes either so I will never get that money back other than in ad revenue on the site. I can't put those duplicate figures that I spent way too much money on for you guys to see galleries of up on eBay or anything. That was just money lost to bring you guys content.

Sonray wrote:I wont say anymore because i will probably get banned if i do, and i dont want that as i enjoy the community, but i will now enjoy it a little less knowing the owner is such a....well, read the above paragraph.

I'm not the kind of site owner. You presented your arguments and you have the absolute right to disagree with me and/or to think that I'm a jerk or wrong or whatever. As long as you present your arguments in a reasonable manner, I don't really care how much people disagree with me. I'm not always right either. I am, after all, human. I make mistakes as do the rest of you. I'm not above anyone. I just own/run a major TF website and have a few connections here and there. At the end of the day, I'm just a major TF geek like the rest of you. Sonray, I have a great deal of respect for you to speak your mind like that about me. I appreciate your honesty more than you know.

I just want you guys to know that people like me on the site are willing to help you figure out ways to legitimately get these figures from actual retail stores. If you want some advice, there are many of us who would be happy to analyze your area's toy sightings and help you figure out a battle plan so-to-speak. If you think that's a waste of time and that I'm just full of smoke, then so be it. I offered to help and that's the least I can do.

Cyber Bishop wrote:Definition of a scalper: one that buys toys at normal or less than retail prices and resells them for double or triple the original price and claims that the item is uber rare.

They are seen hanging out at flea markets a lot. :grin:

this IS the definition of a scalper, lest we lose focus on what we are talking about.

get it?

BUY = RETAIL >> SELL = 2x or MORE

don't get me wrong, i still HATE scalpers, but we must try and differentiate/draw a clear line, between a valid, legal, morally sound business practice, and a totally vile and unproductive system of getting profits quickly at the expense of everything that we TF fans and collectors hold so dear to.

think you guys ever have it tough there? try our situation here in the Philippines. if distro ever so sucks in whatever particular state you are in, it's twice or thrice the suckiness in our country.

heck, in our city, we never even got to see the Energon line even appear on our shelves! most of what i have (or going to have eventually), i purchase off eBay.

so if one is willing to buy a few or more figures, then sell it online AT A REASONABLE COST, (i.e. to cover expenses incurred while at least TRYING to make a SMALL profit) to help people who do not have the particular TF in their area - i don't think that's scalping. that's doing us collectors a service.

edit: well, thanks to the movie, TFs are getting shipped into our toy stores again (that's how i got my 08 and LC prime), but we really missed out on some of the great toylines because of bad distro. i repeat, most of my TF purchases nowadays are either from eBay or a local Filipino TF forum, similar like this.

Ryan:

Thats alot of text to read through and i dont read too well, stuff just becomes a blurr after a while cos im stupid or dyslexic or something like that, but whatever i will just say a few things.

Why i dont post sightings:

Essex is a tiny area, and most of the guys in the ODB forum i know who are from england live no where near me, even though essex is a tiny area i wouldnt expect any of them to travel in excess of 20 miles just for a toy considering the amount of money we have to pay for petrol (gas) over here. That is the main reason why i dont post, i just dont see the point or how it can help anybody over here unless they are local to my location.

Now, onto what has been said:

Now, i do like this place i really do. Ive met some good people here, found a new hobby which i love and have gotten back into collecting transformers, something i have loved since i was a child.

I understand how much work you put into this place, and how much money it must cost to run. I appriciate what youve done 100% which is why when i read your initial post i was more upset at first, then i got angry.

Your initial comment came across like you was basically saying "you are all idiots! Its easy to find these things if you use the sightings forum, and support scalpers!".

It just sounded arrogant and as if you was looking down on us and i didnt think that was a fair way to treat the supporters of your site.
Now many others have gotten this vibe from that post so i am sure you can understand why we'd react this way.

Maybe it was a recent Bay-esque type of reaction, but it was justified. We are both in the wrong i think so lets not fall out over it ok?

I am glad you appriciate my honesty, it is something that hasnt done me many favours with webmasters and mods in the past so i am glad that SOMEONE finally appriciates it, even though it seems to give me a bit of a trouble maker image around here and with your mod team i bet.

I just dont suger coat anything as, IMO, being fully honest and speaking what is simply on your mind and not lieing to people is the best thing a man can do.
My short fuse doesnt help much either i know, but thats just how i am im afraid.
If it gets me in trouble so be it..if people think i am an asshole for it, so be it.

Now i dont want to make enemies with you, as i have had enough of all the bullshit that goes on in forums and websites for many years now and i just want a place that i can finally settle down in and not be kicked out of for being myself, so far this has worked here, and i hope (if you dont mind) to carry on using this place and enjoying the forums for a long time to come now.


I am sorry if i offended you or made it sound like what you do here isnt appriciated, but you have to understand that you sounded like you was calling us all fools and telling us that its ok to buy out a store full of toys and sell them to people on ebay for 200% profit.

We cool?


(man reading this post gives me a headache....phew i gotta go lie down for a bit now. Damn defective brain circuits)

megatroptimus wrote:

Lapse Of Reason wrote:I buy rare toys and sell them for a profit and I'm proud of it. I then turn around and reinvest that money in other luxury items, usually Transformers for my own collection. I find that if I can buy three and sell two, I usually make enough extra to cover the expense for the figure I keep.

This year I bought three Botcon sets and three looses sets, plus all the souvenior sets I could get. I kept one of everything for me and made enough profit off the rest to buy a 50" Panasonic plasma tv.

Resourcefulness is a virtue, not a vice.

Exactly the type of collector I despise.

Why? Care to back that up?

tacogrande wrote:

Lapse Of Reason wrote:I buy rare toys and sell them for a profit and I'm proud of it. I then turn around and reinvest that money in other luxury items, usually Transformers for my own collection. I find that if I can buy three and sell two, I usually make enough extra to cover the expense for the figure I keep.

This year I bought three Botcon sets and three looses sets, plus all the souvenior sets I could get. I kept one of everything for me and made enough profit off the rest to buy a 50" Panasonic plasma tv.

Resourcefulness is a virtue, not a vice.

Maybe you should have counterpunch's I'm a douche sig. Seems he no longer needs it.

Nah, it's not bowing down to a 50" t.v.

Lapse Of Reason wrote:

tacogrande wrote:

Lapse Of Reason wrote:I buy rare toys and sell them for a profit and I'm proud of it. I then turn around and reinvest that money in other luxury items, usually Transformers for my own collection. I find that if I can buy three and sell two, I usually make enough extra to cover the expense for the figure I keep.

This year I bought three Botcon sets and three looses sets, plus all the souvenior sets I could get. I kept one of everything for me and made enough profit off the rest to buy a 50" Panasonic plasma tv.

Resourcefulness is a virtue, not a vice.

Maybe you should have counterpunch's I'm a douche sig. Seems he no longer needs it.

Nah, it's not bowing down to a 50" t.v.

Your 50" TV sucks, Plasmas are crap, dont use it as some form of e-penis "mine is bigger than yours" contest because no ones gonna envy an e-penis that burns out after a year or two..or sooner.

If you are gonna do the e-penis thing do it with something that people actually might envy you for owning.

First off let me say I do appreciate this website and all the great people involved in making it what it is.
Second,
I have not really had a problem finding ANY figures I want because I do have years of experience and access to resources like transportation. Also I don't mind much at all going from store to store looking for figures when I can. It's what I do, and have been doing for the most part of 14 years now.
Third,
I do utilize all the resources this website has to offer, and I make an effort to help out fellow collectors when and if I can.
The sightings section is a valuable tool. I check it all the time, and I report sightings (over 400 in about a year and a half) nearly every time I go out. When I bagan collecting you would have to wait till AFN, AFD, or Toyfare came out, to find out what new toys were on the horizon, or just check the stores blindly. Now with the internet, ebay, etc. Anticipation starts long before any release and people are able to gauge more closely how well a particular item might do. There are pros and cons to this, and I won't go into them right now, but that is where alot of these "scalpers" come into play. This kind of activity has been going on at least since the very early 90's, but you had to have access to specific outlets like comic shops, flea markets etc. in order to see it taking place. The difference now is we can see it everyday on our computers. And I think that has something to do with the way we are reacting on the subject.

I'd like to take a second and focus on the thread topic.
This has probably been said already but...
I think the initial reaction of hatred for this particular ebayer is because the guy is flaunting the item. If he had one up for auction people probably wouldn't have given it a second look. Instead it looks like he's saying look at me, I bought all the G1 Jazz repaints within a 50 mile radius. Or I work at a retail store where they don't care if I buy toys to my content and resell them on ebay. I think initially the guy just looked like an asshole for doing that, and this thread turned into a kill all scalpers thread. I don't think anyone was saying that they couldn't get any figures cause of people like this, they were just really irritated that perhaps they couldn't find one and when they see this guy with 18 of them all you can think is WTF? Mind you we all know this is going to be a limited release, which makes it that much more irritating. You know, if this guy has access to as much inventory as he wants at a particular store, then yes he could be literally robbing people of getting this item at retail in a particular area. I understand there may be people in a situation where they only have access to one Target store, but that is where the collecting game comes into play. You have to be able to search high and low sometimes. Like I said before, I don't encourage what this guy has done, he does seem like an asshole Who is taking advantage of connections, access or whatever. I don't see this as someone who went out, looked for the toys and then sells them on ebay. If someone bought an extra 1 or 2 figures, decided later to put them on ebay, I admit, I don't see anything wrong with that. But the argument started out with the focus being that "Scalpers" seem to be buying out the stores and then selling the figures at a significant markup. That's what the link at the beginning of the thread suggested to me. I think that is where some collectors are getting irritated. That IS something I hope most of us here on Seibertron don't become involved with.

I buy TF for me, sometimes if I can find a real good deal, I'll pick up one or two extra and off them.

I never do so in bulk though, and some of the people I've traded with her can atest that outside of shipping, I don't mark up!

I can understand people wanting to make a buck, but when deluxe figures are hitting Ebay for $40-$60 plus shipping and not the shelves, I do have to say I have a problem with that.

Online stores marking there prices up just because they know someone will pay it is also very wrong, but even worse, I wen't into the Totowa TRU today, and all their movie figures where marked up $2.

On principal, I won't give in on this and give my hard earned money to the scalpers!

I know what stores are worthwhile, and I check them often. Today in fact I found a Titanium Cheetor at a local Target that had nothing earlier this week. I find that if you stay resiliant, and check often, you will find what you want at a regular retail rate. Should a bot sadly elude me still, well maybe I was ment to spend that $10 on something else.

I equate scalpers being a problem with Santa Claus dropping by my house to play XBOX 360 in the next five minutes.

Cyber Bishop wrote:Definition of a scalper: one that buys toys at normal or less than retail prices and resells them for double or triple the original price and claims that the item is uber rare.

They are seen hanging out at flea markets a lot.

So by this line of reasoning, any online store such as BBTS, Digital-toys, TFSource, all the Botcon sellers, and anyone else who sells something over the original MSRP is a detriment to TF collecting?

Some other quesions to consider:

If you found five $10 bills on the ground, would you pick one up for yourself and leave the other four for the next passerbys to find?


If your boss offered you a raise even though you had not been there the longest, would you say no?


If someone gave you a good stock tip, would you not invest because you feel you'd make too much money and that wouldn't be fair to others who made poor investments?



I have no problem with someone like me who might see a few rare figs and buy them all to resell a few. I am not making a living off of it, and if I did it would not be a very good one. Only a few bucks here and there with a huge boon at Botcon time.


I think the ugliest think about all this "scalper" debate is the outpouring of hatred towards the few that are taking advantage of a very small opportunity. Many of the whiners and complainers should be ashamed of themselves.

I have been called a douche and told I am despised by members of this community just because of my stance on the issue. I'm the same member who was giving away free stuff only a few weeks ago (and only one of the three recipients even bothered to thank me for it once it arrived). I can provide a list of 40+ names who responded at the opportunity for free stuff. Nobody had a problem with me giving away $50+ dollars worth of stuff, yet if I were to say I made $20 on a Bumblebee toy I'd get slammed with hate posts. For shame.

This guy is a scalper since they only made 100 G1 Jazz figures for release, these auctions will probably end at $1000.

Oh yea, it's not limited. I think everyone needs to calm down, since the movei figures were relaesaed, it has been crazy. Look at Cybertron and Classics...there was stock left, we didn't need to bid those up on e-bay. And Target has even stated, limitd Transformers until October. People need to stop looking at e-bay.

This whole thread was started because someone intentionally looked up Target Exclusive G1 Jazz on e-bay. If you are doing this, you are not patient, there is no reason to look on e-bay for a new figure. Especially when you can buy it on Targets website!

Sonray wrote:

Lapse Of Reason wrote:

tacogrande wrote:

Lapse Of Reason wrote:I buy rare toys and sell them for a profit and I'm proud of it. I then turn around and reinvest that money in other luxury items, usually Transformers for my own collection. I find that if I can buy three and sell two, I usually make enough extra to cover the expense for the figure I keep.

This year I bought three Botcon sets and three looses sets, plus all the souvenior sets I could get. I kept one of everything for me and made enough profit off the rest to buy a 50" Panasonic plasma tv.

Resourcefulness is a virtue, not a vice.

Maybe you should have counterpunch's I'm a douche sig. Seems he no longer needs it.

Nah, it's not bowing down to a 50" t.v.

Your 50" TV sucks, Plasmas are crap, dont use it as some form of e-penis "mine is bigger than yours" contest because no ones gonna envy an e-penis that burns out after a year or two..or sooner.

If you are gonna do the e-penis thing do it with something that people actually might envy you for owning.

Sounds like Sonny has a bit of penis envy. Whatcha getting so defensive about there, kid?