The Energon Pub

With the recession now approaching the 2 year mark, it's hard to find many companies, products, services and fields that haven't been negatively affected in some form. However, there are always going to be a few things that not only survive in a poor economy but actually find a way to thrive.

Yahoo! Finance recently compiled their top 10 list of products that boomed during the recession and our beloved Transformers actually made that list. Here is an excerpt.

Transformers. Good and evil are still doing battle, which makes toy maker Hasbro a winner. The company's Transformers action figures have morphed into a franchise that includes two movies, a TV series, video games, comic books, and a wide range of spinoff toys that seem to be recessionproof. A sharp boost in entertainment licensing revenue from Transformers and a related stalwart, G.I. Joe, have helped offset reductions in other parts of Hasbro's earnings statement. Expect the bots to keep battling.

Other items included tupperware, private label salad dressing and universal remotes. Yes, seriously.

To view the entire article please click here.

Seibertron.com - Providing the best Transformers coverage in good times and bad!

This has been discussed before but TFs also make a better investment than giving your money to a broker and having him piss it away on his fees even before he has done anything and then the losses via the white collar crime we have recently seen.

I tend to think that transformers do well in these times due to the pure escapist nature of the product. When people are down they always look for fun ways to get their minds off of the real world. Also, for me personally, having the deluxe figs go back down to $10 at wal-mart was a big factor. I would rather buy 3 deluxe figs for $30 then two for $26....call me craxy but the lower prices encourages me to buy more...go figure.

There's a Transformers universal remote? WHAT THE HECK! Why don't I own it already?

4 movies Yahoo:

The Transformers: The Movie.
Some OVA I honestly couldn't care about (and I won't pretend to).
And then the other two.

Not just A T.V series either. There've been lots.

But most of everything else is correct, and pretty interesting.

OK, I read the article. I feel better knowing there aren't specific Transformers universal remotes (especially since I just bought one).

Ravage Eject wrote:I would rather buy 3 deluxe figs for $30 then two for $26....call me craxy but the lower prices encourages me to buy more...go figure.

Amen. Hell! I would rather buy 4 for $28 than 1 for $13. Ah those nice $7.77 rollbacks...

I can believe it. Gencon, the big gaming convention in Indianapolis, also posted record numbers. I work as a freelancer for several companies and when I spoke with several vendors and developers there they all said pretty much the same thing*:

The economy sucks and people are being more careful with their money; that being said, people who really love something and want to relax are probably going to save up for the one thing that will make them happy.

A lot of people love Transformers, so it makes sense that if they had to choose what movie they were going to see over the summer they would choose ROTF.


*K, not all of them said the exact same thing, but my statement is a generalization.

Zeds wrote:This has been discussed before but TFs also make a better investment than giving your money to a broker and having him piss it away on his fees even before he has done anything and then the losses via the white collar crime we have recently seen.

Yep ive made more money selling 2007 figs then on my 401K at work.

Well with the movie basically selling the figures and every store having TFs on sale every other week its not really that surprising that TF did so well. If there was no movie just a show and no sales i bet TF wouldnt be on that list. Who in their right mind is going to pass up 2 deluxes for $20 or a voyager for $14? Well at least we know transformers isnt going anywhere for a while. Its one of hasbros main cash cows now.

Who knew that the salad dressing industry wouldn't be hard hit?

Should of kept my G1 figures!

Deluxe 10 dollars? Where?
Here they are 12 euro's, and those are the animated / universe figz.

Anyway good news. If we have to eat a little less to keep the monthly
haul alive then that's no prob. We are to fat anyway.

I also think a lot of families don't go on vacation but get their kids
some more toys/games.