The Energon Pub

So, I've recently started collecting voyager and leader sized transformers. I like the size of the toys, but they bring a terrible burden, a burden of choice.

When you buy a deluxe sized toy, there is no hope of salvaging the original packaging; however this is not the case for the larger class transformers. Most often you can remove the toy with no damage to the packaging; this leaves you free to save the package for "just incase", "i might need that", or "you'll never know how much this thing will be worth in 40 years" purposes (As an interesting side note these 3 phrases also comprise 40% of the compulsive hoarder national anthem).

A box itself is not much of a world ending threat; however when the box has friends and invites those friends to live in your closet, and those box friends invite their friends to live under your bed, and those boxes invite their friends to live in your shower.... you get the point. These boxes are quickly adding up and taking over the very limited space that my life occupies.

So help me by doing 1 of the 3 following things:
1) Applaud my hoarding ways and challenge me reach 900 empty boxes before you do

2) Make me realize that hoarding empty boxes for the hopes of retaining maximum value of a toy is in fact a form of irony, as the practice is making my soul a metaphorical empty box

3)point and laugh

I say... just get rid of the boxes. Toys are meant to be played with, displayed out of the box. Cut them up for recycling.

4) Chill. If it's a cool box like for example the Universe minicon 12-pack, keep it. If you like or value it for any reason, keep it. I keep some packaging but if we're talking carded figures I'll just keep the card, not the plastic bubble. Other boxes can be flattened if you give up the inserts. It's up to you and before anyone else says it, there are about sixty-five million threads on this subject already . Don't collect as an investment, buy the figures because they help you enjoy life .

I too keep my boxes and use them to store my figures as i only display 3 at a time (not fond of dusting) and i too do not buy deluxes due to packaging destruction. I have done all of the above but most times like i said use them to store the figures then store them in boxes.

Speaking as someone with eight thousand or so packages in 30 gallon plastic bags stacked to the rafters in my garage, I would highly recommend NOT keeping the packages. As you say, it takes up an inordinate amount of your limited space, and when you get right down to it, the way toys are made nowdays, I seriously doubt anything will survive long enough to actually become that valuable. Sad but true.

You do realize that practically everything from the 90's onward is worth diddly? All modern toylines are mass produced and over produced to the point of saturation. Nothing truly retains any value other than speculative market value. Which is worth it's weight in crap. Toss the boxes, or even better, recycle what you can.

On the other hand, keep them if you like them. I'm quite partial to a bit of artwork myself. Just make your own mind up about it dude! No point listening to a person who's too grown-up to keep their toy-boxes, right?

Keep the cool boxes, chuck/sell the rest.

I kept the Soundwave Toys R Us re-issue because it's the coolest box ever, the Soundwave that unfolds as you open it is all awesome. Also kept the Korean Big Convoy box, unique. Still have my Encore G1 Optimus Prime in his box (til I get my shelves built, then he comes out but the box gets kept).

I've also cut the back panels off some other boxes, like Cybertron Primus and MP Starscream (Walmart). Eventually they'll get stuck up on a wall w/ my collection. HTH.

Flux Convoy wrote:You do realize that practically everything from the 90's onward is worth diddly? All modern toylines are mass produced and over produced to the point of saturation. Nothing truly retains any value other than speculative market value. Which is worth it's weight in crap. Toss the boxes, or even better, recycle what you can.

After the sudden realisation that 80's TFs were valuable people started buying multiples of figures to keep them MISB in the hopes of making a tidy profit later. Should've stuck the money in the bank instead! eg I got RiD Prime/Magnus for less than the original retail price of one of these guys. They still had the original (working) batteries!

Last me start by stating that toys are not the best investment vehicle.

With that said, my suggestion is to keep the boxes and everything that was included. I personally, don't display anything in the box. Boxes are stored away for the simple reason that figures resell for more when you have all of the original packaging materials and contents.

For me, I sometimes change the direction of my collecting. Being 100% complete helps the figures I no longer want sell for more $$, more times than not.

Free them from those plastic prisons, rip oben the boxes of toy slavery and shred the bindings that keep them down, destr...etc.

Seriously, I had all the boxes for a lot of stuff, and one day I found it to be too much, and I couldn't keep as many TF's if I kept the packages. So off to the recycling bin they went.

I only keep really special boxes, like my Car Robots Fire Convoy, my CC armor, HTS Dragstrip/Overkill and my Pepsi Prime package.

Everything else is gone.

How much is the space they take up worth to you? If you intend to sell your collection someday, the boxes might help fetch a couple extra bucks per fig. Let's say it adds $200 to your collection...is it worth $200 to give up your storage space for the next 5 or 10 years? Maybe look at it like a storage unit...what do they charge a month? I don't know offhand, but I'm pretty sure it adds up to a helluva lot more than the extra cash you'd get by holding onto the boxes...

I say recycle them.

Here's what I do:

For import/collector or reissue figures, I keep the boxes. It helps protect them if I need to transport them. And often the box is designed to be part of the experience, for example the Takara MPs, any of the reissues, or Alternity figures. If it's a nice box, I keep it. If it protects a valuable figure, I keep it.

For everything else, I keep the card or cut out the back of the box for the tech specs, and chuck the rest, recycling the cardboard of course. Cards don't take up a lot of space compared to full boxes. Sometimes I'll keep boxes for larger figures for awhile, but I normally just end up discarding them in the end.

Yeah, I keep the tech specs/bios too. But it's minimal compared to the entire box. Just too much space is taken up, IMHO.

for 20 years i saved the packaging. same reason. "in 30 years this box alone will bring me money!"

But I realized something:
1) they take up a ton of space
2) I ain't never given up my plastic boys!