Would you guys rather get Starboost or the Mark 42? I can only afford one right now.
Collectibles Direct & Forbidden Planet both say that it's basically to maximise sales directly through Sideshow's website, they know people don't like to wait & many will be willing to spend the extra to get the figure or whatever, that much sooner (neither retailer said this was a bad thing or in a negative way, they said it's basically just good business sense).
Just po'ed this bastard through BBTS.
Unfortunately Forbidden Planet (.com) don't help matters, by frequently taking more pre-orders than they fulfill from their first batch of deliveries.
This has become such a regular feature of my experience with them (with no explanation, or new delivery date supplied, when my order is not processed), that I frequently end-up buying direct from Sideshow anyway.. FP just did it again with the Wolfpack Clone Trooper, 104th Battalion: Delivery date arrived.. figure was listed as in stock.. no delivery.. figure now listed as out of stock.. no explanation.. pre-order still listed as 'processing'.
A couple of peeps on the forum have pointed out in the past, that this may be due to short-shipping by Amerang (the 'trade only' official distributor for the UK).
However if customers pre-order a figure in July 2014, yet FP cannot even be bothered to contact those pre-order customers with a generic new delivery date email, when they list the figure as out of stock, then frankly FP have no-one to blame but themselves, when customers start ordering direct.
This is especially true since FP do not even allocate all of the initial 'limited' stock to pre-orders.. some figures go to their online and retail stores..the figure is thus generally available for a couple of days to buy 'in store'.. so customers only find out their pre-order will not be honoured, when FP change the listing from 'in stock', to 'sold out'..in other words another customer could buy the figure 'on arrival' and get priority over existing pre-orders, simply by playing 'stock allocation roulette'.
I will almost certainly buy Starboost/Gemini from Sideshow direct.. since if FP failed to fulfill a straightforward pre-order like the Wolfpack Clone Trooper, I do not trust them to fulfill my pre-order for Starboost, listed as 'sold out to pre-order' for many months on the FP(.com) website.
thank you all for the input. now time to hunt one down!
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