S.H.FiguArts Dragonball Z figures!!!

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Wtf...Not impressed, Bandai. Not impressed.

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Shipping is $10 and there is also tax depending on what state you're on. Also the payment option is paypal only? So I think you have to pay upfront. I think I'm gonna have to pass. To expensive right now. :(
 
I don't like the "PAY NOW" pre-order style. At least other sites only ask for a small deposit like for some expensive Mezco toys. Right now, a lot of people aren't working and can't prioritize buying Dragon Ball toys because of the crappy coronavirus. No money for necessities, no money for toys.

The prices aren't even good. With the shipping AND taxes, you'll end up paying the same like before, which is around $70+ or more. I'd rather buy from local well known 3rd party sellers because at least I don't pay extra California tax (which is around 7 or 8%) unlike if I buy from Amazon and Big Bad Toy Store. If Premium Bandai shop wants to succeed, they would have to offer the option of partial payment or no payment until the products are actually available.

In short, I'm NOT a fan of Premium Bandai shop and I live in California.
 
It's actually interesting to see americans being displeased by this move.
Also, the timing is just awful.
 
BBTS put them up. $88 for Vegito and $85 for Zamasu. With shipping and taxes, my order to ship to California through Bandai was $139. BBTS charges taxes for California, so I'd be looking at roughly $195 from BBTS.
 
I don't like the "PAY NOW" pre-order style. At least other sites only ask for a small deposit like for some expensive Mezco toys. Right now, a lot of people aren't working and can't prioritize buying Dragon Ball toys because of the crappy coronavirus. No money for necessities, no money for toys.

The prices aren't even good. With the shipping AND taxes, you'll end up paying the same like before, which is around $70+ or more. I'd rather buy from local well known 3rd party sellers because at least I don't pay extra California tax (which is around 7 or 8%) unlike if I buy from Amazon and Big Bad Toy Store. If Premium Bandai shop wants to succeed, they would have to offer the option of partial payment or no payment until the products are actually available.

In short, I'm NOT a fan of Premium Bandai shop and I live in California.

Taking aside the coronavirus situation, payment for items in our collector world has become increasingly more frustrating for the vendors. I agree that an exception should be made regarding the global situation NOW, but I don't necessarily disagree with the "pay first" approach.

I follow some vendors on Facebook who are VERY transparent about their business and what stipulations companies like Bandai Tamashii/Bluefin, Hasbro, etc. put on them. Bandai Tamashii has become MORE DEMANDING FOR MONEY UPFRONT from vendors...especially in regards to "Web Exclusives". These vendors now require full payment for some figure by a certain date because of this stipulation. When vendors (BBTS, etc.) place an order for some of these figures, Bandai has asked them to PAY IMMEDIATELY to secure their order numbers, sometimes limiting allocations. Obviously they get wholesale prices, but the vendors still have to make a profit as for some this is a livelihood. Many times these vendors end up having cancellations...the Dragon Ball figuarts world is finnicky for example...partially because of the fans and partially because Bandai has become from frustrating to deal with. For example with Bandai's long rumored "shortage of figures/allocations", I know fans who pre-order from Japan, then secure "back-up" pre-orders from BBTS, Amazon, etc. and then once they get their Japanese pre-orders in, they're scrambling to cancel their pre-orders with BBTS, Amazon, etc. BBTS obviously got frustrated with the allocations (and perhaps cancelled pre-orders) because they implemented their "one per household" a number of months back when before they never had this.
 
Yeah that's also something I heard from those facebook sellers, companies make them pay now. Even Mezco, which didn't require deposits in the past, suddenly need anywhere between $15 to $20 deposit nowadays for a $90 to $120 item. This move by companies to require immediate payment has caused me to become more of a "Buy Later" kind of shopper. I don't even pre-order from my usual local sources anymore if payment has to be right away while the release date is 8 months or more later (or in Mezco's case, sometimes it gets pushed later a year or more, yikes!). Fortunately in my experience, I never had trouble acquiring stuff that I didn't pre-order. Sometimes I get them for the usual price, occasionally I get them lower (like the price drops that happen to Figuarts Dragon Ball prices on Amazon after a month or so), and rarely do I get them for more than half the original price as long as they were released that month.

I wonder why companies are doing this now. Are they in some kind of financial trouble... I wonder how the coronavirus problem would affect the toy industry.
 
BBTS put them up. $88 for Vegito and $85 for Zamasu. With shipping and taxes, my order to ship to California through Bandai was $139. BBTS charges taxes for California, so I'd be looking at roughly $195 from BBTS.

yup haven't used BBTS since my Broly and SSB goku pre-orders (when those released that's when they started charging tax for Cali). i don't mind the pay first but i don't want these two enough to do that. and like others have said the prices suck. i've got at least my last 5 DBZ figuarts under retail thanks to amazon. with PB being the main place to get these that won't happen again.
 
Yeah that's also something I heard from those facebook sellers, companies make them pay now. Even Mezco, which didn't require deposits in the past, suddenly need anywhere between $15 to $20 deposit nowadays for a $90 to $120 item. This move by companies to require immediate payment has caused me to become more of a "Buy Later" kind of shopper. I don't even pre-order from my usual local sources anymore if payment has to be right away while the release date is 8 months or more later (or in Mezco's case, sometimes it gets pushed later a year or more, yikes!). Fortunately in my experience, I never had trouble acquiring stuff that I didn't pre-order. Sometimes I get them for the usual price, occasionally I get them lower (like the price drops that happen to Figuarts Dragon Ball prices on Amazon after a month or so), and rarely do I get them for more than half the original price as long as they were released that month.

I wonder why companies are doing this now. Are they in some kind of financial trouble... I wonder how the coronavirus problem would affect the toy industry.

Totally understand your perspective on it.

If you've been following Sideshow, Mezco, and even Tamashii Nations the past few years, NRDs are becoming more common. There's A LOT of buyers who simply do NOT have the funds and go and pre-order like crazy. Nothing wrong with cancelling orders as its been part of some of these companies and vendor's policies for a while, but I think it has become TOO frequent and probably ate into their bottom dollar. Hence the NRDs are some way of recovering losses. On a personal note, I sell stuff on eBay and I have frequently had to deal with non-paying bidders. Some don't pay at all and go radio silence, but recently I had a guy who talked up on message about how excited he was to purchase a figure for me and that he was amped he won the auction and promised to pay in a timely manner. He asked for a few days longer cause of his pay-day (this was pre-COVID) and I said sure. Sure enough, his pay-day comes and goes and I know instantly I have another non-payer. I have to file a claim with eBay and thankfully it's easy to do that and get my final value fees back, but as a seller, it's annoying that I put the time and energy into creating my auction, sold it, even generously gave the buyer a few extra days to pay (he went past my standard "pay due after three days of auction's end) and then have the buyer drop off after promising to pay. This is why I actually agree with the "pay first" mentality in some cases. I've been the seller/vendor on the receiving end of these dead-beat buyers. And for some of them, it's a constant issue. Stop buying stuff if you DO NOT have the money. Hence, why I think "paying first" (with a reputable company/vendor) is in some cases, a no-brainer.

In regards to Bandai Tamashii Nations...I think this is an interesting conundrum and I'm wondering what is driving this. If you remember about a year or two ago, there was suddenly this news that "allocations of figures to the US would be less". Some of the new figures coming out around then like DBS Future Trunks and some others were slapped with "2 or 1 per household" limits on websites like BBTS. Some of the other e-tailers were even commenting that they didn't know if they'd be able to fill all their pre-orders. Lo' and behold, after a few Dragon Ball figure releases, this turned out to be smoke that Tamashii was saying for WHATEVER REASON as it was clear that the figures were available. Maybe some sold out quicker than others, but it was clear there was "enough available". Some sites kept the limits, like BBTS, but I personally think that some sites like BBTS are just tired of people cancelling pre-orders and they end up sitting on a whole bunch of stock they can't sell.

Maybe it has to do with licenses and costs associated? Tamashii has bumped up extensively with the Star Wars and Marvel licenses, and those can't be cheap, so now they want more money to line their products with the costs associated. And Tamashii is NOT making these figures like Hasbro is, who basically re-use parts REPEATEDLY. Tamashii can't really re-use their molds in some cases (or chooses not to).

It's a real big mystery but Tamashii has clearly become more assertive with "money-upfront" when it comes to their products.
 
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Oh wow, I can relate with that situation where customers who go talk you into selling them something, asking for discounts and extra pictures, only to ghost you in the end! Happened to me two nights ago actually lol! I also sell on Ebay and I avoid the auction style of selling. I noticed that on other people's auctions, there would be those zero feedback accounts who would bid on an item until they eventually win. Unfortunately according to some sellers, it seems to be some kind of joke or bot account, so the seller never gets paid.

Anyway I hope this coronavirus goes away already, people need to get back to their jobs to make money again (especially us collectors!) haha :)
 
I agree with you on that Adeno! Hopefully this all goes away soon!

Anyways, I'm actually excited for Vegetto. I only wish that Tamashii included a Base and Super Saiyan head with it. I see another DF opportunity here.
 
Hu? Isn't DF basically dead?
There's no news of them since January...

Good point. Aren't they in Hong Kong or Mainland China? They could've got caught up in all the lockdowns there. It looks like their Ultimate "Guhan" was next.

Though their designer would frequently post updates. I feel with the lockdown, he might've had A LOT of time to show new designs.
 
A friend just pointed out that Shfiguarts Tao Pai Pai is made in Vietnam and not in China like the rest of the others.
 
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