darkSpyro

It's bad enough that the secondary market wants blood and first born for Skylanders figures, but now I see a trend where legitimate retailers are raising the prices of the figures too.

Everyone knows that Toys R Us already charges more than most, but now Best Buy has raised their prices too.

This upsets me beyond how it will drain my wallet, it bothers me for other reasons as well. Overall it could hurt the franchise when the fervor (or frenzy) for the figures dies down because demand is finally being met by an over saturated market. Figures will start to warm the pegs and the awesome toy-line that Skylanders is will give the illusion of being a flop when prices need to be drastically reduced to move product.

Furthermore I can't shake the feeling that in the toy industry this is a new precedent. I've been collecting toys my whole life and I can't recall prices on existing stock every going up. These are toys, not gasoline. The prices shouldn't rise unless there was a sale or other discount applied to them and that period of lower prices ends.

Thoughts?

I thought that was how it worked? Although, in the UK, prices have only gone up by £1, and some places still sell them at the original price...

Whilst demand is high, put the price up and people will still buy, it's all a part of business...

The four basic rules of supply and demand apply here:

If demand increases and supply remains unchanged, then it leads to higher equilibrium price and quantity. (If demand goes up and supply stays the same, prices go up, as people will still buy)
If demand decreases and supply remains unchanged, then it leads to lower equilibrium price and quantity. (As demand goes down, more are on the shelves, so prices need to be reduced so they still sell)
If supply increases and demand remains unchanged, then it leads to lower equilibrium price and higher quantity. (Again, more on shelves, prices reduced cause they have more to sell)
If supply decreases and demand remains unchanged, then it leads to higher price and lower quantity. (Less on shelves, charge more, because people will still buy as there aren't many available.)

Therefore, this is all because of stores not being given enough supply by whoever is sending these out to everyone

I did a Business Studies course GCSE/A Level, so i know what I'm on about

If you've already got 25 figures, you've only got 7 to go (not counting the legendaries or Dark Spyro). That price hike amounts to a maximum of 14 bucks. Gonna have to deal with it.

If you were selling a product that was flying off your shelves, you would probably raise the price, too.

It's still unprecedented in my experience.

I survived the Star Wars toy resurgence of the 1990s. When "monkey faced Princess Leia" was $200 on eBay and "Short Light Saber Long tray Vader" Was $300.

Even though Star Wars toys were also impossible to find during dry spells, the prices never went up on existing stock. Not once. Not ever. Eventually these same toys ended up in the clearance bins, but the franchise lives on. Yes the price for the NEW figures is higher than the 1990 prices of the counterparts, but that is more in keeping with a fluctuating toy market and inflation.

To raise the price of existing product is something new and I'm going to come right out and say that I hope this isn't a foreshadowing of things to come.

On a personal note, my family only has 11 figures so far. We will have to "suck it up" by a wider margin I'm afraid. Still it's not about the immediate hit on my wallet, it's about a trend I'm not happy to see. Looking at the big picture here.

The "big picture" is a free market economy based on capitalism. It's not a recent trend. It's been happening since the beginning of time. Even someone who has nothing but the starter pack will be out a maximum of $70.

25 singles x $2 = $50 (could be 8 triple packs x $5 plus 1 single pack x $2 = $42)
4 adventure packs x $5 = $20

That's assuming you don't want Dark Spyro or the legendaries. Also assuming that you buy everything at one of the stores that has increased prices, like TRU or GameStop. If you find product at Wal-Mart or Target (or amazon when they are in stock), you don't pay extra.

Seventy bucks isn't really that much when you consider how much you will spend if you want all of the figures.

It's the first rule in marketing; by bumping up the prices of things that are extremely rare, people will pay the price no matter what to get them.

Unfortunately, I'd say that if/when they release a Skylanders 2, this will be the normal price for things. Although, honestly, it's not THAT bad compared to some figures which don't do anything in a video game.

Although, going up any higher than this is wading into dangerous territory. Hopefully Target/Walmart will keep theirs down.

As a parent, there is no way this game is as successful as it is now if the figures were $10 from the start. I would never have bought the game. If I had, I would have found a way to save the mythical $5 by getting all 3 packs, assuming 3 packs were kept to $25 (but I doubt that would be the case. 3 packs would probably have been $27). I am fairly certain that there are quite a few other parents who would feel as I do if these things were $10 from the start. Someone else posted that the $8 price point is low enough for a parent to not really notice yet high enough to make sense production cost wise. It didnt approach the "What? It costs how much?!?!" price point. I think that is a very valid point. They way I see it, a pack of smokes here in NY is $8. If I can have a pack of smokes, then my kids can have a figure.

yeah but I want to know why tickets are illegal to scalp but toys and other merch isnt. It is the exact same thing, you buy something and then when there are none available or hard to find you charge more. The stores and company dont gain anything from it and if anything it hurts them because the stock moves faster then they can supply it so instead of selling 2 figures they sell 1 and it gets resold at a gain. So the store mark up may be to recover from that loss, but I doubt it.

Well, for tickets and stuff, a lot of times they're counterfeit tickets, and no one can really moderate that, so they just outright banned people from doing so. Unfortunately, the same can't be said for things like ebay, or people in general for reselling them. People do it all the time with other things.

It all comes down to perception. Activision says that they will be meeting the demand for the figures soon. Evidence shows us that this is happening. Stores are filling up now.

Just as shelves finally get stock after a long drought, the price at the store goes up.

Sure plenty of people (children and adults) that are hooked on Skylanders will still buy. Like me they might grumble a bit but the wallet will open. However for all of us that will "suck it up" as stated previously, there will still be plenty of consumers that will see the threshold of perceived value be reached. They will refuse to pay the recent price hike, either because they are considering becoming new customers and they did the math and it's now out of the price range they deem acceptable, or as people that bought the game for the holidays, were unable to find product for months and now see a price increase will move on to something else.

The toy industry isn't really like other industries. The action figure model doesn't fluctuate with supply and demand like pork bellies do.

When a price is suggested by the manufacturer, (MSRP is Manufacturere Suggested Resale Price) it is almost always adhered to by the penny. Only in secondary shops like comic book stores do you see markup. Now if the big chains start to follow suit along with the comic book stores and start raising prices based on what is happening on the secondary market (and I fervently believe that speculators soaking up the old stock is why you can't find figures on the shelves. Either directly because they are making a cottage industry out of reselling figures or as a symptom because no parent can afford to pass up a chance to buy figures at retail if they see them), it could cause a crash. Not saying it will, but saying it could.

Demand right now is higher than supply HOWEVER, the powers that be are said to be about to meet that demand and soon. This will mean a glut of toys on the shelves and the balance will shift maybe far too dramatically. Repercussions of such a shift could result in poor sales in the last quarter of 2012. If that happens you might have to kiss the whole "interactive figure game" concept goodbye. It will appear to the bean counters to be a failure that enjoyed a good initial push but couldn't sustain consumer interest.

Not saying that this is how it HAS to be or WILL be, but the possibility lurks like a spectre all the same.

Quote: skyp1e

If that happens you might have to kiss the whole "interactive figure game" concept goodbye.

It's not like this is a completely new thing at all. Some here may remember the Pokemon V trainer, battle trainer and similar THINKChip figures. These have had intermittent releases in a few forms between gen 1 and gen 4, but worked(v trainer at least) on a similar concept to Skylanders - you buy figures and use them, they save their stats etc. This wasn't half as popular as Skylanders, although based on a more popular franchise. i still have my DP one, and i think the figures still work... So even if Skylanders does disappear into memory, there will still be a market for them(collectors) and we may see something similar again in the future

Quote: Brutungo

yeah but I want to know why tickets are illegal to scalp but toys and other merch isnt. It is the exact same thing, you buy something and then when there are none available or hard to find you charge more. The stores and company dont gain anything from it and if anything it hurts them because the stock moves faster then they can supply it so instead of selling 2 figures they sell 1 and it gets resold at a gain. So the store mark up may be to recover from that loss, but I doubt it.

It is legal to scalp tickets in the state of Indiana. You can always get tickets for the indy 500 and now that the superbowl is there, you should be able to get them as well. There are websites that resell tickets for events in all the states. This isnt scalping as the website paid the original ticket holder a premium for their ticket and then marking up the price so that the website makes $. This isnt scalping, this is simple business.

I agree completely that counterfeit tickets causes problems and this is why scalping tickets is frowned upon.

Quote: skyp1e

It all comes down to perception. Activision says that they will be meeting the demand for the figures soon. Evidence shows us that this is happening. Stores are filling up now.

I see stores filling up with Wave 1 and Wave 2 characters, but not Wave 3. Even with their comments I still think that Wave 3 is going to be in short supply for the near future.

My bigger concern is that Walmart, Target, and Amazon will follow suit with TRU, Best Buy, and Gamestop and start charging $9.99/$24.99. How long do you think it will take for that to happen?

MSRP = Manufacuter's suggested retail price. There's no law saying you can't go over/under the guideline.

TRU is known to bump up prices, especially around Christmas.
It sucks, but maybe a few extra dollars will turn off people from buying there, making it easier to find the toys?

Best buy has them online for $8.99 with free ship. Too bad none of my local stores have any.

Quote: Okaps

MSRP = Manufacuter's suggested retail price. There's no law saying you can't go over/under the guideline.

TRU is known to bump up prices, especially around Christmas.
It sucks, but maybe a few extra dollars will turn off people from buying there, making it easier to find the toys?

Depends on how far they push it. There are price gouging laws.

Mostly these laws are set up to protect consumers during natural disasters like blizzards, hurricanes, et al. But the interpretation of the law can imply an invisible ceiling to how much beyond MSRP a retailer can go before they have a problem.

The Wal Mart that I got my Drobot single pack was $7.99, and the singles at Toys R Us are a couple dollars more. I still think that's a pretty good deal...

Just checked Walmart online for skylanders. Price is now $8.96 for singles.