Hasbro's STAR WARS Bi-Weekly Q&A Session - Part 11

[Krayt]

Is Hasbro listening? You say no but I would say they have listened over the years. How many times did people say they would have loved vintage packing and they brought it back. With Vintage coming to an end now they are bringing back BAD which was another thing fans wanted. They have done fan polls for years and give us the winner of that. They have given us various figures we have asked for over the years. They adjusted characters heights, brought Ewoks into line with proper height, shorten Leia. They have made their sculpts even better, continued to give us better articulation. Do they have to give us an answer to any question, no, what companies do? We were spoiled with Q&A's that how many companies do exactly? And then since people thought it was a free form to air whatever grievance they had, Hasbro got tired of it and decided to cancel the Q&A.

As for your constructive criticism, telling a company they are doing something wrong isn't constructive criticism, it's telling the company how do their job. Their job, it's not yours.

As for the Tonnika sisters.....
How many dream lists they are on means absolutely nothing. Lucas has said no, why can't you just accept that? It's Lucas decision if something can or can't be made, not Hasbro's. So why can't you accept that the Tonnika sisters are off limits. Always have been, always will be. Never going to be made, end of story.

 

[ihnken33]

Hasbro doesn't want to hear about their downfalls, and you only want to praise them for their small meager achievements. So fine, go with that. They have yet to get to the CORE of their issues. Things like ewoks can be fixed easily and might put a band-aid on the overall problem which is once they release these ewoks, HOW THE HECK DO WE FIND THEM?

Constructive Criticism is effective if the ideas are taken into account and considered. As far as I know, they haven't, hence our case assortment beef that has spanned the better part of 3 years. Fans have asked for cases of a new wave to include 2 of each new figure per case, instead of 1 per case with a bunch of re-releases. You wouldn't have to re-release a figure if you would have released enough during the initial run. And don't get me started on repacks. LOTS of repacks, oh and saturation of specific characters that clog pegs hindering the logistics that I keep referring to which is why people can't get what they want in stores. When have those issues been addressed? What good are proper sized ewoks, proper height Leias, better sculpts, and fans choice figures if none can be found or purchased for that matter?

Constructive Criticism is exactly what we have been giving Hasbro (finding a problem, addressing it, and offering a solution to fix the problem) but Hasbro has not listened.

 

[Krayt]

Once again, who are you to tell them their downfalls? What you see as a downfall they might not, you don't know what their numbers are on any end of the spectrum. You are making basised opinion and assuming it's fact. If you don't see anything from their side of things how can you assume you are correct? You might be right, but have you considered at any point you might be wrong? Until you have the numbers or anything from them to back up any of what you are saying, you are making up opinions and trying to base it off as fact. We all get it, you are unhappy with the state of things right now so then just walk away. There is no need to keep going on and on with your opinion and saying you are right when you don't honestly know. You may think you know, and I am pretty sure by now you have convinced yourself you know but you really don't.

As for constructive criticism, I am sorry but what makes you qualified to be a critic? Oh yeah, you buy the product so that means you automatically get to critique EVERYTHING about their product. This also goes back to my earlier point, you don't know anything from their side of things so you can't give a fair assessment without any data to back it up. All you see is what hits store shelves, so that is what 5% of total operation but yet you are qualified to give an assessment on 100% of what the company does. Wow, you must be a business wizard or something.

If you saw a problem with a figure, you could say why did you do this instead of this because this is how it looked on screen. Or you could say, hey is there any chance you could do this figure because we haven't had one available to buy in stores for a few years. Why is it people have to find issues they have no idea the completely logistics behind something and tell a company they are doing it wrong? You are not an employee, or owner, or even an expect in the field so what makes you more qualified to know how to do something over the people that have the job doing it?

I will give you credit for one thing. At least you gave up on the Tonnika sister argument. Nothing like beaten the dead horse for the 100th time

 

[ihnken33]

While I don't have statistical evidence of anything (you are correct on that) What I do have is a list of threads in this forum that all say the same thing. No product or no NEW product available. Look at any of the Target, Wal-Mart, K-Mart or HTS threads, and they will paint a very clear picture about what is happening all across the US, Canada, and Europe. All of these threads are saying the same thing. We can't find your newest product.

While I will concede, there are posts that show people buying product, they are quickly followed up by the same poster posting "I found this wave, but only 1 of this wave" indicating that yes, while it is getting distributed, it's not getting distributed well. And once again, if you look at the lowest common denominator, it's Hasbro. And you will find the same thing in the Joe threads, and the CTR threds where it's movie figure related. Hasbro has issues. You can't deny that, or at least shouldn't be able to deny that. Show me 1 place where they have suceeded recently, and for every 1, I will look through these threads and show you 2 instances where they have fallen short. And that's just the way it is.

Which brings me back full circle, why can't we hold this company accountable? Do they owe me anything? Sure, they owe me their product. IF they didn't owe anyone anything, then why be in business and produce a product for distribution. Because they do what they do (Make a product, and try to market it and sell it) They open themselves up to our discrimination of their business tactics.

 

[Krayt]

Is there a lack of product on the shelves, sure. The question is you are not asking though is, why? Without knowing Hasbro's current direction, or policies, or anything to do with their side of the business you have no idea why there is a lack of product available. They may very well have a reason for it but with you not knowing you can't sit here and say they are wrong. Maybe their numbers are telling them that they can only put out so much to make everything work out. Maybe they have a reason for only having so much out at one time. Maybe there is a crap load of product sitting at some distributors right now. Maybe there is stock sitting some Target warehouse. We don't know all the logistics of the situation, so you can't tell them they are wrong because you don't know what the logistics are. So why not instead of saying hey you are wrong because there is nothing on the shelves, why not try a more friendly approach and say, Dear Hasbro there seems to be less Star Wars figures on the shelves these days than in years past could you tell me why that is, are you cutting back on figures made or will product availability be increased in the months to come?

Once again, they don't owe you anything. They make a product and they get businesses to sell that product to the general public. If you like the product you can purchase the product, if you don't like the product then don't purchase it. If you really want the product and can't purchase it through a brick and mortar location then you need to seek other options (it's not vital to your survival though so it's not dire that you have to purchase it). Why do you feel they owe you anything? They are simply producing something in the hopes of making money, plain and simple. There is nothing there that says they owe anyone in the general public anything. I see it all the time in kids in society today, why does everyone feel they are entitled to something? Hasbro doesn't owe you anything, period. Get over it already.

 

[ihnken33]

OOOOOHHHH I get it, the questions we were asking for the 2 plus years were asked incorrectly. Instead, we need to rephrase the questions to be more PC and user friendly.

Give me a break. We have asked the questions, we asked the questions so much that over the span of their interaction with the fans, they got sick of the same questions. No matter how they were phrased. What they failed to do was give us answers, or give us ANYTHING. If the almighty hasbro has all the answers and numbers and such as to why things are the way they are, then why not use that information they have and fix the problems, or at least let us know what is going on, how they plan to fix the problems and then guess what, we move on to different questions. My point is that in the time that they have opened theirselves up to this interaction with fans, and fans let them know what is REALLY happening out there, they shut down. They adapt an attitude of "LA LA LA LA I CANT HEAR YOU LA LA".

The simple answer is they either don't care or they don't have the information. And why wouldn't they have the information? Every company has a sort of fact finding department to tell them this. IT's how sales numbers are projected, how revenue is calculated, its how freaking pay checks are given out. They have the info, they are choosing not to share the info, and they have chosen not to use the info to correct the current issues. And even if they don't, shouldn't they at least be trying to put their buyers at ease? Oh that's right, they don't owe us anything, they don't owe us an explaination as to why things are happening because they don't have to answer to the people that buy their product. It sounds like an anarchy where the peons like us can't ask questions about why the kings of hasbro do something that effects the kingdom. History has shown us what happens to that king, eventually his head gets cut off because the peons uprise. Now that is an extreme example, but overall, if their sales fall off, then the little people like us who purchase the figures are leaving and hence going after the source. If you get the anology, then everything should be alright, if you choose to over analyze the anology, then I can't help you there. It's a decent example of how history has shown us what happens when communication is non existing or only 1 way.

 

[Krayt]

I get your analogy but it's a terrible analogy. A king controlled the very aspect of the peons life, but you want to compare a king to a business that is only asking you to buy their product. I don't need to over analyze your analogy to see you have compared apples to chair, you didn't get it close to being oranges. You are not even in the same realm of reality comparing Hasbro to a King.

As for communication, questions, whatever way you want to phrase it. Why do they have to answer to you? How many companies have open communication with their customers? Why do they have to? They only answer to owners/shareholders and since we are neither of those they don't owe us any form of communication at all. They simply make a product and we choose whether or not to buy it. Get over it, they don't want to hear from us. If you think that is terrible then stop buying anything Hasbro makes. Look at it this way though, if no company is willing to listen to anything you have to say stop buying all their products. It would cut down on your shopping because I can't think of any company that has an open form of communication you are asking for that will open up their books to you as well as to why they do what they do.

Get over it... Hasbro doesn't want to hear from the customers because all they are going to do is B**** anyways

 

[ihnken33]

It's a great analogy. But you are trying to argue me over every point. Always going back to the key element of supply and demand. We can go round and round (and quite frankly we have), and neither one of us has given. All you have to come up with on each of your posts is "Get over it. Hasbro owes you nothing" and I say "They are a company that has issues". that is the core of our arguments right now.

Is it fair to say that we will continue this and I can't make you see my point, no matter how I phrase it, and you can't get me to see your point? Can we just stop this now, because in the end the facts are this and I hope that they are indisputable by both sides.

There is no more Hasbro Q&A For whatever reason

There is a problem of getting product to the shelves for whatever reason (even you said it yourself in one of the Vintage threads "I sure hope this wave makes it to Canada soon".)

And there if frustration throughout the Hasbro collecting realm and neither side has a clear idea why due to lack of information.

On top of all this, I have to catch a flight tomorrow for a business trip and can't continue to discuss this for at least 2 weeks, and want to at least find equal ground we both stand on.

 

[WayneStarActionF]

As for communication, questions, whatever way you want to phrase it. Why do they have to answer to you? How many companies have open communication with their customers?

Quite a lot do actually. Most that deal with the general public.

Hasbro UK have a facebook page which suggests they convert interaction http://www.facebook.com/HasbroUK

Hasbro Inc don't seem to have an active one. Wonder why?

Maybe if Hasbro did speak to their consumer base a bit more, things might improve. Do you really think Hasbro are happy with the situation, in that they are getting constent hassle from us Star Wars Nerds? Do you think Lucasfilm are happy that the Star Wars license is getting dragged through the mad year after year by Hasbro? If you think everything is rosey, just browse this forum if you do.

Hasbro can never get it right in everyones eyes. Someone going to always want something they can't produce or will not produce, but they at least need to get the basics right, ie availability of product, and I think the cause of the lack of product is many years of crap assortements, and having products on the shelf that do not sell in a timely fashion or at an acceptable price. If Hasbro has choosen to stop communicating with customer because of the hassle they get, then it shows want an arrogant bunch they are.

Look at Brians Toys Vintage-Style I don't know them, but do you think they like selling figures at these prices (4.99), which is well well below their cost from Hasbro? Do you think he does that because he wants to, or because he get so many repacks that doesn't sell, they only choice he has is to charge more for new stock, and give away the old stock.

Its not the only way to do it, buts it becoming the norm. The Walmarts and Targets of the world will not get involved like that, and just throw it on the pegs, and the repacks and over stocks just sit there, they stop or lower new order, and then when a decent wave with decent repacks comes through (Like wave 4) theres not enough of it, and someone at Hasbro will stand stratching his **** and wondering why!!

This has been going on for years, and I believe case assortments, are one of the biggest reasons why stock is hard to find, and fewer and fewer products are getting made. IF Hasbro listened to the problem, fixed it, and got case assortments right, the issues of distribtion and falling sales would correct themselves.

If Hasbro want to burying their heads in the sand just because they dont like negative feedback, then shame on them.

If you insisit there is not an issue, then thats your problem.

 

[Krayt]

Ihnken33
Ok. I don't know if there is frustration on both sides about the lack of product on the shelves, but I do see there clearly is frustrating from the collectors side of thing, that is very obvious to all of us. To me, I believe we are frustrated because we go through a year like say 2008 where we can go to a store and usually get whatever figures we want pretty much. Fast forward to today and as collectors we can't find all that we are looking for so yes we have gotten frustrated (aside from mass produced TPM wave). The question is though what brought about this change, is it here to stay or is it a temporary thing. Hopefully this problem will go away but who knows what will happen.

Just a side note about me asking for the wave to come to Canada. Aside first waves of lines or things of that nature, like TPM wave to kick off the 3D release of the movie, Canada is usually behind in waves coming to Canada than the US. Not to mention that sometimes waves don't come to Canada at all. I was really shocked when we had the Malgus wave already since sometimes it could take up to a couple months after the US gets a wave for us to get a wave then.

So you just want to leave it as that then... And say anymore we agree to disagree?

 

[ihnken33]

Agree to disagree it is!

Good discussion. On both sides I think.

 

[Masterfett]

As for your constructive criticism, telling a company they are doing something wrong isn't constructive criticism, it's telling the company how do their job. Their job, it's not yours.

Gonna have to disagree with you there, w/o constructive criticism we wouldn't have the superb figures we do today.
Plus it's used to maintain accuracy in the line, otherwise every figure would be riddled with wrong accessories etc.

It is in no way telling them how to do their job, but how to improve their product if they want us to continue buying it.

 

[Krayt]

Gonna have to disagree with you there, w/o constructive criticism we wouldn't have the superb figures we do today. Plus it's used to maintain accuracy in the line, otherwise every figure would be riddled with wrong accessories etc.
It is in no way telling them how to do their job, but how to improve their product if they want us to continue buying it.

I would agree with that. We are the ones that collect the figure and we know what to see on the figures and what accessories should come with them. I have no problem with the Q&A questions where people asked if there could be something done to improve figures or give them and accessory that is needed. However, to constantly keep telling them that the business side of things needs to change isn't for us to decide.

 

[Krayt]

So what should we do with this thread now???
Should we ask each other questions about things we would do to change things up if we worked at Hasbro?

 

[Masterfett]

Probably should focus our efforts in the dear Hasbro thread, by keeping it about things we'd like to see.

Also when a new figure/item is rumored or unofficially shown, we could discuss how it works and what could be improved.
Kind of how we're discussing the in and outs of Bespin Gown Leia in that thread.

 

[John_Solo]

God I love the internet.

 

[Blitzkriegtrench]

Meanwhile back in suggestion towne :grin:
My Dearest Hasbro,
Based on the reported success of the current Walt Disney World Build-A-Droid promotion and the Wal-Mart "Discover the Force in 3-D" G8-R3 and Royal Starship Droids what about some more Build-A-Droid multipacks consisting of Astrodroids in need of updates for various reasons such as:
1)R3-T2 [with proper red colouring and dome design-not the incorrect brownish colour and wrong dome deco]

2)R3-T7 [with proper yellow colouring and design-not the incorrect greenish colour and wrong paint deco]

3)R3-Y2 [with proper yellow color and design-not the incorrect green-ish colour and incorrect paint deco]

4)R5-K6 [with proper torso and leg colouration, as the version you released was actually an Imperial droid aboard the Death Star]

5)Whistler [with his green torso paint design (from the novels and other E.U. sources]-and speaking of Whistler-What is his alpha-numerical designation? Is it really R2-D2 as some sources indicate?

6)R4-P17 as ponited out by The Star Wars Astromech page (and the right Rev. Strone) When will we get an accurately painted version of R4-P17 as every
promotional and production version has it WRONG-He should at the least have an upper RED (not Maroon) body and the most a red body [ALA R2-R9] as seen in the ROTS screen caps.

These can be knocked out in two 4 packs like the Royal Starship Droids and maybe rounded out with 2 never released droids such as R2-A5

& R5-X2

All pix from this awesome site
Thanks for reading,
Mr. Spencer Dean Welch II?:>}

 

[Masterfett]

Agreed, all those Droids mentioned need to be made/updated/corrected!

 

[Trooper31]

Agreed, all those Droids mentioned need to be made/updated/corrected!

Sounds good to me.

 

[kenkraly2004]

Dear Hasbro , I buy most of my figures from TVC or Clone Wars at online stores like bigbadtoystore , amazon or brain's toys. Because finding figures at retail store is really hard to find them. Hasbro please fix the the distribution problem with the hasbro star wars vintage collection. It's been going on since the vintage collection started in 2010 and as far back as 2008 when the legacy collection was around it's a on going issue and needs to be addressed. No more pegwarmers at retail stores again.

 

[Buzzetta]

Is Hasbro even doing the Q&A Sessions anymore?

... and not just for Star Wars... for any of the lines? I do not see anything on Hisstank or any other sites...

 

[urbnns69]

Dear Hasbro,

Thanks for wrecking the Star Wars brand at retail through lack of good product availability, poor product-planning, and terrible distribution.

Sincerely,
My Middle Finger

 

[Trooper31]

I think that sums up rather concisely what everybody has been trying to say in these forums for a long time.

 

[Doop]

Hasbro actually communicated with the fans for awhile? Where did these Q&A sessions go?

 

[SaberSonic83]

If you guys still even take questions, I would love to know if LED technology or electronic lights in general will be further used on deserving figures, especially droids. Will we ever see droids with light up eyes, a color-correct R2 with red and blue changing light, or more importantly, a 2-1B with light-up abdomen?

 

[DarkArtist]

I believe Hasbro dropped the Q&A series due to negative comments from fans and people constantly asking when certain characters were going to be made (one of the many questions Hasbro would ask the fan sites not to ask). I think it will be a long time before Hasbro brings that concept back.

For now we should be grateful that Hasbro is still producing toys from Star Wars and not complain about articulation price distribution or paint apps but rather thank Hasbro for doing what they do!

Thank You Hasbro for continuing to make Star Wars products for this old generation to the new generations waiting to be born!

 

[bigbarada]

Dear Hasbro,

Thanks for wrecking the Star Wars brand at retail through lack of good product availability, poor product-planning, and terrible distribution.

Sincerely,
My Middle Finger

I think that sums up rather concisely what everybody has been trying to say in these forums for a long time.

I think it also sums up rather concisely why Hasbro decided to end the Q&A sessions.

 

[Masterfett]

Yep, the truth really does hurt!

 

[Hoth_My_Fav]

I would imagine HAS is busy focusing on other markets that are their bread and butter, ala asian markets. Its clear also thatmaking toys that are geared more towards the collectors is not their bread and butter and not their no. 1 focus.

That said, not having a grass roots connection especially in this day and age of TWTR, GOOG and the internet is not smart on their part but hey thats why HAS has a marketing department and I am sure they have weighed the pros and cons and they feel its not worth the time and effort to do those Q and A's anymore

 

[jaxx]

So... has Hasbro ever actually looked at this thread??? I mean, I can see that it hasn't been active for nearly a year, but has it actually ever had interaction from a single Hasbro rep?

 

[Imperial_PR]

Hook us up with a new version of TPM battle droid OOM-9 !

 

[RediNight]

How much worse can it get after seeing green army men type figures, 5 poa figures, overpriced new size figures, no vehicles, no playsets/environments, and no sales? Seriously, it's not just Hasbro but all toy companies, with the exception of playmates, that are sucking big time right now. I have no problem saving my money for high end collectibles.

 

[Creepy]

Well, I have said for year if we stop buying what they give us perhaps they might figure it out, but we keep going back and picking up anything we find no matter how bad it is. Also, it is not all the toy companies as much as what is in the boy isles. Barbie, Monster High, Little Pony, and just about every toy line for girls has amazing articulation as well as some pretty good playsets and vehicles, now if I only was into that stuff I could be happy. I think back to the original toys when we were given the Death Star playset, and Land of the Jawas and the like, then jump forward to 1995 and the prequels and the playsets were awful. the Theed hanger or the Death Star swing to freedom, doesn't matter, both were terrible. I think back to the original GI Joe adventure team and its awesome articulation and wonder why in the 90's with the Hasbro 12" line did we not get this amazing articulation that Hasbro already owned? Or Mattels Big Jim line with the jumbo fold out jet carrying case, where are they? Well, that is probably why Hasbro stopped the QnA so they could concentrate more on what the numbers show as to what the fans actually want, in which case you get peg warmers as well as less buyers. I hate to think of all the money they could reap if they just gave into the general census of what people say in here. It is sad to think that we all hate the cost of toys these days and yet we still pay it. One of Fords first cars was produced with a product called hemp plastic which was 10X stronger than steel and still light weight and kept the price down....where is this tech today?