I posted a few things on Twitter about this, but I wanted to talk about it a bit on the site here, too, just because I know not everyone follows me on Twitter. Over the past few days I have been reading lots of anger and lots of hype about G.I. Joe: Retaliation toys and the likelihood of a widespread product recall from Hasbro.
To this I just have to say not so fast, my friends.
Let’s just think about this a bit and consider how realistic this scenario really is.
- Product recalls are an extremely expensive proposition and are generally only done in the case of danger or potential safety hazard
- Product recalls are, by and large, reported to the federal government, and end up on Recalls.gov (specifically the CPSC portion of the site), and there is no indication that this has been done as of yet.
- According to many brick & mortar and online retailers, Hasbro sent them communications allowing them to break Street Date last week, prior to the reported date, most likely as a reaction to the movie delay. Why would they then send communications just a few days later telling retailers that they are recalling their product?
- In the same vein, Hasbro issued a press release specifically stating that G.I. Joe is a consumer brand and that items would be available for sale. Why would they then issue widespread product recalls two days later?
- Keep in mind within this two day window, there were also a couple of days of a three day holiday weekend.
- According to several online retailers, including Kokomo Toys, and Adam from Entertainment Earth, Hasbro has issued them no recall orders whatsoever. A Twitter friend of mine named Kenny reports the same lack of a recall notice for Target, and another guy on Twitter, Caped_Crusader has been hitting Targets all morning and finding product on pegs or in stock rooms in every one.
- Many fans report contacting retailers and being told that product was being recalled or was not available for sale. Do not forget, most of these phone calls occurred prior to the previously established street date. If some stores did not receive that communication about street dates, isn’t it possible they were simply referring to the street date as a reason why product could not be sold?
The one outlier in all of this is the reports from Rescuer about Dollar General potentially recalling figures. First of all, I’m sorry, but I simply cannot be convinced based off on one forum message from one person that this is an actual occurrence. Normally I try to maintain benefit of the doubt, but until I hear this from more sources or see more evidence of this, I’m going to chalk this up to miscommunication, especially considering the fact that these are not even movie product.
Granted, I’m not saying this is impossible, I’m just saying the problem is likely being overblown. Perhaps Hasbro is offering an olive branch to certain retaliers? I don’t know, but I’m sorry I’m not taking this all that seriously based on a few scattered forum posts and a random Variety article. Time will tell, but before freaking out, I think we need to at least wait for the street date to come and go and see where things go over the next couple of weeks.
The retailers in my area have put product out so I am not convinced of the recall either. It would not make sense to recall the Dollar store figures either. That ends up being more money coming out of the Hasbro end of things that is not related to the movie. Unless of course there is some clause that they have with Paramount that some how gives them some sort of liability coverage from the loss of revenue. The Dollar figures have been brisk sellers.
i know a guy who sold a DG snake eyes briskly on ebay….after it was up for only a few hours.
he sold it to me.
over the years, like many of you, ive become acquainted with much of the local TRU staff…
she told me that no such communications have been made and that the DC in texas is still showing the 1300 cases of figures as ”active” (not sure if thats the word she used, but her implication was that they were at such a status that there is no indication that they wont be shipping out as necessary)
a wm also assured me that the toys were there and would be hitting shelves. of course, theyre not following hasbro’s schedules, theyre following their own…..sometime this week. typical.
oh my…
re-reading my post…….i realized that i didnt mention that i spoke to the manager. if you read my post carefully, the wording implies that i am….uh…”personally” acquainted with a TRU associate.
hahahaha…..not the case my friends…………oh my.
Hey, whatever you gotta do for the inside information is between you and your god. We won’t judge you.
And please don’t ask me how I get my info from “Big Larry” at Wal-Mart.
you said it monte. sometimes the quagmire that is joe collecting requires a bit of…..extra effort. haha.
Well you have to admit that it’s a brilliant lie that will panic the fans and get them to buy the product as quickly a possible. Buy it now or wait nine months! Or worse, pay E-Bay prices for it.
I’ve been tracking most Retaliation auctions on E-Bay over the weekend and the trooper supplies started dwindling as soon as this news spread on the Internet.
It’s an odd situation at best, but look on the bright side, when have we ever had the chance to look through a wave and then get nine months to save up for what we want?
Justin, do you think there will be someone from Hasbro on Convention that could give us a “official statement” about this recall?
YOU WILL KEEP YOUR DIRTY MOUTH SHUT WE HAVE TO MAKE MONEY OFF THIS TURD SANDWICH SOMEHOW JUSTIN
I found stuff at Target this morning, but I can easily see this all being one and done unless additional wave 1 and wave 2 are being warehoused by all the major retailers. I did feed into the hype by buying one of everything off the bat rather than waiting and doing it gradually, which is what I planned to do, mainly because I didn’t want to wait 9 months to get a couple pieces I might miss. I grabbed one of everything, and now i can sit back and watch the scalping.
Since I’m in an area that rarely gets joes, I was pleasantly surprised when I saw the movie product was out, and had been gone through at Walmart and TRU. Now this was before the “announcement” but I’m not too worried. I’m really hoping if there is a hiatus in the movie product, that Hasbro will take this opportunity, and give us more 30th and PoC. Hasbro could give us more Renegades Storm Shadows, Low Lights plus other hard to find figs, and maybe even squeeze in Kwinn and City Strike Scarlet!
I stopped at a nearby Toys R Us the other day, and they said that they’re getting boxes full of Retaliation figures shipped there weekly! I really don’t think Hasbro is recalling all of these figures.
I’m not sure how true things are in Canada. It’s May 28 and only TRU has some where I live. I saw a pallet with a handful of Movie figs on it at Walmart on Saturday, but nothing got stocked as of right now on Monday, the official release date. Not sure what to think. Definitely the risk of scarcity (especially wave 2 stuff) led me to preorder/buy everything online. Although I’m still hoping the single pack figures show up here so I haven’t ordered them.
My local Canadian TRU got an email saying the street-date is waived–they pegged the toys on Saturday. They will place what they can fit on the plano , and replenish from the stockroom, until its all gone. Won’t be any re-orders until next year. Was told that the manager said that anything peg-warming two months out is going to be clearanced (his personal policy).
Surprisingly to me, what is moving first are the role-playing toys ( masks and swords).
Callers have asked about availability and quantities and were told the store has plenty of stock.
My source is my step-son who works at the store.
Well, I just came from Wal-mart in Canada, saw the items and was able to buy the from the pallet (not on shelf yet). Here, they had single-packs, alpha and bravo figures/vehicles, role-play items and the larger 10″ items. So I think the recall is fiction. Maybe just voluntary at best.
I took the Variety article to mean that Hasbro offered to retailers that they COULD ship them back if they wanted to. This would make perfect sense, as it would allow retailers that are shy about no movie backing and feeling stuck with their orders an out. I doubt there is an actual recall.
I don’t see reatailers pulling product from the shelves especially whenTarget and Walmart in my area are doing a reset.Target only had one peg for the single packs though.
Went to Target today to get the Ninja 4X4, 3 Target employees were resetting the toy aisle and I saw no GI Joe movie product at all. I asked one of the associates and he grabbed up a strip of shelf tags, scanned the Bravo vehicles UPC and went off into the back room. A short time later he came out with a case and I went to the cash registers with my Awe-Striker. It rang up with no problems whatsoever and I was out the door with my new toy.
If there was to be a recall or something, I would expect to have had to go through more hoops and try to convince someone to sell me an item than what I dealt with today.
As for the Dollar General figures, since they’re called “Basic GI Joe” on the case boxes and only have a slight resemblance to the movie in the packaging decorations along with the fact that they haven’t seemed to have any form of a street date, I’d say the idea of them being recalled due to the movie is just mis-information (whether intended or not)
No stores in my area had any product out. Don’t know what that means if anything.
Hasbro Toy shop has/had retaliation toys up for sale.
I was in a Target 1 day after the announcement and there was a blank space where the Joe toys were and a sign that said new things coming soon.
friday, march 25th i stopped in a TRU and saw what seemed to be a preliminary set up of retailiation. stopped there tonight (the 28th) and EVERY retaliation toy was gone. associate claims that someone wiped them out.
went to a target afterwards and not a thing out….had to present them with the DPCI and a worker was nice enough to bring out two cases of figs.
wm is still as ignorant, as ever about, EVERYTHING.
Did Target have any of the 3-packs in there cases, or did they just have single figures and vehicles?
That smells like a scalper was at your TRU. There will be several looking to make money off of this.
One does have to marvel at the fact that a few weeks ago everyone was just bitchin about lack of articulation and none of the figures being movie accurate and now after this news the only thing I see is people scrambling madly to get the toys they think wont be available next week. Tells us a lot about ourselves, doesnt it?
Wow, that’s a really good point. Could Hasbro be far more clever than we’ve given them credit for? Did they know these toys were doomed to be peg-warmers and arranged this little deal with the movie studios to generate this insatiable demand? The joke’s on us!
some this is ebay scalpers making up rumors online, so they can make a quick buck
found a few figures and vehicles this week. bought a few things i wouldnt have due to the recall rumors. now that i have them the toys are not that bad.