A few days ago we started a little social media firestorm when it became evident that once Hasbro terminates their agreement with Fun Publications at the end of 2016, the future of our beloved annual G.I. Joe Conventions could definitely be in jeopardy.
Here we are, a little while later, and this certainly still seems to be the case, with the G.I. Joe Collectors Club even posting a “farewell” via their Facebook page.
Late last night, a petition was posted on Change.org asking G.I. Joe fans to throw some vocal support to the Save G.I. Joe campaign, and I would encourage anyone who has enjoyed the G.I. Joe Convention to do the same. Hasbro needs to know there’s an audience out there who wants these to continue!
Check out the survey on Change.org and let your voice be heard!
Has anyone else considered that Hasbro may want to be doing more conventions instead of one main one? Perhaps the thinking is that not having a specific convention, they can increase their presence at NYCC, Wondercon, ECCC, C2E2? I would mention SDCC but Hasbro has a big presence there.
What is it people want Hasbro to do exactly? They aren’t in the convention business. I’m sure they’d be open to sanctioning another official GI Joe convention if a capable business approached them but leaving it with Fun Pub would be more of a detriment to the brand with their growing incompetence over the years.
Everyone should just go to Joelanta. Seems like Larry Hama’s there pretty much every year already. No overpriced official con exclusives but people just want the GI Joe fellowship, right?
You know, these conventions began as fan run affairs. Just because Hasbro may not be planning to have an official fan club any longer — I remain unconvinced that that’s the case BTW, I doubt they would bother taking the license away from Fun Pub if they didn’t have someone new lined up to take over it — doesn’t mean there can’t and won’t be other GI Joe conventions.
I realize that all this is because you fear that without the club and it’s overpriced convention and fss exclusives, there will be no GI Joe product at all for you to buy. But as someone to whom most of those toys are WAY out of my price range anyone, there might as well be no product at all.
Well said.
Wait, so they are still planning on doing one more round of sub figures? That is surprising.
They keep saying they are, but the time frame is very tight. They still have 3 more months of the current series to go through, and then convention season. If they start taking subscriptions in September, as usual, that only gives them 3 month to produce them, have them shipped to the US from China, then send them out before the December 31st deadline.
Unless they start taking orders right away — during convention season — I don’t see how they can pull it off.
I wonder if Hasbro would ever consider taking over and doing its own sub service line like Mattel with Masters of the Universe.
Probably a pretty slim chance of that.