Recent Vintage Collection Purchases

[Dressel Rebel]

They treat employees like crud.

Oh.  What does Walmart do to it's employees?

[Captain Piet]

No healthcare, non-competitive salaries, limiting of hours, spur-of-the-moment schedule changes, etc. It's pretty much acknowledged as one of the worst employers to work for.

[Jesse James]

So I nabbed a set of Deleted Scene guys, all full price, this weekend.  I left Leia, bot the rest as all I wanted a double of anyway.

Great wave...  Not opened them yet, too tired, but I'll be happy to get to that when I'm not exhausted, and then I can go back to sort of drifting in and out of giving a poop about the line again till more new figures I care about hit shelves and I get that "new figure panic" going on again.

[JACKOFTRADZE]

I picked up some more DTF army builder figures today after reading that the few carry forwars may not get rereleased afterall on several sites. It seems there is some cases revsisions coming so I do think it's a good idea to get them if you see them. I picked up 1 of each of:

Ric Olie (x3 total)
Nabbo Pilot (x6 total)
Gungan (x6 total)
Destroyer Droid (x3 tota,l need one more)

[Pete_Fett]

I picked up some more DTF army builder figures today after reading that the few carry forwars may not get rereleased afterall on several sites.

Wait? What?

Does this mean they are pulling back on the Naboo Pilot, Aurra Sing, Mawhonic and Gungan coming out on Vintage cardbacks?

[Darby]

I think this is speculation at this point.  There's a lot of it going around and to be honest I'm not sure why.  The vintage line in particular appears to be doing well. 

[Jesse James]

I didn't read that anywhere either...  Unless it was in Scum's forum or something, which at this point I'd take anything anyone posts in there with a grain of salt.  The "rumors" coming out of there are largely bunk anymore.

I'm pretty done on DTF stuff anyway to the point I don't think I was even going to buy any of the vintage counterparts anyway.

[McMetal]

After all the chatter about the elusive Astromech BP going around, I snagged the last one I could find in this area today over lunch.

This same Walmart had dropped their clearance price on old Clone Wars figures to $1 a pop, but I didn't think to price check any of their old TVC stuff. Will definitely start doing that though.

[McMetal]

Picked up another complete set of deleted scene figures tonight at Walmart for $4 again, with an assist from Keyan Farlander.

Same scenario as last time, Keyan scanned fine at $4 but the rest did not ring up at all. It was a little easier to just get them to scan Keyan 5 more times though and be done with it. I guess they want as little hassle as possible at night.

Interesting thing was though - ALL of the Deleted Scene figures were actually on the shelves IN the clearance section, right next to the $1.50 Green Lantern figs. Looks like they just dumped the whole case in there. And this was not even all that close to the toy aisles.

Crazy-ass Walmart!

[Darth_Anton]

Seems we're in another slump in one of the largest cities in country. Never saw any of the WM exclusive BP's and have still not seen hide nor hair of the deleted scene figures. All product that I actually want.

[Jesse James]

I don't know if it's a slump or you getting beaten to the punch Anton...  I ran into similar situations, and those WM battlepacks were just practically non-existant from the get-go.  I was just thinking about the droid pack the other day, and how oddly impossible to spot it was for me.  Wouldn't mind another now if I saw it, just for some BAD diversity.

[Greedo The Green Menace]

Wow, I hit paydirt tonight. After months of not finding anything I stumbled across a Bastila, Echo Base Trooper and Keyan Farlander and an Atlantic Superstore in Canada being blown out for a measly 2.44 a pop. Glad I passed for so long on ebay prices.

[Sybeck1]

http://www.jeditemplearchives.com/content/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=9481

Is Walmart pulling vintage in your area? Read what happened to me here.

[Nicklab]

Frankly, that sounds like a load of crap.  Or something one of the dumb WalMart clerks will say in order to get a collector to stop bothering them.

I can't even count how many times I've asked a WalMart associate for help only to have them say something stupid like "Oh, I think we're not even carrying Star Wars anymore".  It's something they say so that they can get you to go away because they don't want to deal with a customer.

Now is it likely that figures are getting boxed up and put in a stock room?  Sure.  WalMart is probably wise to the whole pricing issue and that they've probably lost a significant ammount of money recently.  They're probably pulling the figures so that the UPC's can be sorted out and they can charge the appropriate ammount for a figure.  Once that's done you're probably going to see figures back out on the pegs at full price and collectors lamenting the days of $4 figures.

And frankly, I don't know who looks more ridiculous because of that article:  the WalMart employee who utters that line of crap, or the person who hears it and believes that WalMart is shipping ALL OF THEIR STAR WARS FIGURES TO BENTONVILLE, ARKANSAS FOR REPRICING (caps for emphasis). 

[Jesse James]

WM isn't shipping anything back here...  Not that I'm aware of anyway.  Matter of fact they just put out more Deleted Scene figures, actually.  Picked up an extra (Mc)Cracken this weekend, but wasn't much else I wanted from the wave left.

I'm with Nick, I honestly don't believe that...  Shipping back is a MAJOR step for a retailer, and costs $, so I wouldn't believe that till I saw it happen en masse around the country.    I too have seen and personally heard WM (and Target, and TRU) employees spout anything they can to A) quiet you, and B) get you out of their hair. 

Sucks, but I'm not the only one to experience that at, well, just about every retailer I've ever dealt with...  It's a big reason I avoid customer service if I am able.  They rarely do what their job title implies.  The military has a fun saying of, "that's above your paygrade", and I think that's applicable.

But if figures were being sent back, repriced, and shipped out again for less money, I'd be totally in favor of that, haha.