Frequently (like every other day or so , there is a thread along the title of What New Kits would You like To See?

Unfortunately, as someone who regularly participates with my own (eccentric) choices, nothing ever seems to change....

The 'big' movers and shakers continue to release their Tiger kits, an infinite variation of Panthers and more sets and variants of German Infantry than anyone could possibly imagine.

Now, personally, I find the 'Why are there not more Allied vehicles released?' debate a little tiresome. It has been answered repeatedly here and on other sites repeatedly and intelligently. In a nutshell, it's because they sell.

What I am asking, and (I hope this doesn't end up as another tiresome allied vs. axis thread), is just WHERE and WHEN do the big Manufacturers get their market research from?

Here on ARMORAMA there are almost 6000 Registered Users if one looks at market research (political opinion polls) for example, the sampling is sometimes as few as 1000 people. Why are Mr Tamiya or Mrs Dragon not beating a path to our door and saying
"O.K. guys, what do you want to see in the first quarter releases for 2005?"....

Any ideas, because frankly i'm mystified....Jim

Really bewildering Jim i know, i cant figure it out either? like you say its a nother infinite strwamof ww2 german (now i love my 3rd reich armour soits all good for me ) but no and again i too want to build that nice newy tooled and moulded M-3 halftrack etc that deosnt exist !

jim, i'm gonna have to AGREE w/ you, the big companies are always releasing german armor and stuff, i like the german armor, but there is more to modeling then as you said "the infinite variations of panthers" and all the tiger models they put out. the most common allied kit i see are the shermans and t-34s, they are nice tanks, but where are all of the other ones? i think that it would be much easier for the companies to simply ask consumers through polls, or get one of their reps. in a site like this to see whats up.....maybe one day, the modeling companies will ask US what WE want to see them produce next.

The way I see it, the big manufactures dont listen to modelers. They feel they have an upper hand on things.They ship out all these Panthers , Tigers, Shermans and guess what? We buy them! And so the Manufactures see that these kits are selling and make more of them to ship out again. Its not us modelers that are to blame, we love building models. And we will build what ever is available. Like me, I build a lot of German warships in 1/350 and 1/400 scale. Are they my favorite ships to build? No. US Battleships are my favorite, but there are very few of these kits produced. And I have built all there is, so I turn to German warships becouse there are more of them to build in those scales!
Now I'm sure if the Manufactures did consult us modelers things would be a lot different and we would have the kits that we want to build. But I dont know the answer! There has got to be a way to have the Manufactures to listen to us Modelers.

Cheers,

Garry

Now that is the question....Jim

Some time ago, on the Revell-Germany homepage, they had a kind of a questionaire about your dream model. I did make some coices. But I wonder how many modellers did that. When I read the forums here on Armorama, I get the sense that a lot of modellers do not keep up with the news. Just today, somebody was suprised to see the new Tamiya 1/48 scale tanks which people have been talking about for sometime now. I'm just trying to say that a lot of modellers, I feel, do not check out the various manufacturers sites on a regular basis. Nor do they check Armorama on a regular basis. Maybe I'm just a bit crazy, but I feel a desire to check around for news almost on a daily basis.
Another interesting observation I've made is that there are so many guys here that love mainly one type of vehicle and want to build all its variants. I've heard so many guys wishing every variant of the 251 family, or every variant of the Sherman.. and so on. For me, I just love modelling. I like the Tigers, the Shermans. I also like car models, and motocycle models, and figure painting. I just love all different aspects of this hobby. For some people, if a tank is not weathered "to hell' then it doesn't count as modelling.
So, even though it saddens me to keep seeing a perpetuation of variants of the same FEW vehicles.. I don't think that the modelling companies are wrong in the way they conduct, or don't conduct, their research.

Sorry for being long winded. Just my personal opinion.

I too would like to see allied kits. As to why there are so many types of german armor out. Well prob because the Germans were so Caught up in the Tech end of making new war machines that they number of different vehicles and the number of subtypes of vehicles is just so overwhelming... and why make new molds from scratch that cost money when you can just make a new spruce or two and pack em with some older mold ones already paid for, put em in a new box and call it.. "a new kit with newly tooled mold to build your very own variant of such and such vehicle.... and jack up the price a few bucks in the bargin....

just my 2 cents worth...

someone earlier had mentioned that Armorama itself could open a few forums and finally do a poll to see what vehicle most of us want, and submit it to a company, or vote for several to submit to several companies. Maybe then they would understand that sites like this voice the desires of a good percentage of their consumers.

A year or so ago, Trumpter sent a "what would you like to see" form to my local hobby store. Our response was overwhelmingly in favor of new allied stuff, particularly halftracks with a smathering of Lee's and some odd stuff as well. The results have been zero, not even in the far future. They don't ask us much or listen to us because, right now, we continue to sweep up whatever they make. During the mid-80's we went thru something similar, except nothing new was coming out, not even re-releases of the old stuff. So we quit buying. The sad result was the loss of many local hobby shops. But after a while, cottage industries broke out and the big boys started to take notice, so we had a flurry of new stuff, which we bought heavily and still do. If you don't want another German whatever, then don't buy it. Most of us have enough kits stored away to last almost forever anyway. Wait for what you want, and maybe it'll come when the profit line starts to dip. Just don't lose the spirit.

Well, some of them do. But that doesn't always mean much. Academy was conducting a survey at the Virginia Beach IPMS Nationals a few years ago. It was a right in of what you wanted to see. By far, the biggest requests, by a huge margin, was a M3 Grant/Lee. Now, that was a few years ago and we've yet to see it, but I have no idea how long it takes to get one on the market. I also feel that Trumpeter has been a bright spot on the market. They do what other manufacturers aren't willing to do.

I think you also have to take a look at what the others are putting out as well. You say that they aren't releasing anything really different. Have you looked at some of Tamiya's newest releases? I'm thinking probably not because it sounds like you are really hoping for some particular American subjects. However, Tamiya's been releasing several Japanese armor subjects, including the latest, the Japanese light armored vehicle (their HMVV), which I just picked up (why a diecast floorpan I have no idea).

You also have to remember that the US is not the only market. While we Americans may want to see some other subjects, perhaps the other markets would prefer to see more German subjects.

Me personally, I'd like to see that Lee/Grant and some more softskins. In the meantime, I'll keep looking at what the latest Trumpeter releases are.

If they operate anything like my company that manufactures product, they probably use a sliding scale. They rank their consumer responses from top to bottom. Then they rank their production capabilites from top to bottom. They will rank their profit margins from top to bottom. They will rnak all the various components. They they will pick the one that averages out best across the board.

If I were to guess I would say the number one fator is production capability. How much return on investment to completely retool a new Allied model? THere certainly is a market

Thanks for opening this, Jim. I, for one, feel that we have enough Tigers, Panthers, Abrams, and Challengers. I would kill to have Tamiya or Dragon make an adequate Pz. Kpfw. 38 (t) or 35 (r). Or how about some more Japanese WWII armor? Or, Lord forbid, someone went out and actually made passable WWI armor. As for ships, I would like to see more US and British ships. I don't mean more Missouris or more Hoods. Give me an Indiana. As for aircraft, let's see some more "no-name" aircraft like the PV-1 and PV-2. Maybe some stuff we had planned in the 50's that we never got around to because of one thing or another.

But....this will never happen because of one little thing that's called supply and demand. Due to all of the new video games that come out, kids in my generation think that WWII was fought with the Sherman, the T-34, the Panther, the Mk. IV, and the Tiger. Nobody looks at the early war and even pre-war stuff.

It's time Tamiya, Dragon, Trumpeter, and all of the other big-name companies realize that there is another entire market out there for the taking. Whether or not they realize it is up to us. I'll get off my soap box now. Thanks for your time.

putting out a new plastic kit doesnt really take that long
when i worked for games workshop we used to see a new sprue or kit almost every 2-3 months in injection plastic .
and although these kits arnt something that you could deem as accurate etc.. as all of the vehicles dont really exist, they were non the less detailed ,it is however very expensive to do a new plastic mould ,
but i feel that with the shear volume of modellers who are not just members
of Armorama, but those also who just casually visit this site, i think it would be in a manufacturers interests to ask the majority what they want ?
maybe there is a way for the Big A staff guys to ask a few companies to come and join us ? that'd be great do you think they would listen?

While I can't vouch for the other manufacturers, I know that David Harper told me in a message that the perception at VLS is that "Kraut always sells out" which is why you haven't seen much in the way of PTO subjects until recently. I think with R&D costs being what they are the biggies are sticking with the tried and true sellers without taking a chance on something we'd all like to see like a new M3 series halftrack, plus people seem to buy the millionth iteration of that Tiger I or Panther somebody puts out.

Besides the fact that Germans sell, I think a lot has to do with what stores stock. This topic has been batted around a lot, but no one has ever posted the whole entire Big Picture, and I'm really not sure what the Big Picture is.

For instance, store owners say they don't personally order their stock, the distributor representative does. So HE is the one ordering all these German kits. Maybe he likes German? The rep. can put the blame on the distributor, saying the distributor only buys German kits because they sell or make profit. The distributor then blames the model maker because...I don't know...an incentive for selling X number of kits? So if Germans sell, order and stock German kits!

Also, I wonder how many hobby shop owners, reps., and distributors are WWII German biased in the first place. That kind of tips the scale to WW2 German. We know that a few modelers on Armorama have their own private companies, and we know that they prefer WW2. Often times, the modern kits are hard or expensive to obtain, such as Hobby Fan, Nimix, Pit Road, AFV Club, modern Russian and German figures, Dave Parkins/ Firing Line, or Airborne Miniatures. Sometimes the new modern or Allied kits have bad photos.

Perhaps the broken link is stores not controlling their stock, but having an outsider order the stock.

Another aspect is references. There are way more detailed and informative books on WW2 than on almost any other conflict. Concord helps with their books but those are mostly picture books and contain general information, not detailed specifics such as gas pedals or photos of a specific area.

So it's not just the manufacturer's fault, but probably the whole ordering/ buying system that is broken. I've seen posts asking for this and that OOP kit and even today, these kits have not really been reissued. I, for one, have yet to see the new DML Modern Marines kit again, and I flew home of California and visited two large hobby shops there too. None here, none there...go figure.

Yeah theres a heck of a lot of truth in that trisaw
i know my local shop does the ordering himself and always has a good cross section of stock
but thats not true of everywhere i guess?
its not only allied stuff lacking like i said i love ww2 german armour but theres subjects previously not covered i'd like to see to like "dicker max" and some of the hotchkiss self propelled gun types ,to see these from a good mainstream manufacturer with out shelling out a small fortune for resin kits ,will, certainly for me ,be as welcome as allied kits

as I see it, the manufacturers are simply stuck in the same rut, and simply dont want to spend money on new molds, as has been mentioned earlier. However, we probably need only a few companies to make some high-quality, well researched, interesting kits, and once they start burning off of the shelves, other companies will most probably follow suite. I just hope that they would smarten up and not just start repeating some other vehicle. A lot of people ask for ww1 armor, so I imagine that a british mk1 or a german a7v would fly off of the shelves (this is a bit biased since I want these kits to be released ). I just hope that then they wouldn't start releasing 20 different variants of the mk1, as is the basis of their annoying habit which we are discusing right now :

Yeah spectre ww1 armour from a good manufacturer would be fantastic! i'd by at least a couple of each!

I think that the manufacturers put out whatever they want because they feel that we will buy it, and generally they are correct.
Unfortunately, it's that plain and simple!

[quote]While I can't vouch for the other manufacturers, I know that David Harper told me in a message that the perception at VLS is that "Kraut always sells out" .........

Please let me make it very clear that the "Kraut Sells OUT" quote mentioned above was in reference to VP (Verlinden) not VLS! VLS has been extremely receptive to more original subjects like the WWII Japanese, USMC and WWI figures. VLS also had the guts to do the LVT series of conversions, the Amphibious trailer, and currently the LVT1 original Amtrac kits and all of the Project LVT and the LVT Model Tech Manual publications.

On a similar subject though, I have had two good friends that have moved to Japan and married Japanese women and worked in Japan for many years. One of them was a Chinese friend named Alan and the other an Australian named John. Both of these friends are avid armor modelers.
Alan had also traveled extensively throughout Asia and he told me that the Asians seem to really idolize the WWII Germans. They have an understanding of them and their WWII actions that is very unrealistic, he compared it to the way kids in the west think of comic book heroes like Spiderman or the X-Men. Alan said that you would think that the Germans won the war the way that people in Asia talk about them.

My other friend John, tells a very similar story from his 12 years in Japan. His Japanese wife and her family have explained to him that since the Japanese were so badly defeated in WWII, it is not something that they wish to remember or feel that they can publicaly glorify. They of course do not wish to glorify the American exploits so this leaves the Germans, whom they were allied to in WWII. A kind of "Glory by Association". The Japanese have really been nuts about German WWII collectibles in the past 10 to 15 years, so much so that the price of German stuff has gone through the roof!!

I spoke with several Tamiya representitives in recent years and they all stated that 80% of their sales are made in Japan. The Japanese market drives their production decisions. Japan is also a huge market for DML and most of the other plastic kit manufacturers. So of course they follow suit.

I think that with the current developing technology in the field of computer design and low cost high quality metal alloy tooling, you are going to see more small companies poping up that will offer the unique subjects. We have already seen such companies as Skybow, AFV Club, FineMolds, TriStar, Tasca and recently Bronco really step up and fill some of the voids with some very nice kits in recent years.

There is a strong industry rumor that Tamiya does not plan on any more new 1/35 scale releases ever. They will do a few mods to existing kits already in the 1/35 scale line, but very few. They are diving head long into the 1/48 scale armor market and not looking back.

I wouldnt say that we have it that bad when it comes to new kits. I remember seeing a AMPS poll in 1997 that listed kits people would like to see done and I would say about 5-7 of the top 10 where done by 2002...

I think alot of people are of the thinking...what new tool kits would you like to see with in the next 6-12 months...not a few years down the road.

I agree there are fairly large gaps in plastic that need addressing like the M3 family and the Centurian, but theres been strong rumors of them getting done in the near future.

I remember when the M26 was on everyone wish list back about 15 years ago...now we have 3 different verison of it..2 by DML and one by Tamiya.


The other madding thing when it comes to Modern Armor is why is there so many M1 kits out there? they are nearly as bad with the M1 as they are with the Tiger.

Another comment about modern Armor...HLJ reported that the T-55 was the best selling kit they ever sold...so why hasn't Tamiya followed up with a new verison, which would be pretty easy to do since there are 100's of different T-55 models out there...they could even do a plain jain T-54 with a couple of parts and sell alot of them!

I (unfortunately) am deeply into retail sales at the current time (not plastic, another product) and news flash: most of the people involved are idiots.

I met the VP of US Sales of a major product line once (like 2-3 billion dollars) and he could barely hold a conversation about his own products let alone think of something new.

I doubt if it is any different in modeling (most likely the US rep for Tamiya is a x-plastics / chemical co. manufacture’s rep) not a model builder. That’s how it goes in most industries.

Sad but true.

Tom