QUOTE (Gothneo @ Jul 6 2010, 05:15 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>
I think fans of the Indiana Jones license would disagree. Hasbro, has as much to risk as DST. There is a magnitude of scale here... Hasbro is bigger, and employes more people, therefore it must produce and sell more product. A huge miss for Hasbro, such as the Indiana Jones license has big ramifications.
I think with Indiana Jones you have a franchise that unlike Star Trek has been pretty much dead up until the most recent movie, that movie was less than popular in the long run - Star Trek on the other hand has been in the public eye for most of it's 44 year life and in recent times over 20 years non stop - through TNG to Enterprise and even when Enterprise was canned, Virgin 1 in the UK has shown Star Trek, including Enterprise non stop, you've then had CBS remaster TOS, US TV stations show Trek non stop too, and Paramount spending $150 million on a summer blockbuster with arguably one of the hottest talents in Hollywood at the moment - someone must be watching for them to play it so regularly, and it's not just the US and UK, I know for a fact that Trek is huge in Germany so to suggest that the franchise is in trouble still, and hasn't attracted any new fans into the fold isn't correct - I simply can not say that "Star Trek" 2009 wasn't a huge success, the new movie may not have added any new hard core fans like us
but as TheHSBR said, because of the movie it is now more acceptable to like Star Trek! and no doubt would have brought in casual fans - some may even like collecting toys! QUOTE
But that aside, again, I think your falling into the trap that there really is a huge market for the product and that DST just isn't hitting the variables with respect to that market.
I remember having this conversation about the Star Trek franchise itself when Enterprise had just been canceled, I thought that Star Trek was well and truly dead, that Rick Berman (DST) had become lazy and tied in the way he produced Star Trek and that the best had come and gone but along comes JJ Abrams (Hasbro?), makes it cool again and acceptable to people (kids) who once laughed it off as cheesy nerd food that had had it - last years movie just showed us all that there is still an appetite for Star Trek and like Star Wars it's one of the very few franchises that have stood the test of time and remained popular.
I think there is a huge appetite from collectors, general nerds and fans of Star Trek for some great toys and collectables - Hasbro seem to be able to target both kids and collectors alike with relevant and modern products that excite people, casual or hardcore - i wouldn't say i was a hardcore Wars fan but wow I've got the BMF and I'm getting the new Vintage line as well as the AT AT and Snowspeeder!, Star Trek has so much potential to appeal to the masses, if it is just given to the right people - the new movie showed us the potential it has as an appealing, relevant franchise to a modern mainstream audience - there's no doubt that if the line was given to Hasbro that they wouldn't make it relevant and appealing to a modern mainstream market.
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One more thing people need to be aware of. Things are changing quickly with regards to labor in China. I was in China for several weeks last month, and everyday there were new stories about labor strikes and wage hikes going about on mainland China. Remember one of the main variables to sell anything, is that you have to know the price point your customer will pay. With rising wages in China, the cost to manufacture product will rise. We've been seeing it allot, and it's not the end. Expect prices to rise further. Every figure from Matty for MOTCU cost close to $30 by the time your done with shipping and handling and a large part of that is the labor to manufacture them. I'm sure quite a few people here would pay that kind of money, but is it enough? Matty hasn't released production run numbers, but the assumption is the numbers are in 10k+ range, which seems like allot, but for mattel or hasbro a run is typically 100k+. So the question seems to be... are there 10k+ fans that will gobble up every start trek release if a company went the Matty route? DST, it seems, can't find 1701 in most cases! Playmates doesn't seem to think so either.
Quality is everything - Hasbro have trimmed down their Star Wars line considerably this year but the quality of each product remains strong and sales will reflect that. I'm shooting at stars now but I would say that the reason DST and Playmates product don't sell well is because if you compare DST's and PM's Trek items to those of Hasbro's Star Wars, Transformers and hell even GI-Joe items, well there just isn't any comparison - Hasbro win out on both companies hands down in terms of build quality.
Lets just imagine for a moment that Hasbro have had a Star Trek license for a year now - They show us a Big Massive Enterprise - over 2 foot long, loaded with firing projectiles, incased within an amazingly detailed - film accurate sculpt including lights and sounds taken from the movie, a vintage line of figures based on the classic TV series and a new movie line of figures based on the 2009 movie, an electronic play set of the bridge, a shuttle craft, a 2 foot Kelvin with battle damage, an action figure set of the ice planet scene including two monsters an escape pod from the Enterprise, Kirk and Spock prime and a whole load of role play from both classic TOS and new movie all priced and made as Hasbro have priced and produced their figures and ships for Star Wars - they would sell why? because we know that each of those toys would be built with some care and attention to detail - like everything they do. It's not so much that people don't want to buy Star Trek product - they just don't want to buy shit Star Trek product - Hasbro don't produce crap, unfortunately DST and Playmates have produced crap and when something comes out from DST that is any good it's dogged with quality control issues so why should people waste their money on something that isn't worth the money in the first place?
I simply don't think this has anything to do with the popularity of Star Trek - it's out there, the movie showed us all that there is still a huge hunger for Star Trek - but it has to be good Star Trek - and just like the movies - the toys have to be good too and I'm afraid DST aren't producing quality merchandise, and the same for Playmates too.
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Remember, before AA picked up the license several years back... no one wanted it. Not to make toys anyway. And that was back when Enterprise was still on the air. I have to ask whats changed so dramatically in the positive direction that these other companies might want the license? Sure they all want a pieces of a new movie, and since the CBS / Paramount split, the license is a bit fractured so now the TV shows & movie licenses are different deals so companies went after the license for the new movie, and they probably will again for the 2012 movie, but it doesn't mean there is a market for the CBS portion of the license.
I'm not sure I understand what you trying to get at here?
Before "Star Trek" (2009) Star Trek was considered by many in the wider world as fan-boy nonsense, a franchise that hadn't been relevant since The Next Generation TV series. Now obviously we here think it's all been fantastic for the most part and that people who think it's shit just don't understand it. But in a world ruled by the almighty dollar, Star Trek had to make money, it wasn't so it was canned. After "Star Trek" (2009) Star Trek has been considered by many in the wider world as something that appeals to them, something that has relevance as well as being entertaining and fun to watch - unlike many revivals, it seems Star Trek has legs, people who wouldn't have given Star Trek any of their time seem to be genuinely excited at the prospect of a sequel in 2012 - My point is that things have changed, the critics loved the movie, the word of mouth helped the BO takings and all in all people LIKE Star Trek now because of the new movie, because the movie is relevant for a modern movie going audience an audience that would be as happy now as they were coming out of the cinema last year, to sit back and watch the new movie again on DVD and on the TV because it's entertaining - you don't need a diploma in Star Trek studies to enjoy it and thats the key... As for the license - CBS owns it all, they own the marketing side as well as the brand name and TV rights whilst Paramount own the production side to the movies. So it is with CBS the decision lies as to who gets a license - as I understand it, a license is split up anyway - DST for example have a license to produce action figures, ships and role play but not play-sets - Playmates had the master toy license so as i understand it could have produced anything from Star Trek including it's past.
Obviously at the moment and for the foreseeable future we are only going to get toys from the new movie and toys from the classic TV series. TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT just haven't come away with the same iconic status as the likes of Kirk and Spock. They are spin-offs to the original Roddenberry concept and whilst we all might want a Voyager toy or a DS9 crew, regardless of the company, you'll never get that. What any company would do is the items they know would stand the best chance of selling - this means Kirk and Spock and the new movie and classic TV show - DST have done it all, and now seem to be lost as to where to go with it now and for that reason alone another company should take it over, that company should in my mind be Hasbro because Hasbro offer the license a company fit for the size of the franchise and it's fan-base. Like Star Wars before it, if Hasbro get a license we can expect figures from the new movies and TOS - If it is successful then down the line we could see TNG figures and so on... The main differences though would be that finally Star Trek get a company dedicated to producing toys that are built for play as well as display - an ideal company to take the future of the license forward, to appeal to kids as well as collectors and with their cross-over lines too, especially their Transformers, Unleashed and Ttitanium lines, it's perhaps those that will ensure it's longevity at Hasbro during the years that there isn't a Star Trek movie or TV series.
Finally, this was an article at www.trekmovie.com: http://trekmovie.com...tractions-more/
