Fan-backed Hasbro project: Unicron

[hYpNoS]

Depends on how bbts is doing it, wasn't there a rumor during botcon they sent multiple people to get those botcon exclusives?

Why not have multiple agents buy up?

[Trent]

The limit is 5 per transaction. So just keep ordering in lots of 5. Spend half an hour doing that and you’d have 100. Someone on TFW was saying today that was exactly how it worked for the Khetanna and that is how some online stores had a few to sell.

[Borgeman]

I've checked the terms of the MyUS shipping rates based on weight. They specify their rates "excludes oversized shipments and palletized shipments with linear dimensions greater than 80 inches (203 cm).?".

Linear dimensions simply means to add the length, width and depth of the package. So taking Borgeman's assumptions of a 20 inch cube would give 60 inch linear dimensions, well within the 80 inch limit and therefore giving us some leeway on the dimensions.

Then it all comes down to weight. We know that Unicron has a weight of 19 pounds. So if we very conservatively assume a packaged weight of 30 pounds, it gives a shipping cost of US$143 using Fedex Economy. But I'm a member and pay with Amex, which gives me a 30% discount off this rate. Therefore given the current A$ is 0.70, my estimated cost is A$143, way cheaper than BBTS and Shipito that base their charges on volumetric weight.

You can test this for yourself at https://www.myus.com/pricing/

The only risk I can see is if MyUS changes their policy and moves to volumetric weight at some point before this is released in 2021.

Yeah, if you can secure a weight based shipping that instantly becomes tolerable, because the killer is the volumetric size of the box.

If all else fails, I'll speak to some family I have in Toronto, and ship it to them, while simultaneously planning a USA/Canada holiday, and bring it back with me.
The one benefit of a 2021 release is we'd have all that time to concoct a financially viable plan for shipping.

[griffin]

I can understand why they want this out in 2021 (the 35th anniversary of the movie that introduced Unicron) and that's probably why they have such a short pre-order period because they are short on time to have it produced... but I'd rather have it delayed 6 months and maybe come out at the end of 2021 or early 2022, just to guarantee it happening by allowing us to have a six month payment plan and sold through other Hasbro branches.
We've waited 35 years for a mostly accurate Unicron toy, we can wait another 6 months.

[BigTransformerTrev]

The limit is 5 per transaction. So just keep ordering in lots of 5. Spend half an hour doing that and you’d have 100. Someone on TFW was saying today that was exactly how it worked for the Khetanna and that is how some online stores had a few to sell.

Anyone got the capital to do that? We could have them shipped en’masse and flog’em in Aus

[philby]

Depends on how bbts is doing it, wasn't there a rumor during botcon they sent multiple people to get those botcon exclusives?

Why not have multiple agents buy up?

The limit is 5 per transaction. So just keep ordering in lots of 5. Spend half an hour doing that and you’d have 100. Someone on TFW was saying today that was exactly how it worked for the Khetanna and that is how some online stores had a few to sell.

ah ok
so BBTS has people setup as "backers" to order and then they can sell those figures on later?

[danny-boy]

Currently at 1817. This isn?t going to reach 8000. They need to open international orders to get anything remotely close to 8000.

[DaptoDog]

Currently at 1817. This isn?t going to reach 8000. They need to open international orders to get anything remotely close to 8000.

It's added about 600 backers in a week. If continues at that rate for the next 5 weeks we'll be at just under 5,000 with a few days to go. Add in Japan backing through Takara Tomy Mall and a big final push and it should hopefully get there. I'd say it's more than likely going to go ahead as long as it gets close enough to the 8,000 target. Perhaps they'll extend it for another few weeks so it gets over the line?

[MayzaPrime]

Has anyone here ordered one?

[griffin]

It's added about 600 backers in a week. If continues at that rate for the next 5 weeks we'll be at just under 5,000 with a few days to go. Add in Japan backing through Takara Tomy Mall and a big final push and it should hopefully get there. I'd say it's more than likely going to go ahead as long as it gets close enough to the 8,000 target. Perhaps they'll extend it for another few weeks so it gets over the line?

I don't know... most of those 600 are probably thanks to the big promotion of it at SDCC and the various videos of it at the event. There isn't likely to be any big events before the end of next month to convince people who don't already know of this item and have already decided if they can afford it. I think the last week will have a surge from people who know that they can pay for it, but if they give us the Japanese numbers, it will be worth seeing what their first week numbers are, as they need to out-pace the American backers if this has a chance of getting anywhere near 8000.