[paokole]

This is first time I see a report on the economic forecast of "Action Figure Toys" market which apparently is expected to grow even more in the next 8 years. Estimated at $9 billion in 2021 the market is estimated to reach $15.3 billion by 2031! The main reason given is that it is a highly competitive market with many companies manufacturing toys and wanting to gain a stronger foothold in the market. If this holds true and I believe it does, product retail pricing should have been competitive as well. There's a bit of contradiction IMHO. Oligopoly and collusion to ensure prices continue to go up? Not sure, what's your take?

https://www.openpr.com/news/2893886/...r-15-3-billion

[pergola]

Allied Market Research primarily exists to sell its $4,000 hype reports. It's all market speculation across a wide variety of niche markets, trying to grow them by making rich people more aware of them. Aesthetic Lasers. Aicraft Cabin Interior. Aluminum Wire. All sorts of weird shit allegedly blowing up, all by 2031.

But domestic price fixing is illegal and prices can only be suggested to retailers. But it's harder to allege that prices are unsustainable if retailers are at least meeting expectations.

[THEDARKONE508]

lol, i saw this link posted in the final faction facebook group.
whoever posted this there is barking up the wrooong tree.

[sisco]

Does this mean the scammers and speculators that ruined the retro video game market and are currently trying to sell graded VHS tapes will be moving into the toy market to create another speculator bubble?

[Bujo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pergola

Allied Market Research primarily exists to sell its $4,000 hype reports. It's all market speculation across a wide variety of niche markets, trying to grow them by making rich people more aware of them. Aesthetic Lasers. Aicraft Cabin Interior. Aluminum Wire. All sorts of weird shit allegedly blowing up, all by 2031.

But domestic price fixing is illegal and prices can only be suggested to retailers. But it's harder to allege that prices are unsustainable if retailers are at least meeting expectations.

Collusion and price fixing generally occurs when 3 corporations dominate roughly 90% of a given market. Only one form of collusion is illegal, and that's one or more CEOs directly talking to one another about price fixing. Other forms of collusion are perfectly legal. For example, Toyota often uses press releases to signal to Ford and GM future pricing strategies. Social media posts quickly alert companies to persons or events so that policies can be quickly changed and aligned. When corporations sue one another over something like patent infringement, one goal is for executives to sit down together and map out future strategies under the protection of NDAs and attorney-client privilege. The cellular communications market is a prime example of this with the recent merger of T-Mobile and Sprint.

The same thing occurs with action figures, especially 1/12 scale right now, since it's pretty much dominated by Hasbro, Mattel and McFarlane. The independent toy market hasn't shown the same need for price increases that American production companies insist are necessary. Maybe because their prices were sufficiently high enough already or because there's so much more competition in collector driven toy lines.

[paokole]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pergola

Allied Market Research primarily exists to sell its $4,000 hype reports. It's all market speculation across a wide variety of niche markets, trying to grow them by making rich people more aware of them. Aesthetic Lasers. Aicraft Cabin Interior. Aluminum Wire. All sorts of weird shit allegedly blowing up, all by 2031.

But domestic price fixing is illegal and prices can only be suggested to retailers. But it's harder to allege that prices are unsustainable if retailers are at least meeting expectations.

I understand the argument in favor of market value speculation and that it may be the case here or in any other report of similar nature. Don't forget though we don't need to completely rely on the legitimacy of research being put out there by Allied Market Research or others to realize that the toy companies (Hasbro, Mattel and McFarlane) dominating the toy market are also the ones driving prices up...justifiably so perhaps but that's up for debate and there's been a ton of that in the Star Wars thread. As demand for "certain" toys continues to increase, price increase will follow suit and so on but that's not going to apply to all range of toys which explains the need for clearance prices. And I see a lot of that these past 2-3 years.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bujo

Collusion and price fixing generally occurs when 3 corporations dominate roughly 90% of a given market. Only one form of collusion is illegal, and that's one or more CEOs directly talking to one another about price fixing. Other forms of collusion are perfectly legal. For example, Toyota often uses press releases to signal to Ford and GM future pricing strategies. Social media posts quickly alert companies to persons or events so that policies can be quickly changed and aligned. When corporations sue one another over something like patent infringement, one goal is for executives to sit down together and map out future strategies under the protection of NDAs and attorney-client privilege. The cellular communications market is a prime example of this with the recent merger of T-Mobile and Sprint.

The same thing occurs with action figures, especially 1/12 scale right now, since it's pretty much dominated by Hasbro, Mattel and McFarlane. The independent toy market hasn't shown the same need for price increases that American production companies insist are necessary. Maybe because their prices were sufficiently high enough already or because there's so much more competition in collector driven toy lines.

Interesting point you raised about how reluctant are independent toy companies to raise prices vs. American production. I see ample competition in both markets however prices are not adjusting in the same way granted they're both equally affected by current increases in materials etc.

[THEDARKONE508]

ceo chris cocks bought a bunch of hasbro stock. not the prices are up.

draw a straight line.