The BST has seen more action lately than that opening scene from Saving Private Ryan. Seems like a ton of people are dumping their collections....I know its holiday time but...dam. Not to mention that the Yen is up on the dollar. I am certiainly curious about the ripple effect for the artists and retailers, both in Japan & over here.....
Actually I think things have settled down here quite a bit recently. A lot of collections went through big shifts and purges earlier this year. But sure, there are still some large sales from time to time. In terms of who's buying what, it may be anecdotal, but when I was in Tokyo last week, I was at Secret Base and Real Head when they opened. Both days were release days, but I was the only one in both shops up until the time I left. Well, Mark did call to order some stuff at SB the second I walked in. I also noticed very few people going into other shops. What you can find are a flood of cheap SB, RxH, etc toys all over the place. So I think the shine is off most companies, and the "fad cycle" has passed. Plus, according to some shopowners in Japan, a lot of folks in Japan just aren't spending like they used to. At the same time, we've seen some fantastic releases in the last few months, so I think there's plenty of juice left in the old tank. It's just a matter of the cream rising to the top and the rest being disregarded.
Well that yen to dollar conversion is definitely slowing more than a few people down. I know personally I really weigh purchases in my head more so than ever before. I even have gone to the dreaded bay to look for stuff (which btw still sucks being riddled with junk AND what happened to everyone's Morphy extras- I assumed ebay would be flooded). In short with the dollar dropping to 81 cents to the yen, and factoring in middleman fees, shipping from Japan, it's just not worth it for me to buy like I use to. I use to have a few purchases on YJA every month, now I'm lucky if I get one figure a month. I only look on YJA now, if I purchase from Japan it's via a store. On the other side of the coin though I have noticed prices slowly starting to come down. It usually happens as hot new items make way for newer hotter items, but I've noticed it happening even with older items from a few years back. With more and more people getting out it seems the market is flooding a little bit too. For example items that hardly come up for auction that say 6-9 months ago I bought for 150 you see go for 100 now and actually come up. I guess you can factor in the recession with people having less spending money and flippers have to take what they can get. I also think people who bought for sheer value years ago are worried about too much depreciation and selling quick, which adds to this cycle.
yes, the bst has been more active, but 90% of it is usually junk (including some of the stuff i tried unloading), or the same stuff that is in every sales thread. the sought after gems (at least for me) are still few and far between, only at a more manageable price. still can't find that 1 smoking star i'm missing though, even through all of this collection unloadings. there was a flood of new people like crazy (based on the activity from old to new that i've seen when searching the board) about 2-3 years ago (myself included). a lot of these people, i'm guessing, are branching off from western toy collecting, with secret base and realxhead coverage in magazines like juxtapoz and vinyl toy books like Full Vinyl, etc. with flooding of "collectors", it's usually a given that many of them won't stick around, always out looking for the new best thing. so when that happens, and people start getting out of the hobby (shatty economy is a good point for this type of movement), they will unload, and the secondary market will get flooded. i guess collectors that stick with it will see this movement slow down eventually...
its interesting to see RxH and SB linger in the BST, prices steadily declining for "common" general release toys. gargamel overproduced at least as much as SB, yet their old stuff moves with some fluidity.
