Bandai DX VF-31

[treatment]

9 minutes ago, jenius said:

I subscribe to the QA refurb theory too but no idea how it would work. NY would get them cheap and still be making a lot by supplying them so hence no need to jack them up further.  This goes back to us not knowing what exactly happened with the botched release. I like the theory that Bandai rejected a lot for some reason or another so they cut quantities and now those rejects are flowing out in some capacity. Someone is checking them out for whatever the common flaw was and if it doesn't have it, it makes it to NY. 

 

7 minutes ago, Sanity is Optional said:

So, IIRC one theory was that Bandai had a QC issue and their production volume was lower than expected. Might be that Bandai themselves are still shipping those out as they get fixed up to meet spec, or that there's another company taking the QA rejects and fixing them up.

 

Yeah.

Might be refurbs from actual customer-returns.  We know Bandai accept returns if you're in Japan.  N-Y prolly contracted Bandai to buy back these customer-returns refurbs.

Might also explain why the usual brown-box is not included anymore.

[eXis10z]

It's a little hard to believe Bandai will sell "rejects/returns" to NY or anyone else. Aren't they usually strict with such things? Wouldn't doing so start a precedence of retailers buying and selling the rejected toys therefore damaging their rep.

Edited January 16, 2019 by eXis10z

[jenius]

Well all we have our shots in the dark here. My theory goes like this:
1) Factory receives order to make, let's say 1000 VF-31A Kairos toys. They make 4 batches of 250.
2) Bandai employee inspects 5 toys from each 250 allotment (they would use statistics and a confidence interval to determine their sample size, I'm not going to do the real math).. If all pass, then Bandai takes the shipment. If one fails, Bandai rejects the shipment.
3) In this case, Bandai rejected one of the shipments and issued a notice to those ordering multiples they would only receive one. At this point NY has customer cash but has not actually paid anything.
4) Factory sells QC reject to some other organization for some small amount so they don't take a complete bath on that rejected order. They specify not to flood the market with the toys since they're supposed to get destroyed and also what the QC reject was so this anonymous party can review them.
5) The 750 toys that passed are shipped via boat to Japan where they get thrown in a Tamashii brown box and shipped to customers.
6) Somehow NY gets in touch with this group that purchased the reject batch and arranges to buy the remaining 250 that pass an inspection for whatever Bandai originally was going to pay.
7) Third party group sends Bandai a few a week or maybe a monthly boat shipment that NY just takes its time doling out. Alternatively, NY bought the whole lot, has them already in a warehouse, and is just slowly doling them out because they don't want to tip off the factory...

Hold on, my tin foil hat keeps falling off...

Edited January 16, 2019 by jenius

[Chronocidal]

Except, did Bandai ever say anything to anyone?  I don't remember anyone mentioning that they reduced multiple orders down to singles, or announced that they would.  Wouldn't they have had to make some kind of public announcement about why a bunch of people's orders were cancelled?  Or did they deal under the table and ensure that all of the faulty orders were allocated to the shops taking foreign orders, so they wouldn't have to make any excuse to their "actual" customers?

Edited January 16, 2019 by Chronocidal

[ArchieNov]

So I just heard that Chuck's VF-31E will be a Tamashii Exclusive release. Anyone else heard this?

[seti88]

No i didnt. Where did you hear that from?

[borgified]

47 minutes ago, ArchieNov said:

So I just heard that Chuck's VF-31E will be a Tamashii Exclusive release. Anyone else heard this?

 

Just now, seti88 said:

No i didnt. Where did you hear that from?

I can say that we all want physical and solid hard facts. Not he/she tell me as per one of the TFW2005 threads..

 

[HardlyNever]

I would love a mini-documentary about the whole VF-31A thing.  I bet it would reveal a lot of information about the manufacture and distribution of these things; perhaps information Bandai and the manufacturers don't necessarily want public.  Unfortunately, I think this is such a small incident (in the grand scheme of things), that no one with serious credentials would actually investigate it.

Two things stand out in my mind, that I still can't figure out, and make me think there is/was something sort of shady going on:

1.  A lot of retailers canceled their customers' pre-orders outright.  I think it is highly probable that word got out, either officially from Bandai or through less official channels, that there was something wrong with the production run and that there would not be enough supply to meet projected demand.  What I don't understand (and I think where the real story is) is that NY didn't do this.  They seemed pretty confident that they could meet all of their pre-orders, but would not communicate why they believed this, nor did they give a time-frame to their customers.  What did/does NY know or have that the other retailers didn't know/have?  I think that is where the story is.

2.  To my knowledge, there hasn't been a shortage of TWE products before or since the VF-31A.  Maybe during the days of the Frontier valks there was something sort of like this, perhaps someone could clarify (and I'm not talking about just "standard" pre-order madness).  But if there were practices like rejecting entire production runs, why hasn't this kind of shortage happened before or since?  I'm not saying QC rejects don't happen, but it hasn't seemed to cause a shortage any other time.

Either way, I think Bandai would be dumb to not do another run of the VF-31A (either a straight re-issue, or an Arad's version), as there is clearly demand for it.  But I don't think we'll ever know the full story behind this event.

[spacemanoeuvres]

AAHHH my eyes! Won’t someone please think of the CHILDREN!

[Bolt]

That painful to look at!

The VF-31C is my new Grail..!

 

[no3Ljm]

36 minutes ago, spacemanoeuvres said:

AAHHH my eyes! Won’t someone please think of the CHILDREN!

I like the Getter legs going on in this scheme. Interesting to see how Battroid looks like. Don't worry, I will cover my eyes first before I look. 

 

[yman1437]

9 hours ago, HardlyNever said:

I would love a mini-documentary about the whole VF-31A thing.  I bet it would reveal a lot of information about the manufacture and distribution of these things; perhaps information Bandai and the manufacturers don't necessarily want public.  Unfortunately, I think this is such a small incident (in the grand scheme of things), that no one with serious credentials would actually investigate it.

Two things stand out in my mind, that I still can't figure out, and make me think there is/was something sort of shady going on:

1.  A lot of retailers canceled their customers' pre-orders outright.  I think it is highly probable that word got out, either officially from Bandai or through less official channels, that there was something wrong with the production run and that there would not be enough supply to meet projected demand.  What I don't understand (and I think where the real story is) is that NY didn't do this.  They seemed pretty confident that they could meet all of their pre-orders, but would not communicate why they believed this, nor did they give a time-frame to their customers.  What did/does NY know or have that the other retailers didn't know/have?  I think that is where the story is.

2.  To my knowledge, there hasn't been a shortage of TWE products before or since the VF-31A.  Maybe during the days of the Frontier valks there was something sort of like this, perhaps someone could clarify (and I'm not talking about just "standard" pre-order madness).  But if there were practices like rejecting entire production runs, why hasn't this kind of shortage happened before or since?  I'm not saying QC rejects don't happen, but it hasn't seemed to cause a shortage any other time.

Either way, I think Bandai would be dumb to not do another run of the VF-31A (either a straight re-issue, or an Arad's version), as there is clearly demand for it.  But I don't think we'll ever know the full story behind this event.

I can't believe no one sees the truth......

 it's the patriots, GW decided to use this as an experiment to analyze the physiological and psychological effects of such an event on their subjects.

[Kinzoku VF]

On 1/16/2019 at 10:23 AM, ArchieNov said:

So I just heard that Chuck's VF-31E will be a Tamashii Exclusive release. Anyone else heard this?

 No reasons whatsoever for it to be TWE, it's part of the main squadron. Right? RIGHT.!!!

As far as the Kairos saga....we'll probably never know what happened. I eventually received it months late from NY. Personally, I still think the preorder window stayed opened far too long for this piece. I mean you have a lot of TWE (and normal) releases selling out in minutes. Yet that one was open for what seemed an eternity. Did it mean that no one was in a rush to get it and a month down the line all of a sudden thousands of orders were placed putting the manufacturers in overdrive, thus the delay...??

As most local (Japanese) orders were honored on time, Bandai did not feel the need to provide any official apologies on their site and admit they were running late for late orders they knew were mostly for export. That Bs regarding stores not being able to get their hands on TWE is an urban legend. Of course Bandai know they are selling TWE to retailers, most importantly non-Japanese retailers (who aren't supposed to get nor export those products in the first place...).

[Slave IV]

1 minute ago, Kinzoku VF said:

 No reasons whatsoever for it to be TWE, it's part of the main squadron. Right? RIGHT.!!!

As far as the Kairos saga....we'll probably never know what happened. I eventually received it months late from NY. Personally, I still think the preorder window stayed opened far too long for this piece. I mean you have a lot of TWE (and normal) releases selling out in minutes. Yet that one was open for what seemed an eternity. Did it mean that no one was in a rush to get it and a month down the line all of a sudden thousands of orders were placed putting the manufacturers in overdrive, thus the delay...??

As most local (Japanese) orders were honored on time, Bandai did not feel the need to provide any official apologies on their site and admit they were running late for late orders they knew were mostly for export. That Bs regarding stores not being able to get their hands on TWE is an urban legend. Of course Bandai know they are selling TWE to retailers, most importantly non-Japanese retailers (who aren't supposed to get nor export those products in the first place...).

I think you are mistaken about the order period for TWEs. Most TWE products are available for months and NY typically has them open at original price until about a month before release. The 31A orders closed early, which is how I missed out on it at NY. Notice the 31F Lil Draken TWE set which is due at the end of the month is still available as well as the DX VF-1 Missile set.

[Kinzoku VF]

13 minutes ago, Slave IV said:

I think you are mistaken about the order period for TWEs. Most TWE products are available for months and NY typically has them open at original price until about a month before release. The 31A orders closed early, which is how I missed out on it at NY. Notice the 31F Lil Draken TWE set which is due at the end of the month is still available as well as the DX VF-1 Missile set.

True, regarding the TWE period. I think I had mentioned it ages ago when we were discussing the Kairos fiasco, I had said the same thing .I'm getting old for sure....Somehow for my part, it seemed that for a VF, the preorder window had stayed opened much longer than 'usual' probably mentioned it at the time and again now. 

[Saviant]

As much as I want info on the Armor I want Chuck to finish off my squad 

[nightmareB4macross]

1 hour ago, Saviant said:

As much as I want info on the Armor I want Chuck to finish off my squad 

QFT.

i feel your want to complete the squadron after so many years.

[Chronocidal]

2 hours ago, nightmareB4macross said:

QFT.

i feel your want to complete the squadron after so many years.

I wasn't even planning on getting the whole group, but my inner completionist got to me (x2 even).

If only the series was as good as the toys that came from it.  

Edited January 18, 2019 by Chronocidal

[no3Ljm]

6 minutes ago, Chronocidal said:

If only the series was as good as the toys that came from it.  

Wait. What series now? 

 

[Sanity is Optional]

Eh, completing the squad would be nice, mainly I want it to augment my collection of radome valks.

• Yamato VE-1
• RVF-25
• RVF-171

Still need a VE-11 as well.

Edited January 18, 2019 by Sanity is Optional

[TheLoneWolf]

On 1/16/2019 at 1:23 AM, jenius said:

Well all we have our shots in the dark here. My theory goes like this:
1) Factory receives order to make, let's say 1000 VF-31A Kairos toys. They make 4 batches of 250.
2) Bandai employee inspects 5 toys from each 250 allotment (they would use statistics and a confidence interval to determine their sample size, I'm not going to do the real math).. If all pass, then Bandai takes the shipment. If one fails, Bandai rejects the shipment.
3) In this case, Bandai rejected one of the shipments and issued a notice to those ordering multiples they would only receive one. At this point NY has customer cash but has not actually paid anything.
4) Factory sells QC reject to some other organization for some small amount so they don't take a complete bath on that rejected order. They specify not to flood the market with the toys since they're supposed to get destroyed and also what the QC reject was so this anonymous party can review them.
5) The 750 toys that passed are shipped via boat to Japan where they get thrown in a Tamashii brown box and shipped to customers.
6) Somehow NY gets in touch with this group that purchased the reject batch and arranges to buy the remaining 250 that pass an inspection for whatever Bandai originally was going to pay.
7) Third party group sends Bandai a few a week or maybe a monthly boat shipment that NY just takes its time doling out. Alternatively, NY bought the whole lot, has them already in a warehouse, and is just slowly doling them out because they don't want to tip off the factory...

Hold on, my tin foil hat keeps falling off...

Your theory sounds pretty plausible to me. A good way to test it out would be see if anyone received a VF-31A Kairos without a Big West sticker. From my understanding, Big West is serious with the amount of stickers that they give out to their licensees. Going with your imaginary numbers, I doubt Big West would've let Bandai's factory hang on to 250 unused Big West stickers unless they had a damn good reason.

Edited January 19, 2019 by TheLoneWolf

[Sanity is Optional]

One thing I'd like to add: it's not just NY that got them in later. The Ebay seller I had one ordered from also got it in much later than release.

Might be that Bandai just fulfilled some orders with a delay due to production issues, including NYs.

[TheLoneWolf]

1 hour ago, Sanity is Optional said:

Might be that Bandai just fulfilled some orders with a delay due to production issues, including NYs.

If I had to bet money on a theory, this one would be it. Whenever there's a mystery that's lacking in reliable evidence, I tend to find that simplest explanation is the best one.

[nightmareB4macross]

Well all this theorizing is interesting to say the least. But one thing is clear about a manufacturer of this size. They have no need or want to apologize or accept any wrong doing on their part it’s just bad practice.

Manufacturers deal with these issues in several ways.

One is to offer a rebate to the customer.

Two is offer the customer to destroy the product as they have a no return policy, as this is most common to avoid contamination or confusion of returned product, then in return offer to pay for the disposal. 

Three offer an investigation and report back with simple discoveries and remedies that only cover the surface of the issue.

Four they tell the customer to firesale the product and then they offer them a rebate. 

That’s been pretty much the MO for all manufacturers who can tell the customer that no matter what happens, the manufacture is not at fault. 

Sad but true.

[orindlt]

My 2nd NY VF-31a arrived - first one I ordered on 6 Oct arrived at release, the second one I ordered on 26 Oct arrived this week. It took forever, but they did come through (at least for me).  

[Mommar]

It’s a 1/72 model kit but imagine a CF brownie release like this.

[derex3592]

Insta buy. Hell, throw in the gray Lil Drakkens, I'll pay more! 

[raziel03]

I'm throwing money at the screen but nothing is happening... ;P

but, seriously, Bandai this is the one time we actually want you to milk those molds!

[Saburo]

Delta flight is almost complete, Bandai posted some official images of the VF-31E.

https://sp.tamashii.jp/special/pickup/201906umgv/index.php

 

Edited January 22, 2019 by Saburo

[jenius]

huzzah!

[Sanity is Optional]

I like the orange they're using. Definitely looks better than the tan I was afraid they'd be going with.

Also nice to finally have a pod without that freaking drone charger.

[no3Ljm]

Finally!  

June/July 2019 Release. Woohoo! 

 

 

Edited January 22, 2019 by no3Ljm

[Graham]

Finally!

 

[Lolicon]

So when is PO madness for Chuck?

[brouken]

Yeah! Finally some real DX VF-31E news!

So I'm assuming the PO madness is in March?