2012 iHobby show - Round2 2013 Announcements

[Craig Irwin]

Yep, looks like Revell will be getting my money next year!

[Casey]

Supposedly this is what is coming from Round 2 1st half next year, lots of reissues (sourced from another forum)

Buick Opel GT "Original Art Series" - White - March 2013

Buick Opel GT "Original Art Series" - COLOR - March 2013

Good to see this kit will be reissued, and I wonder if they're doing the Myers Manx color thing, or the '68 Shelby color thing with this kit?

1970 Dirty Donny Dodge Coronet Pro Street - April 2013

At least the DOHC Hemi is back.

M&H Racemasters Small Slicks Parts Pack - April 2013

Are these new?

Scooby-Doo Mystery Machine SNAP (New Tool) - April 2013

Why a new tool when they have the Polar Lights snap kit already?

1972 Nova 'Beverly Hills Cop - May 2013

An attempt to steal a piece of the 1/25 '68-'72 Nova pie? This kit still has the separate front fenders, right?

1966 Chevy Nova - Bill Jenkins - June 2013

I'm betting we'll see some M&H slicks in this release, maybe even the "small" ones?

[Rob Hall]

No idea about the M&H small slicks set, but Modelroundup has a large (tall, wide) set pictured, listed for November..had not heard about those. No idea about the other issues...though--someone on other forums suggested the Mystery Machine might be the one from the live-action movie a few years ago..never saw that, don't know what kind of van it was.

The BHC Nova I assume is just a rebox of the hoary '72 SS w/ separate fenders...the movie car was a battered base model, IIRC.

[Casey]

Maybe they are including these new slicks with their forthcoming Funny Cars, or the Young American dragster kits, too? I guess we'll wait and see.

[Luc Janssens]

Put these 2 on my want list, I have everything else on that list I want:

1967 Shelby GT350 - White - February 2013

Buick Opel GT "Original Art Series" - White - March 2013

Some additional info bout the Opel GT kit, it will have 3 hoods, all reworked, the original drag hood with the hole in it, has been retooled, other drag parts have been retooled/restored as well - it's the best mix of parts from all issues and it will have real metal injector stacks for the drag motor.

[Guest]

I'd like to see a new tool Opel GT, with a accurate front suspension. The rest of the kit isnt too bad, but a new tool would be great. For accuracy's sake, the front pan needs to be seperated from the chassis, glued in place, and the seam puttied and snaded. Easy to do actually, and it results in a far better appearence.

[tubbs]

BINGO!!! I love the hobby trade show. I had been going since it was RCHTA back in the 80's. I met many folks and am glad I did. (even Neil Young!)

But I kinda applaud Revell for the guts of not going, saving the large expense of a trade show (maybe spending the savings on new tools)

It's called CHANGE.....the only constant. When you can spend big dollars to reach those that will come to Cleveland or ZERO dollars reaching anyone with a smart phone or computer......no brainer.

well, unfortunatly, i feel just the opposite. i HATE buying over the internet. i hear way too many horror stories. i want the product in my hand so i can see exactly what i am ploping my hard earned money down for. this obviously does not include dealers you know and trust, but heck, then you have to deal with shipping costs and delivery time. i will take a trade show over the internet any day of the week. i feel Revell blew it by not going. with them coming out with the line up they have this year, its going to be a great year for them. but it would have been real nice to hold that '70 cuda right in my hand.

[AzTom]

well, unfortunatly, i feel just the opposite. i HATE buying over the internet. i hear way too many horror stories. i want the product in my hand so i can see exactly what i am ploping my hard earned money down for. this obviously does not include dealers you know and trust, but heck, then you have to deal with shipping costs and delivery time. i will take a trade show over the internet any day of the week. i feel Revell blew it by not going. with them coming out with the line up they have this year, its going to be a great year for them. but it would have been real nice to hold that '70 cuda right in my hand.

I agree with you Al.

I know Times are a Changing but I still think people would rather buy in person when they can. When we had the store it amazed me how many customers didn't even have Internet connection. I work part time at an antique mall and sell farm toys and models there.

I have offered my card with my web address to several customers that bought at the mall and they tell me they would rather just get them at the mall.

As for the show, I didn't see where Hobbico/Great Planes, parent co of Revell, were even at the show. They have allways had a huge display there.

I really enjoyed going to the Chicago show, you could even win great prizes

[Dave Van]

well, unfortunatly, i feel just the opposite. i HATE buying over the internet. i hear way too many horror stories. i want the product in my hand so i can see exactly what i am ploping my hard earned money down for. this obviously does not include dealers you know and trust, but heck, then you have to deal with shipping costs and delivery time. i will take a trade show over the internet any day of the week. i feel Revell blew it by not going. with them coming out with the line up they have this year, its going to be a great year for them. but it would have been real nice to hold that '70 cuda right in my hand.

I was speaking of iHobby show.........it is NOT a consumer buying/selling show. It is a trade show for the trade....IE wholesalers and retailers. Years ago you had to be a trade member to even attend. The public was allowed to come to offset the cost of the show. If you don't think the way Revell announced their 2013 product line is a sign of the future you are not being realistic. ZERO dollars to do much the same thing $25,000 did a free years ago is the way to do it.

Personal consumer buying is done best at a LHS and that what I do when I can but 3 hours is a long drive for a single item......so remember not everyone has a LHS within ever an hours drive.

I think in this day and age 'internet horror stories' should be a thing of the past. Order from trusted established sellers, use a credit card that has buyer protection and you are safe from losing money or getting less than you wanted.

Edited October 18, 2012 by Dave Van

[Rob Hall]

I was speaking of iHobby show.........it is NOT a consumer buying/selling show. It is a trade show for the trade....IE wholesalers and retailers. Years ago you had to be a trade member to even attend. The public was allowed to come to offset the cost of the show. If you don't think the way Revell announced their 2013 product line is a sign of the future you are not being realistic. ZERO dollars to do much the same thing $25,000 did a free years ago is the way to do it.

Personal consumer buying is done best at a LHS and that what I do when I can but 3 hours is a long drive for a single item......so remember not everyone has a LHS within ever an hours drive.

I think in this day and age 'internet horror stories' should be a thing of the past. Order from trusted established sellers, use a credit card that has buyer protection and you are safe from losing money or getting less than you wanted.

Interesting..so Revell didn't have to pay to show at the NNL? Agreed on the internet...I've been buying models and stuff online for 15 years....hard to beat the ease of ordering something w/ a few clicks.

[jas1957]

I'm sure Revell did pay for their space at the Toledo show. I'm also sure it was a SMALL fraction of what it would have cost to set up at ihobby. Plus probably 90% of the visitors at Toledo were interested in what Revell had to show as compared to a much smaller percenage at ihobby. The ihobby show is dominated by the RC industry, which is fine if that's your interest. Most of us are not so much into that part of the hobby business.

[Rob Hall]

The ihobby show is dominated by the RC industry, which is fine if that's your interest. Most of us are not so much into that part of the hobby business.

True... I have no clue what goes on w/ RC, I don't pay attention to that world. Likewise for armor or aircraft modeling.

[Art Anderson]

I was speaking of iHobby show.........it is NOT a consumer buying/selling show. It is a trade show for the trade....IE wholesalers and retailers. Years ago you had to be a trade member to even attend. The public was allowed to come to offset the cost of the show. If you don't think the way Revell announced their 2013 product line is a sign of the future you are not being realistic. ZERO dollars to do much the same thing $25,000 did a free years ago is the way to do it.

Personal consumer buying is done best at a LHS and that what I do when I can but 3 hours is a long drive for a single item......so remember not everyone has a LHS within ever an hours drive.

I think in this day and age 'internet horror stories' should be a thing of the past. Order from trusted established sellers, use a credit card that has buyer protection and you are safe from losing money or getting less than you wanted.

Dave, you have it very, VERY RIGHT! A trade show is just that, a trade show. Now, let's take a look back at hobby industry trade shows in their heyday (and that was decades before RCHTA (Radio Control Hobby Trade Association and "iHobby":

From the 1930's until its breakup, it was the Hobby Industry Association of America (HIAA), and their annual trade show began on the 3rd Sunday of January, EVERY year, held in Chicago (for the first 40 yrs or so, Chicago and Suburbs was THE epicenter of the hobby industry, and Chicago was the heart of hobby wholesaling (Companies such as Trost Modelcraft & Hobbies--where I first got to know the late Bill Lastovich, United Model Distributors, Midwest Hobby Supply, Walthers -- the train people--were just up the road in Milwaukee, Sig Manufacturing--balsa and airplane kits was a couple hundred miles west in Iowa, Midwest Model Products in Hobart IN). With the exception of Revell (California back then) and Aurora (West Hempstead NY), the major plastic model companies (certainly in the model car field), AMT, MPC, JoHan, Monogram were all within 250 miles of the Windy City. Chicago was the most centrally located city in the US with tremendous access by road, railroad passenger trains, and airlines (even Greyhound and Trailways).

Those early HIAA shows were held in downtown Chicago (the Loop), at the former Sherman House Hotel, where they took up every ballroom, meeting room, banquet room in the building. HIAA shows opened at 8am sharp on the 3rd Sunday in January, to a literal mob scene (pretty much equivalent to a movie premiere in a basketball arena).. Hobby dealers from ALL OVER the country were there. There was no public admission--one had to be a "member of the trade" in order to gain admission. In the spirit of a true trade show, deals were offered, and deals were made back then, at HIAA (the show continued through the coming week, with serious buys being made by anyone who was a buyer for a hobby shop, department store, even chain stores. There were no "advance showings" back then (today, trust me, the relatively few hobby wholesale houses and buyers from large retail chains stocking hobby or model kits will have seen the new announcements well in advance of iHobby or the NY Toy Fair!).

From the first of July 1964 through the middle of August 1973 (with leaves of absence in the summer of 1966, 1967, and the 12-months from June 1969-May 1979) to finish my college degree, I worked for Leo and Berdina Weber and alongside their younger son Mike, here in Lafayette--Weber's Hobby Shop, then one of largest, most comprehensive hobby shops in the Midwest outside of Chicago or perhaps St Louis. In pretty short order, I became their plastic model kit and HO model railroading buyer (subject to Leo's approvals, of course!). So, by the time I was 20 years old, the Weber's annual trek to HIAA was when I became a young man on a mission--to scope out all the new announcements (and they were many!), and with Leo's guidance, putting together my recommendations as to what (Weber's would stock most anything in hobbies--at the minimum of "onesy-twosy" to case lots of kits I was convinced would sell very well.

So there I was, only a couple of years out of high school, rubbing shoulders with not only other hobby dealers from all over the US, but also marketing guys, design/product development people, you name it--I had to be the one to dig into newly announced product lines, determine was being carried over into the new year, learn what the projected release dates were--in short, see all the glitter, glamor and excitement, but also learn enough to be able to tell my boss what we should bring into the store in the areas of my interest and knowledge. (Sure, I made my mistakes over those years, but Leo would always remind me of Green Monkeys--he kept telling me he had to have been drinking Green Scotch when he ordered in those things in the early 1950's!). By 1967 or so (the year the HIAA Show was nearly called off by the Great Blizzard that year, I found myself having to sign pre-orders based on what is called "Open To Buy" (a dollar amount that a buyer is authorized to commit to on behalf of his company/employer). Looking back, even though that notion really frightened me at the outset, Mr. Weber was more than supportive, and if I made a mistake, ordered in something that didn't sell well, or too much of something, he was entrepreneur enough to cover my rear end, and help me look good (something for which I will always remember him--my mentor for sure!).

But the bottom line is, that is what a classic trade show was all about--and there were some funny, certainly interesting things. Take the AMT Peterbilt 359 "California Hauler" for example: AMT first offered that, based on a box art painting, at the 1968 HIAA Show--not enough interest, so it didn't happen. 1969, same painting, same result. 1970 (and the Webers paid for a hotel room so that I could come in from Iowa--where I was a Senior at Parsons College at Fairfield) so I could be there--it was very apparent that the Webers, Father, Mother and Son, wanted me back as soon as i graduated --in fact they matched the starting salary I could have wangled from even a Fortune 500 Company to achieve that!), and what did I see? The IMC Dodge COE, AND a hand-built prototype of the AMT Peterbilt 359 California Hauler! Now that was how things often happened in the industry back then.

w

But, a trade show should be a trade show, first and foremost--and both RHCTA and iHobby pretty much forgot that, if they ever knew it. When Hobbico sets up to sell to hobby dealers on the early "Trade Days" and then quickly takes down the Hobbico sign and plasters up "Tower Hobbies" for the general public to see on Saturday, well who does that offend? Yeah, your LHS. As a result, more and more, LHS owners simply have ignored iHobby and its predecessor, RCHTA--why should they go, and see their arch-competitor right in their face? And, along those same lines, with the internet and a website, why does a model company even need to show up at iHobby, get exposed to a very limited audience of very mixed interests, when they can, as did Revell and Moebius, hit NNL and the Collector's Toy Fair in Sylvania, and reach an audience specific to what they were announcing? Hmmm?

Art

[Dave Van]

Art......thanks for the history and some background for those that may not realize what iHobby is supposed to be. While this hobby is more a business for me any more I still enjoy learning about it past and present.

Interesting..so Revell didn't have to pay to show at the NNL?

I have no info on weather Revell paid for it's space......I do know when they came to the AMS90 convention we gave them 3 booths, along with RC2/Ertl, for free and even provided some other 'help'. But a table at Toledo is a VERY small fraction of an 8 x 8 booth at iHobby....go to their website the rates are on there....just add about 50% for set up fee and 'union labor' cost. (not a union slam just facts) I'll bet Revell paid $75,000 for their booth the year they had Ed Roth and his car that covered 8 booths, back mid 1990's so think about how different things are today.

[vypurr59]

Guilty as charged! I stayed home and didn't bring my models up there to the show because I thought the cost was too much after the report that the show sucked. I guess I should have manned up and gone to show my support for the hobby. I'm now afraid this show will not return to Ohio. I guess I was part of the problem rather than the solution.

They have a 5 year signed deal

[1972coronet]

I can honestly state , without hesitation , that I'm very excited about what Round2 , Revell , and Mobius are releasing for 2013 (and even late 2012 ) !!

I haven't a negative thing to say about any of these releases , as there are many that I've been wanting for decades (but am not Swiss Bank Account wealthy enough to buy them from eBay ) .

[Casey]

Hmmm, if you like your plastic molded in color, you're gonna love these three from Round2.

AMT-849 1/25 1968 Plymouth Roadrunner (Yellow)

AMT-850 1/25 1940 Ford Coupe (Orange)

AMT-851 1/25 1975 Chevy Rescue Van (Red)