How many Little Red Wagons?

[Speedfreak]

Was talking to a member of this forum yesterday and asked him how many Little Red Wagon kits he thought had been manufactured and sold? He did not make a guess, but , I thought it must be in the millions (?) I got my first one when I was 12-14? that was 50 years ago and they still make and sell them. He thought this would make a good thread topic. So aside from the number made and sold I thought it would also be cool to see the history of this iconic kit. Thanks! 

Edited May 31, 2017 by Speedfreak

[gtx6970]

Doubt there's any real way to say with any kind of accuracy. Not to mention the Touch Tone Terror version

I built mine from an unbuilt TTT version probably 10 years ago. With Fred Cady decals . I also have an unbuilt original issue Little Red Wagon put away ( not worth anything even close to what it once was. )

 

Edited May 31, 2017 by gtx6970

[Mark]

I wouldn't say "millions" because the kit was first manufactured by IMC, which was never anywhere near as big a company as Revell, AMT, or Monogram.  In the Seventies, they were "Hawk/IMC" which was even smaller with few stores carrying their products.  Then there was about a twenty-year gap between the last Hawk/IMC kit and the first of the Lindberg reissue kits.  A few hundred thousand would be my guess.

[slusher]

What happened to IMC?

[Art Anderson]

I wouldn't say "millions" because the kit was first manufactured by IMC, which was never anywhere near as big a company as Revell, AMT, or Monogram.  In the Seventies, they were "Hawk/IMC" which was even smaller with few stores carrying their products.  Then there was about a twenty-year gap between the last Hawk/IMC kit and the first of the Lindberg reissue kits.  A few hundred thousand would be my guess.

And, certainly in the original "heyday" of the IMC kits, LRW in particular, those kits tended to be dust-catchers on store shelves.  Most are not really aware,that IMC's highly detailed model car kits came as the "brainchild" of Budd "The Kat" Anderson, (no relation, although I did know him for years), who'd been at AMT Corporation for a few years in the early 60's, had a short stint at MPC when that company was starting up, then moved to IMC (which was never really a company specializing in model kits--rather IMC was an industrial molder of plastic parts, for the automobile and appliance industries--model kits being somewhat of a sideline.

My guess as to the total production of IMC's car kits over the years of the tooling's existence?  In the very low 100,000's, and that in relatively small production runs

Art

[Mark]

I'm not positive, but I believe Budd Anderson went to IMC first after leaving AMT, then went to MPC after that.  The short-lived Automotive Modelers Society ran parts of a Budd Anderson biography in their magazine; unfortunately it was never finished.  It was supposed to have been compiled for a book; if so, that didn't appear either.

[Greg Myers]

An other interesting question, and I thought this is where you were going, how many actual 1:1 Little Red Wagons were made? They did crash a few. There were a few different versions as well, fuel injected, blown etc.

Edited May 31, 2017 by Greg Myers

[Art Anderson]

Along those lines:  Very seldom has any model car kit sold even a million kits over time even.  Even AMT, in their heyday of the middle 1960's, in 1964, was reported by The Wall Street Journal (article titled something like "The World's Automaker" in a front-page "general interest article which has been pretty much a tradtion at WSJ) to have produced apprioximately 15 Million model cars in 1964--but that figure was spread over approximately 30 subjects by then.  MPC claimed to have produced a million of their 1978 Pontiac Firedbird T/A, the "Blackbird", and some have figured a number that high for their "General Lee"..  However, I suspect that the most produced 1/25 scale model car kit of all time was likely the first-generation AMT 1957 Chevy Bel Air HT, which was continuously in AMT's line from early 1962 though 1986, being replaced by the much better '57 Chevy kit in 1997, a production run of some 35 years (which has to be some kind of record).

 

[Art Anderson]

What happened to IMC?

IMC sold their model kit tooling to Testors about 1973 or thereabouts.  Since then, the tooling has changed hands several times, some was even shipped to Japan, produced there for a time.

[Greg Myers]

Was talking to a member of this forum yesterday and asked him how many Little Red Wagon kits he thought had been manufactured and sold? 

Always with the bad vibes Art, Woof 

[Tom Geiger]

Some ancient history... when I got back to modeling as an adult in 1988 my goal was to learn the craft well enough to do some justice to a case of Mopar kits that I had bought over time and squirreled away.  Right away I wanted to buy more Mopar kits and two I was focusing on were the Little Red Wagon and the Fireball 500. In those days these were big money kits... $250-300.  We thought the tooling was gone forever and never dreamed we'd see them reissued.  This was the era where collectibles were going crazy value wise, so everyone was "investing".

There was a guy who brought a case of old and desirable kits to a show and both of my dream kits were there.  He had them priced at $250 each.  I approached him and offered him $400 for the pair.  He declined my offer.  The next month he brought the same case of kits to my club's Christmas party and said he was having a 50% off holiday sale. Before anyone could react, a dealer grabbed the entire case from behind and bought them all!  I was super ticked off at the time that this guy sold those kits for a lot less than I had offered!  And that dealer, who was a guest at the party, had no business being that greedy.

I was piecing together a Little Red Wagon from parts. I had a bad old built up, and someone had supplied fresh chrome. I had the instruction sheet too.  John Slivoski called me up one evening and told me a big secret...Lindberg was looking to release the Little Red Wagon and needed an instruction sheet.  Did I have one?  Yes I did!  So I mailed it off to John.   Sometime later UPS dropped off a full case of the newly minted Little Red Wagon kits that Lindberg sent as a thank you.  For years I had pined after this kit, and now I was swimming in them!   And I was pretty happy I hadn't gotten those kits even at $125 apiece.  

And as most of us know, the AMT  Fireball 500 tooling existed and Playing Mantis released the kit along with a car trailer.  I bought up a mess of these at half price from people who robbed the trailers from the kits.  Probably had a dozen of these at $5 each!

[Greg Myers]

Great story Tom, thanks for sharing

[waynehulsey]

This type of questions always intrigue me: a combination of being around when a lot of the items under discussion were going on and then meeting Budd Anderson in the late 70's after he'd relocated to SoCal and becoming a friend of his over the years before his passing. First concerning IMC, Budd went there after leaving AMT. They were doing a lot of sub-contractor work for the automotive and appliance industries, but were looking for something to expand production. At that time, model car building and slot racing were really strong. They approached Budd about becoming a developer for them due to his hobby background and contacts with the automotive industry, especially Ford. Have never seen any sales figures for them, but from working in a hobby shop in the early 70's, would say their Ford GT series and the Mustang II show car were their biggest sellers. Eventually there was a falling out and Budd left and went to MPC on the invite of George Tethoff who Budd had worked with at AMT. Here's a interesting legal thing I dug up: http://openjurist.org/492/f2d/1281/monogram-models-inc-v-industro-motive-corporation-g  and   http://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/448/284/100832/  This probably had a lot to do with IMC selling out to Testors. Then it seems Testors leased some of the tools to Union - a Japanese molding company who did a lot with other people's tools including Heller. Seems like most of those tools disappeared into limbo; which is too bad because there were some interesting and unique models: Chaparral, Lola, Lotus-Ford. Not sure if Heller got theirs back, since the one's I remember under the Union name like the open wheel and Le Mans cars I don't remember ever being reissued by Heller. It would be great is someone found those tools in a warehouse somewhere in Japan or Korea. That would probably be a big legal mess to sort out.

[Eshaver]

I'm not positive, but I believe Budd Anderson went to IMC first after leaving AMT, then went to MPC after that.  The short-lived Automotive Modelers Society ran parts of a Budd Anderson biography in their magazine; unfortunately it was never finished.  It was supposed to have been compiled for a book; if so, that didn't appear either.

Mark, you are correct in your post . Budd then went on to Choo- Choo custom as a P-R person . he was instrumental in the El camino SS models about 1978.

My Lil Red wagon is a cabinet contractor's installation truck sporting a KZEW FM bumper sticker from Dallas Texas .

[High octane]

This Little Red Wagon is residing in western Illinois, when I saw it a few years ago.

[Greg Myers]

[Speedfreak]

Very cool you all, I was hoping that someone(s) would show the evolution of this kit and it's various versions.

Nice looking build Ellen.

Edited June 5, 2017 by Speedfreak

[Greg Myers]

and the evolution of the real car it's self

[Greg Myers]

as far as exhibition cars there were quite a few, A100s alone, then all the other one offs.

[gtx6970]

The very first Little Red Wagon

 

[Speedfreak]

The very first Little Red Wagon

 

Thanks for posting this pic Bill, who would ever think what engine (until they started it up) lurks inside this little buggy just by looking at it!  

[Tom Geiger]

Interesting that the first Little Red Wagon has the Dodge scripts on the doors, and the hole for the fuel filler. Neither are on the kit

[Speedfreak]

Interesting that the first Little Red Wagon has the Dodge scripts on the doors, and the hole for the fuel filler. Neither are on the kit

That picture must be ' the prototype ' very cool.