Coming Soon from Atomic City's JoHan line of new kits

[stavanzer]

2 hours ago, niteowl7710 said:

As I often tend to say, the opinions of this forum do not often reflect the retail reality of hobby sales, nor things that would be coherent decisions to make as a manufacturer. We are the the top half of the 1% here and the casual builder that still makes up the bulk of sales would recognize the hero car of a movie (of which the existing kit was a hot mess made during the Racing Champion Ownership of AMT) over a Plymouth Cop Car that has little relevance to someone who's not nearing the age of 70.

He is correct. We are the extreme right end of the Bell Curve here. Our depth of knowledge, our sense of kit history, our collective community are all stronger than most modelers. This also shows up in the kits we want. I would love to have a kit of the '68 Plymouth Cop Car. The only thing stopping me is the budget. But, I could have one (and many other Grail Kits) by next Friday, if I start shopping on line this afternoon. All it takes is the willingness to pay the price. But, I am not the Target Market for the worlds kitmakers. I am the Target Market for Round2 & Atlantis, and they are (despite my gripes) serving me well.

Justin Porter is on the Front Lines of this Hobby, observing daily what works and what doesn't. I love it when people tell him what "Should Sell" vs his real time experience with what his customers are actually purchasing. It's as if his Sales are an affront to all the Johan Fan Boys here on the forum.

I especially like the faint, "Well his customers are the wrong kind, buying the wrong kits" Vibe that shows through in a few past comments over the years. As if, they should like what many of us here like......

We complain here sometimes about Hobby Lobby, and the slow introduction of new kits, yet H.L. seems to keep selling out of all the same kits that we here tend to find boring. Somebody is buying those kits! H.L. keeps selling out and re-stocking them. Those are the buyers that Round2 wants to keep happy. Those of us, the "Proud .05 Percenters" are catered to by Round2, but always with an eye on what will sell at the mass retail level. WE are not their primary market. 

[Mark C.]

7 hours ago, niteowl7710 said:

He didn't say they couldn't coexist

My bad... I thought that: "No. I do not want the Johan kits back. No. I do not want the Johan brand back. No. I do not want another backwards gazing vintage (or faux vintage recreation) brand on my shelves."  Followed by: " I'm willing to bet no piece-for-piece reissue of the '68 Plymouth Fury police car is going to match the sales of the upcoming all-new tool Aoshima 1/24th scale F&F MkIV Toyota Supra. "

Meant that it was a zero sum game.  i.e. Some iteration of JoHan branding couldn't exist because Aoshima was directly competing against them and would put them out of business... or something like that.

I also didn't understand that if JoHan did exist, a hobby shop owner would be required to stock his shelves with them and suffer the resultant financial losses.

My apologies to all for my misinterpretation. 

[Mark C.]

4 hours ago, stavanzer said:

Justin Porter is on the Front Lines of this Hobby, observing daily what works and what doesn't.

While I deeply appreciate what Justin adds to the discussion, respect his opinions, and feel he does well in promotion of his shop on this board, I also don't think that one hobby shop in Ohio should be taken as a complete reflection of the car model kit market in its entirety... which is what seems to happen here sometimes.  All good, though.  Great discussion.

[gtx6970]

6 hours ago, Mark said:

Yes, original '66 Fury kits (even rebuilders) are that difficult to find.  The original Jo-Han company was, size-wise, a pimple on the backside of AMT, MPC, Revell, or Monogram back in the day.  They just didn't have the same distribution and weren't available in as many places.  Plus, the subject matter wasn't as desirable back then.  So an all-new injection molded kit of a '66 Fury would not be a smart business proposition.  It wouldn't have been even in 1966.  The only reason it appeared then was that much of its development cost was borne by Chrysler Corporation because they wanted promos.  But apparently enough people still want one to justify a resin kit.  Whether enough of those people are willing to lay out 100 times the original kit's retail price for a kit with no plated parts has yet to be proven, pro or con.

Thanks

 

I did a quick basic search this morning and found none..except a few dealer promos

 

Myself prefer a 1965. But only because of the Indy Pace Car version

 

I personally like the 67/68 body style better and have a clean 1968 conv builder . For that sometime down the road build 

[Justin Porter]

2 hours ago, Mark C. said:

My bad... I thought that: "No. I do not want the Johan kits back. No. I do not want the Johan brand back. No. I do not want another backwards gazing vintage (or faux vintage recreation) brand on my shelves."  Followed by: " I'm willing to bet no piece-for-piece reissue of the '68 Plymouth Fury police car is going to match the sales of the upcoming all-new tool Aoshima 1/24th scale F&F MkIV Toyota Supra. "

Meant that it was a zero sum game.  i.e. Some iteration of JoHan branding couldn't exist because Aoshima was directly competing against them and would put them out of business... or something like that.

I also didn't understand that if JoHan did exist, a hobby shop owner would be required to stock his shelves with them and suffer the resultant financial losses.

My apologies to all for my misinterpretation. 

Here's the misinterpretation. 

You are right, it's not a zero sum game from the end customer's standpoint. Two different customers can want and purchase two different products. That's entirely true. 

What is a zero sum game is the manufacturing and distribution side. 

As we are so very VERY often reminded, the effort to bring a new kit to market costs a large amount of money in design, licensing, tooling, and other manufacturing costs. As such, the model manufacturers - even the largest ones - rarely bring more than a handful of all new kits to market each year. As a retailer, these new announcements shape a great deal of my financial decisions for a year. When respected and well loved companies announce new kits of popular subjects, I know I can expect good sales. When manufacturers with poor reputations announce kits of niche products, I know I can expect bad sales. 

Ergo, what I want as a retailer is lots of new kits of popular subjects from manufacturers that have good reputations. 

A manufacturer that is new to the scene can build a good reputation by delivering excellent kits at reasonable prices of coveted subjects - a good military kit analogy would be Kotare with their 1/32nd scale Spitfire MkI - but this is a tougher road to walk that requires the body behind the counter to do some heavy lifting to assure potential customers that the new brand offers something they want. 

A hypothetical Johan as has been described in this thread - not the efforts of Atomic City which I respect for serving their niche even if the product itself leaves me personally cold - would be spending their hypothetical tooling budget NOT on producing modern kits of popular subjects. They would not be providing me with a new opportunity to markedly increase sales with another strong anchor brand. Revell has gone quiet on the new-tool front and has even been struggling with their supply chain to distributors on existing product (over a year since I've been able to restock the '64 Impala, for instance) and Round 2 has made it clear they are a nostalgia brand, not a modeling brand. That leaves Moebius effectively all alone to create NEW products in the domestic auto genre. So what I want, badly, as a retailer, is another domestic auto anchor brand. That's why I don't want this hypothetical "scan the old kits" Johan. That hypothetical company wouldn't be offering products that could benefit my business. 

If there was any brand from modeling past that I would want back at this moment in time, it would be AMT/Ertl. There was a company, for all its foibles, that married classic subject matter with modern kit design at a reasonable price to deliver some all time great models.  

[Mark C.]

14 minutes ago, Justin Porter said:

Here's the misinterpretation. 

You are right, it's not a zero sum game from the end customer's standpoint. Two different customers can want and purchase two different products. That's entirely true. 

What is a zero sum game is the manufacturing and distribution side. 

As we are so very VERY often reminded, the effort to bring a new kit to market costs a large amount of money in design, licensing, tooling, and other manufacturing costs. As such, the model manufacturers - even the largest ones - rarely bring more than a handful of all new kits to market each year. As a retailer, these new announcements shape a great deal of my financial decisions for a year. When respected and well loved companies announce new kits of popular subjects, I know I can expect good sales. When manufacturers with poor reputations announce kits of niche products, I know I can expect bad sales. 

Ergo, what I want as a retailer is lots of new kits of popular subjects from manufacturers that have good reputations. 

A manufacturer that is new to the scene can build a good reputation by delivering excellent kits at reasonable prices of coveted subjects - a good military kit analogy would be Kotare with their 1/32nd scale Spitfire MkI - but this is a tougher road to walk that requires the body behind the counter to do some heavy lifting to assure potential customers that the new brand offers something they want. 

A hypothetical Johan as has been described in this thread - not the efforts of Atomic City which I respect for serving their niche even if the product itself leaves me personally cold - would be spending their hypothetical tooling budget NOT on producing modern kits of popular subjects. They would not be providing me with a new opportunity to markedly increase sales with another strong anchor brand. Revell has gone quiet on the new-tool front and has even been struggling with their supply chain to distributors on existing product (over a year since I've been able to restock the '64 Impala, for instance) and Round 2 has made it clear they are a nostalgia brand, not a modeling brand. That leaves Moebius effectively all alone to create NEW products in the domestic auto genre. So what I want, badly, as a retailer, is another domestic auto anchor brand. That's why I don't want this hypothetical "scan the old kits" Johan. That hypothetical company wouldn't be offering products that could benefit my business. 

If there was any brand from modeling past that I would want back at this moment in time, it would be AMT/Ertl. There was a company, for all its foibles, that married classic subject matter with modern kit design at a reasonable price to deliver some all time great models.  

Good stuff.  Appreciate the explanation.

There are so many perspectives in the equation that it’s always good to hear what others think.  Thanks for that.

[Can-Con]

4 hours ago, gtx6970 said:

Thanks

 

I did a quick basic search this morning and found none..except a few dealer promos

 

Myself prefer a 1965. But only because of the Indy Pace Car version

 

I personally like the 67/68 body style better and have a clean 1968 conv builder . For that sometime down the road build 

Vic's Resin does a '65 hardtop. I see one shop has them listed for 54 bucks.

No clear parts, plating or chassis. They look kinda rough as they come with the flash still on but they clean up well. 

That's how my '66 started. I had the bumpers plated and made the windows from clear sheet. I did get Modelhaus tail lights and surrounds asthe ones that came with the kit were all one piece but I could have easily used them if I wanted. The chassis is just made from flat sheet stock. Pegasus wheels/tires.