[jjgilz]

With our hobby maturing, manufacturers are giving more advanced notice of models coming out in the future so that retailers can plan for them. This has led to an industry standard of retailers (including myself) offering pre-orders for specific models. As an owner of a store, I personally like them because it allows me to avoid overstocking items that may or may not sell. It's like a guage of model popularity. However, as a fan and advocate of the hobby, it makes me wonder if we are limitng the hobby to the core collectors (who are more in tune with the forums and retailer e-mails) and not allowing our hobby to grow by encouraging more casual collectors to stumble upon them online or at the local store. (As a side note, I remember hating pre-orders at the local hobby store growing up!) Recently after selling out of my pre-orders for a Century Wings model, I had a former Navy pilot (and not an avid collector) call us for that model because he actually flew that aircraft and was hoping to order one. Being sold out of the model, I felt bad partially because I felt it was a chance for him to get a great model and possibly add a new collector to "our club". So here's my question...What do you think of pre-orders? Do you like them or do you instead wish retailers would hold back a certain amount for the release day?

I'll be taking notes! :-)

Jeff
AimHigherJets.com

[Cardinal]

Jeff, I voted for the first option (allowing entire stock to be sold on pre-order) as I thought that this option reflected what was best for the manufacturers and retailers alike as well as, by proxy, the collectors. However, this was my thinking prior to reading your post on the pilot who was having difficulty in finding the model that depicted the aircraft which he had actually flown in (Black Aces?). I've therefore changed my thinking on this and suspect that it may be a good thing to keep a couple of 'to be released' items in inventory and not available for pre-order - your own personal 'discretionary' strategic reserve so to speak .

[Kubikali]

I voted for the second option. It would keep collecting more relaxed. Besides that I have the feeling the market would be more of a buyers market which I prefer over a sellers market.
Probably there are holes to be shot in this idea, but it's my gut speaking (this early...!)

[Kiwi Dave]

There is too much on offer and the market is saturated. Unless the model is limited to a couple of hundred I don't believe any model will sell out to pre-order.

[lanslide]

Good question Jeff. I voted to save some models for the poor guys who aren't tuned in to our forum yet. This should help our hobby grow which would be good for everyone.

[Cruver Collecter]

With the exception of some of short run models, I wonder if this is really an issue? The reason I question this with regards to people new to the hobby is, do most folks start off with the short run type models or do they pick up a model that they just happened to be interested in? I know the first pieces I picked up were some of the more common types and that is what got me digging for some of the harder to get ones. Shoot I found out about pre-ordering well before I came across this forum. I am not a retailer, but I know that inventory sitting on the shelves is a not a good thing. I am a firm believer in happy retailers, happy retailers order more models. In my opinion, the ones that really hurt the hobby are those that snag up models for latter sale on secondary market.

[JustPlaneNuttz]

I'm OK with pre-orders, but there should also be a regular inventory of some sort. That doesn't have to be very large, but enough for casual walk in traffic that the retailer may have. Most retailers will know the habits of their trade. With this hobby, I don't think very much of anything sits around too long when the word gets out (unless stupid pricing is involved).

JPN

[PappyB]

Call me crazy but I think the retailers should cater to their bread-and-butter rabid customers that keep them going outside of holiday gift-buying seasons... so I think all inventory for hot items should be made available for preorder. I believe it also helps the retailer to have the orders in hand sooner rather than later and to help judge the popularity of new lines and make decisions for future purchases/stocking of same?

For most models I really don't think it matters too much though, there always seem to be some available after launch even for extremely limited runs -- such as the FM Me262, which was still available for sale a week after it was first sold I believe.

[1250ships]

I think pre-orders are fine. However I hardly ever use them. I find most models continue to be available after release and if I wait a couple of weeks for all the initial excitement to die off I can often get the model at a large discount. Waiting also lets me see detail images of the model and decide if it looks good enough to buy.

[flyXwire]

Originally Posted by 1250ships

I think pre-orders are fine. However I hardly ever use them. I find most models continue to be available after release and if I wait a couple of weeks for all the initial excitement to die off I can often get the model at a large discount. Waiting also lets me see detail images of the model and decide if it looks good enough to buy.

You pretty much hit the nail on the head on that one and I couldn't agree more with the above statement. I think I've only did one or two "pre-orders" that I could remember only to discover later that those items were still very much available from the other online fellow and were later discounted. I know there's a lesson to be learned here, and you can draw from your own conclusions. It's important (at least in my humble opinion) to not get caught up in the "Limited or SOLD OUT so you better put your preorders in hoopla", as things don't always turn out as expected.