09 March 2011

If it's worth doing, it's worth overdoing (Part 3) - Henkei-s

Ok, this happened yesterday night. 

Like a caveman discovering fire, I discovered that this shop that was only 2 minutes away from where I lived, has a stash of Henkeis, case-fresh-Henkeis.

I walk past this place every other day when I come back from work. After a few trips into the shop in the past months, I decided that there was nothing in there that I am interested in. Walked in with E on the Sunday that just passed and 'lo and behold, there was a stash of Henkeis there - at least 5-6 different characters from the early Henkei days, all case fresh, MOSC, untouched (and obviously unloved since no one bought them).

The real kicker? The shop was giving a 20% discount for purchases over HKD$500 and 30% discount for purchases over HKD$1000. 

For the fun of it, I went back yesterday and bought out all-the-Henkeis-the-shop-had, all. And got the full 30% discount on each piece too.

If it's worth doing, it's worth overdoing.

17 comments:

  1. Call me lazy to convert it myself, but how much in US Dollars is HKD$500? Which Henkei! releases did you pick up? Even the figures that didn't sell as well are still marked up here in the States. Even Cheetor set me back $20 USD and that figure is less than impressive in my opinion.

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  2. @ Colbey: HKD$500 is about USD$65. The Henkeis are also pretty marked up here (but there can be good deals to be had though). I'm very unimpressed with Cheetor, Grimlock, Dinobot, Hot Shot too. These are figures I didn't get and don't plan on getting. Otherwise, my Henkeis are more or less complete. =)

    @ Arkvander: working on that... heh.

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  3. Any Ironhide/s? I still need it HD!

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  4. Yeah, the beast Henkei figures were a disappointment. I only got Cheetor for his tech spec card!

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  5. I hear ya on Cheetor/Dinobot/Hot Shot, but I think you should grab a cheap Grimlock, and just put it aside for now.

    As for complete, what about Henkei Wildrider? (:

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  6. @ gdmetro: actually, I saw a MOSC Henkei Ironhide, C9+, yesterday. It was going for HKD$550, which I thought was a little steep (I don't know what the market price is). I do understand however, that Henkei Ironhide is one of the more difficult to find Henkeis in HK.

    @ Jay: Nope, don't have Wildrider and I don't see why I should either. Figures like Breakdown, Wildrider, Drag Strip, Overkill and like are what I term crass that Hasbro is trying to shaft down my throat. To me, they are just random repaints mis-mashed with a random name with not one iota of G1-tributeness in them (other than maybe, the name). I wouldn't get these even if they were dirt cheap, to be honest. =)

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  7. @ gdmetro: actually, I saw a MOSC Henkei Ironhide, C9+, yesterday. It was going for HKD$550, which I thought was a little steep (I don't know what the market price is). I do understand however, that Henkei Ironhide is one of the more difficult to find Henkeis in HK.


    That is pretty much the Ebay price... guess I gotta pick one up from Ebay. Thanks!

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  8. @gdmetro: Suspected as much. Most of the prices here are very close to eBay or Yahoo Auction prices. While there is the off chance that a good deal can be found, there usually isn't much arbitrage.

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  9. Henkeis out of control.

    Have to give my own market watch... as you know I was hunting for Henkei Ironhide- the cheapest ones on ebay were about$75-80US including shipping. The max was in the mid $90 mark. (These are factoring shipping overseas)

    This week they completely vanished- all bought up- no Henkei Ironhides on US ebay. Ludicrous.I cant even imagine what the list prices will be now.

    The Henkei starscream I bought less than a year ago for $20 now sells for $75-90!!

    And apparently Henkei Mirage is now worth $100 US or more now. Glad I picked up MOSC one for $50 earlier this year- instant $50 gain without doing anything...

    Perhaps the market will crash as one poster said in a previous comment?

    In all your collecting years have you ever seen anything like it? It sounds even more absurd than g1 price hikes.

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  10. ^ Henkei price comment was me- forgot to put name.

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  11. Hey, then the hkd$ 550 MOSC Ironhide I saw actually sounds cheap by comparison!

    Henkei prices are just crazy nowadays. The rate of price hikes are definitely faster and higher than G1, with certain pieces more expensive than even Minty 20 year old vintage G1 pieces.

    When the united pieces are released, henkei became even more in demand, because ppl know that now the can get very near to the "full set" of the core '84 and '85 characters, which are still by far the most well known and popular ones.

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  12. IMO, there's not a chance in hell of a market crash with Henkei. The only thing that could result in a drop of price is rerelease of the exact same figures as they did with Hound and Convoy.

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  13. @Jay: That is more in line with what I was thinking. If Takara does do a re-release of figs as they did Hound/Convoy then..ouch for those people paying $200USD for Henkei Ratchet now.

    -Does anyone know the reason as to why Takara chose to re-release those 2 specific Henkeis only? Were they the most scarce figs from Henkei pre-reissue?

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  14. I certainly don't know why. Hound was definitely the scarcest, but there were others more scarce than Convoy, like Cyclonus. I remember first seeing this:

    http://www.seibertron.com/transformers/news/rumors-possible-reissue-of-transformers-toys/17758/

    Now, we've gotten all of those but Six Shot. And Cyclonus is only applicable if you include Challenge for Cybertron or Battle in Space.

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  15. @gdmetro & jay: I certainly don't understand their choice of reissue for henkei, but Hound was still a sound choice since it was so difficult to find before the reissue. The very strange thing is this -once it's reissued, the value/scarcity of the toy seems to be permanently destroyed (on the assumption that I don't believe the reissue would have met all previous demand that drove the prices up in the first place). Eg, I still see henkei hounds shelf warming in HK.

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  16. Check out this tweet I saw today by the owner of Kapow Toys:

    "United possibly getting a rerun - toys in the frame - Jazz - Tracks, F&R,Wreck Gar, Blurr,Scourge,Wheeljack - should get confirm next week"

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