Tracking toy tariffs

It's weird to see people cutting Brian so much slack for the layoffs and acting like it's out of his hands. I run a company. If I lay of 70% of the people working for me, it's because a LOT of things went wrong. Even if my combined material and labour costs went up 145% tomorrow - that doesn't mean I send everyone home (and, of course, keep my own salary exactly the same... right?). Needing to do that IMMEDIATELY is a sign that it was already definitely going to happen. Anyone that's run a business can tell you that, I expect.

Also, even if he'd gotten the money in the KS, I have a feeling Sharty's line would never have seen the light of day. Just want to be clear about that. However fucking stupid, ill-considered, and lame-looking those figures might have been, however bad of an idea overall that line might have been, EVEN a successful Kickstarter wouldn't have saved it because Shartimus doesn't seem mentally equipped to run a business and manage the creation of an entire toyline. I think he would have tanked it and spent the next 10 years making excuses like that guy that did the knock-off Warhammer 1:18 line and disappeared except to pop up on Facebook once in a while to say that everyone questioning where the figures are a decade later are assholes and meanies and that actually he's working very hard on getting them out any time now.
Hellscreamerz, with a fucking z. That was it, right?
 
Hellscreamerz may have been the name. I almost contributed to that KS. I was just getting out of 1:18 stuff around that time, so I decided to pass. I did put money toward Army Alphas (6" generic army figures, may be wrong on the name) which turned out to be a bust. I do think Shartimus would have done the best to follow through and deliver his line. Love or hate him, he does have a presence in the action figure online world. He's not just another customizer who can kinda fade into the shadows. Larger profile. More to lose. It's a risk of crowd-funding though. I tend to give creators the benefit of the doubt. I'm sure most of them have the best intentions and sometimes shit just spirals out of control dealing with something way more complex than you originally anticipated especially when dealing with a foreign factory.
 
Ashtalon said:
Hellscreamerz may have been the name. I almost contributed to that KS. I was just getting out of 1:18 stuff around that time, so I decided to pass. I did put money toward Army Alphas (6" generic army figures, may be wrong on the name) which turned out to be a bust. I do think Shartimus would have done the best to follow through and deliver his line. Love or hate him, he does have a presence in the action figure online world. He's not just another customizer who can kinda fade into the shadows. Larger profile. More to lose. It's a risk of crowd-funding though. I tend to give creators the benefit of the doubt. I'm sure most of them have the best intentions and sometimes shit just spirals out of control dealing with something way more complex than you originally anticipated especially when dealing with a foreign factory.
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Oh, I agree about intentions. I've defended Boxghost on that front, despite him completely disappearing after his two successfully Kickstarters didn't materialize any product. I think he just got in over his head and didn't know how to stop drowning. I don't think he went in with the intention of screwing anyone. He wanted to make toys. It just didn't work out and not everyone is the kind of person, or in the position, to come out and say 'sorry, I messed up and nothing is going to be made.'

But I also think Shartimus is a complete dummy that had no idea what he was getting into (much like Boxghost, in fact). He may have more presence and more to lose by not delivering - but reputation doesn't put product in hands. No matter how protective Sharty might be of the space he occupies in the hobby (if he even does anymore -- does anyone still care about him?), he could still utterly fail to get figures made.
The question would then be does he stick around and defend himself, stick around and admit he fucked up, or pull a Boxghost and disappear forever? I think he's more likely to go with the former and bank on his reputation to float him until he can figure something out, even if it's years and years of no-product. He seems way more the type to just try to keep the hype-train going while offering paying customers nothing.
 
Damien said:
It's weird to see people cutting Brian so much slack for the layoffs and acting like it's out of his hands. I run a company. If I lay of 70% of the people working for me, it's because a LOT of things went wrong. Even if my combined material and labour costs went up 145% tomorrow - that doesn't mean I send everyone home (and, of course, keep my own salary exactly the same... right?). Needing to do that IMMEDIATELY is a sign that it was already definitely going to happen. Anyone that's run a business can tell you that, I expect.

Also, even if he'd gotten the money in the KS, I have a feeling Sharty's line would never have seen the light of day. Just want to be clear about that. However fucking stupid, ill-considered, and lame-looking those figures might have been, however bad of an idea overall that line might have been, EVEN a successful Kickstarter wouldn't have saved it because Shartimus doesn't seem mentally equipped to run a business and manage the creation of an entire toyline. I think he would have tanked it and spent the next 10 years making excuses like that guy that did the knock-off Warhammer 1:18 line and disappeared except to pop up on Facebook once in a while to say that everyone questioning where the figures are a decade later are assholes and meanies and that actually he's working very hard on getting them out any time now.
Hellscreamerz, with a fucking z. That was it, right?
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Not to mention the fact that people are forgetting that he was already laying people off, very talented people, starting last year before tariffs were even a thing.

Is it out of Brian's hands? Yes and no. I'd say his 25 mill investors have a big say in that, too.
 
Spectre Two said:
That isn't confirmed, is it? Sure, he said he would do Street Force, but I felt that was just tongue in cheek.
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That's what I'd hope. Like, it just seems so petty. I'd rather believe it was just a bad joke than actually making a whole toy line and sinking tons of money in just to spite one dude.
 
RicksNerdLife said:
Not to mention the fact that people are forgetting that he was already laying people off, very talented people, starting last year before tariffs were even a thing.

Is it out of Brian's hands? Yes and no. I'd say his 25 mill investors have a big say in that, too.
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Yeah, Super7 really got out there and controlled the narrative, didn't they? What.. THESE layoffs? Oh, this is Trump's fault. We'd NEVER lay anyone off if it weren't for these rascally tariffs, don't you know. Thing is, we're actually psychic and knew these were coming months ago, so we just kinda got a head start on it. You understand.

Investors are usually idiots that, on some level, rely on people like Brian to tell them what needs to happen. I doubt they just mandated cutting most of the people that make the toys unless Brian said they can do without them. That's my feeling - Brian made sure Brian was going to keep getting paid and probably threw any- and every-one else under the bus to make sure his bottom line didn't take a hit. No proof. Just a feeling.
 
The way I see it is Ultimates were on shaky grounds to begin with and the tariffs killed them. S7 are in FAO Shwarz now with a Peanuts section filled with far less complicated merchandise being sold to collectors and kids. Can probably make all that with a much smaller team. Literally a lot less moving parts. Were they planning on eliminating Ultimates beforehand? They probably considered it, but I have a feeling they were hanging in there and finding a way to make it work.

Someone went on one of the youtube streamers I had on in the background while working, maybe Toy Anxiety? and said he saw Brian's tariff bill for the TMNT figures and it was insane. I imagine they were banking on those four brothers to sell well and maybe makeup some losses. Making that wave - which again, had all four brothers, which are always going to be the best sellers of the line - potentially not make them any money or make them lose money... that's a big deal.

Also considering they have to still absorb 30% tariffs on all the other stuff shipping in over the summer on top of that. But the hardest part is probably keeping people on staff as salaried hires when you don't know if you can feasibly ever release any of the work they are currently doing in the day to day because you have no idea what the expenses are. They probably realize charging people $65+ for a standard Ultimate will lead to even more blowback and customer resentment. They also don't know what anything will be in a years time.

I know a lot of people hate Brian Flynn, but I don't picture him clicking his heals in his office saying "finally! I can lay off everyone and blame it all on Trump! Brilliant!" Nor do I imagine he's stoked his company pulled out of SDCC, which they had been planning for at least a year in advance. If we lived in a world where the tariffs were never an idea in Trump's head, and hadn't been bandied about since the campaign, I think Brian would still be selling Ultimates.
 
AgentHemlock said:
The way I see it is Ultimates were on shaky grounds to begin with and the tariffs killed them.
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I'm curious what you mean by 'shaky grounds?'
I don't necessarily know everything that goes on at Super7. Not by a long shot. But I actually do manage to find out some stuff. My understanding from the sources I have is that Ultimates has been one of Super7's flagship products pretty much since they took over MOTUC. Ultimates, again - as far as I have been told - pretty significantly outsells most of what else Super7 does and is typically far more popular (i.e. Internet chatter and general views) than anything else they do.

It's no secret that Brian Flynn doesn't necessarily care about articulated action figures and much prefers toys that look like they came from the '70s and shit like that. But also that isn't a business model that can sustain itself, it would seem, and Ultimates was the direction Super7 went in order to have something in the production schedule that had wider appeal to modern collectors.

There's also no indication as yet that Super7 plans to stop selling Ultimates figures.

Also, I can imagine a tariff bill at 135% would be insane. But it's all relative, too. Some random dude claims to have seen Super7's single tariff bill and the number was big. But he doesn't necessarily know what the bill usually is, how many items that bill relates back to, or (most importantly) what S7's projected profits or losses are going to be. Big companies operate with big numbers. Unless you know how to interpret them... they're all just big scary numbers.


AgentHemlock said:
Also considering they have to still absorb 30% tariffs on all the other stuff shipping in over the summer on top of that. But the hardest part is probably keeping people on staff as salaried hires when you don't know if you can feasibly ever release any of the work they are currently doing in the day to day because you have no idea what the expenses are.
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Weird how NECA, Mattel, Hasbro, Jada, JAKKS, Jazwares, JoyToy, Boss Fight, Storm, Hot Toys, etc, HAVEN'T all announced that they're laying off 70% of their staff, then. They all have to deal with the same tariffs to sell in the same markets. They all have to deal with the same uncertainty. These problems aren't unique to Super7.
As I said earlier -- what Super7 has done is the kind of thing you do when you were already in really big trouble beforehand. And as Rick pointed out, it's not like Super7 hadn't already laid a bunch of people off before the tariffs ever happened.


AgentHemlock said:
I know a lot of people hate Brian Flynn, but I don't picture him clicking his heals in his office saying "finally! I can lay off everyone and blame it all on Trump! Brilliant!"
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Yeah, it would be crazy for a person at the top of a company to be excited that world events have offered him a convenient way to do the thing he was already going to do without him having to be the bad guy in the situation.
Like, do I think Brian Flynn was waiting for an excuse to lay people off because he WANTED to? No. I think his company is failing because he's a dumbass and makes constant bad decisions, and that he was headed toward laying people off (again) no matter what. Tariffs definitely exacerbated the problem, but also gave him a way to do what was already coming without having to take any personal responsibility.
And let's face it - I don't think I've ever seen Brian take personal responsibility for a single fucking thing as long as I've been aware of Super7's existence.


AgentHemlock said:
I think Brian would still be selling Ultimates.
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To be clear.. there's no indication that he's not still going to be selling Ultimates. A lot of the people he laid off have finished or almost finished -at least- a year's worth of product. Brian can comfortably dump them all in a sewer and still be able to crank out product fairly reliably until at least late 2026. That's, honestly, probably going to be part of the strategy here; make money selling product without the cost of paying employees to work on new product at the same time.
That would, of course, put Super7 in a bad place for future product after all that stuff comes out. But when has Super7 ever been forward-thinking.
 
By Ultimates being on shaky ground... I meant that they've pretty much done all the best selling characters in all of their best selling IPs, along with a lot of deep cuts and supporting cast. They could certainly make more Playmates TMNT or Thundercats minor characters, but those probably aren't best selling rosters by any means. I don't know what's in the tank for GI Joe or Power Rangers, if they're even making anymore. Transformers is done, right? Silverhawks probably won't go too hard now that the main crew is out. I'm not saying they were dead but I'm not saying they were on solid ground. Hence, shaky. They seemed cautious about moving forward if preorders weren't strong, and even canceled some POs for lines that didn't sell well enough.

The guy who talked about the tariff bill Brian showed him was Blake Wright of Toy Collectr Magazine. I'm unfamiliar with him or his magazine, though he might have some degree of insight beyond what some random dude would have. Here's a link to the video, he comes in around the 48 minute mark.

I imagine they were banking on 2003 TMNT to generate some good will, but they potentially lost all their income on what may have been a needed hit. I don't know how you keep paying people monthly salaries if you don't know if the work they are doing will ever pay for itself, let alone make a profit.

I don't know what's going on with other companies or how they are coping, but I wouldn't be surprised if we see more layoffs, and gig workers getting far less gigs. The tariffs are compounding on several years of inflation, a housing crisis, and poor consumer confidence. Boss Fight had previously mentioned another wave of Fraggles, yet there's been crickets for a while, now. Wouldn't be surprised if tariffs make a third wave of Fraggles too much of a risk to move forward with.

I think S7 may potentially move forward with some of the Ultimates stuff they have already paid people to design, as well as repaints and Deluxe reruns. But who knows.
 
Not relevant to toy tariffs specifically, but I actually interviewed an industry expert (I freelance here and there for a patient safety magazine) about how healthcare is handling the tariffs in terms of supply chain. Sounds like they learned enough from COVID to have some plans in place, but that was for shortages, not prices going up to the point that they're in the red trying to buy supplies. We actually started the conversation like: I cannot believe we're having this conversation AGAIN after 2020, but here we are...
 
docsilence said:
Not relevant to toy tariffs specifically, but I actually interviewed an industry expert (I freelance here and there for a patient safety magazine) about how healthcare is handling the tariffs in terms of supply chain. Sounds like they learned enough from COVID to have some plans in place, but that was for shortages, not prices going up to the point that they're in the red trying to buy supplies. We actually started the conversation like: I cannot believe we're having this conversation AGAIN after 2020, but here we are...
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Former nurse, good read. Thank you.
 
altcunningham said:
Former nurse, good read. Thank you.
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Thanks for checking it out. I used to cover healthcare full time, but now I just freelance a bit because I'm a healthcare nerd with a family full of nurses and the work lets me keep an ear to the ground about what's going on. This guy and I could not believe we were talking about supply chain issues again so soon. He was pretty blunt about the lessons learned from COVID and how they don't solve the tariff issues, but at least give a few avenues to lessen the pain.
 
Damien said:
That would, of course, put Super7 in a bad place for future product after all that stuff comes out. But when has Super7 ever been forward-thinking.
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So, I think you are probably right about the plan to forge ahead with a year or two worth of product already designed out.

And I think once they reach the point where that stuff starts to run out they can circle back around with Deluxe re-releases and repaint variants and stuff while they hire - perhaps as contract workers instead of e.ployees - to resume design, if they still wish to.
 
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