Kind of following from an earlier post about an apparent shortage of Gunpla, I thought I would talk about the recent release of the Real Grade Hi-v Gundam, and how that sold out on the very day of it's release (last Friday). What surprised me the most was seeing images in the above video of people lining up for hours just to get their hands on a regular release Gundam. Just a reminder: this is not an event exclusive, or even a premium bandai limited run Gundam kit - this is a kit that (was) being sold in all stores.
This kind of thing seems to be in response to a few things: first, as I mentioned in the past, the Wuhan virus has led to more people finding a hobby that they can do at home, leading to an increase in Gunpla purchases. Consequently, supply doesn't seem to be able to keep up with current demand, leading to people missing out, and a lot of people still scalping kits at a significantly marked up price (with the RRP being 4500 yen, and scalped prices are going for around 10,000 yen - in one instance on Amazon Japan, I saw it selling for as much as over 20,000 yen!). Second - and while I didn't follow news of this closely at the time - this seems to be a reaction to the recent releases of the High Grade UC Nightingale, and Master Grade Eclipse Gundam, with both kits also selling out in Japan fairly quickly, and this time people didn't want to miss out - which, unfortunately, happened anyway. Even with limiting it to one kit per customer, stores just didn't have enough of the product for everybody.
According to the Bandai Hobby Site, they will be doing at least two more reissues of this kit, with the first one being in November, and the next being in January 2022.
As for myself, I was lucky enough to be able to order one through Hobby Search. I was working from home last Friday afternoon, and started keeping an eye on many online shops, including Amazon and Rakuten. By pure chance, I saw that Hobby Search was accepting orders for the RG Hi-v, and was able to put my order through before it sold out a few minutes later. To be honest, I was going to try my luck at my local Yamda Denki store on the day of release, but I was fortunate enough to see a window of opportunity to get the kit online.
Speaking of Yamda Denki, I went there after school today to check out the model kits section, and the amount of product available for purchase has dwindled significantly. Obviously no RG Hi-v, but I noticed that it's not limited to just model kits, but there was also very little variety left in toys in general - and from what I've heard, this shortage is happening for many other products, including printers (my girlfriend and I were looking to get a printer earlier, and the staff warned us of the backlog of orders, even if we decided on a printer there and then.)
This will probably be the last kit I will purchase for this year - aside from the P-bandai High Grade UC Messer F-02, and trying my luck with the Ichibankuji Gunpla campaign that will be starting later this month. But besides those, I've got a pretty decent backlog of kits that should last me well in to next year.
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