While rummaging around another site(Modelling Madness), I've come across the industry news that Hasegawa is raising their RETAIL prices by THIRTY...Yes..30 % effective September 1,2008.Tamiya is expected to follow suit.....
This does NOT take into account what the importers will do to the pricing. All I can say is that if you EVER want ANYTHING that is out now....you better be buying it. I have a feeling that this will really add to the malaise in the hobby industry.
It may very well be the impetus to buy aftermarket kits and accessories....they may be BARGAINS before too long.
I have been waiting for this shoe to drop......at EVERY show I have attended, everybody wants a deal....well, the new pricing will make the older kits on the shelves a TRUE bargain.
Wish I had a happy story to report...but this ain't it, folks.......Dave

Perhaps this will give a big boost to 1/48 as 1/35 gets too expensive.

Hello Dave,

Yes this is news that I have been waiting for as other things here in Japan are on the move upwards...Bad trend!!!!

JohnO

Hi Dave,

I'm not going to say that this rumor is totally bogus, but there is a touch of the panic mode in there IMHO.

Here's what the owner of my LHS (located in Tokyo) had to say:

- Hasegawa just increased the prices of their standard kits in May. (Standard kit defined as, for example, those 1/48 aircraft kits that start with "JT" and anything that is not a "special" edition with different decals, etc.) To do this, they had to reprint all of the box tops of their standard kits so that the prices are no longer on the ends, but are part of the bar code on longer sides. Therefore, it is very unlikely for Hasegawa to raise its prices again in September.

- Having said that, he also mentioned that it is a possibility that we will see higher prices for those "special" edition kits with the different decals and an extra sprue or two.

- He also said that it is very unlikely for Tamiya to follow suit, because Tamiya is already increasing its prices and has been for some time. He mentioned that practically every month there is news from Tamiya that they are increasing the price of this kit or that series of kits. The situation is so bad that Tamiya doesn't have any prices in their 2008 catalog.

So, there you have it. Yes, prices are going up as they naturally would with the main ingredient costing so much more. However, any talk about an across-the-board price increase by Hasegawa in September is bogus. It might be an across-the-board increase by the U.S. importer, but not by Hasegawa.

FWIW
Isamu