Now one could argue that due to their incredible detail and accuracy, Dragons recent releases warrant a U.S. 20plus dollar price tag, but Italeris re-release of the old Panzerjäger 1 listed at Squadron at $22.5 is nothing short of attempted robbery.

In its day the ESCI Panzerjäger 1 was a decent kit, and still is, but it's not even in the same league as the Dragon kits or even the newly tooled Italeri models. So why the inflated price?

Yes, it is the only injection molded Panzerjäger 1 offered in braille but its price would indicate it were of comparable quality and value to Dragons Pz4f1, and trust me for those unfamiliar with the old ESCI kit, its detail and accuracy is nowhere near the level of a recent Dragon releases.

Surely the price will drop as this is an initial release, but IMHO a more reasonable price would be in the 8 to 12 dollar range.

$22.5 for the old ESCI Panzerjäger 1!!!

I'd never have imagined this in my wildest dreams.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Cheers

Peter

Your right, I mean is this a joke? It deff. raises the value of that old ESCI
stockpile I have, just as they were starting to plunge due to the re-releases.
I just tore up one for parts a couple of months ago. Now I've got to find all
the pieces again!

Outragous for sure!

from a local stationary store that has a small selection of models. I paid the equivalent of $11US for it. Whoever is importing Italeri is really raising the prices. +$22 for a model! Yikes!

My two cents,
Jeff

When Fujimi kits were imported (by someone else) they were relatively cheap. Even into the 90s their old 1/76 range was about $5-$6. When they switched to MRC as their US importer the prices of those kits jumped up to $15-$19.

Now that Testors is not importing Italeri to the US, Italeri has moved over to MRC... and the same price jump has taken place. Not only are old molds being sold for as much or more than new kits, but even some newish kits reissued by Italeri are going for out of sight prices. For example, the AMT/Ertl Douglas A-20 Havoc was a $15-$18 kit a couple years ago... now its $70!

You should thank Bush for weak $ in comparision to Euro (exchange rate 1,48) and high shipping cost to US. Prices of Italeri models are in Euros.
In Europe (UE)[Poland]I paid for it 36PLN (Polish Zoty), $ is currently worth 3,12 PLN, but at that moment was circa 3,25-30. So I paid something around 12$, that's 8 Euro. (1 Euro is worth 4,50PLN that day, today 4,38).

Worth mentioning is the fact, that till march 2009 I paid 24-27PLN for Italeri models, but importer changed basic price because of PLN exchange rate fluctuation (thanks to irresponsible Hungarian and Baltic States, which are at the bottom of the crisis and are dragging neighbouring healthy countries in regon into one sack with labbel on it - HIGHLY RISKY! DO NOT INVEST HERE)

I would not be so quick to blame the others. I think that if someone is to blame, it is no one else but our dear Vincent.
Italeri prices have gone completely insane in Poland. Luckily there is still UM, whose models are pretty cheap now, and not worse than Italeri!

Funny you mention that!

I just came back from a HobbyTown USA store and was shocked to see Hasegawa's Panzer IV Ausf. F2 going for $20 USD. I found that so obscenely hilarious that I even took a picture with my cellphone camera.

$20 bucks for something that shouldn't even cost $10?

Cheers!
+Y.C.

The same kit is listed at ~US$6 at Lucky Model on sale http://www.luckymodel.com/scale.aspx?item_no=IT%207058)
~US$8 delivered..............does make the $22 a tad "rich"!
But even full price was only ever US$8.

Guess as much as we all want to support local shops during this time of economic hardship it certainly does pay to shop around.............sadly!
What WILL they want for the Wespe re-release....gulp!!!

Ive just done the currency conversion on that and it comes out as $36 NZ dollars!!! Brand new Dragon kits dont sell for that kind of price here! I know that the world economy is shot but these extreme price increases just dont seem to have any validity. If the model companies and suppliers keep demanding these ridiculous prices then they are going out of business. There is no way i am going to spend $36 dollars on a 30 year old kit!

As an aside, i was talking to one of the guys at my local model shop and he said they are no longer ordering speculative 1/72nd models. They will only stock new 1/72nd models if they already have several firm orders. They just can't afford to have kits on the shelf, which never get sold, because they cost so much. Its a bit sad really, because the discovery of a new lusted after kit on a shop shelf is one of the pleasures of the hobby.

Last weekend I got hijacked & force to go up to AKL & visit a couple of Model shops & found the DML Pz IV F1 at $49.95 NZD!
(The first Dragon kits came out at $19 most at $24/27 at the moment & $33/6 for the Panther G & Figures.)

I think sometimes the stores get 1/72 kits mixed up with 1/35 as I did find that & the 251 (with LAH figures) in the 1/35 selves, I guess it was because the box is bigger & the same as DML 1/35 smaller AFV kit boxes.
& maybe load the price to match 1/35 prices too?

Cheers Elliott

I purchased the kit for AU$31.50 yesterday. The same prices apply to the Tiger I initial and the Sd. Kfz.251/1 and 75mm Pak 40 kits.

A $15 increase in prices which I could understand is probably worth it for the Sd. Kfz.251/1 and 75mm Pak 40 kit as you get 2 complete kits in the box but not for the other two.

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
- Galileo Galilei

Could it be due to the Global Financial Crisis?

Has Italeri's decision to move kit production to china finally hit the buffers?

I can't imagine that production & transport costs have remained low during this worldwide recession/slump....(which has certainly hit china's manufacturing sector very hard)...I'd have thought the manufacturers were under pressure to raise wages now the goverment wants chinese people to buy the products chinese fatories make?

Maybe it's time production was brought back to to europe to cut costs?

se

I have paid 7 euros two weeks ago in a hobby shop in Charleroi (Belgium)
So for the scout car

Best regards,
Peter Wauters

Here in Germany the Panzerjäger is priced at 10.99 , that's $14.00 in the US.
But I found also the PzKpfw. II Ausf. f announced for 13.49 , that would be over $18 in the US.
Most Ex-ESCI are listed between 9.00-10.00 , so I think that the prices of the announced kits will drop to the normal 10 bucks.

BTW: For a while I was searching trough my stack and found a Revell Panther Ausf. A/D that I bought at my local hobby shop for 9.99 DM in 1996 (the time before the Euro hits the deck). That would be 5.00 today, but you normaly pay 9.99 for the same old kit!! (Not that much compared with todays standarts.)

Is Squadron the only shop which have such high prices for Italerie/Dragon/Revell kits?

In Spain its regular price is 11,15 , so 15,60 USD. Though in Spain the current distributor of this brand add more profit than the earlier one, I think that here its price is more or less in European standars. I could understand that in US prices could he higher, but SO high...
Fortunately you ever could buy them overseas and compensate shipping charges ordering other items.
BTW, though Italeri, Trumpeter and Revell increased their prices in this damn year is Dragon the winning: a couple of years ago the basic kits like Hummel costs more or less 13 (18,19 USD). Today costs 16/17 !(22,39/23,79 USD). Not to say the "damn" Pz.IV and early Tiger... So, even with their overprices, Trump and Italeri are still an cheaper alternative to the Orient Lizard.

"it is the only injection molded Panzerjäger 1 offered in braille"

No it's not. It might be the only one offered in 1/72nd scale, but Fujimi offer one in 1/76th scale -- and it is in fact a very nice little kit indeed. It even offers a (rudimentary) interior, which is more than the ESCI kit managed.

Still, it would be good to see a modern take on the subject -- given that Dragon have finally recently completed the Panzer IB family in 1/35th scale, reproducing them in 1/72nd scale would be a nice follow-up.


Bruce Probst
Melbourne, Australia

why not ask Attack to do one they already do 47mm pak and panzer 1A with interior, a new hull and shield and we have a new panzerjager 1 that will make a far better panzerjager then the old Esci model. I dont think that Dragon is going to make one in the next few years.

Greetings Patrick

some of my workhttp://poky609.fotopic.net/

They would need to do a new hull. There were no 4.7cm guns mounted on Pz.IA hulls, only Pz.IB hulls (so far as I know).

Edit: Re-reading your post I see you mentioned that a new hull would be necessary. But that means it wouldn't be a "simple" thing for Attack, they would need to do new molds. If they were going to do that they might as well go ahead and do all the Pz.IB variants. Not that that would be a bad thing! It would be nice to see a new range of 1/72nd Pz.IB kits to improve on the old ESCI offerings. Attack could capitalise on some of the work they've done on their I.A kits, I guess, so it would be a little bit simpler for them than for someone else to step in from scratch.

Bruce Probst
Melbourne, Australia

These are not the texts you are looking for.

more or less 13.95 dollars in a spanish toy shop. And the quality (the design) its not good...