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Re: Elephant in the room

Dear Allan,

with all due respect, to kneel before a virus is asking too much from us, as manufacturers :slightly_smiling_face:.
On a serious note, day before yesterday we had a joy of speaking to Nigel Hannant (owner and MD of Hannants - massive warehouse and on-line shop dealing with scale models) in person, who told us, that his on-line sales have soared and he can barely cope with them with a reduced number of staff, part of which is sitting at home. He had to take a 2,5 hour drive in a white van all to the way from Lowestoft to London to collect our new set.
Earlier today our distributor in Germany received his lot from us as well as our Italian distributor.
So, for those of you, who are not tired of life and always hungry for something new, the rescue is on its way:



Will you ever have a better chance to clear off the backlog of unpainted figures or incomplete diorama or unread book?

Faithfully Yours,

Strelets

Re: Elephant in the room

If it safe to carry on, then carry on, my view long term is to avoid any thing Chinese made if I can and only buy if I truly have no other option, Mars, Sars, covid -19 they are not learning , they could kill us all next time.

Re: Elephant in the room

I completely agree with what Mr.Alan said. Moreover I wanted to thank Strelets for they new French grenadiers. I have ordered them and they arrived today. Wonderful pieces. Congratulations and, if the working conditions keep you in safety, go on with this high quality production.

Ale

Re: Elephant in the room

All sympathies with those who are suffering from the pandemic at present, especially in those countries particularly badly hit by it - Italy and Spain in Europe it seems are worst hit, the USA also.

I would favour continuing with regular releases of new figures however. I agree with Messrs Hannants that this is a time when those of us who are able to can continue to collect and paint figures, even on a modest and relatively low-cost basis perhaps.

I admire Strelets for continuing to design and produce new figures at this difficult time. Anything that we can do to keep things 'normal' is a good thing. Companies who do much of their business on-line and through mail order should in my view continue to trade, so long as their warehouse and sales teams are able to do this safely.

I am looking forward to ordering several sets of the new French Grenadiers for the WoSS next week, and various other items as well.

Keep safe everyone.

Re: Elephant in the room

in these difficult times not only do we have to deal with the virus but also the economic impact and we need to come out of both in as good a shape as possible.i have a local model shop which i used to visit every couple of weeks, and while i have a mountain of figures to paint, this week i purchased items online off him and one of the reasons - i want to be able to visit again when we get back to normal, we need to keep trading otherwise the biggest impact of the virus will be an economic depression. but to end on a positive, thank you strelets for the new figures it lifts the spirits

Re: Elephant in the room

It's up to the manufacturers. If they can afford to continue to release sets in these times of potentially low sales and they are allowed to keep their business open and it's safe to do so why not? it will mean they have a stock of products ready for sale when the market recovers. And even low sales will give some necessary cash flow, I imagine that closing down for the duration of the virus might see some manufacturers go out of business altogether because sales of the last set are needed to fund production of the next one.

Of course lower sales might limit the amount of sets a manufacturer is able to produce (production has to be paid for) but that won't be by choice.

Whether or not you can afford to buy the new sets is up to you; If local hobby shops are open I'll spend some money if I can otherwise I'll spend some money when I can.

Re: Elephant in the room

If manufacturers can continue to produce during these times then fantastic. I'm sure most online stores are currently doing very well but I do worry about the brick and mortar shops who have no online sales. I visit one particular shop once a year when on holiday in the area, it has a huge selection of 1/72 figures, and I try and avoid buying online in the few months leading to my trip there so I can get the items from the shop to give them my business for the year. I hope these retailers survive this current health crisis. And as you've mentioned Hannants, if anyone is ever near Lowestoft, it is worth visiting their warehouse. Ridiculous scale of operations. Just a shame the Strelets, Hat and Redbox sets are upstairs where the public are not able to browse.

Re: Elephant in the room

Elephant in the room..... that would explain that
big pile of doogie i tripped over in the dark...

Re: Elephant in the room

That made me chuckle, Its best to stick to little dogs they know their limitations.

Re: Elephant in the room

Thanks for the response and best wishes in your attempts to carry on in spite of the current mess. As I've said before (and if I've said it here - apologies) - we need to use wisdom, but the bottom line is to either live in fear - or live. The choice is ours.