Before I get on to the first review of the month, I need to have a little rant - a Mattycollector.com related one, to be specific.
A while back Mattel started changing some shipping from boxes to shipping bags, but as an international buyer I hadn’t expected that they would be used for shipping a collector’s item all the way to Australia. As you can see from my rather sad pics of my MOTUC Catra shipment, I was terribly wrong.
This particular journey began when I made my latest trip to my post office box. (I have all my purchases sent there as parcels sent to my house tend to get left at the doorstep even though a collection card is meant to be left. I’d hate to risk something happening to my toys, right?) The clerk went out back to fetch my parcel, and when she came back there was a plastic bag wrapped around it. Never a good sign. It soon became apparent that the bag had sustained some rips and tears along the way. The clerk was most apologetic, but commented that sending something overseas in a bag like that seemed like a bit of a risk.
I waited until I got into my car to open up the bag and survey the damage. As you can see, the white mailer box that Catra was shipped in has been fairly battered as well. A pretty disappointing result.
Now, the figure itself is fine, and as I’m not a MOC collector and I don’t collect the mailer boxes I’m not going to try to chase up a replacement, but I still think I have grounds to be unhappy about this. How on earth can Mattel really expect buyers to be happy with this kind of service? What happens when products I do want to keep in their packaging, like the Retro Superheroes line, arrive in that condition? When I fork out megabucks for my Legion of Superheroes boxed set, are they going to send that in a flimsy bag, too?
Mattel is putting out some fantastic product at the moment. It’s a great time to be a DC Universe, Masters of the Universe or Ghostbusters collector in terms of the toys being produced, but it’s just as equally a frustrating time in terms of availability and service. Things are never going to be perfect, but I do think Mattel is starting to push the friendship.
Have your own Matty story to share? You can discuss it at the AFB Forum, and you can comment on this post to enter the June AFB Comment of the Month Contest!
Until next time!
4 comments:
this kind of things r more usual than we would like to accept & as collectors than invest some hard earned bucks not only in the collection figure itself but in the delivery as well, the least u can expect is something careful & not this... =/
This is just terrible and they ship like this because what? To save a few bucks while the customer gets damage items? I know nothing was wrong with your figure but that is besides the point because a large company like Mattel really should know better in my opinion and sometimes to be honest from the things i read or seen i feel they know they can get away with so they don't care.
Hello. My name is Eduardo and I live in Rio, Brazil. I had heard of those blister envelopes before receiving my Moss Man figure and I was very worried. Luckly, it has arrived in a box. It's a disrespect to all customers to use an envelope to shipping a collector's figure. I have a strange and paranoic theory: Mattel is doing that to force us into buying more than one item. I don't know, that is just me. Thanks.
That choice of packaging is just fucking stupid. I scanned the post and saw the pictures first and assumed you were writing about some shoddy ebay seller, sending you battered second hand goods.
That's disgraceful.
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