So Red Pill is showing off their upcoming 1/32 F-4B Phantom at Nats this weekend, and as pictures are landing on the socials, one question keeps tearing through my brain:
Is it possible to short a model company?
I’m sorry. This just seems like the n-millionth time I’ve seen this play out.
Modelers say they want an uber-kit in a large scale, detailed to the nines. For shits and giggles, throw in the kitchen sink of possible options and promised variants.
Company develops uber-kit. Then, at best, company completely abandons large scale things. At worst, it’s the last kit they ever produce.
Past is precedent
Remember the Tamiya 1/32 Mosquito? An absolutely brilliant kit that as far as I can tell, maybe four people have built. It cost a lot to develop, a lot to buy, and Tamiya hasn’t gone near 1/32 since.
Or how about the Kittyhawk range of Blackhawks and Seahawks in 1/35? So many variants. Honestly, variants I didn’t realize existed. But a 1/35 4-blade helicopter takes up a lot of space. Doesn’t play nicely with modest display cabinets. How many were people realistically buying and building?
Kittyhawk shut down.
Or the Wingnut Wings 1/32 Lanc?
Wingnut Wings shut down. And the company born from its ashes, Kotare, has been wisely sticking to Spitfires and 109s so far. Bread and butter, guaranteed sellers.
Dropping down a scale…has AMK ever made anything since the F-14? How many Minibase Su-33s have you ever seen built up? Do you think their F-16 is ever going to come out?
The brands that have really pulled off the big kits (I’m not counting 1/32 single-engine props here…) have done so largely by not chasing exhaustive detail (HK Models, Andy’s 1/16 armor, Trumpeter) or by sharing the engineering costs with smaller scaled versions (Trumpeter and recently HK).
The one exception
The only real exception to any of this that I can think of is the Bandai Perfect Grade Millennium Falcon. But that’s also Bandai. And the Falcon is also one of those holy grail builds where you’re not trying to sell 16 variants.
FAQ
Does the Red Pill F-4 look impressive?
Yeah, sure.
Do I think it’ll sell well enough up front?
Probably.
Do I think I’ll ever see more than maybe one or two built up in person?
Nope.
Do I think they’ll make it through their entire promised list of variants?
Nope.
Do I think Red Pill is one of the cringiest possible names, and likely to cost them enough sales on the edges that it could be the thing that makes or breaks them?
Absolutely.
You could say exactly the same for Jetmads, yet they seem to be doing fine despite a small number of copies sold and a crazy price tag. As long as there is someone willing to fight for certain kits -especially the ones that have never been tooled- we should applaude the efforts with all our might. We’ve seen more than enough bread-and-butter kits and the list of imported yet untooled kits is getting long.
Yeh, too much desperate offerings and too many modelers with collections that will never get built. I’ve never bought and built a 1:32 kit.
What’s wrong with the name?
The idea of awakening to a harsh reality may not be appealing to everyone.
In some parts of internet this meme from matrix was taken over by toxic masculinity guys. My first thought was Doog is going to rant about this.
Apart from size, cost, and interest, there’s time. The Tamiya Mossie is a complex kit, people do, and have, lost interest with it. Others have picked up on that and have steared away. I have two but frankly I have no interest in the FB variant, much prefer the bombers and PR variants, so mine are stash queen’s at the moment.
Overly complex kits with high parts counts are not big or clever. Kotare know this and have designed their kits to be simple to build yet well engineered, well researched and finely detailed. Winner all round. More of that please.
Eduard is doing the same in 1/48, as are Tamiya with their P-38. Now that I have had my eyes sorted out and I can see properly again, I’ll probably focus more on 1/48, more choice, and in most cases with new moulds, very well detailed, but at a more reasonable price point and at a manageable size.
Aircraft like the F-4 are great and all that, but there’s only a handful of variants that matter, but also in 1/32 it’s massive, it’s big in 1/48! Kits like that are a vanity and in my opinion won’t sell, far better in 1/48, and focus on the variants that have some provenance. As for the name, definately not my first choice. Someone in marketing obviously things they’re being edgy and clever.
I think your whole premise, which if I mat summarize as “producing 1/32nd scale über kits commonly leads to a model company either ceasing being in business, or retreating from the production of said 1/32nd scale über kits” is founded on an assumption that is is best that a model company produce that which guarantees the survival of the company. This may ultimately be a flawed and counter-intuitive assumption, given the recent history and nature of the injection-molded modelling industry and given trends that are steering the industry.
First, why would it be a bad thing if a company’s venture into producing a product that stretches its financial means as a risky business venture be a bad thing? The nature of business is to take high-risk/high-reward ventures that provide a potential high return for investors, as well as opening market opportunities for products that had been previously deemed as too risky to invest research, capital, and production tooling to bring to market. If the alternative, as illustrated by your assessment of Wingnut Wings and its later rebirth into Kotore, is that companies ought to better invest their endeavors into low risk ventures, leads to grave implications for the modelling industry. If modelling companies only, or generally invested their efforts into sure things, we would be left with release schedule of the nth iterations of the greatest hits of commonly modelled subjects. We would then be back to complaining about the 1000th retooling of Bf-109s, P-51s, or F-14s.
Secondly, the modelling community and thus the resulting industry is rather small fish in the Global GDP, and it is mostly a self-contained ecosystem. Many of the start-up companies are made from modelers who seek to see a quality release of a long-neglected subject matter, or a subject that evokes nostalgia or grand feeling of modeling enchantment. The point is that the release of the subject in polystyrene perfection often steers the choice to move a company in a certain direction. This has knock-on benefits as it often results in the realized desires of fellow modelers that share affinities toward the chosen subject matters.
Third, out of the ashes of many of the failed companies come newer start-ups that buy the models, if not the molds passing to established companies. The Kitty Hawk debacle resulted in Zimi Models and the bones of Accurate Miniatures, Wingnut Wings, and others have been brought back to life by other companies. What this means is the company that took to research and tooling risks were ultimately left insolvent as a company, but the state of art was advanced through their failure, and the fruits of the risks still resulted in the resulting products remaining on the market for modelers to purchase.
On the matter of cringe, what the modeling world needs less of is GenX snarky, pseudo-intellectual ponderings being passed off as axiomatic.
Wow, I don’t think you could have sounded more pompous if you tried
I have two Minibase Su (unbuilt), got them early because of fear that the company will not survive such a level of complexity, the seat alone is like 20+ parts.
On the other hand, the existence of 1/200 battle cruisers or a 1/350 Ford makes the idea of a 1/32 Phantom more reasonable.
Totally agree with you Matt, I bought the sublime Tamiya 32scale Mosquito, took one look and realised I,d have to die, be reborn and even then would never have finished it…I admire those who have built it , but sadly beyond me
I guess Im part of the problem. I have all the large scale kits. AMK, Tamiya p-51 and Spitfire, Minibase Flanker, Great Wall and just about every Zoukei-Mura kit out there.
What do I actually build? 72nd scale airfix kits mostly. They’re fun simple and if I screw something up, I have more in my stash. But most of all, they are fun to build.
Not part of the problem at all Robb, as you’ve bought those kits. Ultimately, a company doesn’t care if you build them, just that they sell. Doogs presents a good argument, although I don’t agree with all his examples. Whilst The Lancaster probably helped bury WNW, ultimately, it wasn’t what killed them. That was not releasing enough big sellers like the Camel, Fokker VII, Nieuport and Spad in a timely fashion to fund all the oddities they released.
WNW was always going to be a limited time deal as it was a passion project by Sir Peter Jackson. If he hadn’t run afoul of NZ tax laws, I’m sure they would still have closed once his interest in backing them.
I think the biggest reason these big 32 scale kits don’t sell, is as Doogs pointed out, most people just don’t have the room. They take up far too much valuable space in a display cabinet.
Yeap – got the mossie, sold on, got the minibase su and border lanc… holy crap… I even find the tamiya f-4b overly complex… JUST got the Kotari Bf109K – and it’s PERFECT – quick to build up, perfect level of detail and will get me to the painting in a week at most (if you spend more than 7 days on that cockpit, your over thinking it)… Almost no filler (not there yet, but the dry fit good/better than Tamiya)… agree 100% – but… I’ve my eye on the mega new 1/32 Fury, and also working on the ZM bf109g – so yeah… a sucker for punishment… but will they get finished…
Mega 1/32 Fury? What are we talking about here, Hawker Fury biplane, Hawker Fury post war beastie, or the NA FJ Fury? Please God make it the beastie…🙏
But even if you don’t finish it, its the journey (for me) that matters. For a kit no one has built yet it is getting a lot of grief. I’m going to wait until Karim Bibi has uploaded a build to pass judgement.
More importantly. Why in the living love for all thats alive and sane would your name a company Redpill? Like, you want people to think you’re closeminded rednecks? Or you use it as some old reference less than 10% of your customers get? Or just have an ugly nonsensical name literally nobody connects with what you make, and most expect to be either tryhards or bad doctors? Or just to be “funny”?
Aside from subject choice. Like anyone ever has asked for a 1/32 Phantom, since Tamiya dropped a 1/48 in 2021 nobody will trump in any way the next two decades.