Wal-Mart Fight!!!!

[fredmellini]

Just doing a little venting here!!!! We just had a new Wal-Mart super store open this morning at 8am in the next county. I got up early this morning and drove over there getting there at 8am, I walk into the store and head to the toy dept. to check out the models and some hot wheels for my son Michael. when I get to the Toy section I see a swarm of about 10 guys going nuts over the hot wheels and johnny lightnings!!!! I then decide to head over to the models and of course no one is looking at the models LOL!!! After checking out the slim selection of models I again try to venture over to the Hot Wheels and now I hear two grown men ( and I use the term "grown men" loosely) start yelling and now the F-bounds start flying!!!! Mind you you there are other shoppers, women included within hearing distance and then all of a sudden the one guys pushes the other guy and yells something about he gets the Hot wheels!!!! Long story short I step in between them and tell them to knock it off and grow-up and what a bunch of idiots they are fighting over toys!!!! I just wish there was a better way of dealing with these Hot wheels and Johnny lightnings. The flea market and ebay guys are making it nuts for the true collector--The days of walking into a store and finding something you want are next to none. My son truly collects hot wheels and has close to 100 treasure hunts, and they are all sealed and hanging proudly on his bedroom wall. He has paid for all of them himself from earning money cutting lawns etc. It just kills me to see him pay someone 15 to 20 bucks for a 97 cent car!!!! How is a kid suppose to get interested in something that the adults are ruining!! I don't mind if a true collector adult or child finds it first for there collection--but the guys and gals scarfing everything up to resell at 100 to 300 percent more than retail!!! No wonder the kids have no interest anymore. I am not bashing selling on ebay per say--Hell I do it myself but it is usually something that is no longer readily available or it is something out of production!

[Deleted]

I saw a guy go bananas over some new HW in the red package at a Wally in Columbus Ohio when I was on my way to Toledo NNL. He was so wild he eneded up knocking half the cars off the pegs and onto the floor....where he leaves them after findinf two.....sad

[gwangiboy]

Time to switch shopping to Target!

I'm glad I missed the Hot Wheels day at Kmart last year (think it was last year) ... the sight of grown men biting each other would have been too much. The area was a little bit of a mess later that afternoon, but I didn't see any blood on the floor, so maybe it went off OK ...

[A.J.]

I can honestly say that in my time of collecting Hot Wheels, I never encountered anything like that. And since I don't really care for many of the new Hot Wheels I probably won't encounter it at all. I still like to browse the diecast isle but there just isn't much that will draw the very little cash I have out of my wallet...LOL!

I've only heard the stories.

A.J.

[donculley]

i remember about 7 years ago walking into wally world, and as i was scoping out the racks, what do i find but a treasure hunt in the top corner of the display rack. i thought it was just a coincidence because it was the first car on the peg. later that day a friend of mine went there and a woman employee told him, "you won't find any good ones because she gets them all" . when he mentioned my find she told him that she put it in the corner rack while she was putting the cars out ,but she got called up to the front of the store and when she came back it was gone.. and she was still mad for losing out on the car ! its not just the dealers, the employees get a bunch too. i don't bother with them anymore, i think the new stuff is pretty much junk. i'll stick with my redlines !

[chief]

Fred, I had the same thing happen about a year ago outside Atlanta at a new supercenter and YES they were slinging fists over HOT WHEELS, I WAS a bigtime collector about up to five years ago when they decided to make WHEY to many Hot Wheelslike the baseballl card industry did several years ago and it KILEED the market and the really diehard collectors from even collecting anymore,at least me and a few friends QUIT all together, I sold all my old redlines and went straight to modeling again something FUN AND ENJOYABLE and NO CRAZY crap, so I know what ya mean Fred,.................................Chief

[Deleted]

Just as bad was right after Adam Petty was killed at NH my sons and I spotted two older ladies going though a gondola bin of Racing Champions. We heard one say to the other 'here's a Petty!' and the other looked at it and said 'thats not the dead one'.......shame

[stevehammann]

Last year while I was a prisoner of Indiana, I boxed up some of my older HW stuff (leftovers from 10-15 years ago) and set up at a couple of shows. The only thing I could sell was to serious collectors of vintage. Most of the people showing up had only been collecting for a few years and turned their nose up at most of my stuff because they were looking for new stuff to fill out their "first editions" set. Hell I even had some of the FIRST First Editions for sale CHEAP and they looked at them like a calf looking at a new gate!

[Tim Nolan]

I was a huge collector of Hot Wheels and JL's and anything else that caught my eye until maybe 7 or 8 years ago. It just got too crazy, and like you've all said, dealers ruined it, employees ruined it ( I heard of some taking cash pay for holding cars for dealers and collectors) Prices got nuts too. I had over 7000 pieces,and I sold about half of them to help finance my 1:1 Duece. I havent mourned them, and I kept the early redlines whcih I truly still have a fond affection for. I still pick up stuff I like, mostly hotrods and showrods. I still have a huge cabinet behind my bar floor to ceiling full of them. I got the most satisfaction several years back up at the Toledo show, when dealers who had scarfed up case after case of the "vintage" release cars were eating them for lunch, they had created a false market, drove up prices, then got stuck with thousands of them! LOL! I loved it, and finished getting all the cars I wanted for a song!! ;D

[BigDave]

I remember those days. About 4 years ago I got into an argument with some guy because I picked up the cars that he had laid down. How was I supposed to know that all the cars within reach were his. I just left cause it wasnt worth going to jail for a hot wheel. After that I gave it ip for good.

[robriley]

i was big into hot wheels from 1995 until about the year 2000. i've seen this so many times in the past, and it's actually pretty stupid. "grown" men fighting over 97 cent toy cars...that's just stupid. one guy started that stuff with me over a treasure hunt that i found on the rack. he wanted it, and i wouldn't let him have it. after i paid for it, he waited for me outside the store. he asked if i would take $5.00 for it. i told him no way, and i ripped open the package right there in front of him. i told him that if he wanted it, it woudl cost him $20.00. he abotu had a heart attack and started calling me stupid for opening the package. i was very tempted to set it on the ground and stomp on it, just to make him more mad. i told him that i was going to take it home, and give it to my son to play with. he thought that i had no idea what i was holding...but i did know. i just did that to make him mad.

[rob m]

LOL yeah it soooo nuts. I don't even bother with TH anymore I can't be botherd fighting for them. Still buy the First Editions and stuff but I just wait until there eveywhere and then no one wants them LOL. Just wait unitl next year when the 66 Batmobile come out its gonna be nuts. About a yeah ago I was in a wal-mart looking through the stuff and the employee asked if I was looking TH I said sure. He had hidden them all for about 3 months in a box under a counter and wanted $5 for the prevladge of being able to buy a TH from wal-mart. I reported the guy. Who the hell needs these guys. its fun to make a few extra $$$ selling some old toys but its just gotten stupid

[Honest Charlie]

I don't have to fight anyone at 5:30 in the morning. ;D

[Alan Alexis (stavanzer)]

Yeah, I've had that happen myself.
I gave up the little bitty cars for good 2 years ago.
No worth the hassle.

I was at a W-M about 6 years ago,and I was reaching for an HW that was on a top hook. As I got it in my hand, I felt my wrist get slapped! It was a woman standing next to me.
"I was looking for that one. It's mine" she said.
I kept it. She was p'd. Sje wasn't looking for it, until I reached for it. Silly woman.
After that I stopped buying them at W-M.
I am glad now. The new ones ahve 'jumped the shark' and look lousy IMHO, and are not worth even the 97 cents.