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DHS Villains in Vogue Store sadly on it's way out...
- Thread starter RLMickey
- Start date
momof2inmn
New Member
What exactly is Vinylmation? I saw a picture from the Disneystore, but is it just a squeezy kind of toy?? How can they make an entire store out of those things?
tirian
Well-Known Member
It's a hard plastic object with a design printed on top. A few of them are really nice; most of the images are ugly. The designs are divided into several series. You purchase the small figures sight unseen; even though you know which series you're getting, you don't know which particular design is in the box.
Some of the Vinylmation series have been big sellers, and the bloated Mickey shape is kind of cool in a grotesque way, but they're all basically just dust collectors. They're clearly marked "Not a Toy."
And this is the one reason I will more than likely never buy one. I can not fathom buying $10 figure after $10 figure hoping that I will get the one I am looking for.
LoriMistress
Well-Known Member
I don't understand the fad either.
CoffeeJedi
Active Member
It's part of the whole "urban vinyls" craze of toy collecting. Originally it was a handful of artists contributing their designs to another artist's base body, but it's since exploded with mainstream toymakers like Hasbro getting in on the act with their "Mighty Muggs" series.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Designer_toys
Originally it was pretty inventive, but now even Cartoon Network has their own little vinyl mascot character for commercial breaks.
This is another horrible decision by Disney when they are out of touch with their guests. This is the only store i go into every time I enter the park. Sadly, however, I noticed that they had seriously reduced the cool things that this store used to carry and replaced it with that Vinyl crap. I don't get the vinyl thing at all...it appears pretty lame to me.
Kamikaze
Well-Known Member
Hasn't had exclusive merch for quite a while.
SoccerMickey
Active Member
I'm not sure I see how this is a horrible decision by Disney. I think it's safe to say that the reason why the reason they stopped selling villains merchandise wasn't because they were making too much money off of it. In the past few years the focus of the merchandise gradually shifted from the villains to nightmare before Christmas and a lot of that merchandise was not only available at other Disney shops but also licensed out merchandise to other vendors. At least the vinylmations (for the time being) are available exclusively at Disney venues.
I'm not a fan of the vinyls but I think it's a pretty cool concept. What I think is great about them is 1. Unlike the bean bag plush from the late 90's this, for once, is Disney leading the trend on a new collectible. 2. From getting burnt on the fading value of pins and the bean bags, the die hard collectors have kind of backed off this. From what I've seen, the collectors will buy a case and call it a day. This appears to be a collectible driven by younger folks who are getting into collecting and doing it because they think it's cool, not because they think they're going to end up millionaires from it.
I honestly think this will be a fad that probably won't be around as long as pin trading but give Disney credit for striking on it while the iron is hot.
dreamfinder
Well-Known Member
But thats what happens at Disney. A particular manager decides he doesn't like a certain item or theme. So he stops selling that item. And then of course, sales of that type of item go down. And since it has gone down, they say people don't want it anymore, so they make less. It's a vicious cycle that ends only with the entire line being phased out.
The same general trend has been going on with all merch in the parks. They stopped making cool ride/attraction specific merch. Or even simply themed to the land. So then people stopped buying it. So then we end up with the same stuff in 95% of the stores on property.
It's a shame, and some of the merch coming out lately seems to indicate that someone in the merch dept knows that fans will buy good stuff, and not the same old crud, hopefully it keeps growing.
SoccerMickey
Active Member
Trust me, there's a big part of me that misses the days of the early - mid '90's where I had to buy a suitcase while pm vacation just to fit all the great trip to merchandise that we'd find at walt disney world. And having to make special trips to a specific park or resort because that was the only place we saw item x was an exciting part of the trip. Sadly, I believe that the reason why a lot of the unique items available got phased out was due to the fact that it just didn't sell. Where someone like you or I would love to have a figure or some tchotchke with an obscure character like br'er bear or Big Al doesn't mean that it would have that much appeal to warrant a mass production for the 10's of thousands that descend on WDW on a daily basis.
I can stand the generic items, I hate that disney's animal kingdom merchandise is available in adventureland. I don't like how you can get an item with spaceship earth on it in Hollywood Studios, or Star Tours merch is at Mission Space but apparently those things sell regardless. One thing I think they really need to cut back on is the dated items. There's no way this could be lucrative. 2009 dated junk is still available at the outlets.
I actually got to spend some time talking to a CM in the Villans store a couple of weeks ago, and he too was distressed over the increase in the generic being sold there, and the loss of the villans' merchandise. He has been with WDW for a little over a decade, and said there were a number of CMs he was friends with that all felt something was being lost with the direction Disney was taking in their merchandising. Now, he also said he loved Villans in Vogue, and had spent more time there than anywhere else. But I do think he was sincere in his disapproval, and that of (albeit too few) other CMs as well.....
tirian
Well-Known Member
Actually, the specific merchandise sold very well for almost three decades. Blame the generic crap on the Pressler DL era and the late 90s, when the Wal-Mart "good enough" mentality gripped American spending habits. Disney merch people love how they can spend less on huge bulk orders and charge the same price everywhere.
That said, some attraction and land-specific merchandise has been trickling into the parks over the last year, and it all seems to be selling well, even though overall spending has plummeted. Meanwhile, the outlets and cast stores are full of the generic stuff that nobody wanted.
I hate what has happened to Villains in Vogue, but its failure is also due to Disney's marketing machine. They've been pushing preschool play and tween trash for years, only tossing a bone to the REAL classics and breadth of the Disney name for DVD releases. It's no wonder nobody was buying the villains stuff (and no one was).
I'll be honest, I haven't read through all the responses, but two things. A) I too am sad about the villain store.
And B) funny that Disney thinks villains are "out the door" or at least on their way out but at the same time have signed on with MAC cosmetics to do a MAC and Disney present Venemous Villiains collection ..which will just so happen to be one of the largest licensed collections MAC cosmetics has EVER done. People come into our store freaking out and asking about a line that doesn't launch until late September. Not only that, MAC trainers are usually allowed to take pictures of upcoming collections for training purposes. This time at their training, they were NOT allowed to take any type of photograph. I have drilled my trainer on info and it is so incredibly top-secret and I go to my training on it in a week and a half! Obviously there is a large enough draw for villains that this has been a collection in the works and asked for, for a long time .. I think the sad part is, Disney is a company at the end of the day and they make money .. However, they have to .. Majority wins or better yet, cheap majority mind wins. =[
Edit: sorry had some silly typos!
And B) funny that Disney thinks villains are "out the door" or at least on their way out but at the same time have signed on with MAC cosmetics to do a MAC and Disney present Venemous Villiains collection ..which will just so happen to be one of the largest licensed collections MAC cosmetics has EVER done. People come into our store freaking out and asking about a line that doesn't launch until late September. Not only that, MAC trainers are usually allowed to take pictures of upcoming collections for training purposes. This time at their training, they were NOT allowed to take any type of photograph. I have drilled my trainer on info and it is so incredibly top-secret and I go to my training on it in a week and a half! Obviously there is a large enough draw for villains that this has been a collection in the works and asked for, for a long time .. I think the sad part is, Disney is a company at the end of the day and they make money .. However, they have to .. Majority wins or better yet, cheap majority mind wins. =[
Edit: sorry had some silly typos!
prberk
Well-Known Member
I hardly every buy any souvenirs any more when I go, because nothing is unique anymore. Everything looks exactly like everything everywhere else.
And they used to get a lot more of my money.
The best examples of unique shops that are gone now are on Main Street, and include the real magic tricks in the Magic Shop, and the real sports collectibles that used to be in the sports shop next to Casey's.
At least we still have Sig Cuhuenga's (spelling?) and the Art of Disney stores.
They just need to get back to the "imagine" part of "imagineering"...
Paul
And they used to get a lot more of my money.
The best examples of unique shops that are gone now are on Main Street, and include the real magic tricks in the Magic Shop, and the real sports collectibles that used to be in the sports shop next to Casey's.
At least we still have Sig Cuhuenga's (spelling?) and the Art of Disney stores.
They just need to get back to the "imagine" part of "imagineering"...
Paul
Figment82
Well-Known Member
Even Sid's has been hit by this plague. Up to a few years ago, you could purchase posters from random and obscure movies for an extremely reasonable price. They had containers on the porch with samples that featured all kinds of older Disney movies. I bought one from The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band.
Now those same containers have the same posters you can buy in tubes at the Art of Disney - ones that have Tink in the various seasons, etc. I keep checking to see if it has changed back, but unfortunately it doesn't look like it ever will.
DiPSU224
Member
As an avid baseball fan, I loved seeing all the sports collectibles at the sports shop by Casey's; it was my favorite shop. In fact, I think one year I actually bought a Chipper Jones autographed baseball...I never got to experience the magic shop though. I honestly don't have a favorite shop anymore. The only ones I actually look forward to going in are the Art of Disney stores. Sad.