Toys to Retirement Weekly Wrap-Up #20
Lots to chew on this week...
Hey friends,
Busy week in the toy world. Let’s dive right into it.
Mass Amazon Gatings
I have received numerous messages in the last 48 hours about several brands becoming gated (not restricted), mostly in the toy category. I’ve been lucky enough to dodge this round of gatings, but I can sympathize with how frustrating that is. Marvel, Monster High, Disney, Pokemon, Hasbro Gaming, and others are among the brands that now require 100-400 units to ungate.
I think I would feel a lot more panic about this if they were restrictions, but being only gated provides a path to resolution.
Is it cheap? No. But the silver lining is that this will weed out those who aren’t serious about the toy category. While I’ve yet to see any significant seller count drops, I can imagine over the next couple of weeks we should see people start to drop off listings and hopefully see some prices steadily start climbing.
The truth is, Amazon doesn’t need 100 sellers all sending in the same item to their warehouses when they can get that same quantity from 50 sellers. I’ve been saying it for awhile now — Amazon wants hobby and casual sellers out. There is too much ‘riff-raff’ occurring with muddy supply chains, stolen goods, and sellers who are delivering sub-optimal products they find from discount bins — not good.
I’m hearing from several people that this is the ‘last straw’ for them and they’re packing up and leaving Amazon for good.
It stings now, but if you’re serious about toys, this could be exciting. Even if just a few hundred units are knocked off most toy listings, that could result in each of us netting some extra cash with every sale this Q4 or sooner.
While I can’t speak on Amazon’s behalf, I would recommend getting un-gated sooner rather than later. There’s no telling if these gates will elevate to restrictions or if distributors will quickly run out of stock on the ‘best’ items to ungate with as sellers rush to place orders.
Lastly, do not order items and then return them. That is the quickest way to get on a distributor’s bad side and can lead to them making it more difficult for Amazon sellers to get wholesale accounts. Not worth it. Run your business like a business, not a hobby.
Mattel wins the rights to produce full range of DC toys
This is a huge deal. It’s not 100% confirmed yet, but this may mean that McFarlane is losing the rights to the DC line. It’s seeming more and more likely that is the case, and expect a massive shift in the next year as this transition begins.
Mattel’s previous attempt at a DC line wasn’t incredibly favored by collectors, and was more so targeted at appealing to children. If they go down that same path again, I have to say I’ll be very disappointed.
There is no denying that McFarlane has been a tough brand to nail down consistently from an investing perspective, frequently having figures go straight to clearance, but some of the best toy investments you could have made in the last few years have been McFarlane. Wonder Woman, Bane, Poison Ivy — all toys that any of us would have been happy to put our entire net worth into.
If Mattel produces this line like they do their other mainline products such as Monster High, Barbie, or Jurassic World — we may have less investing opportunities in 2026 than we do now. Hopefully they do a collector edition line like McFarlane has been doing.
What does that mean for McFarlane figures in the meantime, if they truly do lose the license? Well, you have a lot of disgruntled fans. People who spent thousands on a toy line only to be told hey, your Justice League isn’t going to be able to be completed. A lot of people are already checking out and won’t be buying anymore McFarlane moving forward.
For now, I think the hot McFarlane toys only get hotter (1978 Superman, Wonder Woman collector edition, etc.) and the mediocre figures remain mediocre.
Stay on top of this bomb drop, it really will have ripple effects in the toy world.
You can read the full press release here: https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2025-02-27/mattel-wins-back-lucrative-rights-to-make-dc-themed-action-figures-other-toys
Leaks, Rumors and News from the Box Office
Allegedly ‘Thunderbolts’ has had some test screenings and is actually testing better than any Marvel project from this phase. That says a lot, and the film could be a sleeper hit. The question is, does the merch do well if fan reception is positive? Not sure. If you’ve been reading my weekly wrap-ups, you know that I think character design is extremely important to how well a toy does. The Thunderbolts lack interesting design (in my opinion), but Bucky could maybe pop based on his previous figure. Definitely keep an eye on this movie, it could turn some heads if the figures are underproduced in expectation for a bomb.
A Teen Titans live-action movie is in the works at DC Studios — MASSIVE news for the title as this show has a cult following with beloved characters. If James Gunn’s upcoming Superman movie is a hit, expect a newfound hype for DC that will lead to HOPEFULLY great merch sales (all depends how Mattel wants to tackle their production). But just go look at the Collector Edition Starfire figure and you’ll see why I’m excited.
Some alleged leaks have dropped of the 2027 Godzilla x Kong movie. I won’t talk about specifics here, but if you do some YouTube searches you can probably find the alleged leaks. If they’re true, we can expect some INCREDIBLE figures and toys for the movie that kids will love. I don’t care how stupid the story is for a kaiju movie, I just want monsters destroying things, and that’s what it sounds like it could be. Regardless of if the leaks are true or not, nothing excites me more than hearing about a new movie being released in a series when there is merch from the previous movie available on the shelf. It basically means “hey, by the time this next movie comes out all of this merch that’s on the shelf now will be gone because we only want the new stuff out there.” That’s where us toy investors come in, you following?
I’m sure we’ve all seen by now, but a new Shrek teaser has dropped with the announcement of Shrek 5 releasing in 2026. This is one of those movies with cross-generational appeal and if it receives a positive audience response (despite the character design updates), expect merch to be very popular shortly after the movie releases.
X-Men ‘97 has confirmed to release in 2026, though most were expecting 2025. Fans are understandably annoyed, as a two year delay between seasons really kills interest in the product. We still have a stacked year ahead of us, with at least a few years of great toy investing potential basically confirmed — it is what it is.
Showed some toys I might buy (or already bought)…
Did an article this week showcasing some interesting toys that I felt are worth monitoring. I try not to reveal too much, and prefer to teach how to fish rather than what to fish, but every once in awhile I like to drop some stuff that’s on my mind for learning purposes. Check it out here:
Tip of the Week #17
When selling stuff locally, don’t forget to dig deeper into what exactly your customer is buying the product for. Sure, you get the obvious mom buying a toy for their kid customer — but every once in awhile you get someone else who is also in the toy game, maybe just in a different way.
Today I did a bulk sale of some damaged LEGO and found out he also sells used video games, Hot Wheels, and other toys at a flea market on the weekends. What a coincidence, I had a few dozen cases of some Hot Wheels I was too lazy to list individually on eBay and doubled my money by selling it to him for cash. Wouldn’t have happened if I didn’t ask what he did and what else he buys.
A lot of people are afraid to admit they resell, but once you open up that door for them they’re usually more than happy to tell you more and who knows — maybe you make a good connection.
That same guy will be getting a text every time I have a bunch of Amazon returns piling up in my garage sale pile!
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