Retailers depend on the holidays to make their year profitable, and toys are a large part of that. Collectors can use this to their advantage, for adding to their collections as well as buying gifts. While the two concepts of collecting and frugality may seem at odds, being a frugal collector means that you can buy more toys for the same amount of money.
As the holiday shopping season heats up, collectors need to start paying more attention than to just toy stores:
- sales ads for stores will have more toy promotions, including action figures.
- non-toy stores will stock action figures and other toys more than they do during the year. (Examples include grocery stores, shoe stores, and farm supply stores.)
- online stores will put out more coupons to woo new customers and to convince existing customers to return.
The online action figure collecting community is an open one, and has always been a friendly, sharing group. Pay special attention during the holidays: online collectors love to share news of deals and sales. Newsgroups, mailing lists, and forums are virtual meeting places: join in and make a few friends in addition to saving money by learning about deals.
With online deals, you need to act fast. If you wait a day, or even a few hours, the store might be sold out or the deal might be pulled. Online stores play "inventory control" games, and their prices show it - a $14.99 GI Joe might be $9.99 the next day and $29.99 the day after that.
Do you remember the "brick and mortar" post-holiday clearances of years past? The $29.99 Target-exclusive Timeless Collection GI Joes were clearanced for $7.94, and the 9-inch DC Silver Age SuperHeroes, originally $14.99, were clearanced for $3.74.
Regular scouting of brick and mortar stores during the holidays can pay off after the holidays: seeing what does not sell before December 24th can give you a good idea of what will be clearanced on December 26th. Ask at the stores if you can't find the clearance section, because some stores (especially Target) put clearanced toys on endcaps in non-toy departments.
Knowing store policies of price-matching and clearance mark-downs can also help. For example, the lowest level of Target clearance usually has a price that ends in a 4. In the picture above, you can see that the Star Wars Speeder Bike with 12" Biker Scout, which was originally $49.99, was marked down to $34.90 and then to $12.44.
