(Flower) Marketing

I haven’t talked about what I’ve found at the flea markets lately because I haven’t found anything worth talking about. All I’ve picked up are a few odd bodies, some non-H-R minis, and a few books. I think I’ve spent more on produce than I have on horses. (Which is not hard, considering how expensive produce is this year.)

I don’t think the market is tapped out, as much as it’s going through a weird funk right now. In the meantime, I’m trying to pay down a few bills - and stockpile a little cash for some bills to come. (Though I will admit to spending a little bit too much time looking at group lots on eBay - I need that horse-buying fix!)

Apparently there’s a new, non-Mesteno-based series of Classics on the shelves of Walmart right now, but I haven’t had a chance to stop by one yet to get all the info. They appear to be a mix of repackaged older releases and some Gift Sets, with all the usual accessories, Companion Animals, and creepy dolls. Mid-States (Rural King, et al) may have something similar going on, too, but so far nothing but a few vague listings - no pictures, no descriptions - are showing up on the Rural King web site.

Rather than talk about things that do not exist, let’s talk about something that does:

Yeah, I broke down and bought a couple of those Breyer Blossoms thingies. They had a bunch of them in the Pit this year, all of the releases through July, at the non-club price of $25 each.

I was going to get one of each of the three molds used in the program until I remembered that I rather liked the October horse Calendula, on the Johar mold. I’m enchanted by the notion of a model horse that’s intentionally orange, and not merely a failed chestnut. So I just bought the April (the Morgan Mare) and the May (the Warmblood Mare), and will bide my time until October.

I like the series more in person than I did in the photographs (this is never a surprise) though not enough to want to buy up the entire series, yet. They seemed to be selling modestly well in the Pit, though most folks who were picking them up were doing it strictly on a "and just one, for my birth month" basis.

A few months back, Reeves ran an ad for the Breyer Blossoms in the USA Weekend/Parade supplements that come with many Sunday newspapers. The target audience for this ad was not the hobby, obviously, but people who wouldn’t have otherwise thought of buying a Breyer as a gift.

And who knows? Once they get one, maybe they’ll get another. And another, and another…

More on Reeves' marketing strategies another time, when I have the time.

Sometimes, Boxes Do Matter

I’ve done everything I could to avoid writing this week.

There’s plenty to talk about, and I am having no problems in regards to my facilities. But instead of sitting down and banging something out in the past three days, I’ve cleaned the garage, reorganized the bookshelves, shuffled some horses around, and randomly moved an assortment of boxes around in the basement. Every time I go outside to walk the dog or take out the trash, I have to fight the urge to pull weeds in the garden.

It’s gotta be this crazy, almost-snowless winter messing with my head. The mild temperatures and lack of shoveling have been nice, but not if it kicks my spring cleaning mode into overtime.

Now that Reeves has released photographs of all twelve pieces in their "Blossoms" series, I have narrowed my potential selections down to the one of the Warmblood Mares. The funky chartreuse Chrysanthemum one is currently on top of that list, but the green Lily of the Valley and the Blue Larkspur aren’t out of the running, yet. Since the Chrysanthemum one isn’t coming out until November, there will be plenty of time for me to change my mind, especially once I start seeing some of the others in the flesh (so to speak).

I only have one other Warmblood Mare in the collection, and it’s the original Special Run release for Ariat, in 2007. Still new in box:


I’m not a big fan of keeping models boxed, but there’s a reason she still is: I think she was one of the samples that were part of the Ariat display at BreyerFest in 2007 - one of the few pieces that wasn’t stolen.

The program that the model was a part of didn’t officially launch until the fall, so the models in the lightly-attended-to Ariat booth attracted a fair amount of attention - and a few sticky fingers. From the somewhat rough condition of the box - and a handwritten date from early July, on one box flap - I suspect that mine was one of the ones that managed to avoid that fate.

Ironically, it was the condition of that box that allowed me to acquire her in first place. She was left behind in the Ninja Pit in 2008, ignored by the horde. Their first reaction to a ripped up, dinged up, written on box? Pass!

Silly collectors. It wasn’t even the first time that had happened to me, either. (Or the last - remember the Red Halter Gray Flashes, from last year?)

As I’ve detailed before, packaging samples are a common occurrence in the Pit. Most of the time nobody notices them, because there’s (usually) little to distinguish them from the production packaging.

And as I’ve also explained before, sometimes it’s the littlest details that matter. In this (rare) case, it was the box that mattered, not the horse.