We spotted a slightly concerning post on the Facebook page of Outer Rim Trading Co. regarding the popular 21303 WALL•E set.
According to the post, they have been advised that there will be no second shipment of sets and that stock already in the Australian market is all that is being sent.
From our own investigations this set sold very quickly – a local store advised that they had received 60 of the sets and sold them all within a day.
The lack of a second shipment could be related to issues with the neck of the model – or it could just be an example of LEGO Australia underestimating demand.
This stock situation doesn’t affect the Australian online store – orders on that site don’t come from Australian stock. Currently the set is still listed as available on the online store.
Edit: Just to clarify a little further; according to the post in question there was a second shipment due in November which has been cancelled. At this stage we have no way of confirming if there will be additional shipments after November. The post indicates that there won’t be, but that’s solely at the discretion of LEGO Australia. I spoke to a few stores today and none were able to confirm if more stock would be coming in or not. The intent of this post wasn’t to definitively state that there are no more WALL•E sets coming but more to highlight that at the very least it could be a while before smaller retailers get more stock. There are reports that Toys R Us will be stocking the set so it’s possible that they have secured an exclusive and that’s why small retailers won’t be getting more.
For those interested, here is the full post from Outer Rim Trading Co.
We’ve just been advised by LEGO that there will be no second shipment of WALL•E’s in November as planned, so whatever stock is currently left in the Australian market is all there will be. If you were still on the fence, now is the time to buy before they hit the secondary market at greatly inflated prices. Unfortunately we are currently sold out.
Will the ones already in the country have the design fault?
From what I have read there are two different issues – US stock had an issue with one particular part and was delayed. The other issue is the rotation of the head and LEGO haven’t really said anything about changing that.
The second shipment was cancelled as it was sourced from North America and had the quality issue.
A sales person at a Mr Toys told me that the faulty Wall-E was “only overseas” and that they “won’t be getting anymore Wall-E’s in”. I thought it was just the usual Australian retail scare tactic to try and get me to buy their last one, that was already reserved for someone else.
This was what Lego were saying about JW until every independent got a second shipment recently.
There were lots of rumours that JW was a single shipment, but I don’t recall LEGO ever confirming it. Hopefully the same thing will happen here and the retailers will be able to order additional stock soon.
I think it’s very dangerous (& suspicious) when a Lego retailer takes to Facebook and makes a statement like that. Whatever the current situation is with the ‘neck stability issue’ I’m confident TLG will resolve it. They are too heavily invested to go “oh well, that was a dud” and cease delivery to Australian retailers (& possibly production) as was inferred in that FB post. The fact that a local retailer said they sold 60 in a day should be an indication of whether it will be available here in the long term.
I don’t think there is any suggestion that LEGO will stop selling the set themselves, but it’s possible that independent retailers are only getting the one shipment. Apparently Toys R Us are going to be getting the set soon, so it may be that they are getting more of the stock and limited numbers are going to the smaller operators.
I think that’s exactly what Outer Rim were suggesting ie. “now is the time to buy before they hit the secondary market at greatly inflated prices”. I think the suggestion that TLG might stop selling it is implied in that statement otherwise why would anyone need to buy it at inflated prices on the secondary market? My point was their statement could be misinterpreted and is misleading, I don’t actually believe it to be anywhere near the truth.
I can see what you mean.
Retailers seem pretty clueless most of the time. I’ve heard Myer et al say this is the last time we’ll ever get them and then 6 months later a shipment comes in. Not having a go at Outer Rim, but in my experience there is no way to predict what TLG will do. How long is a piece of string? – anyone’s guess