Trumpeter ship kit prices at Hannants

[Vlad]

Let me just start by saying Hannants offers excellent service in my opinion and is usually my one-stop-shop if I'm in the mood for 1/72 aircraft. I've heard their prices are inflated but generally with aircraft I have found this not to be the case, or at least the mark-up is small and acceptable for a quick delivery from a great UK based service.

 

But I also build 1/700 ships and this is where my issues lie. Hannants stock basically the full range of Trumpeter 1/700 ships. Fantastic. But what's up with the prices here?

 

Example: Trumpeter 1/700 USS San Francisco is £26 at Hannants. I can get it reliably for £12 elsewhere. Similar story with most of the kits. Some not as bad but over 200% of the RRP on probably a third of the range or more.

 

I know there are importers to pay but that mark-up is incomprehensible. I can buy these kits from China and pay more in postage than the kit is worth and still get them cheaper than Hannants before postage. Buy more than one at a time and it's a no brainer.

 

So what's up? What's constraining you and hiking prices so ridiculously on this specific kit range?

Edited March 15, 2018 by Vlad

[666nimrod]

We are not the importers of Trumpeter kits and only charge the price that we are charged by the importers, Pocketbond. I will check with them that their prices are correct.

Don't forget that our price includes UK VAT which would probably be added to any imported parcels by HMRC and freight, so the difference would probably not be as big as you are thinking.

David Hannant

[666nimrod]

In my first reply I took Vlad's figures as correct and did not do a check but now I have I think I can say that our prices are very near the average. For instance I have found one on e bay which with postage converts to £33.70 which with VAT added comes to £40.00 or £14.00 more than our price. I can't find any Chinese prices to compare but for many outlets I am happy that the UK importers prices are in the ball park with the rest of the world. Even one claiming to be giving a 33% discount works out at virtually the same before adding VAT.

We are currently listing over 120 kits of which about 10% are out of stock at this moment.

David Hannant.

[Vlad]

Hi David,

 

Thanks for taking the time to check and apologies if my opening post came out a bit aggressive. I am, as I said, a happy customer and will no doubt shop at Hannants again. However, since you checked e-bay I'm not sure how you didn't find dawngrocerystore. This usually stocks a fairly complete range of Trumpeter 1/700 kits with most at 50% of Hannants prices. For the aforementioned San Francisco that's £12.80 + 20% VAT + £8 postage = £23. Which admittedly IS close to your price, but combining postage on several kits rapidly adds up to a huge saving compared to buying from any UK store that presumably stocks from your same importer.

 

I'm not trying to put you down in comparison to that particular e-bay store, I don't know what they do to keep their prices so low (and maybe I don't want to). But as I said the discrepancy seems very specific to this range of Trumpeter 1/700 ships. I can hunt around on Hobby Search, HLJ or e-bay and generally will not find amazing discounts on other things e.g. Tamiya, Flyhawk or Hasegawa ship kits or 1/72 aircraft that are worth paying Asia postage for.

 

That's why this instance struck me as odd and why I wanted to open a discussion about it on these forums. I understand where you're coming from in that there's nothing you can do about your importer and that your prices are in line with the average for imported kits. Thanks again for your replies!

Edited March 16, 2018 by Vlad

[colin]

Don't forget you need to add another £8 in that to cover Royal Mails ransom charges

[Rob G]

You also have to take into account the wage differences, wholesale price, whether or not Mr Dawn pays tax and how much his commercial space costs him (not much, I imagine). And other things too, no doubt.

 

It ain't easy comparing apples from different economies...

 

I have this discussion with people all the time about cheap goods from the Orient vs what it costs to run a retail shop in a Western country. They usually buy on price, and then have the nerve to wonder where all the jobs have gone.