Has Merit stopped making their own brand kits?

[RussellE]

Hi all

 

not sure if this topic is in the correct area (admins, please move if required) but looking at Merit's website yesterday and I noticed that they're no longer listing any of their own brand kits.

 

Does anyone know if they're still producing their own, or have they stopped?

 

Russ

[Space Ranger]

Merit (the manufacturer of plastic kits) went out of business years and years ago. There's a Merit International Ltd. in California, but as far as I know, it is just a distributor.

Edited August 19, 2019 by Space Ranger

[RussellE]

Hi Michael

 

couldn't be "years and years ago" surely, as their most recent release was around 2016 if memory serves? 🤔

 

Well that's too bad if they went out of business. 😢

 

Scalemates shows a couple of their offerings have since been re-packaged by other brands, EG Hobby Boss have released the 1/200 Mikasa and Trumpeter the 1/350 Kittyhawk.

 

Does anyone know what happened to the rest of Merit's ship series?

[Space Ranger]

The only Merit I am familiar with produced some 1/24 car and 1/48 airplane kits back in the late '50s/early '60s. That is the Merit I was referring to.

[dnl42]

The Merit @RussellE is referring to produced a lovely 1/48 J2F-5 Duck in 2016.

 

Sadly, I also don't see any of their own brand on their website. 

[RussellE]

1 hour ago, Space Ranger said:

The only Merit I am familiar with produced some 1/24 car and 1/48 airplane kits back in the late '50s/early '60s. That is the Merit I was referring to.

Nah, I'm referring to the Merit International that released the 1/350 Ark Royal, 1/350 USS Enterprise etc...

3 minutes ago, dnl42 said:

The Merit @RussellE is referring to produced a lovely 1/48 J2F-5 Duck in 2016.

 

Sadly, I also don't see any of their own brand on their website. 

That's the Merit I'm referring to! 🧐

[Harold55]

I could be wrong but I thought Merit International was a brand associated with Trumpeter

[Homebee]

3 hours ago, Harold55 said:

I could be wrong but I thought Merit International was a brand associated with Trumpeter

 

That's what I thought too. Some of the Merit kits have already been reboxed under Trumpeter label.

Anyway you can always try to ask:

https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/profile/17408-meritofficial/

Threads about Merit kits in the Rumourmonger section: link

 

Merit International Ltd

https://www.facebook.com/MeritIntlLtd/

http://merit-intl.com/meritnew/index.php

 

V.P.

Edited August 20, 2019 by Homebee

[VMA131Marine]

Trumpeter obviously did all the tooling, production, and packaging for Merit International's line of kits. Some of these have since appeared in Trumpeter or HobbyBoss boxes so it's not clear whether Merit ever owned the tooling. That information is not likely to become public.

 

It does appear that Merit has stopped commissioning new kits from Trumpeter and Merit is now acting strictly as an importer/wholesaler at the moment. If I had to guess, they probably concluded that the ROI on new kits was too low to make new projects viable. Merit was also producing completed models, and these seem to have stopped also.

 

The Merit kits I recall are:

1/18 SBD Dauntless

1/18 Fw 190A-8

1/18 AV-8B+ Harrier II

1/24 SPAD XIII

1/24 S.E.5a

1/24 Folder Dr.I

1/35 X-Class Midget Sub

1/48 Grumman J2F-5 Duck

1/48 Gloster Gladiator Mk.I & Mk.II

1/48 PT Boat

1/48 Soviet Torpedo boat

1/200 HMS Ark Royal

1/200 USS Hornet

 

I'm sure there are others that I don't remember.