Art of the Shelf: Pre Ordering

This week’s Art of Shelf we are going to sit back talk about every collector’s best friends and at the same time their worst enemies preordering. Pre Ordering is something most figure collectors do. It can be very helpful as it will guarantee the item ordered, however it can be very dangerous if you’re not smart about it.   

Ok Now why is pre ordering so dangerous you may ask? Well the problems with pre ordering can be really simply talked about in three parts: the first part is delays, the second part is money managing, and the last and lest dangerous part is shipping.   We're going to break down each of these problems and look at the root of the problem itself.  I would like to note before we being that most of this will be speculation as I am not an industry expert.   

The first major danger of preorder is delays (interesting fact one item I ordered and was delayed shipped as I was writing this). Now this is less of oh your order has been delayed because of X or Y reason and more that toy companies on both the retail and collectable levels just set arbitrary dates and hope to release them on time. I have pre ordered many things from varies places and they would have as a release date example January 2015 and the item doesn’t reach the retailers until March or April. This is very common issue in the toy company and sometimes hurts toy lines (another blog will address that subject). This may happen for different reason that may include a manufacture delay, licensing issuers, or failed product testing. Any of these reasons could be likely for a delay in a product release. This is a danger with pre ordering though often it is outweighed by the guarantee of receiving the product.

The second major danger is money management.  This danger goes hand and hand with delays and is the most dangerous aspect of preordering. The reason why money manage meant is dangerous is most places will not charge you until the item is ready to ship.  This can be a problem when an item gets delayed and you’ve forgotten or you pre ordered months in advance and forgot. Whatever the reason was you were not ready for it to ship and you are charge and don’t have the funds on your credit card or you bank account was over drawn. This can make preordering stressful as you need to be mindful of your pre orders and how they are paid for. Now there are a few ways you can avoid this problem but they depend on the site you use. The first solution I have is PayPal. Most place when you pre order with PayPal you pay up front for the item, however many places don’t offer this option. My second solution is a prepaid debit card. Though this can be dangerous as they charge you for each transaction so be careful. The best thing with this is to not go overboard with pre orders and keep your eye on them.

The last danger is almost not a danger at all and that’s shipping.  Sometimes though very rare you are shipped a pre order still in the distributors box. Now this isn't always the case but it can happen some times. When this happens you have a chance of a damaged product and there are a few places that don’t offer protected shipping. This is a shop at your own risk, and avoid the places that don’t do protected shipping. Like I said this is the least dangerous of the major problems.

All in all best solution is be smart when pre ordering, know where you are buying from, and pay attention to your money.  This has been another Art of the Shelf I hope you enjoyed and learned something.