>>10456333>They could have fit this on store shelves, but why risk a retail retail run when they know the fan base will foot the bill for them.I don't really know why people treat this like a bad thing. Sure, they could have fit it on shelves, but they have no idea what the demand for it is. For all they know, it could only sell a few thousand, or it could sell tens of thousands. Why take that risk when you can produce the exact amount that you know are going to sell, and you take all the guesswork out? On top of that, its really up to retailers. GI Joe shelf space at retail is tiny. Its probably 2-3 pegs for single figures, and then a small shelf space below that for one of the $40 2 figure or figure+motor cycle combo boxes. That helicopter is gigantic. The box would need to be 3 feet long to properly hold it, or it would probably have to come in two main pieces, body and tail, and need to be assembled, but you'd still need a pretty big box.
You'd maybe be able to fit 1-2 of these on a shelf, but then you run into another problem: Either this high-dollar item sits for ages eating shelf space that could have been used by much smaller, and cheaper, or it sells right a way, and now you have a huge void of dead space on the shelf where there's no product, and you may or may not even get any more in.
>I can name at least half-a-dozen 1:18 vehicles that are larger than the Classifed Dragonfly that were on store shelvesI honestly can't think of anything, at least not recent and not at this price point. 1/18th isn't even that common of a scale anymore more outside of SW. I'd believe 1/18 SW vehicles on the shelves, but come on, its Star Wars. The huge ships are usually pretty iconic, and again nothing really sits in the price range these larger classified vehicles are at.
About the only high-dollar items that you really see at retail are usually LEGO.