“Optom” sends us new photos from Australia – I guess halfway through stacking the shelf, they looked at the orange band and realized it was not June 28th yet …

Of course, in today’s world, the embargo thing makes very little sense. There was once a logistical and a creative reason. Logistically, because deliveries were once arbitrary and hard to track, they wanted to make sure everyone had it ready to go with a long lead delivery time and to coordinate the marketing so it would all appear on the shelf at once.

In the 21st century, this old fashioned thinking is victorian donkey & cart thinking. We can track deliveries and tell by glancing at its tracking if it’s at the back of the truck or the front and that it’s speedily down the road at 64 miles per hour. With instantaneous information flow, what difference does it make?  Unlike a movie release when they tell people to go to that movie starting on that particular day, no one advertises toys will be available on _________ anymore.

The other holdback is creative – they don’t want to reveal any secrets/characters/action sequence before you’ve had a chance to see it on the big screen – but that is EASILY solved by shipping that “toy reveal” playset or character in WAVE 2 or closer to the opening of the film or AFTER.

In the case of PLANES, Disney PR has revealed every main character and the Disney Store has not only revealed every main character character but has released a diecast version – some with lights and sounds with dialogue from the film! The movie still has about 6 weeks before release so what does another week or two make? Either release the toys the week of the film release for maximum impact or just put it on the shelf when it arrives.

They did allow a purchase of Ishani.

This was also being displayed … so why is this called “Pull & Fly” when the bottom is sniped “NOT A FLYING TOY.”

Isn’t that just beggering for a false advertising complaint?

Thanks for the nice photos, “Optom.”