The several vendors I have found are either fellow Cars collectors, or secondary dealers who specialize in this sort of thing, marketing HTF toys on eBay.  Most are in Hong Kong, and from my understanding, they attend open air markets held around China where there are other dealers selling the toys.

Who those primary dealers are is unknown, but the toys often have blemishes or defects making them unsuitable for direct sale by Mattel.  I am guessing they are factory defects culled from production, that somehow make their way out the "back door" of the plant. The thing about them is, they offer a pipeline that hits the market several months before they are available in the USA; and in some instances, have had cars that are very rare (the red 'John Lassetire').  I have a 'Bennie Caliper' and a 'Bertha Butterswagon', both likely from factory production test runs.

Most of the toys are not counterfeits, just culled production parts that Mattel would scrap.  Some makers though are using their access to tooling to make unique Cars (the various 'LMQ' in country colors come to mind, the black 'iCar', the Steve Jobs car, the 'Mack' team haulers).  Those are likely seen as counterfeits, since they aren't Mattel designs or actual production.

Legality aside, it's capitalism at its best and worst.  I can't get some cars any other way since stores around me are awful at stocking Cars, and some are downright perfect when they arrive in my hands.  I've figured out that the "back door" cars hit the eBay market about eight to twelve weeks before they hit the stores in the US, so the trick is to determine what is going to be mass produced and available to all, and what Cars are going to be rare one-offs.  Be advised you'll pay collector prices on most to get them first, but that's the cut-throat world of collecting anything.

For those who lament this sort of thing as underhanded and deceitful, it has actually been a part of toy production for nearly a half century, many manufacturers used to sell or even GIVE factory defects from the plant to employees, or had ways of putting defective toys into the marketplace via trusted vendors.  In the toy train world, this was a regular occurrence with Lionel, and it can't be avoided.  Lionel at one time (1960's) actually had a group of guys who worked at the factory, who used their access to make unique rare toy trains for themselves as planned defects (painting errors mainly), that they then sold to collectors for huge profits.

I still can gets some books this way from a nearby publisher, they put defective copies in a pile, and employees can take home five books a week.  A friend works there, and can often get me railroad history books I want, at the cost of a scratched cover or cracked spine.

Post edited 8:27 am – February 28, 2014 by Mack_me_Bucko

There is a world of more detail that I don't fully understand, but it would involve how the contracts are written, who owns the tooling, the expected life span of the tooling, etc.

For example, we all think of tooling as something made once for posterity and used on-going forever.  It isn't nowadays, especially in the toy manufacturing world. Most tooling we see in the toy market is made for short term production, and has a finite life span of 10,000 to 20,000 units — coincidentally just about what some of the Cars are theorized as production runs.  There is likely a very good reason why some cars like 'Timothy Truecoat' were made once and are now out of production.  The advantage is that with tooling being made by CNC machines, replicating the tooling is easy enough, if a future production run is deemed desirable (the new Kaa Reesu comes to mind).

I know from my time in the model railroad industry, product research and tooling would be planned here in the States, tooling then made in China, and the final goods were shipped back here for final sale.  If you want a specific new model train, you buy it now, as it may never appear again, since the tooling wears out, and the manufacturer here in the States has moved on to their next planned project and doesn't care about the few hundred folks who missed a model the first time around.  This works to the manufacturer's advantage, largely, since inventory sells fast, and completely, meaning no warehoused stuff to pay taxes on.

Who owns the tooling has been a sore spot for many years, and recently the large German model train firm of LGB lost some minor tooling when the Chinese or Czech vendors they used never got paid in the LGB bankruptcy; so the one Chinese firm started selling "knock-offs" of some of the train cars — but they owned the tooling by then, so are they counterfeits, or what?  We know they are from the LGB tooling, and while they aren't made as nicely — but at $25 for two, instead of $100 for one, who cares?

It was common knowledge that if a US firm ordered 10,000 items, the Chinese factory would make at least 10,500 to 11,000 to account for spoilage and damage — as well as to provide a ready source of spares for planned warranty replacements.  They honor their lifetime warranty by simply sending you a new model — not repairing the old one you return.  Your return then is used as fodder for spare parts.  What was unstated in this system was the knowledge that if the vendor made 11,000 units for you, they might actually make 11,500 or 12,000; and sell the extras on the gray market.  Unscrupulous plant managers, or simply folks involved who knew the market could easily make side money doing this.  In one instance, the US maker was the one doing the back door selling, since they could sell a stock $100 model as a "rare" back door item for $150 — and completely eliminate the dealer market and their mark-ups. Pure profit.

This leads to costs.  Personal story.  Several years back at an industry trade show I horse-traded some goods with a friend who worked for Life-Like.  He got some laser cut structure kits (cost to me, almost nil), and I got from him a new unreleased N Scale diesel (cost to him, nil).  I asked if he didn't want more from me, since he was giving me a $100 item, after all.  He replied that the item cost more to ship here from China than it cost to make and package.  That $100 item he gave me would nominally be sold to a distributor Stateside for $45 — and the maker would likely make a 100% mark-up on that sale, so his cost might be $20 or less — and the intimation I got was that the cost was far less, like a few bucks, tops.  We can buy Cars at Walmart for $5 — so I suspect the actual final cost to Mattel of a 'Mater' or 'LMQ' diecast toy is maybe 30 cents — 50 cents in the packaging!  Toys-R-Us regularly sold Hot Wheels for a buck and made money on the deal — and a Hot Wheels car isn't all that different than a Cars diecast really.  Did my point make any sense in the previous paragraph?

I suspect Mattel pays for and owns most of the tooling now, but I would bet the 'Mack' team haulers were from early tooling they didn't contractually own, and now the Chinese vendor is making money selling goods using that tooling until it finally wears out.  I also suspect Mattel is fully aware of this, and knows they cannot do anything about it.  My one Hong Kong source says they buy these 'Mack Team Haulers' in an open air vendor fair/market, and has offered to give them design help in making the artwork better, but they cannot reach the actual maker, since the one they buy from is just another middle-man.

Eh, long winded, and hopefully of some use to someone … but I for one like the back door vendors … and hope they continue.

Post edited 6:39 pm – March 1, 2014 by Mack_me_Bucko

Well, I'm an opener, so not buying loose means I couldn't buy anything off eBay either, which would severely limit my collection at some point. For me, Mattel is just a company, and I buy what I want from them or others to complete a collection that appeals to me.

For me, having the Car in its proper slot in the collection is the thing, not the cardboard wrapper that (in my eye) adds nothing to the value of the final product.  Besides, I wouldn't be surprised if Mattel had a hand in the back door marketing too.  It's pure profit for them.

But then, I have taken a hack saw to limited edition 1 of 500 brass locomotives that cost $5000 to rebuild them into something else.