Other than a review, where the cost is relavant as are the contents of the box, ease of assembly, etc. the total cost of a model is no one's bloody business quite frankly. If your buddy shows up with a heavily modded car next week, lambo doors, GPS, bling-bling wheels, maxed out sound system, elaborate custom paint, are you going to ask him how much he paid for the mods? Are you even going to ask him how much he paid for the basic car? If you do, his answer should be' "Why would you want to ask such a rude question?"
20 years ago, when the aftermarket was in its infancy, a builder brought an F-15 to a show and listed how much he paid for each AM part. I have never heard anyone get dissed as much as him.
Talal Chouman, who has had a cover feature on FSM scratchbuilds his superb 1/16 armor kits. They are assessed by insurance companies in the tens of thousands of dollars. His total per kit cost for materials would by in the tens of dollars because he uses sheet stock and casts his own resin parts in his tiny workshop in his cellar.
The late Jim Jones, who taught me how to stretch sprue, had his fabulous Shinano in hte feature section about 1989 or 1990. He spent some 1200 hours on the kit and detaliled every gun mounmt and aircraft to a fare thee well. His basic material for this: you may have guessed it...stretched sprue. Cost, nothing.
IIRC, most of the detailing on that AC-130H was scratcbuilt. What would the cost of materials mean to a reader there?
Someone early on bemoaned not entering contests because they can't build cover -models for FSM. A couple years ago, our contest's Best of Show went to an out of box figure that was just extremely well painted. Last fall, I took several place awards with an out of box Verlinden 10" seacoast mortar. Very simple kit, maybe a dozen parts to the piece. It was well assembled and painted. That's what got me the trophies, not a ton extra parts.
My most detailed kits, a 1/72 Sherman (from 1983 before there was any aftermarket that didn't consist of a vacuform something or another), a 1/35 Tiran 5 and a 1/35 Bradley had next to nothing in after market costs.
Face it, gents. We aren't going to recreate the models we see on the cover of FSM for ourselves. No one expects us to. Use them as inspiration for what is possible.
As to the magazine featuring more OOB, they have half a dozen every month in the review section. Want to see what can be done OOB? Look there. Frankly, I think the magazine is already too dumbed down with some of the gallery pictures that have been posted recently and a couple of the feature ariticles that had a lot of WOW factor for size but a number of very basic assembly or painting flaws.
I hate the tought of paying $40 a year to look at average level work. For that money, I expect nothing less than masterworks.