Hobbico/Revellogram News

EdGrune

  One of these parties is Round3 LLC.   I don't know who they are - perhaps a joint venture of Round2 and someone else.

I think assuming Round3 is tied in to Round2 is reasonable and would be welcome, I think. Revell USA was not available for bids as a separate entity so we have to assume that this bidder is going after Revell Germany as well. This might be good for increasing their sales presence in the EU.

The pharmaceutical industry rant is significantly inaccurate not to mention well off topic.

Just because someone didn’t submit a sealed bid doesn’t mean the assets won’t be sold. If the company is eventually to be liquidated then this is only the first step, not the last. If there’s any value then someone will try to scoop up portions of it for a bargain price. This certainly isn’t a welcome development but there may still be chapters yet to be written.

I've read every post in this thread. Our hobby is getting grayer by the day. I noticed in the last years of riding motorcycles how gray the sport was getting. A lot of us old time riders and not a lot of new riders. But I think these things are cyclical. Today, three years after I sold my last motorcycle, I notice more younger riders on motorcycles and scooters. I think the same can be said about our hobby. Yes, there are a lot of us old timers who are model builders but occassionally I see a youngster with a parent at the hobby shop perusing the shelves. For those youngsters and for us old-timers just getting back into the hobby (and re-learning the fundamentals), kits from Revell and Monogram, etc. are necessary. I've been back in the hobby for just over a year, after a forty year absence. One of the first kits I bought back then was the Tamiya P-51D. Well, it's half built sitting in its box on the shelf. What have I built in the past year? A Monogram T-6G, an AMT Staggerwing, a Monogram SBD, an AMT P-40N, a Monogram F-82 Twin Mustang. I'm rebuilding my skills just as a new modeler would need to build those same skills. Building those skills is best done with an inexpensive, simple kit. Some of the new kits from today's manufacturers are so complex that a newbie or a retread like myself would just throw up their arms in frustration and walk away and not look back. Yes, hopefully, some how these older companies will survive in the marketplace today. We need them to keep our hobby moving and growing.

I did recently buy a "modern" kit. I took delivery of a MENG 1/48 scale F-35A two weeks ago. Whoa! I sure am glad I didn't buy this kit a year ago. If I had, it would probably be sitting on the shelf next to that Tamiya P-51D. The kit is way out of my comfort range. Way out. The reason I bought the kit is that it will be a tribute to my youngest brother. Gerry (Buzz, as the family called him. He was named after my dad) passed away March 1, at age 52, after suffering a massive stroke two weeks before that left him in a coma. Buzz was a systems engineer on the F-35 program at the Lockheed facility in Ft. Worth. He got to watch F-35's fly away every day. He was very proud to be involved with the F-35 and was excited when the airplane was named the Lightning II, a name he submitted in a company naming contest. Anyway, after a year back in the hobby, I think I am ready for a challenge like this MENG F-35A kit. Not so if I hadn't built those older kits first.

Jeffpez ;

 I didn't mean that to sound like a rant . Only a pretty well known fact . I see the same thing in construction sets . Cobi , Mega-Blox and Brik - Tech and others are competing for the dollars in the market dominated by LEGO . LEGO has Lost a 5% market share internationally . Maybe it's because they , unlike Cobi , for instance won't manufacture W.W.2 related bricksets . 

 They even closed a plant in Billund .That's the historic home of the company and it's founder . So you see every market has it's headaches . Now as to our hobby kit friends . I do hope this comes out okay in the wash .

 As I said many of us have grown up , and old , with these companies around. Remember Lindberg ? Look who's making their stuff now . Molds came out that I had never even seen .( must've been while I was in the Military and not on home soil .)

 I guess the best thing we can do is hope for the best and play the game with the cards we are dealt .  T.B.      P.S. Hey , while we are on the subject , Who the heck is " Round 3 " ?

I'm not going to get too excited yet.  Companies change and grow and sometimes 'go along the lonely path'. History is good to keep in mind, personal and otherwise, when talking about such things, plus a red bottom line likely is not across all divisions. RoG seems to be a pretty steady concern, if their rate of new product delivery is any measure.  Nothing is perfect, but I still look at the old Monogram kits (of certain vintage) with glee, certainly when the latest Trumpy-Boss comes out with annoying shape issues (the Mono P-80 is still the best, IMO,...) which gives my 12-14 year old self renewed joy in the marvelous tooling skills that produced such as the Mono F-14A cockpit (completely accurate down to the triangular shaped control knobs on the consoles...)

So, we hope for the best and perhaps even pray for the day when the next 'surprise' can come from Mono/Revell's shops.  Who would have expected a state of the art Stearman or Spirit of St. Louis, anyway?  Now where did the new tool Revell Mossie go, anyway?!

Kind Regards, Robert

Yeah Rob ;

 I built the " Mossie ' when Revell ( U.S.A ) first brought it out many years ago .It was also the first time I used " Polly - S " paints . Good Bird , Good Paint .Where they now ( the Plane and the Paint ) ?

I wonder if the demise of Revell will lead to inflation in prices from remaining mfgs.  I assume Revell had a big following in US, and there must be a temptation for other kit mfgs to raise prices accordingly.

Tanker - Builder

 As I said many of us have grown up , and old , with these companies around. Remember Lindberg ? Look who's making their stuff now . Molds came out that I had never even seen .( must've been while I was in the Military and not on home soil .)

 I guess the best thing we can do is hope for the best and play the game with the cards we are dealt .  T.B.      P.S. Hey , while we are on the subject , Who the heck is " Round 3 " ?

Just in case Revell goes south, I bought one of each of a few a Revell 1/48 scale kits that I wanted and  that were still in a number of on-line inventories.  Six kits for under $100.  Monogram kits (Revell USA) have always been great, stress free builds and are working out well for me since I am cutting my teeth on more elaborate styles of airbrushing which I don't want to learn on with a $50 kit.  

Big News! Revell Germany and Revell USA have been sold to an entity called "Blitz 18-313 Gmbh" for $3.9 million

I have to say that is an astonishingly low price considering the asking price was ~$10 million. My guess is that the purchaser is the current Revell Germany management team. And now we have the interesting situation where Revell USA is owned by it's German spin-off.

Here's a link to the purchase agreement:

http://upshotservices.s3.amazonaws.com/files/ff11e972-f6c7-458c-a00b-05e14958d7f7/5ed51134-635a-4fd4-882c-7cf95721ae59.pdf
 

If it is Revell Germany associates, I will feel very good. They were producing nice kits lately. it would be in good hands.

There's a good description of Quantum on Bloomberg if anyone is interested. Companies that buy the assets of others who are in financial distress or bankruptcy are common and their motive is strictly to make a decent return on their investment. More than likely they'll try to clean up Revell's financials and then find a buyer. None of us is privy to the inner workings of Hobbico so we don't know what it was that actually caused their failure but it was hinted that they took on too much debt that then couldn't be repaid. If that's the case and now that the new owners bought it for far less than the liabilities there's every reason to hope that Revell will continue. Based on the limited info available this doesn't seem like a bad outcome. 

So, I'm working on my two P-51Bs and what to I notice? A Hobbico logo!

Did u use a mrecorder.com on Android for monitro somebody? Can u tell me how It is work?