Definition of HTF, Rare, Holy grail, etc.

[SuperFast]

What does that mean? What makes a Matchbox rare?
Can we fix this in numbers?
How many Matchbox did Lesney make from each model?
For example, a model was made 1000000 times, 990000 times in standard colour and 10000 times in a rare colour?
Not only the colour, also interior, labels, glazing and hubs/ wheels are reasonable.
A special example: # 7 Hairy Hustler with amber glass and purple glass. How are the numbers here?
Sven

[GHOSTHUNTER]

This is an often asked question of occurences and production methods that went in to creating so-called 'HTF', 'Rare' and 'Holy Grail' models.

This is a question not easily answered in one post and in fact many answers are scattered around the various topics and articles on the forum, I don not recall a single topic, thread or members's post that gives all the answers in one go and this may not actually be possible as member's views, ideas and actuall collecting experiences will have different answers.

There is also the level of collecting each of us do. I am an obsessive collector and will try and add every variation of a model to my collection and I will have several examples of a given model that to me are not or were not hard to find but to the more general collector of the same model, it proved to be a very hard model to find!

There are no set guide lines as to what makes certain models or variations found on a model for collectors to go by, it is driven by the collectors themselves.

The factories are there to make money, not create rare models, but long term production will accidentally create models different from the set down specification due to the supply of materials such as the paint and packaging.

Long term production will also put a strain on the tooling which can and often does require modifications or a total remake if production is to continue of very popular models.

So, I have started this discussion with one reply to Sven's opening post, please continue as this could or should be a topic we can all be involved with!

Ghosthunter.

[Squid]

"Hard-to-find" and "rare" are difficult to precisely define. There are some variables in the equation, too: how many of a given variation were produced when new, and how many managed to survive over the decades. With production numbers not exactly known, we must determine scarcity by documenting models in our collections and tracking public sales.

"Holy grail," on the other hand, is entirely subjective, and can vary widely between collectors. My holy grail might be something that would only rate "uncommon" on a scarcity scale, and is my holy grail simply because it's a favorite model that isn't yet in my collection. Another collector's holy grail might be any preproduction or color trial model.

This is a discussion I will be watching, mostly so I can determine if we can agree upon what constitutes each level of scarcity...and indeed, what those levels are.

[GHOSTHUNTER]

This forum is but one of several forums catering for matchbox collectables so we are only one piece in the big jigsaw of the matchbox collecting community. If we were in a position to establish levels of acceptance regards what constitutes HTF, Rare and Holy Grail status models, this all changes when the other forums do the same thing and the chances of our statistics being the same as the other forums is pretty slim!

If as a collector of the matchbox ranges you were to stay on this forum ignoring all other matchbox themed forums then establishing scarcity etc would work for us on here, but having the right to move around the internet and visit (in many cases also contribute to) those forums is all part of our collecting experience.

It certainly would be handy to have some authoritive information on the numbers of certain models we deem as HTF, Rare and of Holy Grail status, but I think we could only do and provide this at a basic level similar to when the Matchbox International Collectors Association (MICA), asked its subscribed members to reveal to the club (and in to the MICA magazine), how many examples of known rarely seen Models of Yesteryears they had and if I remember (Bob Tutt may know more on this), the totals for about a dozen chosen subjects were in the handfuls!

Ghosthunter.

[SuperFast]

Good points at all.
I think forums in Europe would come near to the same result, but world wide we would have different results.
But without real numbers of manufactured models we don't come further. Would be interesting how many of all models Lesney has produced.
Sven

[GHOSTHUNTER]

We collectors live in hope that one day somebody somewhere will come forward with those precious archives containing production numbers of the various product lines made by Lesney.

Ghosty.

[misterpop]

Those production number figures it would seem are very hard to find.

[Squid]

I've already theorized about why we don't know production numbers, but I'll do so again. Sure, the bean-counters would have analyzed sales to determine what was a hot seller, what was sold for pennies on the dollar, and what was returned due to unpopularity. They may have looked at monetary figures or percentages of total production instead of actual production numbers, too.

It's what became of those records that is a mystery. Were they discarded by Lesney, to protect the data or simply because nobody thought they would be of any interest after half a century? Did a subsequent owner of the Matchbox trademark/brand do the same, for one of those reasons or entirely different reasons? Or might we someday discover the records in a forlorn corner somewhere?

[GHOSTHUNTER]

My understanding of the system used by Lesney during the late 70's and early-80's gained from being an unpaid member of staff with a retailer who stocked Models of Yesteryear, is the sales team worked with feedback from the retailers or distributers on the models sold. Yesteryears were packed 36 to a box and the smaller retailrs had three boxes of each model currently in the range at that time. Sell all those three boxes of models and put in a request for more stock, maybe another two boxes worth.

Extra stock was simply sourced from the stores assuming Lesney had in fact made enough to be able to carry stocks which in some cases was clearly not possible due to over demand, poor production or shortage of supplies. It is common knowledge Lesney were always under pressure to keep up with demand for their model cars ranges as they were so good at a given price point compaired to the competition.

The Models of Yesteryear range were a headache for Lesney as they were well engineered examples of the toolmaker's skills and had set such high standards of detail and finish it was difficult to maintain this through prolonged production and when the Hot Wheels saga kicked off at the end of the 60's and the 'Regular Wheels' range needed much attention regards updating the wheel and axle components to compete with Hot Wheels, production of the Yesteryears was stopped to allow Lesney to divert its resources into the 'Superfast' conversion program.

During this Yesteryear stoppage the decision to cancel the range completely was considered but fortunately rejected and some activity took place on the Yesteryears with regards to updating the specification with new paint schemes and a cheaper to make and fit wheel and tyre combination.

As an engineering company production figures would have been recorded for everything made as part of a catalogued product range but what happened to the records is not known by me, but if they have been kept they must surely surface one day as their significance becomes clear to the owner!

Ghosthunter.

[Idris]

As regards rare models, my rules of thumb are a survival rate of 10 - 15% (I can't remember what the source of this is, but I read it somewhere) and the fact that, for every model we know about, there's one in a sleeper collection. So, if we know of six example of a particular model, that means there are probably actually twelve still extant, meaning the total production was somewhere between 80 and 120 examples. Since Lesney would probably have worked in dozens (certainly in the RW era), that means between 7 and 10 dozen were produced.