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Idris wrote:Putting this query into some kind of perspective, although I could find eight Beales-Bealsons on Ebay (see above), I could only find five two-line Pickfords.

Assuming they are all genuine, the production figures for both are not yet comparable as clearly more Beales originally existed, which again questions how many Beales were done.

Having now established the model was not fully the result of Lesney production, strange it should appear in Scale Models magazine. Who offered it to the magazine for a review and why on a model (toy vehicle) made in limited numbers. Would be nice to see that article.

Ghosthunter.

GHOSTHUNTER wrote:

Idris wrote:Putting this query into some kind of perspective, although I could find eight Beales-Bealsons on Ebay (see above), I could only find five two-line Pickfords.

Assuming they are all genuine, the production figures for both are not yet comparable as clearly more Beales originally existed, which again questions how many Beales were done.

Having now established the model was not fully the result of Lesney production, strange it should appear in Scale Models magazine. Who offered it to the magazine for a review and why on a model (toy vehicle) made in limited numbers. Would be nice to see that article.

I would have thought that there were considerably more two-line Pickfords than Beales-Bealsons produced (narionwide firm, probably at least one hundred times more outlets, big money, model produced by Lesney).
Unfortunately, I cannot remember the precise context of the 3,000 figure in Scale Models, but there was a 'Diecast Corner'-type column every issue which I always used to scan through in one of Mr. W.H. Smith's well-stocked reading rooms.

I still have a lot of those magazines in storage and some I take to my toy fair, the next one of which is on Sat February 9 so I will look through those ones with me just in case I have them from the 60's.

Ghosthunter.

Idris wrote:I would have thought that there were considerably more two-line Pickfords than Beales-Bealsons produced (narionwide firm, probably at least one hundred times more outlets, big money, model produced by Lesney).

Probably, though it would have been easy enough to produce the two-line Pickfords in small numbers or small batches, as the only difference from the normal blue model is in the decal. I wonder why Pickfords wasn't happy with the normal three-line decal? It's not really a very obvious promotion to give away something that to a non-collector was effectively indistinguishable from the normal issue.

Quite by chance, I have just found that the USB-drive I'm using for work contains a scan of a U.K. matchbox articles on the Beales-Bealsons which appears to include the Scale Models text verbatim:

thanks for posting this - fascinating.

As Glenn says fascinating.

Is this one of the earliest situations of a Lesney model being used for a promotional purpose and where along this model's time-line was it chosen for such use?

Despite reading the article, I find it odd that Lesney allowed this to take place (painting, assemby with rivetting etc outside their control!!), with little input from themselves.

I wonder who did the models in the Bournmouth area. Of the top of my head I can not think of any toy company in that area at that time, but maybe because the model was outsourced the numbers produced are so low.

Ghosthunter.

GHOSTHUNTER wrote:...maybe because the model was outsourced the numbers produced are so low.

...but the whole point of this thread is to argue that the number of models we see going past on Ebay is extremely difficult to reconcile with a production run of only 3,000 units.

Idris wrote:the whole point of this thread is to argue that the number of models we see going past on Ebay is extremely difficult to reconcile with a production run of only 3,000 units.

I'm convinced. We've also learnt that the promotion was for spend across the store - not just toys. The population of Bournemouth is currently around 180,000 but the Bournemouth - Poole - Christchurch area has around 400,000. In 1965 Bournemouth had a population of 160,000. It's easy to imagine many more than 3000 customers from that size of population.

I do think Ghosty raises a good point about the quality of the work - mine both seem well-painted, the remains of the decals are smooth and neatly applied, and the rivets are also good. They weren't thrown together in a shed somewhere but assembled by someone who knew what they were doing.