***** ZST Wrestling's HEELS AND FACES Retro Fig Thread *****

Who’s doing it well?

Chella

Chella

Hi everyone,

Zombie Sailor here,
Just wanted to chime in as there seems to be many people here in this message forum that don’t know the process of making action figures and the cost associated with manufacturing them (something new to me as well)

The price to make each figure is far more than you could ever possibly imagine:
For starters, JUST to make the steel master molds in the factory, EACH mold is between $8-9k.

We are using high quality artists in the toy industry to hand sculpt each figure, that is several thousand dollars per figure.

To get the initial resin prototypes cast, then painted are several thousand per character

If a character has a soft goods coat or something, that’s $1000 to make a few copies plus the pattern copy for the factory to replicate

Fees paid to the designer/blueprint layouts which is to Ron Rudat, who happens to be the man responsible for the overwhelming majority of all the WWF Hasbros figures look...coming out of toy designing retirement to continue the Hasbro legacy...Ron is paid very well and deserves every penny

Graphic Design for ads, package design, safety testing, shipping containers from overseas to us here in the U.S., import fees, lawyers, etc. several thousand

Then, the factory still has to charge us per piece whatever it is they charge us...

Finally, royalties are paid out to every wrestler to give you officially licensed merchandise. The talent are getting paid a nice flat fee and a percentage of each figure sold, much more than the WWE would pay out for mass market releases and a much more hands on approach for talent to decide how they want their figure to look.

Mattel for example, it might cost them $25k to make a steel master mold for an elite....but that’s being spread out over what, 30-50k figures made ? That cost becomes pennies per figure, though our molds cost less to make compared to a said elite figure, we are probably only making 1-2,000 of each character which factors into the cost per unit. These will definitely be on par with the best retail figures available and in most cases, way better...but these are being made(as of right now) in small batches, something unheard of to make this sort of investment with so few units being made.

So we have a high cost to make each figure, then, we would like to make a little bit of profit afterall.

The costs are huge, the risk is high, but no one else was doing it...or doing it good for that matter, so here we are.

The Brian Myers Figure looks insane and is just about finished, series 1’s lineup has internally been made official with names not even shown yet and already sculpted.

Nearly 20 names already signed, and I cannot stress enough...Dino Bravo’s FIRST figure.

It’s going to be a fun ride. If you want mainstream figures of “main event” guys, there’s a Target 10 minutes down the road.
If you want retro style figures done better than anyone with crazy attention to detail based on the majority of wrestlers who weren’t given their due, who might have very little merchandise out there or haven’t had merch in decades - then Zombie Sailor has got you covered.

I appreciate the interest from everyone, thank you anyone who will support this line and I hope this helps clarify as to why these figures won’t be 10 bucks each.

Amazing you literally promoted Chella last week and essentially took a dig at them this week, this is what people mean when they say you talk out of both sides dude, what happened did you not get a influencer sample? Chella is doing just as good a job, a fantastic job in fact. I have opened them, much more value than your pod ones. As it’s been pointed you you have an invested interest here as you have a ZST coming out, so just promote that rather than knock another company.

Yup and I have just given my opinion. If you have any experience in creative writing your sign off is what readers take in the most. You ended in a negative manner. You also took aim with the “who’s doing it better”. Now let me make another point, when AEW 1 was released you addressed the skin tones and said “this figures will evolve, and Jazwares will work out the issues etc etc” Now Chella has released ONE figure thus far and your comments are very critical of the product, Do they not deserve the same respect? Especially since Zombie has detailed the process of getting a figure to market independently is long and costly, Chella will be facing a lot of the same process too. You should have some knowledge of this process too, you have figures produced but I would assume Ringside is doing a bulk of the work which is a big benefit.

I agree, it’s debatable, but a start up completely independent toy company opening its doors and bringing out an action figure line during Covid, with a physical release during that time and a lot of happy customers, is arguably also seen as ‘good’.

People will always have a preference which is fair enough, people can find parts of figures they don’t like (we all do it with main stream figures, including some of the AEW skin tone) we can also look at Hasbro and question skin tone, but again I agree, it’s all debatable as it’s all preference.

Based on that, whilst I applaud his honesty about the costs of his production and also the effort Zombie is putting in, I don’t agree that other lines “haven’t been doing it good”.

But like I say, I love figures and welcome both lines.