Live Q&A with the Global Brand Team

[MCX_Team]

Yes, I find it difficult to collect the sets I want living in the UK. Movie Turtles was fine (though I wished we'd got a little Megan Fox, I would have bought at least two of those cos I wanted one for my Transformers movie collection too :P ) but very few of the Collectors sets based on the 80's series are available here. I had to import Krang's Rampage but the Technodrome would be far too much to do the same. I had a friend send me Baxter Stockman as well as He-Man and Skeletor from the cool new Heroes figure range I would love to collect but again not easily available here. I love these figures and would love to buy more.

Also could we please get ThunderCats figures? :D

Marcela: Hey Carnivius! I'm so happy to hear that you enjoy our TMNT sets - this is a brand that I had a blast working on! In regard to retail distribution, I think Nick handled that question really well in his previous answer. We would definitely love to make the toy available everywhere -- it would help out a lot if you could make your wishes known to your local retailers!

Nick: Love Thundercats!! It could be a perfect addition to the MCX Heroes family. We appreciate when you give us feedback or recommend brands that you love.

[MCX_Team]

What is the process like to acquire a new license; from pitching to production? :)

Sabrina: The first step is to LOVE the license, and do research to make sure that our fans will love it too! Second, we make sure that it has enough content to be made into a construction toy line. Third, we work very closely with our licensed partners to make sure that we stay authentic to their brand. Next, rely on our talented team of designers to make that brand come to life. We go through an internal approval process before we pitch to our retail partners. Lastly, we make it available to fans in stores!

[cdn_bricks]

Do any of you ever get to travel to 343 industries' office? Have you ever been inside the Halo museum?

[MCX_Team]

Do you have a soft spot for any particular brand(s)? Any favorites?

Marcela: I love Pokemon, and I'd like to see more MOTU in the future!
Sabrina: I LOVE HALO!!! <3 In the future it would be great to see more Futurama!
Nick: I'll always have a soft spot for Destiny as it was the first licencor pitch I made. I'd love to work on Stranger Things and Overwatch!!

(Note: CARY APPROVES FOR OVERWATCH!!)

[MCX_Team]

Do any of you ever get to travel to 343 industries' office? Have you ever been inside the Halo museum?

Nick: Hi again! I'm one of the lucky few to have visited the 343 industries office, I actually went to the Museum opening last year and the guys are awesome! We even have our SDCC Warzone Map as part of the exhibit.

[BlockBAE]

What happens to pitched products that don't get made? Is there a hallowed Mega Museum?

[MCX_Team]

First off, thanks for doing this Q&A! To start, could each of you introduce yourselves and let us know what the role of the Global Brand Team is? Second, can one of you try and explain the process of how an item goes from the factory to the retailers? There was a post just yesterday showing that Halo Heroes series 6 has shown up in the US. I don't understand how this is possible when Halo Heroes series 5 is barely widely distributed yet. Third, why does Canada tend to lag behind the US in terms of product availability? I suspect that Canada is a much smaller market than the US, but it seems ridiculous that products designed by a Canadian company have a hard time making it into Canada. I recently found out from ToysRUs Canada and Mattel that the ProBuilder sets don't have a release date in Canada and may not even be released. Can any of you comment on this?

Thanks!

Nick: Hi cdn_bricks! I'm the Brand Director on Mega Construx, nice to meet you :). My job is to work with the brand managers, the design team, and the sales team to bring product to you!
Marcela: Hi! I'm Marcela, and I'm the Brand Manager for Call of Duty and TMNT!
Sabrina: Hi!!! I manage part of our gaming portfolio!

Once our items are manufactured, they are shipped from our plant to distribution centers where they will be expedited to various retailers.

The goal of our collectible price points, like the Halo Heroes, is to produce a limited quantity of these items to ship around the world. It does happen that a retailer does skip a wave, depending on availability in our distribution center.

In regard to your question for the Canadian market, is it actually one of our most prominent markets. The ProBuilder sets are being introduced at Toys R Us, both in the US and Canada. Let us talk to our Canadian counterparts and come back to you on this specific question! :) Hold tight!

[Carnivius]

Marcela: Hey Carnivius! I'm so happy to hear that you enjoy our TMNT sets - this is a brand that I had a blast working on! In regard to retail distribution, I think Nick handled that question really well in his previous answer. We would definitely love to make the toy available everywhere -- it would help out a lot if you could make your wishes known to your local retailers!

Nick: Love Thundercats!! It could be a perfect addition to the MCX Heroes family. We appreciate when you give us feedback or recommend brands that you love.

Thanks for the reply and yes I've read Nick's comment. The only toy store even remotely near me that sells Mega is the Toys R Us in Cambridge and they have a lot of Halo, Call of Duty, Despicable Me and TMNT movie and nicktoon. I happily bought most of the TMNT movie sets cos I enjoy the movies (have both on Blu Ray) and they're what got me into Mega because of the fantastic mini-figures (I always found those of a certain other brand too simplistic for me even if they are iconic though I have owned some over the years cos I enjoy building sets). I'm not a fan of Halo/CoD but I've bought several sets of those as they are brilliant sci fi and military sets in their own right. But no TMNT Collectors figures at all, though funnily enough the store DOES have the regular action figures by Playmate of that era of TMNT, both in the recent Classics form and also re-releases of the original vintage action figures bizarrely so seeing the Mega versions next to them would be awesome. Your Party Wagon is far more cartoon accurate than the Playmates toy ever was too and is probably my favourite Mega set overall. As I mentioned I'd love to be able to buy the Technodrome and the black and white sets and everything else from the classic era as well as more from the Heroes line (my friend did say he'll try find me the Aliens and Star Trek figures too from Wave 1 but I can't expect him to keep sending me the stuff from the US all the time, especially anything bigger than figures). and I'm looking forward to future figures such as Futurama (and I'm glad you share enthusiasm for ThunderCats... in the 80s along with the regular figure line there were mini-figures that were fun to collect and Mega could be the updated version of that line, and would love a properly scaled Thundertank that sits 2 figures in front and more in back like the TMNT wagon). Anyways I'm just babbling, probably because I love the figure style so much and is what I've wanted from a building brick brand for years and the potential is limitless. Keep up the good work

By the way I do have to mention that the T-800 from the Terminator Genisys (never been sure how to spell that) line is an amazing lil figure. Such detail. If I could easily army-build this I'd buy many packs. As it is I only have the single figure but I love it. Just wanted to say that (and if Robocop ever happens to appear I'd buy that too, but for now I make do with my sloppy custom version I made) :)

[MCX_Team]

Can any of you explain why we can't purchase items directly from the Mega store (at least in Canada anyways)? I feel like being able to purchase directly from the online site would circumvent a lot of the distribution and accessibility issues.

Nick: This is something we’re working hard on improving worldwide. We tend to leverage our partners' online stores where you can find most, if not all, of our sets at a very competitive price. Most of Mega’s key retailers have online stores that offer the majority of our Mega Construx sets and we lean on them. The goal of the Mega online shop is to help you find the toy in your area, not to sell directly to the consumer.

[Admiral-Sabree]

Thanks for doing this Q&A. One major question/concern alot of people have had lately is with the distribution of sets. Some sets have complete missed there release window wile others arrive far later then when we they were revealed. For example the halo heroes series 5 was revealed months ago, however they were not really avaible untill 2 weeks ago missing the halo 3 anniversary, and heroes series 6 has now been found 9n stores. OTher sets that are missing in most areas are the two destiny armor sets that were revealed earlyer this year, dear orbit hunter, and future warcult titan.

Is there any plans to remedy these distribution issues. Another question is what causes these abcenses of sets. Is it a embargo problem or something along thouse lines. Lastly is there a general time frame set for when sets will appear on shelves and at online retailers.