December 2007

This Months News

There has not been the frantic release of kits/models for Christmas this year as in previous years. As far back as I can remember, the three months before Christmas we were inundated with every model subject. I know the industry mass produced models from Minichamps, Spark, and IXO etc. are being released in far greater numbers now than ever before and I’m sure that market has been swamped with new releases recently. Talking about Spark, the famous model shop Boutique Auto Motor (BAM) in Paris has been bought by them and rumour is they are looking to acquire other retail outlets in major European cities. Now this is an interesting move by them entering the retail market. When many in the trade are selling on the web they are going back to the high street. I assume that this will include all their buddies in the group, Minichamps, Bizarre, Red Line, and Le Mans Miniatures. Where will this leave the model retailer when they start cutting prices is anybody's guess.

Armco Model Cars is a new name from Sydney based Down Under Dreaming Pty Ltd. Better known for their 1/24 scale Model 56 custom cars. They will be making a series of Aussie themed 1/43 scale models, built only, limited to 500 of each. The first of which is the Chevy Camaro of Bob Jane, winner of the ATCC 1971 this car ran in various liveries and this one is based on the version that raced at Warwick Farm in November 1971

Although not a handbuilt model, and suffering from the usual industry produced model inaccuracies, retailing at $99 they are ok. They come in a nice presentation box with numbered certificate and are available from us, as will be any future release in this series.

As this is the last news letter of 2007 I would like to wish everyone a good Christmas and a very happy New Year. January news letter will see the start of the ‘coming soon’ section this will give you all an idea of what will be coming during the next 2 to 6 months and enable you to pre order to save disappointment. Just remember if you order after the model has been released and you miss out, don’t blame us. Also if you do not have access to the internet/e-mail full time and would like the news letter by snail mail we can offer Aus/NZ customer that option for $12 (Aus) AU$20 (NZ) per year. This charge is to cover mail cost and the new letter will remain free!

In January news letter we will let you know of our plans for 2008 As David is now ‘retired’ and fully available we should be able to get on with more model releases and the full modeling services will be up and running.

And now unfortunately the bad news. Overseas postal rates will be increased from January due to the fact that you can’t send registered air mail now unless it’s insured. Our postal charges with in Australia remain the same.

Also many of our suppliers in Europe are experiencing difficulties with the postal services to Australia and are now only using courier services. We have experienced this ourselves with goods taking much longer than time quoted by the postal services. Packages from UK, France and Italy are taking far longer to arrive. Fortunately most do arrive, but when a shipment take up to 47 days air mail you begin to wonder. This will about double the shipping cost to us and I’m afraid it has to be passed on to you.

Meanwhile take a look at what has been released this month by visiting Our new releases for this month

See our shipping page for details on postal charges.

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Dave Eames