Quoted from pinballaddicted:I am hoping Stern make 1000 GZLEs or maybe even more. Enough to satisfy demand and stop the flipping. Pinball pricing is crazy and unsustainable.
Agree with your point that if Stern made more LE’s to meet demand, then prices would not be crazy. So what if for Godzilla, let’s say Stern said they are selling no more than 1,750 LE’s at $10.5k. They would plan to run and sell the first 1k LE’s immediately, with follow up runs tbd. The first run may be enough to satisfy demand and if not then more runs of up to 750 LE’s could be made. While disappointing some because they would not be able to flip their LE’s for guaranteed profit, it would keep their market price close to MSRP level. In that case everybody wins. Guy buying game initially pays msrp, guy buying nib from dealer when Stern makes another run a year later pays msrp, guy buying a HUO pin can expect to pay close to msrp. With this approach, we have just reduced the risk of price gouging in the product’s lifecycle.
A side benefit of announcing a ridiculous number of LE’s is that it gives one pause about how special that LE would be. It might influence many of those buyers into the premium model instead and they would feel good about it. Some LE’s have nice extra’s and better graphics, while others do not and might not be worth paying more for.