Lee's Toy Review Forum

The brand new shippers coming out at Walmart this week contain ten different cars with a surprise variation.  All ten of these cars have redline wheels as the surprise variation.  These were planned variations by Mattel at the request of Walmart to be a surprise in their new N case assortment shippers. 

Here is the list of ten different redline wheel cars:

orange Mach 1 Mustang
burgundy '67 Shelby Mustang GT-500
blue '67 Camaro
gold Chevelle Station Wagon
yellow Dairy Delivery
green Dodge Challenger SRT8
red Ford Fairlane
blue Jeep Scrambler
purple Ice Cream Truck
purple Mercury Cougar Eliminator

Now, if you've read my column in Lee's, you know that I gave very high rarity ratings to the Shelby Mustang and the Mach 1 Mustang over the last two months.  But in light of recent events with the large multitude of these cars popping up at Walmart this week, that has all changed drastically.

It seems that a small number of the redline Shelbys and redline Mach 1's leaked out two months early, and were mispacked in regular cases, instead of Walmart shippers.  They were sent to other retailers by mistake (some even in other countries).  So with these small number of variations reported two months ago, with no others turning up, and no word from Mattel about these redline variations being planned releases at Walmart in September, it appeared that they were short run production errors, variations created by mistake.  Up to this point, only half a dozen Mach 1's had been seen and only two dozen Shelby's had been seen (totals counted from ebay sales and reported finds by collectors on diecast forums).  So that is why these variations drew comparisons to other rare pieces seen in the past, like the 2006 Motown Metal '67 Camaro, and led to the high rarity rating given to these two Mustangs in the monthly column.

Even the aftermarket prices on these two pieces supported the belief that these were going to be extremely rare pieces, with auctions for the redline Mach 1 closing as high as $250.00, and auctions for the redline Shelby GT Mustang closing as high as $140.00.  These quoted prices were seen in online sales that closed as recently as a week ago.

But now these 10 redline variations are shipping very heavily at Walmarts, effectively flooding the market, and the value on these once "rare" variations has collapsed.  Over the last three days, we've seen more and more of these cars popping up, starting as a trickle and swelling into a dam breaking deluge of these cars suddenly being found everywhere and put up for sale.  Aftermarket prices on these cars took the sharpest nosedives in memory, quickly going from $100 per car, to $25 per car, to $8 per car, to $5 per car, to about $3 per car now.  All of that happened in about a day and a half.  And not all Walmarts have their shipments yet, so prices probably aren't done falling.

Obviously my opinion of the rarity of these two Mustangs has dramatically changed.

All ten of the redline variations should be considered no more rare than the average Kmart Kday event exclusive color variation, in my opinion.

I plan on covering this matter and these cars in next month's Variation Hunter article.  But since this situation changed so quickly and dramatically, I thought it best to put a post up about these cars to get the timeliest accurate information out there to you guys and gals.

My latest check on the aftermarket finds completed auctions for all ten Walmart redline variations for under $30.00.  That looks about right to me.

Thanks,

Variation Hunter