01/21/2017

Kmart Collector’s Day

The next Kmart Collector’s Day Event is Scheduled for Saturday, February 18, 9AM local time. It is rumored that the 4 exclusive colorways will be the ’55 Chevy (HW Flames), ’08 Dodge Viper SRT ACR (Night Burnerz), Custom ’56 Ford Truck (HW Hot Trucks) and the Cool-One (Yellow – HW Art Cars).

17th Annual Hot Wheels Collectors Nationals Convention

The first souvenir car was unveiled Friday for the event which will be held April 5-9, 2017 at the DoubleTree in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It will be the collector-favorite, #Blown Delivery which can be seen >> HERE << courtesy of the Collectors Events Unlimited Facebook Page.

Hitting Stores Now!

Collectors here in the U.S. have been posting that they are finding the Camaro Fifty Series in their #Walmart Exclusive dump bins.

U.S. collectors have also reported good fortune in finding the “E” case assortment of Hot Wheels mainline cars at Toys R Us — which seems to have the jump on the other retailers for this mix.

The Super Mario series that hit select Walmart stores in 2016 is now turning up at 99¢ Only stores.

Upcoming Release for Fast & Furious

The Lamley Group previewed the upcoming Fast & Furious 8-car series that is due to hit Walmart in March. You can see that preview >> HERE.

Nissan Skyline GTR (R34) gets a Metal Chassis!

It appears the #Nissan Skyline GT-R (R34) will get a metal base and will most likely appear in a 2017 collector line. If you are a Red Line Club member, you can view the sneak peek of it on HotWheelsCollectors.com.

History Lesson: Special Trailer Editions by Full Grid

On Thursday, a collector on the HotWheelsCollectors.com forums was looking for info on the Hot Wheels Special Trailer Editions that were sold by a company called Full Grid back in the late ’90s / early ’00s. Well it turned out that the owner of that company was none other than the current owner of 1 Stop Diecast, Fred Blood. He chimed in and gave us all a history lesson:

After retiring from pro sports, I started Diecast Investments in 1998 selling Redlines and then in 1995 when Tom Lowe started Johnny Lightning we became one of the first three distributors. Carter Pennington who was the sales manager forced us to change our name before he would allow us to advertise the JL line. We had to set up a retail and a wholesale company. Full Grid was our retail mail order and store locations name and 1 To Go was our wholesale division.

Full grid a year later became on of the charter and largest M&D distributers of Mike Strauss’s Limited Editions. We actually sold 12,000 of the 30,000 unit production run of Blue Angels VW Drag Buses in one Saturday Morning.

Mattel then came to a group of us and wanted to have five master distributers in the US for the Adult Collectables line. Myself, Richard Adtkins, Mihn, and two others were the first five.

I am proud to say that Full Grid won Mattels Distributor of the year award four years in a row and we tied with Adkins foir the last year it was ever given out. We also won the Matchbox award that year. Also the same four years we were Playing Matis’s Distributor of the year.

One of the programs we ran was a Hot Wheels Souvener Trailier in which we traveled the U.S., The Hot Rod Magazine Power Tour, The Indy 500 and F1 race, Almost all the CART races some IMSA races and most Good Guys events for years. The trailer although I no longer own it still does the LA Auto Show every year and this past year was our 19th year there.

For the trailer Mattel produced the series of Trailer Editions, There are eight cars all Limited to 15,000 each.

The Dodge Ram flames RACED.com (my indy car company and still my daily driver truck but the flames are now red), The Hot Wheels Flammed Daliy Delivery, The SCTA 40 Ford Pick up, The Moon Eyes Fiat with no wing, The Andretti 56 Ford, the red flammed Way to Fast, The Parnelli Jones Mustang, and the Walker racing Suburban.

In 2001 I closed Full Grid due to a divorce and opened 1 Stop Diecast which we run today. Next year will be Mattel Hot Wheels 50th and my 30th in the diecast business.

Tons of fun!