Blindbag Hunting Woes

[AlexRae]

I live in Salem, OR USA and am having some woes about trying to have a complete ponyville BB sets. The stores that I know carry them are: Fred Meyer's, WalMart, Target, and TRU.

My woe is that Fred/WalMart is in the 7th (See through, non-neon) wave, TRU is back on the 4th (  ) wave (glitter), and Target is on the 8th (See through, neon). I haven't seen a 5th (yellow/princess) or 6th (3d gems/solid color glitter) wave carrier period in the US except for very briefly when I was still living in Texas earlier this year. I also still need some of the 3rd wave and I know some people are reporting that Target or TRU will randomly jump back to 3rd wave.

Does anybody know where the mystical 5th/6th wave resides? Some people are reporting they're another euro-specific wave, but I've seen US-style cards in some eBay auctions. I watched WalMart and Fred skip from 4 to 7. I also still need some of the 3rd wave and I know some people are reporting that Target or TRU will randomly jump back to 3rd wave, but I'm curious if that is still happening.

(And does anybody know ANYWHERE still selling the Apple Family or Royal Wedding trio blister packs? Or have a WalMart still selling the Pinkie Pie & Friends set? eBay is crushing my spirit, man...)

[snwbear24]

I got my whole set of Wave 6 Blindbags at the Dollar General

[ValhallaLilly]

Oh dang must find a dollar general. I've never seen any of the 3d gem symbol ponies. we had the princess sets for like two weeks. thankful I got all the ones I wanted from that set. and we had the glitter ones forever. now we have the see through sets buy not the neon ones. I found one just opened box and got all the ones I wanted from there and that was it.

[AlexRae]

There don't seem to be Dollar Generals in Oregon.  Time to get my old Texas friends to be spies.

[hathorcat]

They are not exclusive to Europe. They have had a US release.

The problem is that they have been churned out so quickly and that Hasbro technically class all blind bags, no matter the wave, as the same product. What a store has will depend on what a distribution centre will have at the point at which the store needs new stock. So if a store has boxes and boxes of wave 4; it takes them 4 months to sell them during which the DC has stoked wave 5 and other stores have requested new stock; then its perfectly possible that by the time the store comes to reordering their DC has now moved on to stock wave 6; therefore the store skips wave 5 altogether.

I am not sure if they have stock at the moment but some of the wholesale online toy retailers like Entertainment Earth and Big Bad Toy Store will carry complete boxes. Or you could post over in the Wanted forum and you hopefully will find a member who has local stock that can help you out.

[MaronaPossessed]

They are not exclusive to Europe. They have had a US release.

The problem is that they have been churned out so quickly and that Hasbro technically class all blind bags, no matter the wave, as the same product. What a store has will depend on what a distribution centre will have at the point at which the store needs new stock. So if a store has boxes and boxes of wave 4; it takes them 4 months to sell them during which the DC has stoked wave 5 and other stores have requested new stock; then its perfectly possible that by the time the store comes to reordering their DC has now moved on to stock wave 6; therefore the store skips wave 5 altogether.

I am not sure if they have stock at the moment but some of the wholesale online toy retailers like Entertainment Earth and Big Bad Toy Store will carry complete boxes. Or you could post over in the Wanted forum and you hopefully will find a member who has local stock that can help you out.

This. This is why I always order the wave blind bags online

Also, Toywiz has them. Long time ago, they priced a wave for over 60 dollars. Don't pay that much.

[Shiromisa]

$60 for a whole box is about normal, that's what I paid at Walmart for a box of wave 7. TRU is stocking 5 near me, try there!

[SilverRains]

I have not found wave 6 at all around me, but I have seen wave 5. I found some wave 5 ponies in places I wasn't expecting to see blind bags at all. If there's a mall nearby, it may be worth checking stores that sell collectible things (like comic shops), stores that sell 'pop culture' stuff, and possibly stores that sell games/movies/CDs. I've found a few blind bags in such places, usually at a wave that the toy stores don't have anymore.

[lonewolf]

I got my W6 set from Dollar General also (it took several trips to 4 different stores in my area though). A few months ago the Target in Topeka had a few W5's, but are now on W8 (I got my W5 set from BBTS).

[AlexRae]

I have not found wave 6 at all around me, but I have seen wave 5. I found some wave 5 ponies in places I wasn't expecting to see blind bags at all. If there's a mall nearby, it may be worth checking stores that sell collectible things (like comic shops), stores that sell 'pop culture' stuff, and possibly stores that sell games/movies/CDs. I've found a few blind bags in such places, usually at a wave that the toy stores don't have anymore.

Yeah, I forgot that I looked at Hot Topic and while they did have wave 5 (and 4, and 7), they were nearly $6 a piece.  A stop in FYE once showed them to have glitter ponies... that was a few months ago. Thanks for the reminder to check there again! Is there any particular mall type store you've found them in? My old haunt in Texas was a comic/table top shop (where I'm more likely to pay a few extra bucks to support a locally run shop), but the ones here just don't got 'em.

They are not exclusive to Europe. They have had a US release.

The problem is that they have been churned out so quickly and that Hasbro technically class all blind bags, no matter the wave, as the same product. What a store has will depend on what a distribution centre will have at the point at which the store needs new stock. So if a store has boxes and boxes of wave 4; it takes them 4 months to sell them during which the DC has stoked wave 5 and other stores have requested new stock; then its perfectly possible that by the time the store comes to reordering their DC has now moved on to stock wave 6; therefore the store skips wave 5 altogether.

I am not sure if they have stock at the moment but some of the wholesale online toy retailers like Entertainment Earth and Big Bad Toy Store will carry complete boxes. Or you could post over in the Wanted forum and you hopefully will find a member who has local stock that can help you out.

Thank you for confirming they're out there in the US, and the DC exposition. That kind of confirms what I was thinking was happening, but was hopeful there was some wiggle room. The retailer thought hadn't crossed my mind simply because I usually only have the budget for a few at a time, rather than being able to buy a box. Thank you for also confirming which forum I could look for a local stock person to haggle with!  ^^

[ValhallaLilly]

Yeah I about fell over when I saw the blindbags at HT. And actually that may have been the only place I saw the 3d gem ones now that I think about it. But yeah not for 6$

I've found them at Suncoast if that helps.

[AlexRae]

Yeah I about fell over when I saw the blindbags at HT. And actually that may have been the only place I saw the 3d gem ones now that I think about it. But yeah not for 6$

I've found them at Suncoast if that helps.

Part of the reason I caved to BB is that they're available as low as $2 a piece so they make a good pick-me-up treat and they really make me smile. So the $6 negates half the point for me.
What's Suncoast? I tried to google, but I kept getting surf shops... >.>

[ValhallaLilly]

Oh sorry didn't even think of that. Suncoast Video maybe? They have lots of movies and posters. It's usually a small store in malls.

I had luck with Dollar General yesterday! I only found the main six and one other that I didn't want but one of those was the 3D gem!! Gonna have to hunt down some more stores. And I thought of this after that I should have asked if they had more in the back.

[AlexRae]

Ohhh I think I vaguely remember those stores. Didn't they merge with F.Y.E? Time to find out.

While I'm here, can anyone who HAS the wave 5 Twilight, Rainbow Dash, and Fluttershy confirm whether or not they match the pigmentation of the mane 6 from other waves? They look lighter and I like getting true color alts, but if they're exactly the same... Eh, save my money.

[natashareine]

There are no Dollar Generals in Minnesota and the closest Toys R Us is like 3hrs away... my nearest Walmart hasn't had blind bags in months and the Target has had the neon ones forever. The closest Hot Topic is 2hrs away, but I wouldn't pay that much for them, anyway. The downsides of living in Northern Mn in the middle of freaking nowhere