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All Photos © The Motorsport Collector,
1999. All Rights Reserved.
Mattel
About a year ago, Mattel set the collector
die cast world on its ear by acquiring merchandising rights for
die cast and other products from Ferrari, Jordan, Williams, Stewart
and McLaren. Early on, it seemed as if Mattel were putting more
emphasis on packaging than quality as pre-production examples
were shown around the world. When the first 1998 F1 production
pieces appeared (branded Hot Wheels Racing), Mattel seemed to
ignore the US market and sent nearly all of the product to Europe
and other parts of the world. A few pieces have found their way
back to the US, but they're quite rare.
At the Chicago Hobby Show, Mattel had
a variety of their new 1999 Formula One product on display. The
display cases were poorly lit, and we apologize for the quality
of the photos here. Mattel sales reps couldn't answer very many
of our questions and, despite what you may be seeing in some catalogs,
we don't expect to see most of this stuff until after Christmas.
If and when it DOES appear, we will
have it.
Watch the Recent
Additions page for the latest information.
The poor lighting made photography
difficult. Here are the 1/18 scale 1999 Ferraris and Williams.
It looks like Mattel will be producing
these cars in Limited Editions, note the 4,998 sticker on the
top left of the box. We may see some shortages as a result. In
addition, note the lack of beer and tobacco markings.
The Ferraris don't have much in the
way of markings on the side, not even disguised Marlboro hash
marks.
Sorry for the quality. Mattel seems
to want to keep us all in the dark.
Mattel's McLaren deal only applies
to certain scales. We're seeing 1/64 and 124 scale from them,
and 1/18 and 1/43 from Action/Minichamps. The 1/64 Team Sets look
pretty good.
The packaging on the 1/43 Jordans.
We like the 'diorama' type packaging
and bases that Mattel has introduced.
We couldn't get close enough to compare
detail with the existing Minichamps 1/43's.
I wonder if Mattel's deal will carry
over to the Stewart Team's change of ownership and badging? Next
year, they will make the switch to Jaguar.
Quality looks pretty good from this
angle. We'll keep you advised.
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