New Zealand Hot Wheels Purchase

Managed to get a couple of items from a fellow New Zealand collector, he was getting rid of his Super collection and while I was slow to the party and missed out on most, I was able to get one item I didn't have and one I already had (to be added to the trade pile).

The seller was also kind enough to include the regular versions of the cars as extras
I'll let you guess what car is in the trade pile (or you can watch the YouTube video)...

The star of the parcel however, and what I want to talk about was the 2013 RLC Exclusive VW Drag Bus. Now, some collectors go crazy for the Drag Bus but I am not one of them. Sure it is a nice casting and is good for customs if you are into those as well (again I am not), but the call to me on this was the Hot Wheels Racing Team colour scheme - the Hot Wheels logo with the blue and white colour scheme calls out to me and makes me want to get every car that is in this style. Mattel seems to know this as they tend to make a few cars in this colour scheme :-)

In 2013 I had just joined the Red Line Club - as a New Zealander I am allowed to, but have to ship the items to a parcel forwarding service in the USA in order to actually receive the cars. When this VW Drag Bus went on sale, I got up at the required time (5am on the day after the sale - time zones!) and tried to purchase. Sadly the website was playing up, nothing could be added to the cart. I refreshed and refreshed, read the forums and then had to give up and get ready to go to work. Whatever the problem was, was resolved in that time of getting ready and going to work so by the time I checked the website again, the Drag Bus had of course sold out.

Prices on eBay were of course naturally inflated and so I added it to my wish list for the future. That future arrived last week when it was offered on the Facebook group for sale and I jumped. Pricing was exactly the same as if I had of got it directly from Mattel (factoring in postage to USA address and then onwards to New Zealand) so I think I did pretty well.

In the die cast car hobby, it sometimes pays to just wait for that item you want to come along at the right price rather than hunting for something.