The Yak Shack Forum

Hello all.  What with the mystery Pear Tree Leaves card and all the rumors inhabiting Yak-land, I decided to finally go straight to the source.  I e-mailed Mike Simon, VP of Sales and Marketing at Artbox.  I asked about autos, props, & costumes.  I asked about the "triple autograph card".  I asked about the Memoribilila exclusive.  Here is a copy of his e-mail reply.

F.Y. I. I already posted about the Pear Tree card in the other forum, but again I say, Bidders Be Warned!

The leaf cards that I sent out were all numbered 1-30 and those were case incentives only. I have no idea what this card is, especially if it is not numbered. The update set will be scheduled to ship in early November 2004. Triple autograph, where did you hear that from? There will be 2 autograph cards per case. There will be over 14 different costume cards and 10 prop cards with 2 case incentives. Cards Inc. will have 500 holo sets with an Exclusive Autograph Card. That’s it for now, until you get your hobby boxes. There will be other interesting cards…

 

Mike Simon

VP

Ooh so that's the Warrick Davis (auto unconfirmed) set - it comes with a holo base set :) coooool - much rarer (at 500 WE HOPE) than the San Diego tin!

2 autographs per case is so evilly mean... I mean no disrespect but they aren't all Potter autos are they?? No way! So it' 7 cases before you have 14 autos neverlo a full set or the really hard pulls!!! CRAZY

What's VP stand for? Vice President? I dunno your American business terms - but I do know you get up VERY early in the morning Morenomark - is this part of your early morning ritual - check forum - go for a jog :) and all before most of America wakes up :)

VP = Vice President

Hopefully John Edwards very shortly.  (Sorry.  Political.)

As for the lateness of the hour, work for me ends at midnight, so for me this is 7 PM (1900 for you European-types).  Ten-and-a-half-hour shift, but a four day work week.  I  could use that time-turner...

It's good to hear he's on a figure of 14 costumes... that's plenty - that 19 rumour was crazy!

But then again "over 14"? How random is that comment at this stage. Either they aren't going to make the release date of Nov 3rd or surely he already knows!

I've been wondering about the release date, too.  One rumor is that Artbox does not have the Harry autos in hand, and with the release just (wait...must check Mark's countdown) 14 days, 17 hours, 38 minutes, and 50 seconds to go, wouldn't you think that they'd have started packing the boxes by now?

To be honest if the idea of simulaneous UK and US release was true they ought to be down at the post office with the cases  ;D

 :-\

I honestly thought the "19" number was a typo.  Thought maybe they meant "10", but hit the wrong key.  I wonder if he's being vague because they are still working out exclusive deals for some of the collectible shows later on in the year.  Second time I've seen mention of the "Harry not in-hand" rumor.
Interesting.

Noooooooooooooooooooo

I suppose that will make people open up boxes though this time, since Rosemerta was a relatively low priced card in this set - and her card is still in date too - but I dislike redemptions really  :-\ although it has made it interesting for us to know how many are redeemed. Presuming artbox continue numbering the letters we should know of the number of Harry's around which will be handy  ;D

There will probably be seventy-five Harry cards.  Or at least that's what they'll say.  But then if you count the number of cards that end up on eBay, you might just figure out that there couldn't be just seventy-five, as there would have to be some people who just kept...

Oh, sorry, that's the Hermione auto card.  

It will definitely be interesting to see those numbers if the Harry auto is a redemption.

If there's no triple auto, then what are the possibilites for the last auto?  McGonagall, Snape, Draco?

mcgonagall auto way cool or better yet hagrid definately a must

Ooh you are right - they HAVE to be done at some point :)

Especially a McGonagall for me  ;D

We can always live in hope!!!

*if* the rumours are true and it does exist and it is limited to 100 pieces *if* the print run remains at 1000 cases that's one in 10 cases!

So it may take a day or two for one to surface!

I got the Harry auto confirmed but not in hand from a very reliable dealer who talks to Artbox directly alot from what he tells me so it may be a redemption if they don't get it quick.  

Is it just Harry or are there others that might be redemptions?

I have no idea all he said was Rupert Grint was in hand at artbox and harry has signed and is confirmed but auto's were not in hand at artbox.

Yeah Harry was confirmed here too but I haven't heard about redemptions!

Oh well at least Ron is in  ;D

Who knows they may get them in time for pack out.  I think the companies can pack out and ship in a few days turn around.  So I bet they don't begin collation and packaging til this weekend or beginning of next week.

Wow I didn't realise that :) there is lots of hope yet!

OK i've just had word that Artbox HAVE had back the  Ron and Hermione autos and that we will know on Friday whether it will be a redemption or auto from Dan (presumably if they haven't got it back by Friday it will have to be a redemption card).

:D

Good news though  

In other news, they seem to have changed their minds to 15 costume cards INCLUDING the creature cards... which is odd really as they seem to have previously been bundled in with the props.

"There will also be special autograph cards that I think everyone will like, that will be announced this Friday as well"

Place your bets... dual auto or triple auto??

This Friday  ???

They are doing a real good job at keeping us (well, me at least since I really can't talk for everone  ;)) in great anticipation. There doing it on purpose ... I swear!

More rumored news (sidebar - for some reason Artbox employees seem to be telling lots of people different things) anyway.

I was told (and this also came from Mike Simon VP to a dealer) that there would be the 3 props per case, 1 costume per box, 2 auto's per case and 3 Film Cards per case.

Also I was told that he said the print run was looking to be about 18,000 boxes or 1,800 CASES :o :-\ >:(

I don't know how I fell about that that sounds like panicked collectors (like me) overbuying for fear of shortage!?!

1,800 cases sound really high considering that Star Wars was rumored to be about 32,000 boxes (or about 4,000 cases) and there are many more Star Wars collectors (and older collectors with more $$$ to spend).

But with one costume per box, that means 18,000 costume cards!  :o  Divide that by 15 different cards, and it averages out to 1,200 cards per costume piece.

No guarantees my information is correct again this is just what I was told by a reliable source.  Who says that is right from an Artbox VP.  That would make more sense though taking into account what Roz was told that it will be one costume or prop per box.  I was expecting them to make about 1,000 case, but if preorders were strong they could move that up and stretch the inserts out a little more - maybe come out with a film card insert ???

Good... but I have to say that my news on insert ratio came from Mike last night... I am just hoping that it was a typo!!! Somehow I doubt it though

Roz,
You are probably right then, I bet they lowered the ratio of inserts to compensate for the high demand in preorders and made more cases of the product.

Two dealers I am going through both were able to get more cases.  One got 5 more cases and the other got at least 10 more cases promised.  So where are these cases coming from???  The elves at the North Pole are opening our packs taking out the extra inserts and putting them in the new cases :'( ???