Star Wars toys across the world

[stillakid]

One of the "perks" of my career is getting the opportunity to travel on occasion. In the past few months, I've been to the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Dubai, and now the Czech Republic.

In addition to doing my job, I was also looking forward to finding unique "foreign" (non-US) Star Wars collectibles in addition to the action figures that I normally collect.

However, I've been disappointed in not finding much of anything at all. Short of the UK, there has been nary a hint of Star Wars merchandise anywhere. It is possible that I'm just not going to the right stores or parts of town, but the most I've seen thus far has been game related, but no true toys.

I'm wondering if this has to do with a general uninterest in Star Wars in decidely non-English speaking countries, or does the lack of merchandise itself contribute to the lack of interest from toy stores, at least as I perceive it?

[TeeEye7]

I think you may be onto something with SW being favored more in Engilsh-speaking countries.

I was a short-lived tri-logo collector. When I knew friends or family were traveling abroad, I asked them to look for things SW for me. Normally, there was very little to report (yes...traveling in non-English speaking countries). Product was always scarce. I think it's what you said: that SW is more popular with Canada/UK/USA folks than the rest of the world based on my small experience.

Perhaps sci-fi in general is more popular with us? :confused:

[LTBasker]

I'm sure at least you could add Japan to that list, they're just as obsessed with sci-fi (and not just anime sci-fi) as us, maybe even more... If you go there I'm sure you'd find alot of cool stuff, they usually have even better exclusives. Like the R2 trashcan. :p

The only things I've seen from other countries that were really interesting were the long-photo POTF2 figures, the BattleDroid and PitDroid pack-ins and then the Star Wars hippos from Germany (made a few years ago I think).

[Major Karr]

There are several comic book shops in Paris around St-Germain where I have seen lots of stuff...found the Vader w/Interregation droid, R2 w/Holo Leia. Mostly stuff that was available here.

[JediTricks]

There's also not all that much buying power in other countries, many countries are small and/or poor so they don't show up on Hasbro's radar and thus Hasbro doesn't cater to them - it's just not worth it to Hasbro to print up new packaging and research all the laws to make sure the toys are compliant just to sell 500 units in an entire country.