Low Tamiya stock everywhere?

[fullspectrum 97]

Hey guys. Whats going on with Tamiya? I know there's a pandemic but why is there such low to NO stock on Tamiya kits everywhere? And when will they get kits back in stock? I heard there was an issue in their Philippines plant. Anyone have any idea?

[Mad Ax 9291]

I think all we can do here is speculate, which is what we've been doing all year.  I'm not up to speed with what's happening pandemic-wise in the East but I'd be surprised if it isn't having at least some effect, either through factory shutdowns, reduced staff numbers or the same thing happening further down the chain causing problems getting raw materials and parts.  There have also been constant shipping problems over the past 12 months, I thought a lot of this had been sorted but the pandemic has shown it can throw us curve-balls on a whim.

It has also occurred to me that, as Japan is Tamiya's primary market, if they are having problems meeting demand then perhaps they are concentrating their stocks at home.

Tamiya doesn't really publish this information so we can't do much more than guess.  However, in the UK a least, the distributor tends to have an idea of what's shipping right now and I think most of that gets pre-allocated to the hobby shops, so the shops usually have a rough idea of what they're getting in the near future.

[J@mes 2326]

No air freight, so it is all on a slow boat

[ScoTT-02 7]

When I was trying to buy my first Tamiya kit before Christmas from a popular retailer I asked why stock was really low and I got the following answer - the Philippines had a full military Covid lock down early on and Tamiya decided that they should move production (equipment and materials) to Japan, all of which stopped production for weeks.  Once everything was relocated and set up... the Philippines lifted their lockdown!

Seems plausible and just like my luck! 😂

[yogi-bear 2315]

Tamiya blog also had a brief article in December on how Tamiya has seen an increase in demand this year, not a lot of detail though,

https://tamiyablog.com/2020/12/popular-plastic-model-due-to-nesting-chairman-shunsaku-tamiya-speaks-of-worldwide-shortage/

[moffman 5746]

1 hour ago, yogi-bear said:

Tamiya blog also had a brief article in December on how Tamiya has seen an increase in demand this year, not a lot of detail though,

https://tamiyablog.com/2020/12/popular-plastic-model-due-to-nesting-chairman-shunsaku-tamiya-speaks-of-worldwide-shortage/

Certainly looks like that's the problem then? Also (again only what my local hobby shop told me🤷‍♂️) a lot of the tamiya and other manufacturers products are in the UK but the containers are stuck in container ports like a lot of other overseas products!

[fullspectrum 97]

9 hours ago, ScoTT-02 said:

When I was trying to buy my first Tamiya kit before Christmas from a popular retailer I asked why stock was really low and I got the following answer - the Philippines had a full military Covid lock down early on and Tamiya decided that they should move production (equipment and materials) to Japan, all of which stopped production for weeks.  Once everything was relocated and set up... the Philippines lifted their lockdown!

Seems plausible and just like my luck! 😂

I heard something along the same lines. I guess there is a major disruption going on with them. My local Hobby shop said he has more kits coming in Feb.

[Killajb 1546]

I can assure you all that Tamiya is low on stock here in Japan as well.