How To Go From Crazy Idea To MULTIMILLION Dollar Business - Sideshow Collectibles Interview

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(Intense music plays)
- [Narrator] Our pop culture has the power
to bring diverse communities together.
It's a bridge that connects us, its characters
and their stories, sparking our imaginations
and igniting our ambitions.
(dramatic music)
From heroes, to villains, to creatures,
we celebrate beloved icons of cinema,
television, gaming and comics through our licensed
and original collectible products.
Slideshow's mission is in creating highly detailed statues,
posable figures, fine art prints and prop replicas.
- Hey, welcome to another episode of the Dan Lock show.
Today I am like a kid in a candy land.
You have no idea.
Look at where we are at.
Now, if you've been watching my videos on YouTube,
you know from time to time I will do a lot
of unboxing videos and I see the comments that you ask me,
"Where do you the toys?
Where do get collectibles?"
Here we are.
Here we are.
I'm so excited to be at the Sideshow Studio
and thank you Robin for inviting us.
- So grateful to have us here. - Thank you for coming.
This is a dream come true.
- Yes.
- [Dan] This is truly a dream come true.
- [Robin] That's wonderful to hear it.
- Thank you.
In case you don't know, Sideshow Studio,
we're going to go into the story.
What Sideshow's really about I think is connecting people
with their favorite characters, right, their icons--
Right, from your favorite TV shows, right,
from your favorite movies.
Iron Man, Batman, all the characters that you love.
But maybe you see, this isn't just a toy company.
We're gonna talk about a lot more than that,
we're gonna talk about the backstory a little bit, right.
So, Robin, maybe share with us a little bit about how
Sideshow, how this all started.
- Wow. (laughs)
We've been in business, this year is going to be
our 25th year.
- 25 years!
Anniversary, wow.
- Very long time.
And we started as a prototype development studio.
And we were helping other business realize their dreams,
their prototypes, their products,
and we were doing well, we were making some money
and being able to feed ourselves,
- A very humble beginning, right?
- Very humble beginning.
- Just before the show we were talking
about 4 people.
- 4 people.
We started in a garage in Woodland Hills
which is San Fernando Valley.
And technically, it was probably half a garage,
because the car was still in the garage.
But, yeah very small.
And there was a crew of 4 people.
And we were really fortunate.
We found each other and we shared the same passions
or similar passions.
And we made a group and started working together.
And it went on from there.
And we were able to work with many larger companies.
At that time, we were considered a subcontractor.
So if you had a toy company or some other company,
they'd say hey let's send it out of house.
We were the out of house.
We were the small, little garage out of the house,
but we were out of the house.
So we did that for a few years.
And we also took ideas that didn't work well
in those toy companies and they said,
"Okay, this project is gonna die,
so can you make it better?"
So we would redesign it and then present it back to them,
and quite a few projects went super, super famous.
And we sat there going wow, we did a lot of love
and labor, but we got paid that much.
- Now what led to the beginning?
The struggle years, how long did that last?
For how many years?
The 4 of you just kind of doing out of passion?
- It was quite a few years.
We went, probably I think, 8-10 years
before we really got that traction.
We were starting to work fluently, you know,
so we weren't worried about, you know,
where the next meal was coming from.
But we did the toy prototyping.
And there was some things in the industry
that were going a little south at that point.
We had various strikes, writer strikes, actor strikes,
so the industry was kind of shrinking
and some of those businesses were shrinking a little bit.
So it made it a little harder if you're a group
of starving artists who work.
- What was the turning point for Sideshow?
Like from that to now with--
- [Robin] The turning point was--
- [Dan] This huge of 5 buildings, right?
- [Robin] Right, I think the turning point--
- The staff.
- The turning point was one of the items
we designed went skyrocketed.
- Like a viral?
Not even viral, it just went--
- You saw it.
You saw it on TV, you saw it, they made cartoons out of it,
they made merchandise out of it.
And we were like we get this little check.
There was really a lot of love and effort
put into redesigning those particular set of characters.
Unfortunately, I can't mention the characters,
but it was cartoon, they made it into a cartoon.
And we said, enough, we're gonna do it for ourselves.
We know how to do the prototyping.
We've been doing it for a while.
- So you know that you have the ability to create
a product that people will love?
You know what to do.
- And we were fans ourselves.
We were geeks.
You know, when we redesigned something
or make the prototype, there's a certain level
of fandom that goes into that.
And on the side, we were doing all our stuff,
and it was all kind of Pop Culture, Hollywood related.
So we said why aren't we doing this ourselves?
And one of my partners, we were very blessed to make
those connections at that time.
He was a business guy, because you need a business guy.
- You knew the business guy.
You have all the artists here.
- Yeah, I want to do my art, I want to do my art,
and he was like let's get all together and--
- What're we gonna do?
- Yeah, look at what's the goal?
What's the business model?
How do we make this, sell this, present it?
So he was instrumental in that.
And we were lucky because each partner had
their own skillset that they brought to the table.
And I think that was really the magic that we were geeks,
but we also had a skillset.
And we didn't step over on somebody else's skillset.
- So everyone has their own areas of expertise,
and you have a strong business person.
- We had a business person, we had a painter,
we had a sculptor, and a graphic designer.
So we had our own mini studio at that time.
Which is great.
So yeah, it was that turning point
of they made how much money?
It's a cartoon?
It's good products, and we can really do this.
- 'Cause as you think about it, most people think
about toys, is that a real business?
Can you make a living doing it?
Right, I'm curious in terms of even pricing
all the items that you have.
Because they are like toys, but most toys are sold to kids.
But to me, this (mumbles) I don't want to call them toys,
they're like collectables.
Right, they're selling more to adults.
- Even at that time, when we made items,
they were in the toy category.
But we considered them differently
because we brought a tailor in that worked
with the studio who was making actual costumes.
So we went hardcore.
- Make it as realistic as possible.
- We're gonna reproduce exactly,
try and reproduce exactly what you saw on film.
And, I think we did really well.
Our first license was with Universal Studios.
And we did the Classic Monsters.
- Oh nice.
- That was one of our gads.
We all were like I love the Frankenstein films
and the classic Hollywood.
Because we thought that was classic Hollywood.
But at that time, you didn't see a lot of product.
And when you did see it, it was in October.
It was for Halloween.
And then you would see the generic stuff come out.
But we never figures, we never saw statues.
We never saw anything that was, what we could consider,
classic and collectable for people that age range
at the time.
And we were fortunate to meet with a product rep,
and we got into Universal and said,
"Hey we're interested in licensing the monster."
And they said, "It's not Halloween."
And we were like, "We know.
We're going to sell it.
But like, "It's not Halloween."
We're gonna sell it in spring.
We're gonna make this happen.
So our first license was the in the 8 in figure category.
And it was slightly jointed figures.
And, you know, they were just like, here you go.
You go guys, you 4 people, you go.
(laughs) - Yeah good luck.
- And what we didn't realize at the time is
that Universal didn't hold the likeness rights
for any of the actors.
And that's why when you were seeing product,
it was very generic, it wasn't of Karloff, it wasn't Lugusi.
And they said, "Well now you have our license
for the monsters, but now you have to go
and make deals with all the estates."
- Ooh, okay.
- Right, and we were like, "Yes we will."
We're gonna do that.
And there was a lot of skepticism from the studio.
- Because nobody's ever done it.
- No and they were having difficulty connecting the estates,
and fortunately, we got ahold of Sarah Karloff.
And she represented her father's estate.
We said, "Hey we got this crazy idea.
We got the license from Universal.
We want to make it look like your dad."
'Cause there was no product, no official,
what they would call officially licensed product
in the market place showing the classic actor's faces
on that product.
So we were able to make deals with the Karloff
and the Lugosi estate.
And we did the first, and the Chaney,
so we did the top three.
And our product line was sold to Toys R Us at the time,
and it, bam, sold out.
Because the collectors were like where did this come from?
- Like I guess like, this is--
- Right, where did it come from,
and it actually looks like what I remember
from my childhood?
- Yes, that's exactly it.
- What I remember when my dad took me to the movies,
or when I'm up late at night and watching the films.
And there was an emotional connection
that their faces brought to those characters,
because that's what made them the characters in the film.
- 'Cause I think about it like,
"I never collected toys before coming across
the first product like.
I never collected, not my decision.
- It's an addiction. - Right?
- And then when I saw, I think I was browsing online one day
and I saw this figure.
I forgot which one was the first one I bought.
Maybe it was Iron Man, I'm not so sure.
Like the first one.
- That's a classic. - Right.
And I'm like this is not a toy.
This is like, it feels like a connection
if you can bring this home.
A piece of the memory, the film, the excitement,
the emotion, right?
- That's the connection.
That's like when we did that first product line,
we were geeks.
We were pop culture geeks, and that was a labor of love.
And we were ecstatic to the point where we went to
Toys R Us, the local Toys R Us, and we took cameras
and we were in the isle taking pictures
of the product on the shelf.
Because we were so excited.
I have to say, we got bounced out of that Toys R Us.
Because they were like, "No pictures."
Like we were paparazzi at the time.
I don't know why they were like you can't take pictures
in here, but that's how excited we were.
That we were emotionally attached to it.
And we got a lot of feedback from fans
that said thank you because this is what I remember
it looked like, and I have it and or I gifted it
to my father and he can't believe that it looks like that.
So it was gratifying that, one, we made the right choice,
and that it worked and that it was well received
by the fans.
So we did that line, then we came back
with a larger 6 scale version.
So we upscaled it, and again that was in Toys R Us.
- Would you say also because of the timing
for now they say the last ten years,
the Marvel Universe or the superheros really,
it's both, Sideshow both kind of grew together, right?
- [Robin] We were in a good spot at that time,
and we worked well collectively.
And we didn't quit.
And we just had a lot of hard work and not giving up.
And even when we failed, we had to regroup
and start a different way.
And that's, for us, I think, and for me personally,
failure is good.
Some people get freaked out about it.
And they let it side track them.
But I think, in certain respects, that failure gives you
that breathing moment to reflect back.
- To invent maybe.
- Yeah, what did I do wrong?
You know, what can I, how can I make that better,
or do I trash that idea and go in a different direction?
It gives you that pause moment, so failure's good.
It's when you have repetitive, identical failures,
that's stupid.
- It means we haven't learned from our mistakes.
- That's stupid, yes, you can't continue to fail
in the same manner.
Because then, you're not learning.
So we did have a lot of failure,
but we were able to pick ourselves back up.
- Robin, was there a time during the last 25 years,
a moment where it was a pivotal moment?
It can be one of those moments where when this works,
it's gonna be great.
If this doesn't work, we're gonna be in big trouble.
Those moments.
I mean, I'm sure you have a lot of ups and downs.
Share with us maybe a couple of those moments.
- I think, you know, once we got into the momentum
with the Universal license and we got product in the store,
we weren't knowledgeable about what happens in the store.
We weren't knowledgeable about any of that.
So that was the school of hard knocks.
And in some cases, there's a lot of hidden rules
that stores run by and they make the manufacturers jump
through flaming hoops.
- Yeah then pay them late and then all that, right yeah?
- Right and then, you know, the interesting thing
with some stores that they have their own time frame
of how they think things should sell through by.
And if isn't sold, they take it and they toss it
in a discount bin.
And then if it's not sold from there,
they literally send it back to you, crushed,
and say give us our money back.
And you have a crushed product.
So for us that was difficult.
You know, when you have geeks and you have people
that are emotionally invested,
'cause not only our clients emotionally invested,
we're emotionally invested.
And then you get it back and it's all crushed,
you know, and we made a change to not sell to major stores.
That we were going private.
We're gonna do self distribution.
- Online?
- We were going to sell online,
and we weren't going to be distributing our product
through an actual distributor.
And we weren't going to be selling to Toys R Us
and major stores.
That we were going to go through specialty shops,
mom and pop shops, and we were going to be selling online.
So for us, that was a big change for us,
because we were bucking the norm.
Because they said, "What're you doing?"
Everybody gets distributed.
Everybody uses a diamond or everybody uses
some sort of distributor to push their product.
- And toys, you gotta touch it and feel it
and all that right?
- Right, but we thought that we had the key,
that we were gonna sell to local shops
and they're already invested in tailoring the experience
to the people in their town.
So they could be our grand ambassadors and sell the product,
and then we would also sell online.
And then we would start taking control of our own destiny.
And because at that time, everybody was saying,
"No, you have to do it this way."
Again, we had a moment where we had to step back and say,
"We understand the normal path,
but we're gonna try and do it differently."
And so we became self-distributed.
And now, from there to where we're at now,
we're distributing globally.
- What percentage of the customers are coming from online?
What percentage are coming from the smaller boutique stores?
- Oh goodness, it's hard to tell,
because we have boutique stores
but we also have distribution.
So we have some distributors throughout Asia, Europe,
and so they sell to other stores.
So it's really hard to say what that quantity is.
But we've been successful.
I'm not complaining.
I'm not worried about where the next meal is coming from.
- And I love the model from a business perspective.
I think it's very smart because a lot of the,
let's say the items, the products I order,
some of them are limited.
Like you don't always carry, so we don't carry a lot
of the inventory, right?
So then I know, then also increase the urgency.
Okay, I gotta buy this, 'cause Sideshow may not have it
like a year from now.
Or they become very, very expensive,
even if I buy on like Ebay and things like that right?
So from their perspective, I think that it's awesome.
And then also the pre, I can see where you can pre order
certain products.
With toys usually, it's an impulsive buy, right?
Kids in the store, they see the toy that's cool, right?
This is not like, no, I wait sometimes a year
for my item to run.
- It's also different manufacturing.
You know, when you're seeing those plastic toys,
they're manufactured way different.
Tens of thousands.
And our product is hand molded, hand made, hand assembled
in a lot of cases, and hand painted.
So it's very difficult sometimes to,
"Oh we're gonna make 50,000."
That's not, that's not the nature of the product.
It's of how you go from start to finish.
It's a very artistic, manual process.
So that's why you have a limited editions.
- And it's so happy like as a fan, I would buy one product.
It's an Iron Man figure, and then oh, there's another one.
There's a different color or a different look,
and that's great.
You collect that.
And then there's another figure.
It is addictive.
- Well especially with Iron Man.
And then you have movie one was 3 suites.
And then movie 2, there's 900.
They just exploded with the amount of suits,
and now you're like okay well that suit is cool,
and that suit's cool.
And I wanna, I wanna heavy lifting Iron Man suit
that's more of a like kinda army kinda heavy lifter one.
But they were so unique.
- [Dan] The Hulkbuster, right?
- [Robin] Right and there were so unique
that when, if you're an Iron Man fan,
you're like now I need.
It's not where it's a color shift.
They were significant designs, and the unique paint.
- Yes, different abilities.
- The applications and different abilities.
So now you went, "I need them all."
You know, and then they have the whole Hall of Armor suits.
- That's beautiful.
And then when do you guys transition to more than
making more the life sized or bigger figures?
- Well, you know, the interesting thing is we started out
doing bigger figures, bigger life sized busts.
And then that went away.
When we were doing the prototyping, we, like I said,
we were doing other things, other passion pursuits.
And at that time, we were working with a comic book artist
named Bertie Bryson.
And he had just released a beautiful graphic novel
of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.
So we did a life sized bust of Bertie's item,
of his Frankenstein.
It was beautiful.
So that was limited edition.
But at the time we were a small studio,
so I think it was an edition of 25.
So if someone can find the Bertie Bryson Sideshow bust,
that's gonna be yes, it's very rare.
So we, a lot of these categories we're working in,
we were working in just nobody knew it.
So when we got the chance to start working
back into the life sized, we were like bring it on.
We're ready.
We've been ready to do that.
- And I think one of the, one of the key things
about all the items I collected,
it's not just a figure, but it comes
with a lot of accessories.
So then you don't get bored.
Oh it's he's just a figure.
But you can change the hands, you can change the head,
you can change this, you can get a different position
and different things.
It makes it very interesting to play,
but also interesting to display.
- We had a lot of clients that reach out and say,
"I love this figure, I don't know what to do with it.
I can't pose it, it doesn't look like anything.
You guys have beautiful galleries online.
We have a wonderful photography team, video team,
and the customers were struggling to make it look like that.
So now we have a series about how to be a poser
where we have one of our gentleman that just,
that's what he does.
He's very talented at that, so he has his own series
where we're like okay, this is how you pose this figure.
So we walk collectors through, step by step, if you want--
- I remember the first couple of figures,
I went this doesn't look very good.
The hands are like this and it's like this.
That's not a very hero-y pose, right?
They looked odd.
- The great thing about Terry in that series is,
he'll tell you why he's doing that.
He said if you want to look dynamic, this is how you do it.
He'll actually give you tips on how the wrist works
and why you have to turn it certain ways.
So he's not just showboating.
He's actually teaching you how to do that.
Which our collectors gave us positive feedback on that.
So I'm glad that we can help them to pose it
in their collections.
And they send us pictures using just beautiful--
- And you have a blog, I know that all the collectors
that take photos say enter kinda like a contest.
Like it's collected a month.
- [Robin] Yes it's, yeah.
- Collected a Month, I gotta enter there
- Yes, well and good thing is we want
to see everybody's collection.
So we're not looking for overwhelm me with your collection.
It's show me your favorite piece.
Show we what you got.
- It's your passion, right.
- Yeah, your passion.
Whether it's one or two pieces,
or if you've designed, you know, a whole room.
We've have people that have designed custom rooms.
We've had people that just have certain corners available,
and they decorate a certain corner of their house.
- Whose your favorite character?
- Oh goodness, I was just talking with your crew beforehand.
I love Deadpool.
Because he just gets away with so much stuff,
so much stuff.
You know, when you're having a hard day at work,
you just want to Deadpool somebody.
And if you guys know the character,
you know what I'm talking about.
So that's my--
- And he's so different from every other character.
He's just not politically correct.
- Not politically correct.
Just a lot of physical slap-stick stuff in a character,
and so that he's one of my favorite.
But I'm also, you know, we recently did a statue of,
oh goodness, we did one for How to Train Your Dragon.
- [Dan] Oh How to Train Your Dragon, yes.
- [Robin] He was, you know, he was really cool.
- I do also want to ask you about the team,
because the team is what makes the company work, right?
One thing I love, if you never purchased anything
from Sideshow, let me walk you through the process.
After you purchase, at the end there's a thank you, right.
And the thank you, there's a little video.
There's all teams like hey thank you.
For the first time I saw that, that's very unusual.
And I love that video, because when you buy
something online, keep in mind, like when I buy a toy,
all I saw was the picture.
So I bought the picture, and I really don't.
Even before I came to the studio,
I didn't know how big the company is.
I thought maybe she's got 10 people.
But you don't know.
You have no idea, right.
There's no concept.
And but when you can see the people,
the culture behind the company,
it almost makes me feel oh,
like there's real people behind this.
And they're just like me.
They're a fan, and they, right?
- They say come on in here.
You're a pop culture geek like us.
- Like wait you're one of us.
- It's sometimes it's hard to find a connection like that.
And we're the hub.
You know, I wanna be the hub.
Because we spend so many years as artists struggling
to find other people to connect with,
and I think that is one of the unique things
about our business that.
Even we went form 4 people to 160,
but it still feels like family.
It's close, you know, we try to keep that atmosphere.
And a lot of the people we have on staff
are also pop culture geeks.
Some do cosplay, you know, some have gaming--
- [Dan] Go to Comic Con.
- [Robin] Comic Con, yes.
Every year we go to Comic Con.
And, but there's such a wide variety of passions
and interests and pursuits.
Some people are gamers, you know, hardcore gamers.
Some people are sci-fi, Dungeons and Dragons.
You know, there's probably nothing that you can't name
that one of the 160 that work here.
- [Dan] But I could see even just walking (mumbles)
includes some (mumbles) in here.
- [Robin] We've got a lot of B-roll.
- [Dan] Yeah, in the office, and you can is right there.
Andy was sharing with me the seal of the company.
The seal of the company is actually a vegan, right.
So he has this kitchen that provides vegan food,
and also teaches the staff how to make vegan food.
See that's all part of the culture.
They're unusual, again for just a prototype, a toy company,
like that's different.
That's all culture to me, right, from what I see.
So I bet so the staff, you, it's very close, right?
- It's important for us to make it a family,
and to, my partner Greg always says it's not about
the product, it's a bout the people.
And it is about the people,
because if you're connecting with your coworkers
and you're connecting as group.
And you love where you work, then you're gonna be happier
in what you're producing.
- [Dan] And the customers will feel it.
- The customers will feel it, and we haven't been shy
about sharing the staff with the customers.
We have live chats, you know, we email.
But we also have the online shows.
We have different venues to bring the staff to the people.
So we have weekly shows and we'll pull people
from customer support, and then one of the interesting
interactions we just had, we had one of the guys
from customer support do an unboxing.
And in the chat was like, hey that was the guy yesterday
that helped me with my coupon code.
So it was nice because they get.
These are real people.
You're not calling a call center.
- Yeah, it's not an actor.
- Right, it's not an actor.
You're not calling a call center.
These are people that actually work here
and come everyday and deal with the product
and help create the product.
Or they help to fulfill the product,
once it's sold to the vendors.
So it's a 2 part system.
- So how is the Sideshow structured, now?
I know you have the multimedia side, right.
You delivery, shipment side.
And you have the kind of the creation, prototype side.
How does the company divide in terms of functions?
- It's creating the product and fulfilling the product.
I think is the easiest way to define it.
- And then you have the studio, right?
- Yeah and we have the studios and--
- Beautiful by the way, look at this.
(Robin laughs) This is awesome.
You only see bits of it, but it's beautiful.
This chunk. - He's showing this much.
- Yeah this chunk, there's that chunk, there's this chunk.
- Well it's really a 2 part system,
because we want to create collectables
that people have an emotional attachment to.
And it fulfills a moment or it captures a moment
in their life where they remember.
I remember when I went to the theater with my family.
I remember when we sat in front of the TV
and watched this.
I think I'm a superhero, so therefor, I want the Iron Man
because I can picture myself as Tony Stark in the suit.
And that's me and I want it.
But then there's another portion of the business
that has to do deliver on that emotional purchase.
And what we have to do on that side of the business
is not create disappointment.
Because you don't want disappointment.
You want that emotional excitement to carry through
all the way to delivery.
So that's what their objective is.
Is to connect with the customer, make sure they're happy,
make sure all their questions are answered,
they're accounts are taken care of,
and to be able to shepard that product to them
and get it delivered to their door
and to really close that--
- That's actually a great point.
Like to not to create disappointment,
because I was just before we turned on the camera,
was showing Robin, like, all my.
I just have all my Sideshow delivery delivered
to my house today.
Like here, like seriously, I have a shipment
from you all the time.
- And I'm glad that our text messaging is working.
- Yeah, it's working very well.
- We tested that out.
- Very working well.
But I bought toys from other companies,
like a couple other brands.
I won't name name, right, but similar figures
and stuff like that.
The hand doesn't work, or it doesn't look right,
or it's something.
So now I don't by from anybody except Sideshow.
- Thanks, that's awesome.
(both talking at once)
- I have never been, I have never seriously,
not because I'm in Sideshow's studio,
I've never been disappointed, one time.
One time, not one time.
- Well it's lovely to hear that, thank you,
and we work hard to make that happen.
And but we're not delusional to know that stuff happens.
Things break.
When people are disappointed, you're shipping it
and you can.
We had one customer that kept complaining
that his stuff was broken.
And I'm like oh I'm so sorry, let's replace that for you.
And then he was taking pictures,
and there was a boot print on his box.
I said, there's a boot print.
He upset the delivery guy, and the guy--
- Every single time.
- And the delivery guy was squashing it,
and so we helped try and rectify that for him.
But the ultimate journey of that product,
it was still broken.
So we had, you know, rectify it and replace it
and make it whole and make his emotional attachment
and his understanding of what he was going to get
from that product whole.
Somethings happen like that you never, never foresee.
And we know it's gonna happen.
And if we try to work our hardest to make it right,
and if not, we can try to improve their experience
for next time.
And so it's, that's one of those failure points.
That's like okay I'll fail, but we're gonna try.
And we're gonna try to improve it
and make sure the clients are happy next time.
- Where do you see Sideshow is going in the next 5 years?
So now we've got 25 years, like 30 year anniversary.
So 30th anniversary like where would you see Sideshow at?
- I want to be in a completely different place
than we are now.
You know, we have been working on our IP.
We have one of our Ips.
- Court of the Dead. - The Court of the Dead.
We have a lot of stuff in the pipeline.
There's some really exciting stuff coming up.
Unfortunately, I can't say it.
- Stay tune, stay tuned.
- But yeah, we have a lot of things piled up
to activate, you know, in the next few years.
So we're super excited internally,
and I'm so super excited!
But I just can't tell you about it.
- It's a cliffhanger.
- I know it's a cliffhanger.
We'll have to do another interview.
- Yeah, we'll come back for another interview.
- Come back, right now we can talk about it.
- Now we can talk about it.
So for my audience, maybe they just want to purchase
the first product, or they've been following me
for some time that they want to now expand the collection.
But I'm telling you, if you buy your first one,
that's it, it's game over.
It's a never ending black hole.
That's my warning.
- Yes because we've designed it to be
a never ending black hole.
- Once you get your first one, that's it, you're done.
- We try to make the client experience quick and easy,
so you can go to Sideshow.com, you can browse.
- YouTube, definitely follow on YouTube
if you want tips, yeah.
- YouTube or on Instagram.
But the just the experience online,
when you're on the product page,
hopefully we can serve you up videos,
we can serve you up the gallery.
You can see all different sides
of what you're gonna be purchasing.
You can click online chat and talk to one of our geeks
in customer support, because they're either a fan
or they have to product sitting in front of them
or they've been down in production
while they're sculpting the product.
So they're very knowledgeable about the product.
And then we also have flexible payment plans.
- Oh yes, that's actually, it's actually very important.
'Cause it's still, it's for most people,
it's a 4-300, $400 figure.
It's not a $30 figure.
- Well, we originally started the flexible payment plan,
I believe early 2000s and nobody in the industry
was doing it at all.
And we tailored it based on a client interaction I had.
And he said, "Hey, I wanted to buy this item,
but I got the money and I blew it.
I just spent it, and now I'm kicking myself
because I really wanted this item.
And I only have X amount of dollars left."
So he said, "Can I just send you all my money
and then you can allocate it for me?"
And I said, "Yes, we'll make that happen."
And we did and that was the inspiration
of the flexible payment plan,
because we realized some of the clients were struggling
and didn't quite know how to finance their money
to make that purchase happen.
So in some cases, it allowed that collector
to be able to obtain their dream item
that they thought they couldn't
because the one lump sum was so overwhelming for them.
So the payment plan said hey you can pay for it,
75 bucks a month and we'll hold onto it,
and we'll ship it out when it's ready.
- And some of the items even when you pre order,
you just make a deposit then you can still
keep making payments when it's finished.
- Well we try to time it--
- Before the release, right?
- Right, when we have things in production,
we try to time the payment plan
so once you finish your last payment,
you're item is delivering with everybody else's.
'Cause you still want that excitement,
and you don't want to go online and hear from some guy
how the item is great and he loves it
and you're missing out, but your payment plan
still has 2 payments to go.
So we try to time it appropriately,
so everybody gets that excitement.
- I just remembered.
I shall share a quick story.
We'll wrap this up.
So I go to see movies all the time.
That's how I relax, right?
So every single time, I would go see, let's say,
one of the Marvel movies, usually after the day or 2,
I'll get an email from Sideshow,
exactly the movie I just watched.
Right, so listen, I just watched Iron Man 3,
and there's Iron Man 3 figures.
Oh, here we go.
Here we go.
And my wife would be like, oh Sideshow
just times you perfectly.
They know when you're watching the movies.
- I'm surprised we haven't found out
your wife's email address.
This is what he wants.
- This is what he wants.
So how do you know?
It's perfect timing, every single time.
Every single time.
So it's awesome.
It's so awesome.
Thank you Robin, thank you for having us.
- Thank you for coming out,
and we're gonna take a tour.
- Yeah, so make sure all it includes something special
B-Roll for you.
And make sure also check out Sideshow.
Just go to website.
Get your first collection.
- Yes please.
- Do an unboxing video.
Don't just watch my unboxing video.
Do your own unboxing video.
- We love to see everybody that gets product in
and they unbox it.
Some pictures of your first product, if you get one.
And you know, share your collection with us,
because we're geeks and we love to see that kind of stuff.
So please hit our social media channels.
Hit us up online at Sideshow.com and share your passion.
- Yes, and comment below what else you want to see.