If you’re wondering why we and other retailers in North America haven’t been receiving the latest Hobby Master products for several weeks running, you may want to read this insightful article that recently appeared in the New York Times. Several months back, when our distributor for Hobby Master, Historic Sales out of Minnesota, was sold to Collectors Armory in Georgia, the Company re-routed each Hobby Master shipment away from Los Angeles to the port of Savannah, Georgia. This made sense because at the time both the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, the principal ports of entry for inbound freight from Asia, were deluged with shipments and unable to keep up with the logjam of ships and containers arriving on a daily basis. Recently, it was reported that there were at least 200,000 shipping containers either ready to be unloaded or parked in a holding area, waiting for their turn to be picked up by local truckers. While both ports are now operating on a 24-hour, around-the-clock basis, the problem is exacerbated due to the lack of truckers picking up their loads and ferrying them to their distribution centers.
It turns out that Savannah is faring no better than the west coasts ports, itself inundated in cargo bound for distributors and retailers around the US. According to this article, over 50,000 containers are either sitting idle or languishing off-shore in any number of cargo ships, thereby suffering much the same fate as other ports of entries around the country. So, while you may be seeing certain Hobby Master products appearing overseas, on Facebook or elsewhere, take heart and understand that these same items will eventually make it to Historic Sales of Georgia and in turn to us and every other retailer patiently waiting to take delivery of their orders.
Mind you this problem plagues every Forces of Valor shipment as well since Historic Sales has once again been appointed the official distributor of the line in North America. Likewise, Air Force 1 has been beset by the same problems, although we recently received a shipment from them, which will likely have to last well into the first quarter of 2022. No matter how you look at it, its going to be a very long holiday season that will certainly extend into the first half of the new year…
Update: Late on Tuesday, we were informed that the trucking company responsible for picking up Historic’s inbound containers has been notified that the September shipment of Hobby Master products has been offloaded, passed customs, and can be picked up in good order. Presently, they are attempting to take delivery of this shipment by week’s end and, if successful, we should be receiving our order sometime towards the end of the first week of November. With Thanksgiving looming, there is no way of knowing if the “October” Hobby Master shipment will arrive before the start of the holiday season. We will post further updates on both the “October” and “November” shipments, along with the Forces of Valor shipment still pegged for a late November arrival once information has been passed along to us.