Year End Review - Best of 2013 by Brand/Company

I have absolutely no time to kill. And yet, true to form, this is exactly when I choose to occupy myself with a mindless task.

I found myself asking which of the "Big Five" brands (Schleich, Papo, Safari, CollectA, and Mojo Fun) had the best year for 2013. (Before you get the wrong idea, let me assure everybody that I don't actually think there's an objectively correct answer out there. As you quickly see, the "results" are completely dependent on my own preferences about particular models and even more importantly, only based on the models that I purchased.)

Typically, in making this sort of assessment, I'd just go with my gut. This time, however, I thought I might try to generate a (very slightly) more respectable method for determining the results. So here's what I did.

First, a little background: I keep an excel spreadsheet with information about every single model I own. One of my line items is a numerical rank between 1 and 10 (1 being the highest and 10 being the lowest) that provides a very rough indication of how much I like a model. It's a very subjective exercise, but after receiving a model and spending some time with it, I will assign it a number. I also regularly rejigger the numbers as I go back and compare ratings and spend more time with the models.

With that in hand, I listed all my purchases of 2013 models for each of the five big companies, and for each of the five sets, I took an average of my "preference ranking." The lower the resulting number, the better.

The immediate, unfiltered results were as follows. This ranking basically tracks which brands produced the set of models that I preferred overall, given the "preference ranking" numbers I assigned. (1 is the highest ranked, 5 the lowest):
1. Papo
2. CollectA
3. Safari
4. Schleich
5. Mojo Fun

This is not the ranking I would have created if I'd gone with my gut. I was surprised to see Mojo so low and surprised that Papo came out on top (though not dismayed, Papo is awesome.) Some further reflective convinced me that there were some factors skewing the results, starting with these two: (1) There was a Mojo figure I purchased with which I was really disappointed. I felt this one low score was unfairly penalizing Mojo. So I decided to factor it out. (2) I basically bought twice as many Schleich models as I did for almost any other company -- e.g. 25 Schleichs compared to 11 Mojo, 10 CollectA and 16 Papo. So, I decided, in fairness to Schleich, to limit the average score to just the top 12 Schleich models, so that this gave a better representation of how the company had fared against the others. With these two adjustments in hand, I generated the following ranking.

1. Papo
2. Schleich (big jump!)
3. CollectA
4. Mojo Fun
5. Safari

Finally, there was one more crucial consideration to take into account. Companies like Schleich and Papo made some great models. But CollectA and Mojo surely get credit for making available models of extremely novel, interesting, and desirable animals. (The Papo Tigress and Grizzly are really nice, but c'mon! CollectA and Mojo gave us a Markhor, Saola, Two-Toed Sloth, Gaur Bull, Blackbuck, and so on.)

So, for each animal, I raised its preference ranking by one point if it was a novel/rare/desirable animal. All the animals listed immediately above got a boost. Combining ALL of these adjustments, here were my final rankings.

1. CollectA
2. Mojo Fun
3. Papo
4. Schleich
5. Safari.

I confess, this last ranking probably matches perfectly with the ranking I would have produced with my gut. I don't know if that's an accident or evidence that the method I generated is successfully tracking my gut.

What I found most interesting about the exercise, though, is this fact: If I don't take into account the excitement that comes with getting a new and interesting animal, Papo and Schleich do much better than expected. This leads me to wonder if I may sometimes be underestimating how happy I am with their products because of the excitement that CollectA and Mojo creates by focusing on more obscure and interesting animals.

Who knows. Probably it's all meaningless. I can say two things for sure though: First, there are a handful of 2013 models I couldn't imagine giving up and CollectA, Mojo, Schleich and Papo are all represented (in fact, fairly equally represented) in that group. Second, this was a major exercise in procrastination. Oh the shame.

Anyone else want to share their rankings of the 2013 product lines by the five major companies?

(And please, if there's a thread that already addresses this topic, admins should feel free to merge my post above with the existing thread.)

Scott, it is interesting to read your post and follow your ideas. Like you, I don't have enough time to make this kind of topic     But I was thinking to show a comparison topic between 2013 and 2014 with maps and stats as soon as Papo will give us some official pics to complete my maps.    

I think Roger will probably open a "Best or something like that" of 2013 soon   

    I LOVE your analytical ways   
Nobody can doubt that my are a mathematical genious   

Gosh ! My mind is so full of the 2014-models, I find it hard to remember what models they made in 2013   

But my gut feeling is :

1. CollectA
2. Mojo Fun
3. Papo
4. Safari
5. Schleich.
6. Bullyland

The first two because of the many wonderful, rare species.
Papo because of the wonderful dogs
Safari because of the moon fish, flying fish, Life Cycle series etc
I put Schleich almost last, because of the "My little pony"-style. This may not be fair, and probably stems from my high expectations from earlier times.
Bullyland deserves a place in the row because of the Wincent

This is very interesting to read. I think it is neat how you give each figure a ranking on your spreadsheet too, so you can look back and do things like this.

scot(t) wrote:

I have absolutely no time to kill. And yet, true to form, this is exactly when I choose to occupy myself with a mindless task.

I found myself asking which of the "Big Five" brands (Schleich, Papo, Safari, CollectA, and Mojo Fun) had the best year for 2013. (Before you get the wrong idea, let me assure everybody that I don't actually think there's an objectively correct answer out there. As you quickly see, the "results" are completely dependent on my own preferences about particular models and even more importantly, only based on the models that I purchased.)

Typically, in making this sort of assessment, I'd just go with my gut. This time, however, I thought I might try to generate a (very slightly) more respectable method for determining the results. So here's what I did.

First, a little background: I keep an excel spreadsheet with information about every single model I own. One of my line items is a numerical rank between 1 and 10 (1 being the highest and 10 being the lowest) that provides a very rough indication of how much I like a model. It's a very subjective exercise, but after receiving a model and spending some time with it, I will assign it a number. I also regularly rejigger the numbers as I go back and compare ratings and spend more time with the models.  

With that in hand, I listed all my purchases of 2013 models for each of the five big companies, and for each of the five sets, I took an average of my "preference ranking." The lower the resulting number, the better.

The immediate, unfiltered results were as follows. This ranking basically tracks which brands produced the set of models that I preferred overall, given the "preference ranking" numbers I assigned. (1 is the highest ranked, 5 the lowest):
1. Papo
2. CollectA
3. Safari
4. Schleich
5. Mojo Fun

This is not the ranking I would have created if I'd gone with my gut. I was surprised to see Mojo so low and surprised that Papo came out on top (though not dismayed, Papo is awesome.) Some further reflective convinced me that there were some factors skewing the results, starting with these two: (1) There was a Mojo figure I purchased with which I was really disappointed. I felt this one low score was unfairly penalizing Mojo. So I decided to factor it out. (2) I basically bought twice as many Schleich models as I did for almost any other company -- e.g. 25 Schleichs compared to 11 Mojo, 10 CollectA and 16 Papo. So, I decided, in fairness to Schleich, to limit the average score to just the top 12 Schleich models, so that this gave a better representation of how the company had fared against the others. With these two adjustments in hand, I generated the following ranking.

1. Papo
2. Schleich (big jump!)
3. CollectA
4. Mojo Fun
5. Safari

Finally, there was one more crucial consideration to take into account. Companies like Schleich and Papo made some great models. But CollectA and Mojo surely get credit for making available models of extremely novel, interesting, and desirable animals. (The Papo Tigress and Grizzly are really nice, but c'mon! CollectA and Mojo gave us a Markhor, Saola, Two-Toed Sloth, Gaur Bull, Blackbuck, and so on.)

So, for each animal, I raised its preference ranking by one point if it was a novel/rare/desirable animal. All the animals listed immediately above got a boost. Combining ALL of these adjustments, here were my final rankings.

1. CollectA
2. Mojo Fun
3. Papo
4. Schleich
5. Safari.

I confess, this last ranking probably matches perfectly with the ranking I would have produced with my gut. I don't know if that's an accident or evidence that the method I generated is successfully tracking my gut.

What I found most interesting about the exercise, though, is this fact: If I don't take into account the excitement that comes with getting a new and interesting animal, Papo and Schleich do much better than expected. This leads me to wonder if I may sometimes be underestimating how happy I am with their products because of the excitement that CollectA and Mojo creates by focusing on more obscure and interesting animals.

Who knows. Probably it's all meaningless. I can say two things for sure though: First, there are a handful of 2013 models I couldn't imagine giving up and CollectA, Mojo, Schleich and Papo are all represented (in fact, fairly equally represented) in that group. Second, this was a major exercise in procrastination. Oh the shame.

Really interesting to read that, but i have one question. What is your main orientation for your collection?


  


You know i only collect only species and if i have this specie i dont buy more figurines of this specie. As example, i have some kudus, but the last Kudus was also very nice but i dont buy them because i have a few (but one of the reasons is also that i found every much a lot and so i havent the money for more exampars of each specie). So i am concentrate to find all the "new" species for my zoo.

And so is my ranking:

1. CollectA
2. Mojö
2. Safari Ltd
4. Schleich (only 1 animal figurine- but number one for my daughter with Bayalas)

And last year nothing from Bullyland and Papo.

But in the year 2012 Bullyland was number 4.    

This Year... I list it in general no only animals.      
1.Schleich
2.Papo
3.Mojo Fun
4.Safari Ltd
5.Collecta
6.Bullyland

I LOVE it, when we don't agree ...in this kind way    

Year 2014..

1.CollectA
2.Papo
3.Schleich
4.Mojö Fun
5.Safari Ltd
6.Bullyland

Interesting topic, thank you Scot! 

Safari is king! But last year i was slightly disappointed. My top three are Safari, CollectA, and Papo as I feel these are the highest quality figures. Schleich was just okay, Mojo made some masterpieces but Bullyland has been horrible. If you look at their 2014 releases it is almost disgraceful!   

In my opinion - combining quality and novelty - for 2013:

1. CollectA
2. Papo
3. Mojo
4. Schleich
5. Safari Ltd

Thank you everybody for all your replies and it's been extremely interesting to see the rankings that others have posted. Thank you for contributing!

SUSANNE wrote:

 
I put Schleich almost last, because of the "My little pony"-style. This may not be fair, and probably stems from my high expectations from earlier times.

Susanne I had exactly the same thought before I sat down and starting looking over the spreadsheet more carefully. Then I started to realize that there were some models by Schleich that I really liked. I too miss the grand old days of Schleich -- this last year I didn't buy a single Schleich horse, for example; I just don't like what they're doing anymore. But when I saw that Schleich had introduced so many new models and was able to put aside the ones I didn't like, I was surprised that there still remained a core group of models that impressed me. My favorites were Koala Bear, the Chimpanzee family, both Bulls, the Griffon Vulture, the Beaver, and the Blue Whale. I also was pretty satisfied with the Swan, the little crocodile, the Penguin, and the Ram. Not a bad set really.

I realize that many will not share my enthusiasm for the figures listed. All I'm saying is that my little exercise made me realize that I was more satisfied with Schleich than I had previously thought. It was surprising.

widukind wrote:

Really interesting to read that, but i have one question. What is your main orientation for your collection?

...

And last year nothing from Bullyland and Papo.

Andreas, I've often tried to characterize the primary orientation of my collection, but I have not succeeded. I have a diverse and eclectic set of interests, and they change. Like you, I love new species. There are occasions when that's all I care about. But then I'll discover that my enthusiasm for collecting new species will bring my attention back to a gorgeous newly released model of an animal that we see over and over again. (I really liked the 2013 Schleich Koala, for example.) I'll then remember why I started collecting. Moreover, I am very attracted to particular types of animals. I really love cattle and antelope and bison, and recently I've become very interested in dinosaurs. So my orientation is both multi-layered and always shifted.

You probably noticed that Papo was at the top of my first and second lists. There is a good reason for this: I was really impressed by Papo's overall quality. The Grizzly, the Tigress, the Carnotaurus and Dimetrodon, the Anteater, Gharial, Gibbon, Giraffe, Polar Bear, the Charolais cattle, and the dogs, all of these sculpts impressed me. So although Papo got almost no boost when I factored in novel and original species (that's probably why you acquired no Papos at all), I still thought it was a very very good year for Papo.

weaselfan93 wrote:

Safari is king! But last year i was slightly disappointed. My top three are Safari, CollectA, and Papo as I feel these are the highest quality figures.

Lance, I'm also a big fan of Safari. But if it weren't for their Gryposaurus and Dimorphodon, they would barely have rated with me in 2013. I found pretty much all of their extant animals disappointing. Even figures like the wolverine and the Elk, which I liked initially, I eventually came to feel much less strongly about. I recently bought this year's Raven and I like it better than any wildlife Safari released last year.

But again, that's just me. Different brands appeal to different collectors. Every brand had something great to offer.

Overall, my favorites were probably: Carnotaurus (Papo), Female Chimpanzee (Schleich), Dimetrodon (Papo), Dimorphodon (Safari), Gaur Bull (Mojo), Gryposaurus (Safari), Gharial (Papo), Koala (Schleich), Saola (CollectA), Linnaeus Sloth (Mojo), Nursing Tigress (Papo), Baird's Tapir (CollectA), Scottish Terrier (Papo). It's also hard to ignore the Blackbuck, Markhor, and Maned Wolf (all CollectA), and the Grizzly and Giraffe (Papo).

Very interesting topic to read   

scot(t) wrote:

Andreas, I've often tried to characterize the primary orientation of my collection, but I have not succeeded. I have a diverse and eclectic set of interests, and they change. Like you, I love new species. There are occasions when that's all I care about. But then I'll discover that my enthusiasm for collecting new species will bring my attention back to a gorgeous newly released model of an animal that we see over and over again. (I really liked the 2013 Schleich Koala, for example.) I'll then remember why I started collecting. Moreover, I am very attracted to particular types of animals. I really love cattle and antelope and bison, and recently I've become very interested in dinosaurs. So my orientation is both multi-layered and always shifted.

You probably noticed that Papo was at the top of my first and second lists. There is a good reason for this: I was really impressed by Papo's overall quality. The Grizzly, the Tigress, the Carnotaurus and Dimetrodon, the Anteater, Gharial, Gibbon, Giraffe, Polar Bear, the Charolais cattle, and the dogs, all of these sculpts impressed me. So although Papo got almost no boost when I factored in novel and original species (that's probably why you acquired no Papos at all), I still thought it was a very very good year for Papo.

I understand you. And i think it is really interesting to see all the different ways of the same hobby.   

In my opinion - combining quality and novelty - for 2013:     
I do not judge on wildlife        

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2014

1-CollectA
2-schleich
3-Mojö
4-Safari Ltd
5-Papo
6-Bullyland

    

For me was:
1. Mojo Fun (A lot of unusual species and wonderful figures, some aren't really relistic but they look nice too)
2. CollectA (A lot of unsusal species, not the first because the most of the figures are males ) 
3. Schleich (No really good figure and no really new species, but the most was ok)
4. Bullyland (The most of the new relases don't look really realistic, but they are wonderful figures)
5. Papo (Bad paintjob on the figures, this destoryed all)

I don't have any Safari figures because that they aren't on the list, but some of them look wonderful

I'm still thinking about the way you established your list Scott and I tried to apply it to my own list... it seems it didn't work easily for me. It's strange because I often think we have similar ways of collecting.
So I tried to find my own method. After thinking and thinking again I decided I knew exactly my ranking, I just had to explain it

So here it is:
1 - CollectA and Papo
3 - Mojo
4 - Bullyland
5 - Schleich
6 - Safari ltd

So why Safari Ltd is at the last place since I like very much this brand? I didn't buy any model this year, I was tempted by the Dimorphodon, the wapiti and the wolverine. I had to make more choice this year and I missed all the Safari Ltd. I guess it was a real choice.

Schleich, I bought some this year, mostly because they are easier for me to catch. The otter, the macaws, the blue whale, the blue shark, the manta ray, the beaver, the arctic hare and the chimps. A nice batch but none of them are on my "Really big pleasure" list!

Bullyland? I only bought one model, the wisent! And it will be the only one for 2013 but I love it very much, much more than any of my new Schleich.

Mojo! Mojo on the third place because I don't have a lot of 2013 models, they appeared lately at a moment where I had less money so they will have to wait before joining my jungle. Nevertheless I am waiting impatiently to catch them: The gaur, the sloth, the tamandua, the tapir, the honey badgers, the emu, the pronghorn and the stoat! I have the vulture, the puma and the proboscis monkey and I love them very much. especially the vulture, the more I know him the more I   

At last number one ex aequo: CollectA and Papo, I can't choose! CollectA gave me so much joy with the tsunami of unusual species: markhor, saola, blackbuck, baird's tapir, River dolphin, scimitar oryx, pilot whale, lonesome george, maned wolf and fennec.
And Papo gave me some of my "really Big pleasures" of the year: The gharial, the indian rhino and calf, the fox, the lying tigress with cub and the dromedary, they are so excellent!

I don't measure with a metric system like Scott. Honestly my gut feeling tell me that my choice is still with Papo. despite the facts that Collecta & Mojo have been listening to us and produced a lot of rare animals that others don't made.

I agree when Scott mentioned there are some animals only like it on the first sight and after days pass by, you may not find it appealing as before. But some Papo models still remain in my heart somewhere.

Great topic, Scott.   
I can't say what brand is the best for me, because I look at the figurines, not the brand name! So the only method to make a TOP 6 chart is the number of the figurines I bought from each brand (only 2013 releases):
1. CollectA
2. Schleich (sea animals released in May made Schleich #2)
3. Mojo & Papo
5. Bullyland
6. Safari (if you count the Backyard birds toob as one product)

I know it is not a main brand but for me is also Science and Nature a phantastic brand. The figurines looks very naturally, also are this phantastic unusual australian species and the prices are also good          

For me, Mojo and Collecta both share first place.
CollectA did not dissapoint, and as usual, gave us new species and good paintjobs.
Mojo had a fantastic 2013 with wonderful new species and all animals were very well executed.
They took a great leap as a new beginning company and I feel a lot of respect for how far they have come in such short time.

Papo is second.
Nice figures as usual from this company, but some paintjobs were not as good as what we've come to expect from them.

Schleich is third.
Although I really want it to be last.
Some sloppy paintwork on some figures but they have gotten way too expensive with their small sized animals.
Everytime I bought a Schleich animal this year, I felt ripped off.

Safari ltd. gets fourth place.
None of the figures from Safari ltd. appealed to me except for the Wapiti.
I found the rest a bit meh.

Bullyland is not on my radar.
Bullyland figures are not what I look for in animal replicas and all I ever bought was the Zebu.
And this year the Wisent.
So yeah, two Bullyland figures in my whole collection and it probably will stay like that.

Here is my vote for 21013:

1  ) Kaiyodo + Kitan Club  (OK, not toys and not so established as some "big brands"  )
---
1) CollectA (big species range, great figures = No 1 for me!)
2) Papo (figures with personality, e.g. tigress, peacock, giraffe, grizzly, fox, some rare species as bonus - gibbon, gavial, anteater)
3-4) Mojo (surprise with species range, some well made figures, e.g. guagga, tamandua, vulture)
3-4) Schleich (similar as Mojo, some figures are good -chimp male, ara, hippo calf but I had higher expectations)
5-6) Safari Ltd (two great figures -wapiti and wolverine- per year are not enough for me; but the tube birds can be good too)
5-6) Bullyland (two great figures -wisent and steinbock- per year are not enough for me)