Britains value

Yes, our names are quite confusing, but we aren't the same person.

Until now, I thought that the older the vintage figures get, the more expensive they become, but I now realise that may not be the case. Collecting Britains may not be so popular anymore, because younger people never played with them and most older people may already have their collection complete.

I only started collecting about 5 years ago. Since then, my impression is that prices have been fairly constant, but I feel that they have slightly gone up in the last year or so. My theory is that this is because first it was winter and then we got the corona virus. During the winter and during the pandemic, people stayed at home and had more time to collect, while at the same time, second-hand animal figures may be harder to find for sellers (I think they often come from flee markets and car boot sales).

The economic impact of Covid hasn't fully hit us yet (it has seriously hit some people), but yes, it's likely that this will bring the prices down in the coming years.

No, you are definiatly not the same haha...
It is indeed so, that those older 1:32 figurines are quit stabil in price, because their produced numbers, and what is on the market is stabil to.
I think you are right about the corona-times, people are more at home, and spend more time on the net so also on collecting.

If prices will go down, we must see, but logicly yes, as people need money, so more stuff comes on the market, and that makes prices go down in general.
BTW Roger, i sorted out the VEB Plaho's for you, i made pics, and will send them to you.

Seen today

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/VINTAGE-BRITAINS-MODEL-No-1311-INDIAN-ELEPHANT-FIRST-ISSUE-MIB/303867062114?hash=item46bfe36762:g:yCgAAOSw9-9fm144

Bargain? £130 with box plus £7.95 postage costs.

Crazy!

Chris Sweetman wrote:

Seen today

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/VINTAGE-BRITAINS-MODEL-No-1311-INDIAN-ELEPHANT-FIRST-ISSUE-MIB/303867062114?hash=item46bfe36762:g:yCgAAOSw9-9fm144

Bargain? £130 with box plus £7.95 postage costs.

I bought such elephant in mint condition (without the box) 10 years ago for GBP 1.50 on eBay.co.uk :)

Wow- so expensive!

jarda wrote:

Chris Sweetman wrote:

Seen today

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/VINTAGE-BRITAINS-MODEL-No-1311-INDIAN-ELEPHANT-FIRST-ISSUE-MIB/303867062114?hash=item46bfe36762:g:yCgAAOSw9-9fm144

Bargain? £130 with box plus £7.95 postage costs.

I bought such elephant in mint condition (without the box) 10 years ago for GBP 1.50 on eBay.co.uk :)

You'd have to be very lucky to find them for that price now, but with box, I'd say £15 is a reasonable price. Buy it now offers are often a bit crazy.

I bought it new in the 1980's i think for around 25 gulders....

From the late 60s until the late 80s, the Britains catalogues often contained price lists. It’s interesting to see what the prices were at that time. I checked the prices of four popular animals, the African elephant (the cow, not the later bull), the Indian rhino, brown bear and (male) lion. Below you see the prices in 1967, 1975 and 1987 in regular font, and in bold what the 2020 prices would be if we take into account inflation (using the Bank of England inflation calculator). In 1967, Britain still had the old monetary system, so the price was in shillings and pence (decimal conversion in parentheses).


When I was a child, Britains was considered a high-quality, expensive brand, and they certainly were compared to the much cheaper Hong Kong toys. But in today’s money, they are quite cheap compared to current major animal toy manufacturers. (The British pound is currently worth EUR 1.16 and USD 1.38.) The lion and brown bear were much smaller than the same species of modern brands, but the African elephant was the same size and the rhino was only slightly smaller.

Interesting side note: The platypus was the cheapest zoo animal in 1967 at 4d (£0.02), which is £0.31 in today’s money. It is now one of the most expensive figures on the second-hand market.

rogerpgvg wrote:

From the late 60s until the late 80s, the Britains catalogues often contained price lists. It’s interesting to see what the prices were at that time. I checked the prices of four popular animals, the African elephant (the cow, not the later bull), the Indian rhino, brown bear and (male) lion. Below you see the prices in 1967, 1975 and 1987 in regular font, and in bold what the 2020 prices would be if we take into account inflation (using the Bank of England inflation calculator). In 1967, Britain still had the old monetary system, so the price was in shillings and pence (decimal conversion in parentheses).


When I was a child, Britains was considered a high-quality, expensive brand, and they certainly were compared to the much cheaper Hong Kong toys. But in today’s money, they are quite cheap compared to current major animal toy manufacturers. (The British pound is currently worth EUR 1.16 and USD 1.38.) The lion and brown bear were much smaller than the same species of modern brands, but the African elephant was the same size and the rhino was only slightly smaller.

Interesting side note: The platypus was the cheapest zoo animal in 1967 at 4d (£0.02), which is £0.31 in today’s money. It is now one of the most expensive figures on the second-hand market.

Interesting stats Roger. An explantation on how the 1967 prices are higher than the other years mentioned is that toys in this period were deemed luxury goods and had Purchase Tax applied to the tune of 33.3%. UK Purchase Tax was abolished on 2nd April 1973 and replaced by Value Added Tax (V.A.T.). When V.A.T. was first introduced all goods that were V.A.T. rated were taxed 10% so prices of toys were effectively reduced by 22.3%! V.A.T. was introduced into the UK because we were required to do so due to becoming members of the EEC. Now the UK is no longer a member of the EU does this mean that we no longer have to have V.A.T.? From 1973 to present V.A.T. has gone up and down and in 1974 a two tier V.A.T. system was introduced with V.A.T. ratings of 8% and 15%. Don't know about other EU countries but in the UK V.A.T. has been a complicated system.

Currently, as of March 2021, the UK has three rates of V.A.T. which are applied to goods and services: Standard Rate 20%, Reduced Rate 5% and Zero Rate 0%. Items may also be exempt (or 'outside the scope') of V.A.T.

Thanks, Chris, that's very interesting information.

Really interesting information, Roger and Chris, thank you!

rogerpgvg wrote:

From the late 60s until the late 80s, the Britains catalogues often contained price lists. It’s interesting to see what the prices were at that time. I checked the prices of four popular animals, the African elephant (the cow, not the later bull), the Indian rhino, brown bear and (male) lion. Below you see the prices in 1967, 1975 and 1987 in regular font, and in bold what the 2020 prices would be if we take into account inflation (using the Bank of England inflation calculator). In 1967, Britain still had the old monetary system, so the price was in shillings and pence (decimal conversion in parentheses).


When I was a child, Britains was considered a high-quality, expensive brand, and they certainly were compared to the much cheaper Hong Kong toys. But in today’s money, they are quite cheap compared to current major animal toy manufacturers. (The British pound is currently worth EUR 1.16 and USD 1.38.) The lion and brown bear were much smaller than the same species of modern brands, but the African elephant was the same size and the rhino was only slightly smaller.

Interesting side note: The platypus was the cheapest zoo animal in 1967 at 4d (£0.02), which is £0.31 in today’s money. It is now one of the most expensive figures on the second-hand market.

And strangely enough this model was never officially listed, i still have one of these 1cm big critters available for who wants it...

The platypus was listed in the catalogues. I think you mean the black panther. It wasn't listed individually, but Chris's detective work showed that it was listed as part of Box Set number 7317 in 1969 (it was also produced in the 1980s, but not listed then).

Britains 1323 Platypus was illustrated in the following catalogues:

1965 price 3d listed as 'New addition'
1966 price 4d
1967 not priced
1968 price 3d and the last time this figure featured in a catalogue.

Note:

3d = 1 1/4 pence so rounded down this would be 1p or rounded up 1 1/2p In 2017 this would be 22p*
4d = 1 1/2 pence In 2017 this would be 23p*

* https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency-converter/#

Please note that part of the UK decimalisation when released in February 1971 included a halfpenny piece. Yep only the UK can have a decimalised currency that had a 1/2 not a 0.5! So in effect the UK didn't go totally decimalised until the 1/2 piece was withdrawn from circulation in December 1994. One of the reasons it was kept in circulation for so long was to fight against inflation as with the 1/2 piece as part of legal tender the £ was divided into 200 units.

BTW if anyone is interested a Britains Platypus is currently for sale on e-bay for £40:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121733787205?chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&itemid=121733787205&targetid=1141640585251&device=c&mktype=pla&googleloc=1006944&poi=&campaignid=12125450855&mkgroupid=118098821258&rlsatarget=pla-1141640585251&abcId=9300480&merchantid=7271864&gclid=Cj0KCQjwmcWDBhCOARIsALgJ2QfosMz5RLCTgr8zVrJsXoE1kvZG9JlKtOaYTRbWvigRyTrAHB6n53QaAk9OEALw_wcB

rogerpgvg wrote:

The platypus was listed in the catalogues. I think you mean the black panther. It wasn't listed individually, but Chris's detective work showed that it was listed as part of Box Set number 7317 in 1969 (it was also produced in the 1980s, but not listed then).

Oh yeah, i got mixed up with those 2 indeed.

Chris Sweetman wrote:

Britains 1323 Platypus was illustrated in the following catalogues:

1965 price 3d listed as 'New addition'
1966 price 4d
1967 not priced
1968 price 3d and the last time this figure featured in a catalogue.

Note:

3d = 1 1/4 pence so rounded down this would be 1p or rounded up 1 1/2p In 2017 this would be 22p*
4d = 1 1/2 pence In 2017 this would be 23p*

* https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency-converter/#

Please note that part of the UK decimalisation when released in February 1971 included a halfpenny piece. Yep only the UK can have a decimalised currency that had a 1/2 not a 0.5! So in effect the UK didn't go totally decimalised until the 1/2 piece was withdrawn from circulation in December 1994. One of the reasons it was kept in circulation for so long was to fight against inflation as with the 1/2 piece as part of legal tender the £ was divided into 200 units.

BTW if anyone is interested a Britains Platypus is currently for sale on e-bay for £40:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121733787205?chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&itemid=121733787205&targetid=1141640585251&device=c&mktype=pla&googleloc=1006944&poi=&campaignid=12125450855&mkgroupid=118098821258&rlsatarget=pla-1141640585251&abcId=9300480&merchantid=7271864&gclid=Cj0KCQjwmcWDBhCOARIsALgJ2QfosMz5RLCTgr8zVrJsXoE1kvZG9JlKtOaYTRbWvigRyTrAHB6n53QaAk9OEALw_wcB

i never had these old catalogues, besides the 1968 one, but i can't remember i saw it in there strangely enough.
I also have a Platypus available...

Britains black panther current prices on Ebay

All 'Buy it now' and prices don't include postage:

£29.99 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185256208505?hash=item2b22216879:g:HQAAAOSwPA5h1MfQ

£34.95 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/203791361945?hash=item2f72e96799:g:YzcAAOSwsQ1h4X8g

euro 46.80 (£38.95) https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353467178932?hash=item524c491fb4:g:AmMAAOSwLRdggX8w

£49.95 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/194693810948?hash=item2d54a7cb04:g:qy8AAOSwAa9h0ZPP

One dealer lists a few all at £34.95 - example https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185087774334?hash=item2b18174e7e:g:Dv8AAOSwKIZhWwo~

I remember in1983/84 the piglets and lambs were 10p and the sheep and pigs were 25p. I think horses and cattle were 35p. Happy times and easily able to build a nice farm over a few weeks with my pocket money.

Uhhu, I will stop wishing for a britains panther/leopard

...unless I am crazy lucky again like when I got the platypus for almost nothing

just a note on ebay prices - these figures that you see at those prices usually don't sell, and that is why they are still for sale there at those prices, month after month. Or they will take a long time to sell, like months, or even longer. Or in many cases - never.
Those prices are not a (true) reflection of the actual prices that these figures actually do sell for - purely because they are Still available for sale. If they were in demand then you would rarely see them for sale at these prices as they would be snatched up by keen collectors who are happy to pay those prices.

It's like the used car market - no matter how much someone thinks their dear car is worth - it will only be sold for a price a buyer is happy to pay for it.

So they can put on whatever price they think it may be worth (in their 'guestimate' mind), but the true value of the item will only be realised when someone is happy to pay the price they deem suitable for it.

It is a Buyers market.

Ofcourse, there are many tales of being lucky, like Susanne :) and that is what is exciting about searching for the figures you desire - when you come across it at a super price. A price you are happy to pay. Happy customer, happy seller. No-one misses out because it is an eager sale of appreciation. The seller sold something that (only) had a certain value in their eyes and the buyer purchased something that had great value in their eyes and so a sale took place. It is a win-win.

Susanne I am sure you will get a black panther at a price you can easily afford. Just keep your eyes open

Thankyou, dear Sunny

I just picked up the Platypus for £8.00 and the African Elephant bull (with replacement tusks and unboxed) for £19.99.

thebritfarmer wrote:

I just picked up the Platypus for £8.00 and the African Elephant bull (with replacement tusks and unboxed)  for £19.99.

WOW !!! Yes, it IS possible, if you are brave and fast

CONGRATULATIONS

thebritfarmer wrote:

I just picked up the Platypus for £8.00 and the African Elephant bull (with replacement tusks and unboxed)  for £19.99.

They are good prices. If you look well in Ebay lots, you can sometimes find a cheap platypus hidden behind other animals. The elephant bull doesn't quite so easily go unnoticed.