Flair - still trading?

[leccyflyer]

I just built my Outlaw with Solarbo and Graupner balsa that I estimate is between 40 and 50 years old. It was perfectly fine.

[Cuban8]

13 hours ago, Nigel Heather said:

I don’t think the demand is there.  I see quite a few Flair kits in the classifieds and I’m always surprised about how little they sell for.

 

Cheers,

 

Nigel

Unstarted Legionaire kit on Ebay currently at £130 after twelve bids. Clearly, still a worthwhile audience for the kits.

13 hours ago, Nigel Heather said:

 

 

Edited August 10, 2023 by Cuban8

[Andy Stephenson]

I've heard this about balsa before, being old and dried out but this doesn't hold true as It's supposed to be fully dried-out in the seasoning process before we ever get our hands on it.

I also have stuff that's at least 50 years old and it's still good.

[Don Fry]

1 hour ago, Cuban8 said:

Unstarted Legionaire kit on Ebay currently at £130 after twelve bids. Clearly, still a worthwhile audience for the kits.

 

Realise the buyers don’t emerge until the last 10 seconds, but is a long way short of what a manufacturer would need to survive. He is also going to need a steady line of customers, so I would actually expect to see astronomical prices if the demand is there, and supply so poor. 

[Geoff S]

Not sure how I'm slated as the starter of this thread. IIRC I merely commented with a quote on another one.  Perhaps I did and I am actually getting even more forgetful as I age 🙂

 

I'm also one of the bid once bid late school.  I decide what the maximum I'm prepared to pay is and bid in the last 15/30 seconds.  If I get it, I get it and if I don't then it was too much anyway.

[MattyB]

6 hours ago, Don Fry said:

Realise the buyers don’t emerge until the last 10 seconds, but is a long way short of what a manufacturer would need to survive. He is also going to need a steady line of customers, so I would actually expect to see astronomical prices if the demand is there, and supply so poor. 

 

Exactly. The odd kit that goes for a semi decent price on Ebay doesn't prove anything more than there were two people interested in it on that particular day, and certainly doesn't prove there is a a big enough market to revive the brand. That would require some proper market research to be carried out, unless you wanted to lose a lot of money finding out...

[dave parnham]

Unstarted Legionaire kit on Ebay currently at £130 Just sold for 147 still a bargain for the fun that can be had with that. i so wanted to put 151 on there too !! shame

i hope they build it and enjoy it.

[Don Fry]

6 hours ago, Don Fry said:

Realise the buyers don’t emerge until the last 10 seconds, but is a long way short of what a manufacturer would need to survive. He is also going to need a steady line of customers, so I would actually expect to see astronomical prices if the demand is there, and supply so poor. 

So, it went for £147. That’s nowhere near a retail price. So the top bidder will pay an unknown price, second bidder beggars the kit seller. Market research done, don’t even ask to employ those expensive individuals. Nice kit, I’ve built Flair designs, nice aircraft, I’ve maidened a Legionaire, nice flyer, but you can’t do it for that money. Sorry, it’s a shame, I mourned the loss, but it’s gone.

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

10 hours ago, Geoff S said:

Not sure how I'm slated as the starter of this thread. IIRC I merely commented with a quote on another one.  Perhaps I did and I am actually getting even more forgetful as I age

 

You're not losing it Geoff - I split this away from the Ripmax thread as it was going way off topic and deserved its own thread.  i

It just happened that your reply was the best place to start it!

[Nigel Heather]

21 hours ago, Cuban8 said:

Unstarted Legionaire kit on Ebay currently at £130 after twelve bids. Clearly, still a worthwhile audience for the kits.

 

 

Just to be clear, I said that I was surprised how little they sold for, I didn't say that they sold for nothing.

 

I still consider £130 (£147) pretty low.  Before I saw prices I would have expected unstarted Flair scout kits to fetch between £250 and £300.

 

They are out of production so if they were in demand I'd have expected unstarted kits to sell for a premium.

 

If a company were to take on the range and sell it I would expect them to have to pitch that at £250 RRP or higher to make it worthwhile.

 

I made a Puppeteer many years ago.  What I recall was a model that needed a lot of work (I quite enjoyed that though) and a lot of additional cost - solartex, wheels, pilot, machine gun(s), decals, paint.  It was quite an expensive model to complete.  I imagine that will put off many builders these days, especially those that have become used to ARTF.

Edited August 11, 2023 by Nigel Heather

[Geoff S]

I built my Flair SE5a back in the late 90s (it was my 3rd or 4th build after my trainer and Precedent FunFly).  IIRC it was less than £80 (just) and the OS52 Surpass I bought for it from the same model shop was about £150.  The 58" DBSS Cirrus Moth I built about 5 years ago was around £150 then and is £225 now (balsa's gone up greatly) so I would expect a refurbished Flair scout kit to be in the same region - perhaps £250 max.  Who ever bought the Legionaire kit got a bargain IMO.  I would certainly have bid over £200.

 

I've still got the drawings (a bit tatty IIRC) and instruction for my SE5a.

 

 

[leccyflyer]

Certainly whenever Puppeteer or  Fokker DVII kits come up on eBay or classified ads, they typically go for ~£200, I can't recall too many going for much cheaper than that - though the Magnatilla typically does go for less than that.

[Cuban8]

I guess that the crux of the matter is that to take part in our hobby before  the mid 90s when cheap ARTFs were beginning to really take hold, one was pretty much obliged to build a model from a kit. Some saw that as an obstacle, while others enjoyed the process as being part of the journey. Depends what the individual wants from the hobby and how the split between 'builders' and 'flyers' is distributed and how it's changed over the years. 

As a rough guess, back in the day 90% of us were builders, those remaining sourced their models solely on the second hand market - obviously not a hard and fast 90/10 spilt, some of us had a foot in each camp as would have been confirmed  by the popularity of huge swapmeets and well attended club auctions. My own club's annual auction was very big - a couple of hundred attending from many surrouding clubs at a large village hall that we used to hire. 

We ended it around 15 years ago because the buyers and sellers were just no longer there in sufficient numbers any more. Events do continue on a smaller scale, I'm pleased to say, but a shadow of the past TBH. Just the way it is.

I was thinking about Flair yesterday, and on reflection I can understand the current owners' reluctance to burst onto the market again - it's just so uncertain, and are the returns that one might expect on a large investment needed to restart production going to be worthwhile? It's not exactly just a hobby for them to remain occupied on a few quid for fun.

I don't know how things are going to go, given that Far Eastern manufactured ARTFs are not the really cheap option any more and their availability and choice has become much reduced. Kit manufacturing on a large scale has taken a huge hit with many well known names, not just UK ones, having either having  packed it in or are just ticking over with a much reduced choice.

However, on the up side, if one wants to buy an ARTF it's still possible at an increased, but mostly affordable amount and you might have to wait for delivery. People like Sarik and others do a fine job in offering service and choice for building projects of all types and complexities and of course, a few kits are being manufactured  if one seeks them out.

Edited August 11, 2023 by Cuban8

[Nick Funnell]

I have a half built Flair Fokker Triplane 1/4 scale and am desperately looking for a set of plans or copies to finish and fly her.

Does anyone know of any please Thanks in advance [email protected]

[GaryW]

6 minutes ago, Nick Funnell said:

I have a half built Flair Fokker Triplane 1/4 scale and am desperately looking for a set of plans or copies to finish and fly her.

Does anyone know of any please Thanks in advance [email protected]

 

 

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/155552704306?mkevt=1&mkcid=1&mkrid=710-53481-19255-0&campid=5338723872&toolid=20006&customid=g5Rjte4bAAAAu89rHwrJ2bfbtZg2AAAAAA

[Nick Funnell]

Hi Gary thank you for the info I dont think the ones on ebay are the same as Flair ones but thanks anyway