We contacted the Disney Store about the production mishaps guests were experiencing with the recently released Whiskers and Tales series. Here is their response:
“Quality of our products is of the utmost importance, so we apologize to any of your readers who might have found issues with their Whiskers and Tales Vinylmation Series.
For any guest who has an issue with the Whiskers and Tales Vinylmation they purchased at a Disney Store, we advise that they return to the store where it was purchased and ask a Cast Member for assistance. For those guests that made their purchase online at DisneyStore.com, they should call DisneyStore.com Guest Services where a Cast Member can best address their questions and concerns. The phone number for DisneyStore.com Guest Services is: 1 (800) 328-0368.”
“Quality of our products is of the utmost importance”
So why has this happened, AGAIN? Where is the excuse for that? I’m shocked that this is actually a person responding and not the auto message stuff they send out.
Ya. I’m holding back the commentary on the response right now and letting you guys talk about it first. I can assure you this is from our actual PR rep at the Disney Store and not an auto response. – Nick
Oh I noticed that it was an actual person. But the rest of it is still scripted. I’m more ticked that they didn’t give a reason. Even more so, the fact that this was released with this bad a quality.
That’s great that they will service the quality problems, or at least that is what I get from the message above.
How widespread is the quality issue for W&T? Are collectors speaking out because of what happened on Furry Friends or is there a larger than typical problem associated with W&T? I opened about 2 1/2 cases persoanlly and heard from another collector that bought his case from the same Disney Store I did. With every vinylmation set, I can pick out spots where paint didn’t get applied properly or wasn’t allowed to dry thus making pinhead spots where paint was missing, but with the above mentioned 3 1/2 cases, I didn’t find anything out of what I normally find. I had a few spots on two W&T characters (Lucky & Bolt) where pinhead spots of white paint was missing. One was under the chin and the other was on the side of the foot (paw) but neither was glaring.
For what we pay for a Vinylmation, we expect perfection, but small defects can be expected. If Disney would always replace a defective Vinylmation, that would be awesome. However, with dumpster dives, kids repeatedly dropping Vinylmation while walking around the parks, etc., I cannot see them doing this as a general rule.
I look forward to hearing what happens for W&T problems.
This is one of the first series where I feel the quality went CHEAP. Some are awesome in the series….but Nana was left UNFINISHED! It’s pretty bad to have paint issues at this price point from a Disney product and it is even worse when they forget to paint the design on…especially half way.
They painted on the bonnet ties around her neck BUT, forgot to paint on the bonnet!!!!! The ties lead to nowhere. Looks ridiculous. I really wanted her, but now I will wait for a better FINISHED one hopefully in the future.
This is hard because, yes, like you would want Disney to be, they are receptive and will address problems as they come up. Obviously this is a very generic response but at least we got one.
On the other hand; Like what Nick said on the Podcast. They should have known better than to let this one even come close to having the problems we have seen. To me, it just feels like the problems from last time were really overlooked. That is a bigger problem because it tells me the attention to detail we used to see is going by the wayside. Hopefully these issues stay somewhat isolated and the people who were really looking forward to this set and missed out on a good model can have theirs replaced.
If this is true they should really let all their stores know about it. I attempted to exchange my damage Figaro, and they were completely unaware of this. either.
I would call customer service or even print out a copy of the response we posted here and show it to them.
Wouldn’t all those “unhappy” guests also be eBay resellers, by any chance, who would certainly LOVE history to repeat itself with Whiskers and Tales the way it happened with Furry Friends, when the recalled series made them able to resell their just-purchased trays up to 6 times the price they originally paid ?…
Please !!… Enough is enough ! We didn’t hear half of you about the production issues with the Park 9 series Dapper Dans hat issues…