There are a few things that determine how much a vintage action figure or toy is worth. Firstly, whether it’s sealed or opened, and in case of the former, the condition of the packaging. Next comes the condition the toy itself is in. Wear and tear, along with paint chipping will see the value of the item drop. Lastly, and most importantly, how rare it is. Limited edition or extremely rare items tend to have a higher price. While all of these are obvious to any collector, there are certain exceptions.
In a hobby where even a single scratch can lower the value of a product, it’s the exact opposite for manufacturing or packaging mistakes. Typos, mislabelling, printing errors, or any mistake by the manufacturer often tends to make the item more valuable. Technically, the error does make the product more rare, but it’s actually a case of collectors deciding its value themselves. If everyone agrees, the manufacturing defect is a value booster. Take, for instance, this misprinted vintage Star Wars Luke Skywalker figure.
Graded Vintage Star Wars Figure Has A Couple Of Printing Errors
As showcased by FewDivide7917 on Reddit, they found a vintage Meccano Star Wars figure of Luke Skywalker from Return of the Jedi. While the French title, La Guerre des Etoiles: Le Retour du Jedi, is absolutely fine, it’s the character name and card-back image that’s wrong. The card-back is a picture of Han Solo instead of Luke. At first I thought there was a typo in the name card too, but it turns out ‘Yan Solo’ is the official French translated name for the smuggler. To top it all off, it’s professionally graded 70 by CAS.
It’s pretty surprising how these kinds of errors make it past the quality checks, but we’re certainly happy it did. If anything, they add a bit of humour into the hobby. They are in turn coveted by collectors, as factory errors like this one are pretty hard to come by, increasing the rarity of the figure. Along with the CAS grading, you can bet that this figure could get a few thousand dollars from the right people.
Mislabelling and typos, while rare, are still pretty easy to understand. In some ultra-rare cases, you might even find figures with the wrong body parts or accessories. Find one of those, and you’ll be able to make some real money by selling it to the right collector. While most of them are weeded out during quality checks, a few always manage to slip by. Either that, or someone at the factory decides to keep one for themselves.
Have you spotted any hilarious factory errors like this one? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!