The One Where Palitoy Explain The Inexplicable

Quickfire · Post by **Quickfire** » 14 Sep 2006 20:17

To be continued.

In the next 4 weeks.

Gnomically,

The Baron · Post by **The Baron** » 05 Jan 2007 09:01

[polite cough]

Quickfire · Post by **Quickfire** » 05 Jan 2007 21:34

The Baron wrote:[polite cough]

JA-JA-JA ALLES KLAR! Mein verdammte skanner is unglaublich bl?des arschloch-gefichtes!?!?

Quickfire · Post by **Quickfire** » 07 Jan 2007 21:49

Years after the initial promise, here it finally is: the letter received from Palitoy in March 1985 in response to my plaintive, disenfranchised, traumatised and accusatorial wailings due to the sudden disappearance of our heroes

from the shelves of all
good toy shops in early 1985; not to mention the erasure of our heroes from the pages of Battle Action Force at the same time.

UPDATED: The pic shows thanks to the Baron!! Such are the ironies of history, will have to scribble that down in my memoire...

Looking back, the denizens of Coalville made quite an effort to go into detail with a 9 year old. And they also flagged well in advance the return of the "awesome" Black Major and the Red Shadows. Though whether it was

who engaged with them, I don't think it happened quite like that in the end. Maybe Palitoy had received more letters of the same nature; maybe they were just being kind; maybe impending redundancy meant they had more time on their hands.

The annotations were mine: my Dad said the letter was badly written and suggested I practice correcting it as an English grammar exercise

Ah, it all brings back such memories of the end of the Shad-slotting age, shovelled up by

, shat on by

, with all the badly-rebadged hardware coming to the shelves in shambolic gangs.

Quickfire · Post by **Quickfire** » 11 Jan 2007 22:11

PS. Where is Lindy Pine now?

lindypine · Post by **lindypine** » 20 Oct 2007 18:22

Hi Everyone!

I am Lindy Pine, the author of the letter you posted, Quickfire, that I sent you in 1985. I cannot believe that you kept it all those years! I apologize that my grammar was not correct - it's strange because I am usually a lot more accurate than that.

Let me explain how the letter came about. Back in 1985 Palitoy, believe it or not, did not have a marketing department which dealt with kids writing in about any of their products. They did have a department which dealt with defective products, but if a child or parent wrote in about any of their brands (Tiny Tears, Action Man, Action Force, Star Wars, Care Bears, Trivial Pursuit etc etc) there was no-one to deal with them and before I joined they had not answered a single letter in several years!

When I began my new job as Consumer Response Assistant I had to sort through the literally thousands of letters and try and group them in order that I could come up with some standard letters just to try and get some responses out. It was a huge job! Also, each product had offers on them with no closing dates so by law we had to honour them and we had to send products out by the thousand. In addition, kids were filling in applications to join the 'Tiny Tears Club' or the 'Action Man Club' but the forms were piling in and there were no clubs in existence so we had to create them! All this was caused by many over zealous and thoughtless marketing managers! So that's probably the reason why my letter had typos in it - because I was under pressure to get thousands of letters out! And we did finally achieve it! We answered every single letter and joined everyone in their requested clubs.

After that huge project was done we finally began to be able to run the department as it should be run. Later on I put together a questionnaire about Action Force and sent it out to 100 kids. We wanted their input as to how the story should unfold. That was huge fun - I was amazed how creative they were and how much they knew about the characters. I wonder if any members on this site completed one.

I had a great deal of fun working for Palitoy and miss the job and the UK also because I live in Southern California now with my husband and 6 year old son.

Thanks for reminding me of a special time in my life and I wish everyone all the very best in the future of the club.

Kind regards,
Lindy Pine
former Consumer Response Assistant
Palitoy Ltd

The Baron · Post by **The Baron** » 20 Oct 2007 18:27

Wow! Thanks ever so much for posting, Lindy, no doubt you will be bombarded by questions in the coming weeks! Starting with...

When you say "We wanted their input as to how the story should unfold." are you referring to the Battle comic stories, or to the universe as a whole? How closely did Palitoy work with IPC?

lindypine · Post by **lindypine** » 20 Oct 2007 18:39

Palitoy worked very closely with IPC and wanted to make sure that the storylines coincided with their brand plans. I think I was present in meetings but to be honest I can't remember that far back now.

I do remember though being very passionate about their brands, and particularly Action Force. I think I might have the original questionnaire somewhere and if I find it I will post it if it's possible and if anyone wants to read it.

When we picked the winners of the best questionnaire I had to ring them up to tell them that they were going to get an Action Force vehicle and it was great to hear how excited they were. That made the job truly worthwhile!

The Baron · Post by **The Baron** » 20 Oct 2007 18:45

Please do!

So can you put us out of our misery regarding Operation Deep Cover?

It was the final story arc, where Zartan infiltrates AF as a UN investigator and gets a guided tour of all of the facilities. The competition at the time was to guess the location of the new AF base "Ground Zero", and that hints would be given throught the storyline, with a major cash prize to be won...

The most popular theory was Dover, as I recall.

lindypine · Post by **lindypine** » 20 Oct 2007 19:07

I'm sorry - I left before it got to that. I will see if my former boss knows, who is a long-time friend and who stayed on there long after I did.