I need to preface this with the warning that this is all hearsay, even with the photographic evidence. I know some will be tempted to believe it immediately based on their own cynicism about/pathological hatred of Mattel, but before you go down that path, just try to keep in mind that all we have right now is the word of some anonymous people on the Internet.

Now then. As you know, there are a mere 1,000 MOTU art books available at SDCC. The limit on them is supposed to be two per customer. Also, vendors, exhibitors, and professionals were not to be allowed to buy any of Mattel’s SDCC items during Preview Night last night.

But there have been reports of vendors not only buying books, but buying twenty of them–and then announcing it to those waiting in line.

Here’s the story from Ted Biaselli on Facebook, complete with a photo:

THIS is an image of a DEALER with all of the Mattel exclusives that he purchased tonight… including 20 of the Exclusive Art Books! What happened to 2 per person!??! He was right next to the booth and said OUT LOUD “I’ll be selling these at my booth!

What do you think Matty? I waited in line for 3 HOURS! And moved 200 feet. It was a TRAIN WRECK! The most poorly managed situation I’ve experienced at Comic Con!

And here’s more from Ted’s friend and He-man.org member BCRDuke:

I just finished talking with a friend of mine who was there tonight, and he’s one of our own here.

He has PICTURES of booth-owners buying exclusives in bulk. One booth owner bought 20 Art Books. The booth owner then announced to everyone in line that he had 20 books, and to come to his booth to buy them!

He has pics, and put a few up on matty’s facebook page. There is no getting around this, “matty.”

Thanks for looking out for the FANS. THE PEOPLE AT THE CON WHO RUN THE BOOTHS pretty much qualify as PROFESSIONALS in my book… and since they are renting retail space from the CON itself, they are associates of the CON… which makes them PROFESSIONALS. Their badges may not say that, but that’s what they are.

This stuff happens at every con, but this is the WORST example of this EVER.

The “FANS” who were left standing in line AT the cash registers, were told to leave and given passes to come back at 11AM… two hours LATER than opening… which means that exclusives would be on sale for 2 hours (probably to more BOOTH PEOPLE – since they will be there BEFORE 8AM to set up/open shop/MARK UP THEIR MATTEL EXCLUSIVES), before any of these FANS got to buy anything.

It’s just ridiculous. Basically, the hard-core collectors of MOTUC are going to get jipped out of He-Ro, because there will only be a SMALL number on sale on Mattycollector.

Mostly scalpers/re-sellers were able to buy the Art Book. Whatever… we all know how important nostalgia is to them.

Same goes for those who collect DCUC.. the Wonder Twins pack SOLD OUT its allotment for the day, not two hours after preview-night opened.

And here’s the alleged scalper in alleged action:

There’s also a LOT of good MOTUC stuff already, which I’ll get to in another post later today. But this annoyed me enough to put it out there.