Monday, July 22, 2019

Why We Call Em "Space Buckets": Current Retail Hing Fat Style Astronaut Sets by SDS Direct, Daron Industries, Imex Prods. Etc

Let's start right at the Hing Fat corporate website's page for their Space Astronaut toy sets.


Picture used with respect and out of an intention to build interest in the toy sets. I had them as a child and still adore the forms. Hing Fat as a company known today has existed since 1980, but I had my set in the early 1970s. Were Hing Fat the originators of the very distinctive looking set while still a Hong Kong based company? I would enjoy learning what it was I had as a boy.


I know it came packed into a bucket. Here are HF's three current Space Bucket packagings. Where to find one at retail? Their web page is intended for bulk vendors only.


I love this set too, and the idea of the owner having their toys in a handle-carry storage method. But alas, I can't order a shipment of twenty boxes. 

Here are some other retail configurations to look for, and I will try to group them by similar looking packaging. As far as I know their contents are all identical, with Hing Fat's mainland China plants the likely production location. The way I would think the arrangement works is that other companies who distribute toy sets obtain the component pieces (spacemen, rockets, vehicles etc) from Hing Fat and package them as they see it. With HF having its own retail packaging wing which ships them as seen above.


Daron Industries, longtime distributor of inexpensive toy sets. I have one of their NASA sets with diecast vehicles and would be interested in seeing what's in their bucket.


Wish the image was larger to see whom this is by as it's Lunar Module base plate has the decal stickers which my earlier example lacks.


... Looks more like a Space Mayonnaise Jar. Or one of those big jars of Cheeze Puffs you'd get at Walmart. Lid solution looks weak, and like it'd be a chore to get it all back inside. But its LM also has the technical decal on its Descent Stage base plate.




Walmart's picture ... Not sure if it's a "tower" configuration or (more likely) squished.



Here's the current industry standard: SCS Direct's "Big Bucket of Astronauts" and I'm hot to land a sealed unit. Pix snagged from a bunch of online retail outlets + the SCS corporate site. Use is to help promote the toy line.



Yup! That's sort of how our's came. Handle bucket. I don't believe it was a clear plastic, and was likely destroyed long before the toys themselves ended up ash canned. But it was in a bucket with a handle and I took it everywhere I was allowed.





Some contrast adjusted images of the SCS Direct Lander.


Is that it?? General Dynamics early LEM proposal.



O.0


Someone will have a sealed unit & I want it.


Never seen this packaging before, though then again I've only been on this quest since April. Looks like it does away with the pesky Space Shuttle too, which never went to the Moon and won't be missed. Will have to try and scare up a sales listing to go with it & update.


TinToyArcade's product pix for the Daron Industries packaging.




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