WHERE TO FIND 1/6TH STUFF AND MATERIALS

There are quite a few 1/6 scale retailers on the Internet. The ones listed below are definitely my favorites - based on experience. I've had nothing but good experiences and won't hesitate to recommend any of them. I've listed them according to my frequency of use and experience.  DO READ the Bad Retailer Alert below though.  It could save your life.

Good Stuff To Go
This is where I buy all my boxed figures. I love Ken and Gail to death.  They are the best dealers overall.  Not the biggest selection in loose parts, but you should go to them for everything else. Very fast shipping and good customer service.

The Battle Rhino
Another one of my favorite loose parts dealers. They are quick, quick, quick. Especially useful if you're dying to get that one piece you need to complete your figure in a hurry.

Monkey Depot
Shipping time is decent and the shop is geared towards more military items. Their prices are decent and service is pretty reliable.

Old Joe Infirmary
OJI is another great retailer. Operated by Craig "The Doc," OJI is a valuable resource for the more obscure loose items. Shipping can occasionally get slow due to Doc's schedule, but service and pricing is great overall.

Hobbylink Japan
Hobbylink is the place to go when getting anything from Japan. Their shipping and prices are very decent.

Echobase Toys
Echobase is another very fast shipper.  Prices can be better, but they make up for it with customer service, responses and ship times.

War Toys
War Toys is one of my favorite retailers although their prices have been unusually HIGH occasionally. They carry one of the largest loose parts collection on the Web. Shipping is super fast (usually 3-4 days once placed). War Toys is one of the better retailers out there.

Toys Square
Another Canada-based retailer. Has a few non-mainstream items such as 3Zero or Medicom loose parts. Very expensive so watch your wallet, but that's due more to the types of products they carry rather than expensive mark-ups.  I purchase from them all the time so no worries about service or pricing.  They are also the North American distributor for most of Hot Toys' products apart from what Sideshow distributes.

Toy Boxer
Toy Boxer is a good source for boxed figures. Their shipping prices are the best out of any of the 1/6 retailers. The owner, Gary, frequents the boards a bit and can easily be contacted if any problems arose.  I've bought a good deal of boxed figures from Gary without any problems.  Only drawback is that he does this as a side hobby so shipping can be a little slow sometimes. Other than that, no problems there.

The Corner Arsenal
Awesome pricing and service. While the stock and parts are pretty limited, the pricing on loose parts is some of the best I've seen. Service emails are personalized by the owner of the shop instead of system generated "your order has shipped" stuff.

Doll Hobby
Carries lots of cool and rare Japanse doll bodies and accessories like Volks and Azone. Excellent pricing and service.

Tidal Wave Toys
Japanese retailer who carries hard to find figures. I use them only when Hobbylink is out of stock. Site and business is run by a guy doing it on the side so service and responses are kinda slow.

Dave's Hobby Shop
Based in Hong Kong, they carry a wide range of 1/6 products including many rare and hard to find figures and accessories. Very fast shipping and excellent service too.

Justice Fighters
Good selection of loose parts and very prompt service and shipping.

Dardon Action Figures
Very limited loose parts but good pricing on harder to find figures.

Toy Anxiety
Toy Anxiety, although they have great service, is very expensive. Their loose parts are usually $1-2 more than most other shops and I only use them as a last resort for finding that one last piece to complete your bash.

Red Planet Toys
Decent prices and decent shipping time.  A little slow to load due to all the extra graphics and eye candy, but no problems with service or products at all.

Atlantic Toys
Still, another retailer for reference.

Action Figure 2002
The founder of Fun Toys started retailing manufactured 1/6th figures.  He still carries a lot of the Fun Toys line on his site and even has some exclusive Hong Kong released custom items including figures, weapons and various things on the site.  Very cool guy who browses the forums and is actively involved in the 1/6th hobby.

Cotswold Collectibles
Decent service and site, but their prices are fairly higher than the ones listed above.

Reasonable Collectibles
Carries a small range of loose items, but at least they have loose items. Not as popular as the others mentioned above so you'll get a good chance of looking for that one popular item that's always sold out at other retailers.  

Toy Chest and Collectibles
Great service.  Although their loose item inventory is a little small, their service is pretty good.  They only ship via UPS, which is gawdawfully sloooowwww!

Just Be Toys
I haven't purchased anything from them yet, but they do carry some of the hardest figures to find and prices look very reasonable.

Far Out Toys
Far Out Toys is my local supplier. Armando, the owner of the shop, is about two minutes away from my office and I often drive over to the shop like every week to see if he gets anything new in. Armando is pretty cool. He knocks prices off a few dollars just for the hell of it when you start paying!

 
BAD RETAILER ALERT

Small Blue Planet
Small Blue Planet has moved from one of my favorite retailers to a bad retailer alert in just under a year.  I've experienced some problems with them a few times back, but I hesitated on placing them under a bad retailer.  I guess it's the right time to now because it would seem that the exact same problems arise time and time again on every order I place.  My last three orders have gone from bad to worse.  On average they take about three weeks to process your order -  from the time you place the order until the time they start to charge your credit card. Please keep in mind I had to send an average of three emails to get to them to start processing the order.  The first was sent after a week and they responded in three days.  First occasion said they were swamped with orders, sorry, yoddie, yoddie.  Second occasion said they were in the process of moving and this last and final one, again, said they were moving.  How many times in a year can you move shops and warehouses?

Of course, after three weeks, I give up all hope on this once great retailer and call it quits so I decide to send them a nice friendly email and said, "look guys, please cancel this order.  I ordered some toys for my nephew's birthday but that has long since passed so please cancel it."  Well, you might have guessed it, the email goes on to be IGNORED and they charged my credit card exactly two days after I sent that email.  Sure this might be a fluke.  Small Blue Planet might not have received my email requesting the cancellation and by some blind luck, they just happened to process the order after three weeks when they're all nice and settled in their new shop or warehouse that they took a month to move.  Riiiggghhhtttt . . . on three different occasions over the last six months?!  Whatever the case, this is the last and final time I am using them.  Heed my warnings and stay away from any planets that are blue.  If you're still in doubt, check all the negative comments from other people through the Men With Dolls and OSW Forums.  I know they have a retail store, but if you're neglecting customers who are purchasing online, why put up a website for?  Might as well focus on your local customers and close up your e-shop.

Andgor Toys aka the "Toy Bandit"
These guys will rob you blind.  It is extremely tempting to order some custom heads made by Andgor Toys.  But heed my warning or you will be ravaged by one of the most notorious bandits prowling the world wide web.  I ordered a boxed CYGirl Blaze and a few custom heads (one of Brad Pitt and one of the Samuel L. Jackson heads) back in 2001.  Being the complete newbie that I was to the hobby, I never bothered to check these guys' reputation. Two days after my order was placed, my credit card was charged immediately.  Oh yeah I was happy.  "These guys are fast, that's a good sign," I thought.  A week rolls by and no package from the guy in the brown suit and cap driving a big brown truck or your friendly neighborhood postman.  Two weeks slide by and I get over-anxious.  I send them an email.  No answer.  I send them another, then wait another week.  No answer.  I send them another three emails over a period of two weeks, still no answer.  After six weeks I decide to put my foot down and say "enough is enough" so I called up my credit card company and dispute the charges.  Well, who do you think decides to email me?

"Oh we're so sorry but we were out of stock on (blah blah blah) and your order will be shipping today" says the owner of Andgor Toys.  I did not get anything until three more weeks (UPS only takes a week to get here).  Well, the guy with the brown suit showed up with a rather large sized package for me and in my mind I thought "well, it's all worth the wait and all that crazy trouble if I can get that custom Brad Pitt and Samuel L. Jackson head".  Boy was I wrong.

Upon examination of the box, it was waaayy too light to hold anything inside.  Being the genius I am, I told the UPS guy to wait while I unpackaged it.  As my Spider sense had suspected, there was nothing inside, absolutely zilch, but a box with paper and styrofoam cushioning.  The UPS guy thought I ordered a collectible toothpick or something and was determined to turn the box inside out to find it, but no, despite both our efforts, we couldn't find anything and suffice to say, I've been robbed by the notorious Toy Bandit.

Pissed as hell, I contacted my credit card company again.  Well this time around, Andgor Toys changed their story around and said that they shipped me all of the goods and even got a tracking number from UPS (the empty box).  Clever, but not as clever as me.  I work in a law firm remember?  I got the UPS guy to handwrite down on a little pad of paper about the box with the mysterious invisible toy and submitted it to my credit card company.  I can thank my lucky stars that my credit card company sided with me instead of the Toy Bandit.  After this whole incident, I looked up their Better Business Bureau record and they've got a complaint file logged against them the size of my phone book.  Later on, I was told by lots of people through the various forums that "you're not a toy collector until you've been taken by the Toy Bandit".  I find that funny as hell because even to this day, I still see complaints from new members on the various forums about being robbed by the Toy Bandit.  How can a company rip off so many people stay in business even after three years?

Still don't get the picture?  Check out the following links and read other people's run-ins with the Toy Bandit:

Rip Off Report

Better Business Bureau

OSW Forums
1/6TH MATERIAL RETAILERS

One of the hardest things I faced when I started to customize was finding a good place to buy things. Between going to Michael's and my local fabric store, I didn't know where else to find this or that. Luckily, I received a lot of help from different collectors through my posts at the Men With Dolls forums. Check out the board through the "Forums" section when you get a chance.

Stretch House
My one-stop-shop for pleather and lycra. Decent prices and fast shipping time makes these guys my favorite 1/6 scale fabric store.

Spandex House
Not as descriptive or image-heavy as Lycra House, but their price and shipping is similar. An alternate source for fabrics.

Fishman's Fabrics
Carries a very large inventory of all kinds of fabrics. Good customer service.

eQuilter.com
Carries a large selection of fabrics.

Denver Fabrics
More fabrics galore!

Create For Less
Carries a really large selection of sewing notions and various doll supplies.

Rio Rondo Buckles
The place for belt buckles. Excellent service and pricing.

Tiny Zippers
The name says it all. Tiny Zippers carry doll sized zippers and many other doll accessories.

Smooth-On
Smooth-On makes some very good casting material. Though the site is slightly hard to use, their products are very good and the staff is a pleasant to deal with. They will answer every question you have.

Sculpey
Home of the most widely used clay. With Sculpey, you can create almost anything. It's more ideal for small jobs such as molded hair, beard, face mask, sword handles, etc. But is slightly harder to use when you move to bigger scales.

Aves Apoxie
Aves Apoxie sculpt is great for almost everything. You can mend broken parts together, sculpt on top of other sculpts, etc.

Afrocare.com
Afrocare has some great synthetic hair for rerooting.

Ragdolly
Carries a variety of hair for gluing or rerooting.

RestoreBarbie
Carries more hair for your rerooting needs.

Dr. Locks
You can never have enough hair.

JKM Ribbing
The place to find 1/6 scale webbing material. The 1/8 grosgrain ribbons work best.

eHobbies.com
Carries lots of hobby supplies.

cchobbies.com
Carries lots of styrene sheeting.

hobbylinc.com
More styrene sheeting in case you can't find any at your local hobby or art shop.  Definitely one of my favorites.

Tower Hobbies
Definitely one of my favorite supply stores.  Between Hobbylinc and these guys, you can get pretty much any supply you really need.