HELP! How do you guys manage your build lists

[MichaelS]

I see that misery loves company. Well at least I won't die leaving my poor widow with a garage full of plastic kits worth little or nothing.

[gomidefilho]

I use the force Michael! kkkk

[Kevin WS]

Michael - plastic kits are, seriously, an investment.

I have tons I never built, and they have done nothing but appreciate in value. They have in some cases outperformed investments over 5 years plus - but this also probably depends on the country you are in, and sometimes the type/make of model.

[MichaelS]

From what I have seen they are an investment only if you take the time to sell them individually on ebay, etc. In the plasteeq club I was in we had 2 or 3 guys pass and leave huge hoards to their widows who of course had no idea what to do with them. The club members would help them out but often the kits were sold in a lump to people who specialize in that and gave only pennies on the doller for them.

[Kevin WS]

Correct Michael. I have also sold a number via modeling shops - on consignment, with 30% to the shop. But you need a friendly model shop to do this.

[Butelczynski]

I gave up planning ahead any further than next model. Things change and new models/ projects come up in unpredictable patterns so I don't keep list.

One guideline I try to keep is Finnish models and conversions have priority , recent SB-2 his is an example of that.

[whulsey]

Manage - planning: what interesting concepts. I just hope to live long enough to someday actually finish one of the 8 or 9 paper, 20 or 30 plastic, 3 or 4 metal, 1 wood and a couple of resin models started...and resist the urge to start MORE.

[missileer]

I think Knife and Whulsey pretty much summed up my model management techniques! I have two wooden and 1 plastic models that I started in the 1950s!

[Amccombs3]

I'll try a more in-depth answer than "spur of the moment", although that often drives my shorter-term projects. For example, I may think "I haven't built a Scissors and Planes model lately", and that tends to be the first one I find in my stash that I have already printed. Or "A Homespun Magixx Easter Egg! That's different than what I've been doing; sounds like fun."

Then there are the models that I build for a specific person or event. I built a set of silly themed models, each in its own box, for a friend going in for a long hospital stay who was going to need cheering up but no visitors for a while. One of them was a witch doctor, labeled "For when you're mad at your doctors for what they did to you, and you want a different one." Or I've built models for a specific show's theme. I built the FG Helldiver because we were struggling to meet a tight deadline on the 1:1 scale one I was working on, and I gave the model to my bosses as a joke, labeled "When you absolutely, positively have to get a Helldiver there overnight."

Some I built because I'm curious about the source. I built one from a Russian magazine called "Lefty" (translated), just to see how it would turn out (not particularly well, in that case).

I have an ongoing theme of my own of cat models (the animals, not machines named after cats), just to torment Dave Winfield, who despises them. (Hi, Dave!) And I've done other themes -- fantasy creatures, and the notorious "food" series.

My first paper models were architecture, because that's what the hobby shop happened to have in stock (I got lucky).

When it comes time to select a high-quality pre-printed model, I spend some quality time with my stash and give it some serious thought. For my current long term project, the GPM Sherman tank, I chose it based on general appeal, an old family joke about Sherman tanks, and the fact that several other modelers have built it and written build threads, so I had somewhere to go for advice.

[nebeltex]

Periodic marketing research.