The POP (point of purchase) store display!

06-2007 More updates to this page including the above prototype picture and some new pictures of one of my "restored" displays below!

For me, the store displays are the most fascinating piece of Deal's Wheels memorabilia. Revell and other model companies would put together store displays and offer them to hobby shops for purchase so that the shops could place the display out on the counter and hopefully lure people into purchasing the models. This was probably an especially good idea with Deal's Wheels models as the models do not always look exactly like the box art and there were no pictures of the built model on the side flaps. The display would have allowed potential buyers to see exactly what they were getting.  These displays were only available for a short time in 1970 as an "announcement" of the Deal's Wheels line when it was brand new. Elsewhere on my site are scans of the original brochure that was sent around to hobby stores with pictures of the prototype display and pictures of the first four models (first release was the Bug Bomb and Glitter Bug, second release was the Zzzzz-28 and Stink Ray). The last page of that brochure has an order page that allowed the hobby shop to order a case with one POP display and 24 models. Above is a scan out of this brochure showing the prototye display. As you will see below, the actual production display had some changes made, no doubt because it was cheaper to produce. Notice the wild tye-dye pattern on the prototype display! Several people have commented on the odd "splash" design on the production displays, it looks almost like the "Deal's" word didn't print properly. This is because they were mimicing the pattern of the prototype display, it is intentional.

My thanks to Todd Cerami for obtaining the above pic for me from his Japanese friend Shinji. Shinji is apparently a hardcore collector of American Deal's Wheels, and picked up this really cool original store display complete with factory built-ups from Todd some time ago.

Above is what appears to be another pic of Shinji's store display. This is out of a Japanese magazine called Speed King that had an article about Dave Deal and Deal's Wheels in it, the magazine scans are elsewhere on my web site.

Many years ago I managed to locate not one, but several of these original store displays. I've been meaning to post pictures forever, and at long last I got around to it (05-2007). There were apparently two "phases" of store displays issued by Revell, initially they were delivered with two models while later displays came with only one model. Some of the models on these displays had detailing paint on them and others apparently did not. I've got examples below with descriptions under the pics...

OK, here's my first display. The Bug Bomb on this display is actually original to the display. It was missing a few parts when I got it, so I fixed it up. I went a little overboard from a purity standpoint as I added some detailing that wasn't original to it. The figure was already painted as shown though.  This display did not come with a Glitter Bug on it, as mentioned above  some of the displays only came with one model. I keep my Glitter Bug on there just because I think it looks cool this way :-) If you look close you can see the torn paper where the Bug Bomb wheels were originally glued to the display (it was centered on the display).

This is a 100% complete and original store display exactly as it was shipped. This model has no detailing paint on it, but this does appear to be the original model as it is still glued down and other than the lack of paint, the tire glue and build are consistent with the other display models I have. I guess Revell was trying to save some money and at some point started sending these out without paint. On the displays with only one car, of the two tabs the one for the particular model was apparently raised while the other was left flat. The models on all these displays were glued to the display with what appears to be hot glue, or maybe silicone adhesive. This display still has it's original cardboard shipping liner (not shown in pic). It's in remarkable condition, the only condition issues are the stains on the backdrop.

Above is another completely original store display. This display came with two models located exactly as shown. As you can see, there was some detailing paint done on these, this is original. It certainly isn't what I would call pro-level painting, Revell probably had some college kid assembling these for them and slapping some paint on in between beers :-) That's what it looks like anyway, like someone was in a hurry. Unfortunately this was probably on display somewhere that saw direct sunlight for parts of the day and as a result the red portions of the backdrop are faded. There were also some parts missing from the cars, I doubt the builder scraped the chrome off the parts before gluing and over the years the parts fell off. I did some cleanup work on this including removing a lot of dirt from the models and base, waxing the models to bring back their luster, replacing the stripes on the Z (old ones were chipped up) and replacing some missing parts (whole engine on the Z, engine scoop on the Stink Ray). I went to great lengths to keep these all original though. I did no painting on them, all the paint is original. I even left the glue globs on the wheels where the cars were originally glued down (you can see some of that in the above pics).

This poor thing is in lousy condition and is missing its original models. I've provided a pic mainly to show that it too originally had two models on it. You can see the paper tears where the model tires were originally glued down.