This article helps our Volunteer Squad keep the database clean and consistent! It pertains to members who have Contributor access and above. If you're interested in getting involved, read more about joining the Squad here. We'd love to have you aboard!
Ideally, every Database Item on hobbyDB will have at least one Retail Price to start its price chart.
This is the price paid when the item is first available to purchase at retail stores before it starts being resold on the secondary market. Retail prices are often referred to by a few different names, depending on the country:
- Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price (MSRP) in the USA and elsewhere
- Recommended Retail Price (RRP) or Suggested Retail Price (SRP) in the UK
- Unverbindliche Preisempfehlung in Germany
- And others
Ideally, the Retail Price is the first Price Point on each item and the starting point for the Price Chart. This can be ensured by setting the Price Point's date to the day the item first became available to purchase by the public. The date can be estimated if it's not known—for example, if you know the item was released in 1990 but not what day or month, the date can be set to 1 January 1990.
NOTE: Chases have the same Retail Prices as commons, and items that come in blind packaging all have the same Retail Price regardless of ratios or Production Status such as standard or chase. The item's Estimated Value will quickly adjust to market value as Price Points from the secondary market are added.
Adding a Retail Price is very easy. After navigating to a Database Item's page, click Price Points, then click Add Retail Price:
Fill out the form, entering your best estimate of when the item became available for sale as the "Valued at" date. As prices can vary between different currencies there is no problem if an item has more than one Retail Price in different currencies.
Here is an explanation of the different form fields:
| Currency (if not US$) | Select the original currency for the Retail Price if it's anything other than US Dollars. |
| Price (In that currency) | Enter the price in the currency selected above. |
| Price (US$) | Enter the price in US Dollars. If you've entered a price in a different currency above, you'll need to convert it to USD. You can use XE.com's historical rate tables or X-Rates.com's historical data to do this. Be sure to use the exchange rate that was current on the date entered for the retail price. |
| Valued at | Enter your best estimate of the date the item became available for sale (not today's date). If you don't know the exact date, use the first day of the month or year closest to when the item became available. |