Looking 4 Russ customlabs

[thunderbolt]

^^^^

[fallensaviour]

Is this a joke?

The last time this topic was brought up you made a big(really big) deal about the "quality" and how Russ was second to none in customizing heads.

At the time, I knew that you were wrong, but now you say that you never ponied up more than $20.00 per? What do you call that?

A "quality" product that you argued about tooth and nail, and yet you never had enough faith in his integrity to go out on a limb for more than you would throw on the bar? Seriously?

All I said at the time was that he had no right to keep customers waiting for months for something they paid for upfront. I still feel that way. About him, and any other "store".

After that, you told me to relax, and after I told you not to tell me to relax, I had to read posts by the moron who told me to "lighten up Francis", not to mention being called an icehole by another idiot.

Well, now we're here. This is what that "quality" is all about?

From what I've read so far, Russ's heads sucked. I've seen them on customs, and I always thought that(too small, too big, too lame, etc.), and now, unfortunantly, he's MIA. Yes, MIA and leaving a lot of people in the lurch. I know how that feels, and speaking from experience, I can tell you, it bites.


Yeah, he can't even get his act together long enough to fill orders, and yet he's going to change the face of customizing forever.

Bottom line is this: Russ is NEVER going to make good on his orders. With all due respect, BK telling you that, "He knows, nuff said" is manure.That and a token will get you on the subway.

So, either you can chalk it up to experience and take the hit, or you can band together and see how much this leech actually owes. If it's a significant dollar amount, he could be looking at mail fraud.

Something to think about.

It's a shame that other sellers get lumped in to a catagory with this parasite, but that's the way it is. No one actually knows anyone on this forum, all you really have is a level of trust. That's it.

Well,well,well what bridge did you crawl out of Mr..Phantom TROLL,was it?
I still stand by what I said I placed orders and I received my product and the quality is excellent.
Do I order Two heads at a time yes I do.I have ordered several times from Russ and gotten my product.
I like to keep it at $20 a crack.
I order from several people.Not just one.
Hey heres a picture of some things I ordered from several people...Anybody else you want to take a cheap shot at???
Here are some things from Doc mego,Russ,castaway,steve-0s toys, and austin.



By the way if he does makes good on his orders,then you may be looking at slander and liable.
Just something to think about.


Once more your opinion means absolutely ***** to me!!!


P.S. You spelt unfortunately and Category wrong you may want to fix that so you don't look Stoopid.

P.S.S. RELAX icehole!!!

[Dave Mc]

Chill folks. This thread is appropriate because it informs the community of an issue with a seller. I understand cash is involved and people get passionate, but keep it civil or I have to make the thread go away and that removes important info from the boards just because we can't express ourselves without bickering.

[GUYx1]

For me, It's never a cheap shot, always an expensive one, as I usually do large orders. It's not like I didn't know I was in for trouble when the Holiday Buy 2 get 1 free offers started showing up and I was stail waiting on stuff, but I couldn't help myself either.
If you see more items continually showing up for sale, yet yours somehow never get shipped, we have to keep track of it.

Kinda scary how I have hung in there with hundreds of $$$ outstanding and yet there are people ready to send out the bounty hunters over $20.

I buy from EVERYONE and always find a use for a head, be they big, or be they small. (The heads in question from Russ were the Bowen comicbook hero heads. They work best with non mego custom bodies, you just have to get used to them. I prefer Austin's head sizing so they look good either way.. )

It's not a matter of having faith in the sellers. I think what we all should do from now on is NOTE the paypal Transaction IDs and exact orders from everyone we make purchases from. After 30 days, people lose track of things.

This sort of problem can happen to ANYONE of us, no mater how trusted,
so we shouldn't bicker or jump on anyone about it, but instead KEEP YOUR ORDERS WELL DOCUMENTED!

I Would normally think - order off a website, paypal, done deal.
It is not that simple. Even ebay orders will get forgotten if it takes 2-3 months to produce the custom item. And you certainly cannot leave feedback 4 months later.

We have to be very proactive and not expect technology to be there for us.
It sucks, but we cannot expect the Websites we order from or the Sellers we paypal to keep track of everything, especially once a year has gone by. I am certain that given a few years this will all blow over. I've waited this long. Hopefully 2009 will be a good year for orders arriving.

Personally I'm thinking Russ will be there at Mego Meet with a nice goodie bag for each of us.

[YANOULI]

Paypal closed my claim because i filed it 2 days after the 45 day limit ran out, so unless Russ makes good ( and i personally don't think he will ) i'm out $60 and i can't afford to give money away.
I really feel for you guys who have paid $100's.

[GUYx1]

Great News! Russ has reappeared on the OTHER forum!
He said:
"well not enough time to create any more I've go 20-40 things that should change MEGO customs in a big way orders got way 2 many to do didn't leave the time i needed some of the things on my desk has been on their 2-5 years i feel I've taken the head thing as far as it can go ,man I've got removable iron-man armor about done,bodies with joints that can't be seen ,etc etc that I've haven't been able to get to in years .i feel like I've introduced ways how heads are done in MEGO today from how they use to be done. and i think I've got more to give to MEGO than just heads not done with all together doing heads but when i come out with one I'll offer 10 or so up already poured and once their gone their gone as well as other stuff but will not be another store"



Sounds like he has a lot on his plate but as soon as he gets the 2-5 years of orders out, everything should be back to being awesome!

[Megospidey]

^^ If you will notice, he's listed as a guest on that site as well. He wrote that before he pulled himself off every site and shut down his own sites.

[GUYx1]

Your spidey senses may be tingling, but for me, I'm hoping 2009 will be the year I receive my 2007 items. Fingers crossed : )

[The Toyroom]

^ I think that's being a little Pollyanna if you ask me....let's look at this realistically:

- He owes a LOT of people a LOT of items from at least as far back as 2007
- He's effectively removed all lines of communication (e-mail addresses, web site, his own forum as well as deleted his accounts on other forums)
- As Ian pointed out, if you wait too long to file a PayPal claim the claim is closed. I'm sure most of the people that have been waiting LONGER than the 45 days.

So unless someone decides to file an internet fraud complaint with some sort of law enforcement, Russ is under no obligation to fill any of these orders because at this stage of the game he has effectively made himself "untouchable".

And if you think he still has the funds that people sent him just sitting there in his account to go out and purchase the supplies he needs to actually fill all of these large outstanding orders and they're miraculously going to start flooding everyone's mailboxes....well I've got a bridge in Brooklyn that you might want to take a look at.

We, as a community, need to face reality that the cash, the heads/parts, and Russ are loooong gone. I guess some people may feel the need to be optimistic but I'd rather be REALISTIC. Hopefully this will be a learning experience for all of us as buyers AND sellers...albeit an expensive one.

[Jerry68]

What lesson Toyroom? The way I see it there are only a couple.
1; We don't trust each other, which I will not do!
2; The one I think you are trying to get across is, after 30days we need to file complaints with paypal. This is the only way I see this going. The only reason I waited so long was the fact that Russ was a well touted person on these boards. Perhaps we as a community set guidelines for buying and selling. That we hold as our own sort of constitution? I have waited a lot longer than three months from some well respected people here. The thing was There was efective lines of communication. This whole matter brings a lot to talk about. I think we have a long way to go before this gets settled. Please, everyone should share their thoughts so this does not happen again.

[BlackKnight]

Please, everyone should share their thoughts so this does not happen again.

Thoughts ?
Here's Mine.
If I half to wait longer than 30 days for Something from a Seller from the Museum,.. or Market Place..., I am Filling a Paypal Claim on Day 31 From Now on. (Unless ofcourse it's a Pre-Order, Obviously that doesn't Count.) If someone has all of my Money,.. & I have nothing in 30 Days,.. the Day after they will get a Claim Filed against them .

.. Now Obviously,.. if I am working with someone,.. or perhaps making payments on a Figure,.. or What Have you,.. & they say have half of me Cash,.. or something like that,.. thats a Whole Different Sport.

[The Toyroom]

What lesson Toyroom? The way I see it there are only a couple.

Here's the way I see it..and it's my personal opinion as both a buyer AND a seller:
1. I would never wait for an item as long as a lot of people here apparently did. 45 days would probably be my breaking point but I don't think I'd wait that long to make inquiries on the status of the order, regardless of the person's reputation. I'd start asking after 2 weeks. 45 days with no sign of product would be where I would draw the line and file a PayPal complaint. If that doesn't spark a fire under the person's butt I don't know what will. It becomes their burden of proof that the item was delivered. If it's never made it into the mail system to begin with then I think the customer has every right to their money back.

2. As a seller I try to ship within the same week(usually 3 days, 7-10 max) that the order was placed but if something caused me to deviate from the standard, I would most certainly communicate with the customer as far as delays. A good example for me are the playsets. They're very labor intensive and are not going out within a week. But they are very pricey so I feel I owe it to the customer to keep in contact with them as to the ongoing progress.

People may have thought Russ was communicating with them but I think the standard became for him to ship out a partial order as a show of good faith, the customer would be happy and then add even more to the order and the cycle would continue. And a snowball effect began.

3. I think a lot of people, myself included, have heard "behind the scenes" rumblings about what was going on with Customslab for awhile, now. Some, like myself, probably didn't say anything because we didn't have outstanding orders with Russ and figured it was none of out business. Which, technically, it isn't but I guess when it effects the community as awhole that we belong to, then maybe it is.

Others who did have outstanding orders from Russ refused to say anything for fear of being piled on ("Don't worry....Russ is a good guy...he'll come through...it's worth the wait") or because they feared they'd NEVER get their orders.

So we're all guilty in a way of sweeping things under the rug.

[thunderbolt]

You guys that are holding out hope for your heads need to come back to reality. If the seller has left all forums, including shutting down his own, closed email accounts and Paypal accounts, it ain't happening. Not sure what happened with Russ, but he has definitely left the building and isn't coming back.

[GUYx1]

Toyroom,
So what pray tell would you have me do?
It's not like I didn't bring this stuff up privately to the powers that be A YEAR AGO.

Every Issue presented here I have addressed personally with Russ.
I asked about the tiny head size of some of the heroes:
"my heads are in scale with the mego bodies the 8" and 6" . mego heads are way over scaled
russ"

Having a good attitude is all I can do. There is no other hope.
I am hoping that Russ CARES about you guys more than he does me.
Russ's orders admittedly date back up to FIVE YEARS.
Any attempts at expediting my orders in 2008 resulted in ANGRY EMAILS from him.
I tried asking why I was not receiving my orders back in 2008
"look i jumped you ahead of 25 order befor so wait your turn their just now getting what you jumped over they get done when they get done btw don't send me any more snotty remarks in emails again
russ"


He was mad because I could not figure out why he could not get orders out.
I asked if he could perhaps catch up on casting on his days off work:
"no saturday is family day sunday is to do's around the house and mondays is my day off
russ"

I kept asking if you can't cast on your days off, when can you cast???
Apparently Russ did his casting at the end of the year when he was not working. Thus you need to wait until 4th qtr for your orders unless he can fit
it in.
"as of late the last 3 months i've worked my job of 76 hrs a week but i'm off untill after christmas now this week shiped out 16 orders and i will be getting them all out befor christmas thanks
russ"
I'm not TRYING to suffer from Stockholm Syndrome like Patty Hearst, but
It's pretty tough trying to make all this stuff and still have a life.
I have heard that excuse many times, so I just have to live with it.

It is not like Russ it the only one heading toward oblivion while trying to make a business of selling custom mego items. All I can say is be careful and keep a good attitude, because confronting the mego customizers does not work.

[The Toyroom]

Guyx1 (and guys in general)...

Seriously, I'm on YOUR side and I think this SUCKS! But in my attempts to shed light on this I'm feeling a little backlash coming my way....not cool.

Here's the thing...based on just what you quote from Russ' e-mails to you (and I know they're genuine...the man had a certain "style" of communication as it were ) I would NEVER had let the guy slide with an attitude like that. That's part of the problem...Russ thought he was King of the World and expected that people would wait indefinitely for that perfect head sculpt and he could throw disrespect toward customers left and right when they questioned his process (or lack of apparently). You are not the only one I've heard this from lately. I think it's poor form as a customizer and a businessman that he conducted himself in that manner. Like he was "above the law" or something.

I dunno...I'm still scratching my head trying to figure out how things got to this level and how we can fix them as a community. Maybe someone else can help me out in the points I'm trying to make...I seem to be striking out. I just don't want to see people holding out hope for something that's never going to come. Like T-bolt said, Russ has left the building.