My hobby as a Hotwheels collector

          How many of us remember the first toy car that our folks got us as kids?, that first experience that leaves behind an evergreen and ever lingering, sweet memory of times past!, for some it may be a Hotwheels car, for others it may be a Matchbox car or one of any other brand. I have such memories from my childhood days when my Dad and Mom got me Hotwheels cars and those memories are suave and fresh in my memory, as if it were yesterday!. Those were the days when Hotwheels were made in India by Funskool India under licence by Mattel and they were all metal!, and hardly cost Rs/ 50 a piece.

     I still have those cars at home, although I must admit that I need to take them out from wherever we have stored them, usually in some cardboard boxes. Then, there was a lull in my Hotwheels collection hobby till the year 2013-2014 when I saw a Hotwheels Lamborghini Veneno on Ebay and I wanted it badly. Thankfully, they had "cash on delivery" option. From that time, I started collecting Hotwheels cars again and now my collection numbers at least a thousand cars, most of which I bought from toy stores in my hometown of Chennai or from friends that I made online who were kind enough to help me procure those cars and whom I duly pay in return for their support and kindness as fellow collectors. 
 
     Personally, in my Hotwheels collection hobby, there have been times when I have felt frustrated, especially when going to stores in the recent past and not finding any Hotwheels in the pegs where I live. In India, the Corona pandemic caused a shortage in the supply of Hotwheels cars delivered to stores which was followed up by a BIS scheme that meant that toy cars of imported brands like Hotwheels needed to get the BIS certification from the Indian government before they recently made it to stores, in between, there were also some logistics issues or so I was told by shopkeepers and workers in wholesale stores alike, who were unaware that most collectors nowadays are fully aware of what is going on, since we discuss matters about supply chain issues and other stuff hindering us from getting our hands on those lovely Hotwheels mainline cars for MRP!. This period of lull in supply is when I managed to get my hands on some rare Hotwheels cars which I could not have even imagined, like vintage cars and cars that I wanted to collect in my childhood but I had missed out back in those days!.

    As for now, I am really delighted to see that Hotwheels cars are back in Indian stores like before, although the price has increased, I do hope that we Hotwheels collectors here in India, continue to receive stocks from Mattel Malaysia always and do not suffer shortage or lack of Hotwheels in the future. So I look to the future of our Hotwheels collection hobby with hope, let us see what awaits us as time goes on. For the new Hotwheels collectors here who do not know about how much Hotwheels costs have arisen from the time when we were kids in the late 80's and early 90's, I am adding that detail here for your information:

late 80's through 90's - Rs/ 50 (a piece) (made by Funschool India under Mattel's licence, all Hotwheels cars had black-walled wheels, some had white-walled wheels and were mostly metal on metal castings, hence heavier than current castings)
early 2000's - Rs/- 70- 80 (a piece) (this is when we started seeing exotic wheel rims)
2013-2017 (approx)* - Rs/- 99 (a piece)
2017- 2019 - Rs/- 120 (a piece)
2019-2020 (approx)* - Rs/- 149 (a piece)
2020 to present - Rs/- 170 (a piece)

*- year details may be a bit off but this is why I have added the asterisk sign to show that the year details are based on mere guesswork on my part as a collector because I admit that the year details may be inaccurate.