@john3976 - The Diecast Zone is wholly owned by Mint Models.  Michelle Peters purchased Legacy Diecast and The Diecast Zone a few years ago from Michael McNab.  Regarding sponsorship, I can say with great confidence that, with an audience of just a few hundred aging collectors who are on the downslope of collecting, it is highly unlikely that any of the manufacturers would be interested in investing their advertising money in a site like The Zone, which would yield a limited financial return. 

Mint Models has an ubiquitous presence all over the Internet.  They can be found in virtually every social media outlet.  I have no empirical evidence to support my suspicion, but viewing the situation from 20,000 feet, my guess is that generated model sales by The Zone are probably a fraction of what they receive from other Internet outlets.  I believe they're keeping The Zone alive more as a legacy courtesy than as a solid sales/profit-generating decision.  

I have purchased from both Mint and Legacy, in fact my 1969 Ford GT40 Le Mans winner by Amalgam was purchased from Legacy Diecast. I think you under estimate the power of a forum. But if you want this site to go Facebook you will lose many of the current members who have no interest of becoming members of Facebook. Nothing in life is free, someone has to pay for it, Facebook makes money off their members data and I will never be a member of Facebook due to that, sadly to many in society today think they should have access to everything for free. 

Please tell me and others who do not have a Facebook account and do not want a Facebook account how we are supposed to view this site if it was to go to Facebook? At least with this current site if you are not a member you can still open this site and read posts and look at the photos and videos, if you want to post you have to create an account to become a member. If this site was on Facebook right now I would not be capable of even viewing threads, photo's and videos unless I create a Facebook account. Sure it is a free account but Facebook is also taking all your data and selling it to people/companies. 

Mint/Legacy Diecast has made one mistake with this site being they have zero marketing presence on it. 

I won't name the forum but some from this forum have posted on this other forum with the dealers corner.

Here is the competing forums dealers section, clearly these dealers are finding value in being part of a diecast forum:

• DEALER'S CORNER

  STATISTICS

  LAST POST

• www.DiecastModelsWholesale.com
  
  We carry over 10.000 different items… a selection no other website has. We are one of the top leaders in the industry and direct distributor of diecast models in the USA, a characteristic which allows us to provide the best, competitive pricing around. Each model that has a fragile window box, covered with carton protection and wrapped in bubble wrap to protect each model from damages in transit.

  Topics: 1
  Posts: 6

  Last postRe: Introducing DiecastModelW…
  by [KRAFTIG] View the latest post
  Sun Mar 26, 2017 1:11 am

• www.ModelCarsHouston.com
  
  At Model Cars Houston, our philosophy is to provide our customers with high-quality diecast, model cars and model kits in the industry while offering the highest quality in customer service.

  Topics: 21
  Posts: 37

  Last postRe: The MOST IMPRESSIVE 1/18 …
  by ModelCarsHouston.com View the latest post
  Tue Jan 14, 2025 10:08 pm

• www.Model-Universe.com
  
  We’re Model Universe and we’ve been serving collectors and modellers around the world through our online model shop based in the United Kingdom since 2009. At Model Universe, we are passionate about scale models and are committed to providing our customers with the best products and service possible..

  Topics: 2
  Posts: 3

  Last postRe: 1:18 Tesla Cybertruck (St…
  by Mozzi View the latest post
  Thu Jul 10, 2025 9:12 pm

• www.MyDiecastCars.com
  
  Since 2016, MyDiecastCars has been selling diecast cars of the highest quality. Recently we changed our name from Racing Heroes. Our warehouse is located in Idaho, USA but we happily ship diecast models worldwide. We try to update our inventory regularly which focuses on diecast models from Almost Real, AUTOart, CMC Models and LCD Models.

  Topics: 1
  Posts: 1

  Last post** Elevate your Diecast Cars …
  by [KRAFTIG] View the latest post
  Tue Aug 08, 2023 6:59 pm

• www.Replicarz.com
  
  After twenty-one years of serving the model hobby industry, Replicarz is proud to announce that we will begin producing our own range of models. Starting with both 1:18 and 1:43 scale offerings initially, with possible larger scale models in the future.

  Topics: 5
  Posts: 11

  Last postReplicarz.com Summer Sale!
  by [KRAFTIG] View the latest post
  Fri Aug 06, 2021 3:41 pm

@john3976 - I have no idea where you're getting the notion that FB sells personal info.  They absolutely do not sell your data. 

What Facebook does, which is common for the entire marketing industry, is market your demographic data.  And make no mistake, your data is being widely marketed even without being on Facebook.  That's why you receive telemarketing calls and junk mail that are targeted directly at you, because your data is widely available. 

Here's what is absolutely known about you and all of the rest of us as well.   Unless you're willing to spend an enormous of amount of money to remove all of this info from the Internet, you cannot stop any of this from occurring.  

1.  Address and prior addresses

2.  A birds-eye view photo of your home and property

3.  Phone numbers

4.  Income and Net Worth 

5.  Age 

6.  Gender

7.  Approximate house value

8.  Family members

9.  Friends 

10.  General health

11.  Political party affiliation

And frankly, it appears you're worried about a concern that already exists and is widely available.  If having your data is that big of a issue, if I were you, I'd be more worried about other sites that lack the financial resources to build robust firewalls protecting themselves from hacking to obtain your Social Security, bank account/credit card numbers.  No one is hacking FB!  Their firewalls are virtually impregnable. 

And just to be clear, my argument was no longer about moving to Facebook.  Indeed, it transitioned to allowing non-members to post without a fee and also illuminating that diecast manufacturers sponsoring The Zone is highly unlikely.   

Peace!  

Yet Facebook accounts get hacked, well there goes that theory. There are links telling you how to check to see if your Facebook account has been hacked it happens so much. 

@john3976 - Sorry, but, NOPE!  No one can penetrate the FB fortress firewall and have access to pertinent information.  Sure, people copy profiles, but that's as far as it goes.  It isn't hacked in the sense of gaining access to personal information.

Marty, Marty, Marty, no system is un-hackable, the United States Government which has the most robust security available has been hacked multiple times, no system is un-hackable.

Let's talk about Facebook's security track record. Because let's be honest, it ain't exactly stellar - and rebranding to "Meta" hasn't fooled anyone. Here's the thing: Facebook's got more money than Scrooge McDuck swimming in a vault of gold bullion, and they've hired enough employees to populate a small country. So, where's the disconnect? Why, with all those resources, does it feel like our data is about as secure as a toddler with a box of matches?

Breaches, people, breaches. Facebook's history is littered with them, each one a gut punch to our privacy.

But listen, deleting Facebook might feel like tossing your phone into the ocean because you got a single spam text (trust me, tried it, regretted it). So, what are we supposed to do? Just throw our hands up and say "Welp, guess I'm living in a digital fishbowl"? Nope. Not today. Today, we're talking about taking back control, even on a platform with the security of a wet paper bag

Data Breaches That Have Happened in 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025 So Far

Apple, Meta, and Twitter have all disclosed cybersecurity attacks over the past 12 months.

I realize this topic is over 2 months old, but as I am just looking at collecting again, I have been re-visiting saved web sites. I have no issue with paying a small fee for membership, IF I think the forum is worth being part of.

A better restaurant analogy would be being able to look at the menu, 1st. If I see the food served is things I would like, with decent prices, then I would consider paying a small fee to eat there, and be able to return as often as I want.

I'm on FB, from over a decade ago, when a model RR group I was in migrated there. It's gone, as the original moderators left over time, more and more non topic posts showed up, and more and more of the original people left because of it. I look at FB about once a week, more than that, it's gets tiring with all the "People You Might Know" and all the posts one gets from the AI from groups, Pages, etc, that one has absolutely no interest in. And the "Reels' pop ups, mainly just click bait. I have no idea about it's security, but as was stated, anything is hack-able. 

One suggestion I'll throw out, is creating a email group on Groups.io. For $220. a year, you get 30Gb of storage, members have joining fee. I own a model RR group, each year I post a request for donations, any amount. When goal is reached, I post that it has been. Any excess (as I do not want to keep track of how much, for next year, I donate to a charity of a members choice.

Just a few cents worth.

Jim Flynn

@jimgf Good accounting and analogies Jim. Hope you decide to join us and stay!

Posted by: @perrone1

↑

"Good accounting and analogies Jim. Hope you decide to join us and stay!"

+1

My 2 cents - I think one problem is for the exception of Rich there are not many 'full photo' car reviews anymore and most of the ones Rich posts seem to be 'reprints' Back in the day there were some of us who were sent new car models to photograph and review. I have to admit that I haven't figured out in the current format how to install comments between photos so I don't post full sets like I used to. Those 'promotional' cars also widened my car knowledge and interest - something that I hopefully did for others as well. Times change and people move on but I think more reviews of new model offerings, particularly of newer model cars - like the super and hyper cars of today might bring in some new blood and add back more interest to all of us.

Frank, it is easy to "install comments between photos"....This is a screen capture just prior to my hitting, "Add Reply" to your post above.

Photo uploaded from hard drive, utilizing the click on text (Attach Files) at bottom of this entry block:

 Installed comments between photos.

One more photo: 

According to McNab, our reviews lead to a boatload of sales and he was more than happy to keep us in review samples and we got quite a few direct from the companies. Back then our database (Lists and Reviews) was quite comprehensive. I personally took a lot of time and energy into it only to see it virtually gone(or at least inaccessible) as did the rest of the crew.

Posted by: @rich-sufficool

↑

According to McNab, our reviews lead to a boatload of sales and he was more than happy to keep us in review samples and we got quite a few direct from the companies. Back then our database (Lists and Reviews) was quite comprehensive. I personally took a lot of time and energy into it only to see it virtually gone(or at least inaccessible) as did the rest of the crew.

@rich-sufficool I agree Rich, loss of the data base was a real blow. I do think our reviews helped with sales especially as we were doing them at the time when the retail stores were all closing up so you no longer had the opportunity to see models 'up close and personal'.

@franklemire Amen, sir.