Leia (Bespin Gown) on TESB 31B Cardback with SURVIVAL KIT OFFER?!

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For your attention and your take on this. 

discolouration of the gold painted neck variant?

That's right Chris, but the main point here is the Survival Kit Offer on the U.S. Kenner TESB 31B debut Card Front picture of Leia (Bespin Gown)

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Jay, calling for your attention to this thread.

31c is the survival kit offer sticker. I understand it's a very rare one. There's supposed to be an R5-D4 31c with survival kit offer sticker but i haven't seen it.

OK let me start again... Very rare!

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Quoted from SWCA...
According to famed cardback expert John Kellerman this is only the 5th Survival Kit stickered offer cardback known to have surfaced. There have been 3 ESB 32 Hoth Stomrtroopers (1 cardback only, 1 no-POP, and 1 standard carded) and 1 ESB 31 R5-D4. Now this ESB 32 back White Bespin Guard makes the 5th to have surfaced. That makes these stickered offer cardbacks very rare to say the least.

Chancellor_Peter wrote:

A previously undocumented variant or an anomaly out of the Blue?  Let the experts comment on this packaging variant with the "green neck" version of Leia (Bespin Gown)

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OK this is strange though. This is the survival kit offer used on the 41 back!

Can you show the back?

Were the stickers applied at the factory or at retail?

Surely this is just an anomaly, with someone putting a sticker on existing stock, such as what they did with ROTJ transition stickers?

Ian

I would assume that they were using up old stock 31 - 32 backs, and just added a sticker.

Just the same as the Canadian tranny cards.

edit. I see Ian beat me to the responce.

I have one on a r2-d2 41 back.Are those common?
I justed looked on the swca and noticed yall were talking about the 30's cardbacks.the 41's are common.

Johnb wrote:I have one on a r2-d2 41 back.Are those common?
I justed looked on the swca and noticed yall were talking about the 30's cardbacks.the 41's are common.

The 41A's are the cardbacks that had the survival kit offer, and are very common.  They didn't have a "hand applied" sticker on the front.  The offer information was "printed" on the card. You can see the hand applied sticker has a thicker red boarder.

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I didnt research it before I opened my big mouth.I am just now getting into cardbacks,so keep up the good work with explaning the differences.
it really helps newbies like me.thanks

Can't the survival offer be found as a sticker on the 41 backs too? I understand they are rare but not anywhere near as rare as the 31 and 32 backs with the survival offer sticker for which I believe 6 examples had been found up until now. These also have the survival offer on the back and are a transition to the 41 back. The survival offer sticker is different on these though. Thicker border.

This Leia Bespin 31 back has the offer sticker that's used on the 41 back with the thin border which is very odd.

Peter can you show us the back too? Is there an offer sticker on lower half of card?

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Oliver thanks for chiming in mate.  I wished I have further details especially the Card Back picture of this rather unusual Side Profile 1st picture Leia (Bespin Gown) MOC figure to shed more light on it. Whoever that uploaded this image in the source website Empire Strikes Back (2nd series) Figures (Free Survival Kit) Assortment stopped short of doing that.

From what we can see the "Survival Kit Offer" appears to be the printed version rather than the sticker of this version found on the rarer ESB 32C and even ESB 31C carded figures.  I am hoping that our resident Leia (Bespin Gown) focus collector, psybertech, to come back online quickly to share with us on what he may know about this 'Survival Kit Offer' MOC version from his collecting focus.

olisuds wrote:

Chancellor_Peter wrote:

A previously undocumented variant or an anomaly out of the Blue?  Let the experts comment on this packaging variant with the "green neck" version of Leia (Bespin Gown)

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OK this is strange though. This is the survival kit offer used on the 41 back!

Can you show the back?

Hmm how can the offer be printed?

I know someone to ask about this ;-)

Ok I have a bit of learning to do on the 41 backs. Peter you are the expert on these. Are there any 41 backs with the sticker offer?

I understand the starburst offer is always printed and the one with the thick round border is the sticker.

So this is really unusual to see the printed offer on the original Leia picture. I would really love to see the back. Any chance of tracing where the picture came from?

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Unlikely for US market release unless there are anomalies such as early release of the Offerless US Kenner ESB 41B and 41C carded figures during the timeframe before the May 31, 1981 expiry date. So far I have not seen any. Definitely chronologically speaking its illogical to have US Kenner ESB 41D and 41E carded figures with the Survival Kit Offer sticker stuck on them.

olisuds wrote:Ok I have a bit of learning to do on the 41 backs. Peter you are the expert on these. Are there any 41 backs with the sticker offer?

I understand the starburst offer is always printed and the one with the thick round border is the sticker.

So this is really unusual to see the printed offer on the original Leia picture. I would really love to see the back. Any chance of tracing where the picture came from?

Yep It was clarified to me there are no 41 backs with offer sticker. The star bursts are all printed and all the stickers have the thick round border sticker. All the known 31c and 32c transitions have the offer sticker with a sticker on the back too. So this is a real puzzle to see the offer printed on the 31 back and really confuses the hell out of me.

Also only 1 Leia Bespin 41 back with survival offer exists and its a Tol Toys. A US version hadn't turned up, not even a card.

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I have now posted this up Facebook at : https://www.facebook.com/groups/StarWarsESB/permalink/494357470775561/ and have tagged you. You may want to check out Steve York's posted comments.