1997 In The UK
1997 was a key year for Hot Wheels in the UK , In the preceding decade little attention had been paid to the European market , for large periods of time it was virtually impossible to find ANY Hot Wheels in the stores.

Then came the breakthrough , in early March 1997 one or two independent toy shops started to receive 1997 UK Hot Wheels catalogs !, These were shrink wrapped in bundles of fifty, interestingly the larger chain stores such as TRU never received them.

The catalog was in the form of a pocket sized fold out poster , the front cover proclaimed "Hot Wheels - The Coolest collectable cars !", "Free Collectors Handbook" . Some stores just left a pile of these booklets on the counter for people to take , others gave away one free with a purchase of two Hot Wheels cars.
Inside, the twelve new First Edition cars for the year were pictured , including the Ford F150 truck in pre-production white , but the most interesting items for collectors were the photos of the segment series , all twelve mini series were pictured , but no less than seven of these appeared to be different than the USA releases , these were :

  • Racing series (#1 Ferrari 348 in red , #2 BMW M3 in White , #3 Jaguar XRJ9 in purple , #4 Porsche 935 in Black)

  • Classics series (#1 Auburn pictured in red , but actually appeared in black and silver, #2 Talbot Lago in Purple (never issued), #3 Duesenburg in White and purple , #4 Mercedes 540k in Purple)

  • Construction series (#1 Peterbilt, #2 Oshkosh, #3 Earth Mover (never issued) , #4 Breakaway Bucket(never issued)

  • Ferrari Collection (#1 Ferrai 250 in silver, #2 Ferrari 308 GTB in Black, #3 Ferrari F40 in Red, #4 Ferrari F50 in Red)

  • Street Racers (#1 BMW 850i in White, #2 Lamborghini Countach in White , #3 Porsche 911 in blue, #4 Ferrari 355 in Yellow)

  • Cabriloet Series (#1 Mazda MX5 in burgundy , 96 Mustang in White , Mercedes SL500 in Gray , 96 Camaro in red)

  • Road Repair Series (#1 Sandstinger, #2 Dirt Rover, #3 Road Roller , #4 Highway Builder)

    The standard segment Series available in the UK for 1997 were :

  • White Ice
  • Blue Streak
  • Race Team III
  • Dealers Choice
  • Heat Fleet

    The rear of the catalog featured pictures of five packs , Playsets, and XV racers

    Also on the back page in small print was " Mattel UK Ltd". So although most of these pieces were available throughout Europe , the catalog only appeared in a small number of stores in the UK.

    The cars started to appear in March in 72 car cases along with the standard pieces , the early part of the year saw the appearance of the Ferraris, the Street racers , and the Cabriloet Series , with the others appearing towards the end of the year.

    Many of these regional pieces were based on old Corgi castings and were made in China , amongst the hardest to find these days are the Jaguar XJR9 and BMW M3 from the Racing series, the BMW from the Street Racers and all the Road repair Series.

    In the same year one or two of the regular "Blue Stripe" cars were also unique to Europe :- The Mercedes 2.6 in Gold with sp5 and the Jaguar XJ40 in blue with sp5.

    A Special UK only catalog was also issued in 1999 , but showed all standard models .

    Some packaging variations appeared during the Year :

  • The Blue Street Racers Porsche appeared in standard Blue Stripe packaging and the standard Red porsche appeared in the Street racers pack

  • The FE 97 Corvette , Mercedes DTM , and Lamborgini all appeared for a short tim ewith the wrong FE number on the packaging

  • The Mazda from the Cabriloet Series came with or without side stripe

  • The 31 Doozie and Auburn from the Classics Series were re-issued in 1998 as standard line "Blue Stripe" cars but still in the special colors.


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