What once appeared as the end of an iconic line of seasonal decor following the demise of Prime Plastics, newly produced Grand Venture blow molds will be available in 2016 on a limited basis.
Founded in 1997, Grand Venture operated a small manufacturing facility in Washington, Pennsylvania where the company produced Christmas, Halloween and Easter blow molds. Among some of the more popular products Grand Venture produced were the Drummer Boy, Climbing Santa, the Halloween Witch, the Ghost with Pumpkins and the Pumpkin Tower.
After an eight year run Grand Venture ceased operations in 2005, but the company was purchased by Prime Plastics. Later that year Prime began producing a limited line of the original blow molds and would continue to do so for eight years.
in February 2013, Prime Plastics filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. In June of that year, it was reported that the FBI and IRS raided the offices of Prime Plastics and the home of the former owner, George Retos. According to reports, Retos, a convicted felon, had allegedly “spent large amounts of money on activities such as gambling and stock trading instead of paying his tax liabilities, and concealing his income and assets.”
In September 2013, Prime hired Heritage Equity Partners in an effort to secure investors or a buyer to assume ownership of the company. While some unnamed companies did inquire about the possibility of purchasing Prime, none were willing to make an offer. Being unable to secure a new owner, the federal bankruptcy court ordered a sale of the company’s assets.
On December 12, 2013, Prime’s assets were auctioned in an effort to raise capital to pay the company’s creditors. Among the items that were initially available for purchase were the steel molds used to produce the Grand Venture line of blow molds. However, Nick Retos, Prime’s CFO and the son of George Retos, claimed ownership of the steel molds. While the validity of the ownership claim was uncertain, the steel molds were not sold during the auction and remained in the possession of the younger Retos.
For a brief time encompassing parts of 2013 and 2014, Christmas Lights Creations was the only online retailer to have a limited inventory of new Grand Venture Christmas and Halloween blow molds among our product lines. Once those products were sold out it appeared they might not be available again due to the end of Prime Plastics.
But thanks to Union Products, a few of the Grand Venture Halloween blow molds will be back for 2016 and we’ll be the first retailer to carry these products. We’ve already listed the Boo Ghost and the Ghost with Pumpkins among our product lines, although it should be noted that the retail prices currently shown for these blow molds are tentative.
We anticipate having these new blow molds in stock sometime during the late spring or early summer. Christmas Lights Creations is very pleased will be able to offer our customers these newly produced Grand Venture blow molds and look forward to more lines being produced in the future.