There's something unusual for Gundam fans just appeared - an online shop specialising in Gundam kits based in the UK! It would never have happened in the bad old days...

Since the store is fairly unique, we wanted to give it a bit of space on UKA - I know there are a lot of Gundam fans out there judging from the emails I get from both UKA and Anime Connect, so I thought it might be fun to let the owners, David and Nigel, tell you about the origins of the store. Especially since my Gundam knowledge is peripheral at best! Here's David:

The beginning of Gundam Mad:

It all started when my friend, Nigel's wife decided to buy some Gundam toys for their son. This was the first time I had heard of Gundam but I had always liked mecha related anime. Anyway a short time later we both got our hands on our first Model kits. Mine was a 1/100 High grade Wing Zero. I built it over Christmas and thought it was great. The quality of the model kits was amazing, much better than your typical airfix type kit in the UK.

Nigel had also recently returned from a trip to Taiwan for a computer show. He brought back a 1/60 high grade Gundam he got from a corner shop out there. After seeing it built I was determined to find out where I could buy one on the Net.

After much searching one weekend I realised that, whilst there were plenty of US suppliers, UK shops were few and far between. The other thing I learned was the existence of different "Grade" gundam kits, and that in fact the ones I had seen so far were High Grade (the lower end of the complexity scale).

I kept searching and eventually found a supplier in Japan. I placed my order for a Master Grade Nu Gundam and a Perfect Grade RX 78-2.

Anyway, Nigel already has a successful "Small Form Factor" PC business selling online so we got together and decided to open a website and sell Gundam model kits into the UK.

From our experience, the few UK suppliers that do exist are expensive and have very limited stock. So we want to offer sensible prices with a large UK stock so that we can provide a fast reliable service to our UK customers.

We launched the site on the 7th of March and already have a big stock of kits in our UK warehouse.

Future Plans:

We also plan to sell Gundam DVDs and any other Gundam related goodies our customers ask for along with modeling tools and materials that compliment the kits we sell.
Another important part of our plan is to help promote Gundam in the UK by taking an active role on the fan related Forums, and by writing product reviews and news relating to Gundam goodies.

You can find a review of my Nu Gundam on www.scifimodels.org.uk here.

Where are we?

We are based in the UK in North Yorkshire between Skipton and Bradford, all our business is done online.

About us:

David
Age: 29
Likes: Gundam (obviously), electronics, DVDs, Airsoft, and cheese
Dislikes: paperwork, electronics and mushrooms.

Nigel
Age: 30 odd (dunno exactly)
Likes: Gundam, PCs, DVD, Home cinema, Airsoft, champagne and cider
Dislikes: PCs (when they go wrong).



So there y'go, that's Gundam Mad, who you can find at www.gundammad.co.uk should you feel the need to tinker with some mecha. All the best gents ^_^

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