Check this out! Keep Your Toy Box Organized with DASH

Keep Your Toy Box Organized with DASH

Not everyone buys their first action figure with the intent of collecting, and not everyone realizes they’ve already begun collecting until they’ve amassed a considerable number of toys. And then it just happens: you look up at your shelf and realize you’ve got quite the spread, and there are so many other great collectibles out there for you. But your collection is getting out of hand – you go to the store and can’t remember if you’ve bought this model before, or if you thought of buying it but didn’t. You go home to check, and realize you haven’t bought it, but by the time you get back to the store, it’s gone – snatched from you in your moment of hesitation.

Okay, so maybe that doesn’t always happen, but wouldn’t that be a nightmare? It’s why you need to have a good system for organizing the things in your toy box… or shelf. After all, whether you plan to sell your collection someday or just want to keep it to yourself, antique toys are quite the popular investment, and could even be lucrative if done properly. In the old days, keeping your collection organized for potential buyers or for posterity meant keeping receipts (which would fade with age, rendering them useless), but now, there are several options that help the would-be toy collector keep track of every valuable toy.

One such option is the DASH Action Figure Collector app. Available on both the iTunes App Store and Google Play, the app gives users access to information on thousands of action figures, as well as the chance to finally organize their collection. Here’s a quick rundown of its features from the developers themselves:

“Once you open the app, you’re greated with a helpful home screen. From the main screen you can access your collection of figures, search for figures in the catalog, scan a barcode (Android only), access your wanted list, or even find articles from right here on DASH Flash. I think the coolest feature is being able to view and manage your digital DASH collection right from the phone. You can see a list of all your figures separated into their respective categories, from which you can then go to any single figure’s listing from the DASH Catalog… But the fun doesn’t actually end there. One of the most useful features ever devised for an action figure collector is the built-in barcode scanner in the Anroid app. Thanks to DASH’s extensive record of UPC codes for figures, you can pull up most figures’ listings using nothing more than a barcode and your phone.”

Of course, nothing is perfect, and some of the features of the app require an upgrade. It can also be quite annoying if you’re on the road – which is when the app claims to be most useful – but can’t get a decent signal in a ToyCon and can’t access anything because your data sucks. It would be great if the app could store information locally so you wouldn’t need an internet connection to do quick searches, because as Kim Shadbolt of Pocket Fruity explains, “3G is good, but can be a bit temperamental depending on where you are, what network you’re on and how much data allowance you have.” If you’ve got LTE or a stable WiFi connection, this shouldn’t pose much of a problem, and when you really think about it, all that information stored on your phone would probably end up slowing it down anyway.

The app also requires an account on DASH to work, but there’s a good chance that you already have one. In any case, creating an account is free, so that shouldn’t really pose much of a problem. But while you can browse figures on the free app, you’d actually need to upgrade to get full functionality. It’s a great app and it pays for itself over time, but unless you’re actually really into collecting toys, you may want to skip this one and stick to their website for searches.

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