Maybe it's like the head of Tyco trains said about 40 years ago about why they were cutting out their kits and concentraiting on their RTR line. The inventory process to ensure that all the parts were in the kit box and sorted into packages actually cost more in terms of manpower and time per unit than it did to have an assembly line build the models. To keep the kit prices enough under the RTR to get people to buy the kits, they had to have less than 1/2 the profit margine.