Its heart breaking to see these reproduced as aged boxes and looking rather well made as we all know these will be soon up for sale as originals all over the place. In fact they already are for sale on a popular online market place.
Unless we can examine any newish looking cardboard vintage pellet box in person i would be inclined to think they are fake. This sort of kills the original improved bulldogs online sales along with all the others in light of these many reproductions. The prices of some of the pellet boxes sold recently i suppose proved just too much to resist for the fakes industry. However i am very surprised that a well respected shop is the source of these fakes.
I would much rather live in hope of finding an original box then buy a repro but then again thats me, also encouraging the fakes makes finding an original box hard due to the loss of trust in this niche market. I for one wont sell any more of mine duplicate vintage cardboard pellet boxes purchased as part of collections as the prices are rapidly hitting the rock bottom for the cardboard the tins are fine.
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HW97k, HW98, Diana mod 36, BSA improved Mod D, FWB 80, HW45