[woodcote]

Robert Dyas are a hardware retailer who turn much of their stores over to Christmas tat - mostly in the £10-£50 price range. I've seen Carrera Go!!! sets there in the past (which didn't sell), but not Scalextric. Most big retailers seem to take a Micro set at £40-ish and a 1/32 set at £70-ish for Christmas. Robert Dyas probably insisted on a 1/32 set at the lower price point (they distribute discount vouchers, so the £49.99 will be £39.99 at the till with a voucher). The 'START by Scalextric' sets were being produced in the factory ready to be shipped to the US, so I'm guessing a few got put in the UK shipment with UK power supplies.

Here are the US 'START by Scalextric' sets at the 2019 New York Toy Fair...

   

The Robert Dyas set appears identical to the US Formula Challenge set. The track on the box looks very much like the Start to Sport converter pieces - those are included to make the set a genuine Scalextric starter set. The only advantage of using the Start track is that it is cheaper to produce and allows a much lower price point - something that has some logic for markets that Scalextric are trying to break into. Not so much for the UK - although I'm sure Hornby will take notice of the sales figures. Robert Dyas clearly wanted a Scalextric-branded set at their preferred price point. We'll see if they sell them all - or if there are stacks of them for £20 in the post-Christmas sale.

Back on topic...

Argos have also chosen a set available in the USA - the 1/32 scale Extreme Speed set - as their 'exclusive' Christmas Scalextric set...

   

This set is in the Scalextric USA webstore and is not entirely exclusive to Argos in the UK - Jadlams also have a few sets available. It is £90 at Argos and £99.95 at Jadlams (£103.49 via Amazon). It's the first time I've seen an Anime livery on the super-resistant LMP car - the GT livery is a new version of the Anime 'Sunrise' car.