Went to the Spring meet yesterday. While not bad, was sadden by all the empty tables I saw. And really surprized how none of the makers of trains didn't show. Lionel, Bachman,Atlas all chickened out. There was some great deals I got from a few sellers but some of the sellers I heard complaing of no buyers was funny !! When sellers are charging Ebay prices for so-so /junk items or keep bringing the same stuff every meet but with prices jacked up I can see why the complaints were there. and with Black and Purple halls basiclly closed,(purple had some layouts) Me and my brother was out of there before 230p. pre-pandemic it was usually closer to 4pm. And while the TCA is trying their best, they need to get better food selections other then chicken strips, or forcing people to walk over to the orange hall for a sit down meal when you're over at the far white & red halls.But as I said at the start there were deals if you looked hard enough. I just HOPE this isn't a sign of worse meets to come.
That's a shame. I was considering attending York for the first time in a few years but like a lot of us I've downsized and am spending less and less time with trains. These days I'm more involved in my other hobby, pinball restoration. In that vein I attended a large convention in Milwaukee this weekend and it was very crowded and highly attended by manufacturers. I think it will take a little longer for the crowds to return to York. The reality is the demographic of York attendees is probably the most threatened by Covid while pinball collectors and gamers are a much younger group.
I haven't been, but for what it's worth there's been several YouTube videos from some who were there and they were very ecstatic about it. I guess it all depends on your expectations. I'm sure more videos will follow.
I've never been myself. It strikes me as one of those things I should go to at least once, but as I've been having very good luck at finding things at the local shows I attend and at various hobby shops I've visited in my travels (And I don't like to travel much) I've got no pressing need to go to the York show. If I do go it'll be more out of curiosity than anything else.
Apparently because you were rushing and left by 2:30, you missed Atlas. They were there, I've seen pictures of their table. I don't think they had a large display layout, but they were present to talk to customers.
Not to defend Lionel at all, but they did declare pre-COVID that they were only going to do the Fall meets, and they are sticking to it, so it's not a secret they would not be there. It was probably even an informal consensus across some of the larger manufacturers of the time (including Bachmann and even MTH, since the announcement regarding Mike Wolf retiring had not been made at that time).
The large dealers seem to finally be doing the cost/benefit analysis as well. One of the larger ones who was missing told me that it regularly costs them around $10k to do a meet once you included paying the staff, hotels/meals, etc. Even with the large volume these bigger dealers may do, you still need to sell a lot of trains to make that amount of cash back in profits.
As to the food vendors, while probably true, those vendors also need to weigh whether it's worth it for them to set up at all and/or stay for Saturday. I beleive at least one or 2 of the trucks that were in front of Orange Hall on Thursday and Friday were gone on Saturday morning. They are fully able to count their sales over each day, so those who have been attending for years undoubtedly know of the minimal participation on Saturdays. If you don't make enough sales to pay the person manning the stand for they day and the costs to run it (oil or gas for cooking, etc), how many times do you lose money before you just skip the day?
The on-site restaurant used to be an option at the Red/White Hall end of the Fairgrounds, but I heard from at least one or two people that it it has been hard for the Fairgrounds to find a vendor/contractor to open that back up for events (not sure if this was COVID related, or not, but seems possible).
-Dave
Dave, we did not RUSH by! we walked every single aisle looking at everything but the small scales and the cheesey junk. we also look under the tables at the sellers excess. If Atlas was there then they were hiding. Hell even the orange Hall captian Lou Palumbo wasn't there. Maybe you looked at everything that interested you but all we look at was Lionel and AF/S gauge trains. And my brother's friend was checking out whatever MTH was around.
As for Lionel. they said no to the Fall meet as you stated. they never said no to the spring meet last year. The TCA had to announce that. Maybe they'rs hidiing due to all the delays in shipping and the fact they are really overpricing their trains and don't want to hear from unhappy customers.
If anyone's interested the club's going to live-stream our May 19th meeting program where the theme is "York Show And Tell." The guys who went to York will be displaying their York show finds. It can be pretty interesting!
If the Facebook link works the show should begin at 7:15 PM Eastern Time. (Last meeting there was a glitch and the link didn't work, hopefully it won't happen again. Hey, it's electronics, they can fail when you need them the most.)
https://www.facebook.com/VirginiaTrainCollectors
Wait, May? I thought it was June?
Same me, different spelling!
pennytrains Wait, May? I thought it was June?
No, it's May 19th. Here's the club calendar of events.
https://www.vatraincollectors.com/?page_id=5
And just to reiterate, club meeting presentations will be live-streamed, "God willin' and the creek don't rise!"
Shhhhh..... "They" might be listening.
rrlineman Dave, we did not RUSH by! we walked every single aisle looking at everything but the small scales and the cheesey junk. we also look under the tables at the sellers excess. If Atlas was there then they were hiding. Hell even the orange Hall captian Lou Palumbo wasn't there. Maybe you looked at everything that interested you but all we look at was Lionel and AF/S gauge trains. And my brother's friend was checking out whatever MTH was around. As for Lionel. they said no to the Fall meet as you stated. they never said no to the spring meet last year. The TCA had to announce that. Maybe they'rs hidiing due to all the delays in shipping and the fact they are really overpricing their trains and don't want to hear from unhappy customers.
Well, I must be misreading your intent with respect to Atlas and their attendance. Your first post said they "chickened out" like the other vendors, which made me think you were actually looking for them. But in this post you say "all we look at was Lionel and AF/S gauge trains". So if you were ignoring anything not Lionel of AF S Gauge, I would expect you could easily skip them over.
In any event, Atlas was certainly there. The first photo in this post shows their booth with customers in front of it, but you can see their sign and that they did in fact have several tables. It looks to me like they were on the end-cap of the aisle right across from the LCCA booth (it's not like they were off in a corner in a remote alcove or anything). This post is one of the large dealers interviewing and going over some of the product before the hall opened for selling. (sorry for the links to a different forum, if I had found any pics on this forum of the booth, I would have linked to them instead)
Last thing, I believe you have Lionel flipped around. They WILL be doing Fall meets (at least that has been their statement up until now), it is Spring they WILL NOT do. So I stand by that they were not really expected to be at this meet.
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