Model manufacturers buy-outs and take-overs

[Anonymous]

I am becoming concerned about the above trend. I realize that economics is the force that drives these ventures. However, I believe that these exclusive distributorship agreements that have emerged will make it more difficult for modelers to obtain the products that they desire.

[Anonymous]

Yep, It has seriously taken a large selection of products out of my trade area. I am from Wyoming and there are only three hobby shops in the entire state. All of them use Walthers because everything is in one place. Now that Horizon has mucked things up. a good fifth of the hobby products that these hobby shops regulary stock are now out of reach.

At least Accurail is still staying Kit oriented for the time being.

James

[TurboOne]

Hopefully the manufacurers will pay attention to the buyers and future buyers. If they are customer oriented, and meet the needs of the buyers, the distributors won't make a difference. If they KISS (keep it simple stupid, silly whatever word you want) then they will make sure all brands get to all stores that want them. Many times a takeover is good, as new blood revitalizes a older product either with new product or better advertising.

Tim

[Anonymous]

We have been fortunate here in Arkansas. Both of my Hobby Shops can still get Walthers and Horizion Products. However, it has not been easy. I recall the hysteria over Athearn and Roundhouse a year ago and these products are still around as if nothing has happened with the exception of ready to run products coming out.

[Anonymous]

From what I have seen on these forums, Accurail has been for sale for quite a while, and will probably be the next to move on.

Many of these manufacturers are small companies and when the owners are ready to retire then the company is sold or folds up. This was the situation at Stewart Hobbies, luckily they sold to Bowser so we will still have their cars and engines available.

Look at Herald King, the owner died and the family wants too much money for the artwork so we have lost a large quantity of decals for cars made in the 60's and 70's which is an era many modelers are still doing prior to the mega-mergers.

My LHS will not deal with Horizon so I have to go farther afield to purchase Athearn, MDC and Intermountain Products.

Rick

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Student of Big Sky Blue

Yep, It has seriously taken a large selection of products out of my trade area. I am from Wyoming and there are only three hobby shops in the entire state. All of them use Walthers because everything is in one place. Now that Horizon has mucked things up. a good fifth of the hobby products that these hobby shops regulary stock are now out of reach.

What about some of those larger hobby shops that also do business online? For example, I know that Cabbose Hobbies (http://www.caboosehobbies.com) and MB Klein (http://mbklein.com) both offer large selections of Athearn and MDC in their online catalogs...plus probably many other lines no longer carried by Walthers.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by TurboOne

Hopefully the manufacurers will pay attention to the buyers and future buyers.

Tim

Who are tomorrows future buyers?
As time marches on and the heavy hitters climb that grade to Train Heaven
will there be an abundance of successors to keep those mega shops profitable?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by locomotive3
Who are tomorrows future buyers?
As time marches on and the heavy hitters climb that grade to Train Heaven
will there be an abundance of successors to keep those mega shops profitable?

Nada problem, as long as they maintain an online presence - they will be able to sell beyond their immediate locale. Future modelers will be much more comfortable with buying over the internet.

[jsoderq]

QUOTE: Originally posted by TurboOne

Hopefully the manufacurers will pay attention to the buyers and future buyers. If they are customer oriented, and meet the needs of the buyers, the distributors won't make a difference. If they KISS (keep it simple stupid, silly whatever word you want) then they will make sure all brands get to all stores that want them. Many times a takeover is good, as new blood revitalizes a older product either with new product or better advertising.

Tim

As has been posted here and elsewhere innumerable times Horizon definitely does not distribute to all stores that want to sell their product . They are not the best distributor to deal with especially for smaller shops. As people have already pointed out, many local shops no longer are able to carry Athearn, Roundhouse and anything else Horizon may gobble up. What this will do to the hobby in the long run remains to be seen. For decades Athearn kept more modelers in this hobby than any other company.

[TurboOne]

[:D][:D][:D]

Happy New Year Chuck.

The future buyers are kids, mine are 9 and 6. My 6 year old is especially excited over trains, he just got 3 Thomas engines that he calls "breakable" Thomas. He is very careful with it and can't wait to start building a layout beyond the tree set up that Thomas is now. Most kids have gotten into the Nintendo type video games and they beg Mom and Dad to get these $50 dollar video games, yes we have some, but mainly older $20 dollar games. I see a lot of those dollars now going to a true family hobby, trains. It is something we can do together, and my 9 year old girl wants to build the mountains and scenery. If enough people get the kids involved, I see a big future in MRR, if not, when the current 50 plus generation, and most MRR's I meet are over 65, when they are gone, then there better be a whole new group to replace them.

Tim

Train people have more TOOT!

[TurboOne]

Hi John. After a very tough experience at my LHS, I have been to many an internet site. Not quite as fun as seeing and touching the trains, but until I found a kid friendly LHS I will spend my $ where I get real customer service. If your LHS is a good one, than they should be able to deal with even a silly company like Horizon and have enough buyers to keep supplied. I believe all my old engines from the 70s are Athearn, so I was bummed when my $23 Walthers catalog didn't have them in it. (Can't believe I paid $23 for a catalog, didn't catalogs used to be free so we could buy product ? ) But online I found all the trains from anyone. And these forums have been fantastic. Lots of great info. I think the internet has made everyone equal, even if you live in a town of 40, you can shop online and its just like living next door to the biggest train store around. Woo Hoo

Tim

Train people lay better rail !

[darth9x9]

The reality is that this is what capitalism is all about. The same thing happened to the car manufacturing industry. Back in the 1930s, there where 100 different automobile manufacturers. Today there are around a dozen.

The same with PC industry in the 1980s and early 90s. There were so many different brand name PCs (although many were based on IBM's motherboard), they put there own name on the case. Almost every town had a PC store. Now where are they? The likes of Dell, HP, and Gateway have either bought them up or drove them out of business.

You should expect the number of manufacturers to decline but the baseline of products of each to increase. They will have to do so to survive or perish.

Just look at Walthers...they announced their modular wall system in the February 2005 issue of Model Railroader (pages 16-27). What does the future hold for DPM? Only time will tell but Walthers, if you haven't noticed, has been constantly expanding their product base to compete for our modeler dollars.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by TurboOne

[:D][:D][:D]

Happy New Year Chuck.

The future buyers are kids, mine are 9 and 6. My 6 year old is especially excited over trains, he just got 3 Thomas engines that he calls "breakable" Thomas. He is very careful with it and can't wait to start building a layout beyond the tree set up that Thomas is now. Most kids have gotten into the Nintendo type video games and they beg Mom and Dad to get these $50 dollar video games, yes we have some, but mainly older $20 dollar games. I see a lot of those dollars now going to a true family hobby, trains.

Tim

Train people have more TOOT!

I have three grand kids, 9 to 11 and a pair of F3s going around the tree and I'm the only one playing with trains.

Play station 2 sports 2005 , NASCAR chase for the cup, the Simpsons etc all command
their attention.
And when you jump in the 4X 4, it's the portable Game Boy Advance SP.

These technologies/home entertainment are highballing down a fast track.They
do not bode well for the future of MR from my engineer's seat.

And then, there's the limited number of railroads to model after and here in Phoenix, there's not even an Amtrak train and only one back home in Grand Rapids.

Grandpa Chuck.

[Anonymous]

I'm not sure this is entirely a bad thing. Hornby's buying the Lima group should result in better quality and steady supplies at reasonable prices - not something Lima managed over here in recent years (towards the end, Lima's list prices with their regular rises were totally unrealistic considering their dire loco drive systems, lack of detailing, etc. Basically you were not getting value for money). Obtaining supplies was also tricky at times, and as for spares, well, you had to really need them! Hornby seem to be far better at getting decent models at sensible prices out to the customers, and assuming they plan to continue this with the ranges formerly owned by Lima (I know they plan to get the Rivarossi models back into production ASAP in order to get into the USA market) there could be some very nice steamers out there in a year or so. I suspect Hornby will be far nicer to deal with than Horizon reportedly are, judging by the reports on here of Horizon's activities and what I've heard from friends in the trade about Hornby (one of my LHS persuaded Hornby to make a limited edition train pack complete with loco headboard - impressive that Hornby are willing to consider a special order of only 1000 units!). Just my thoughts!

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by locomotive3

QUOTE: Originally posted by TurboOne

Hopefully the manufacurers will pay attention to the buyers and future buyers.

Tim

Who are tomorrows future buyers?
As time marches on and the heavy hitters climb that grade to Train Heaven
will there be an abundance of successors to keep those mega shops profitable?

Ooooohhh this is very profound. Very true indeed. Please put this in a qoute some where MR!!

By the way on the reference to computers such as HP, Dell etc... I no longer throw money at them, I plan and build my own systems and provide my own tech support. My $1500 (in parts) system will rival easily the best of the store bought machines anyday.

Lee

[TurboOne]

[V][V] Well I wonder how long on this great sight before the negative would surface. HighIron you are the winner. So many great folks I have talked to on here, very helpful for a new returning modelar.

Having a manufacturer actually pay attention to a consumer is a rare thing now a days, if you don't think so, go to a walmart retailer and see how they have changed the shopping experience. Then they beat up a manufacturer so that soon they can't have any customer support.

So the users should let MRR know how they feel.

If you can assemble a computer from scratch, great. The reason yours is better is you picked what was important to you for your computer needs. But for under $600 I can buy a store built computer built to my kids needs and I don't have to deal with XP headaches. My time with my kids is more valuable then hours building a slightly better computer, which I did before I had kids.

The great part of this hobby, most folks are great. They want to share their knowledge with others and get satisfaction from helping others. Then their are those that might be helpful, but are having a tough day and let it out on a forum. Lastly there are those that may never be kind, and only want to be a demigod to the newbies and show how much they know.

To those and they have been hundreds that I have read and listened to Thanks. To those that want to be mean....[:o)][:o)][:o)][:o)][:o)] Happy New Year !

Tim

[TurboOne]

[:D] Hey Grandpa Chuck [:D]
hang in there with the trains. We did all the video games, including having my 9 year old having Santa bring a new computer to play The Sims 2 on. She has spent a lot of time on the computer, but will come up for air, and watch the trains. She is getting ready to build her first model building, then wants to build my old 7/11 building from the 70's that I never got around to building. The scenery excites her, then the train.
My 6 year old will bounce between Mario 5 on the gamecube, and running his Thomas. He also got a desert storm military train for christmas, and loves the missle car.
We just got back from the train museum and he had a blast. We got invited behind the scenes at the three rail layout and he loved the close up perspective. The daughter was great for a couple of hours then wanted to go back to the computer. But she had a cousin with her, and I think the girl to girl thing wore on her. Anyway my long winded point is if you whistle, light it up, smoke it up, and blow your horn..........They will come

Happy new year Grandpa Chuck

Tim

[Anonymous]

The grand kids need to see the museum at Belboa Park. That should throttle up their interest.

[Anonymous]

Why do we worry about these things? As long as the train comes into station, I'm happy!

[grayfox1119]

This is no different than what has happened in many industries in the country, just look at Computer industry. Digital Equipment Corp was the leader in the world in 1989 in mid size computers, where are they now? Gone with the wind, along with Data General. The auto market, the steel industry, banks, all the same. It takes real good CEO's to keep a company in competition, it takes GREAT CEO's to GROW and expand a company. You must listen to your customers, anticipate their needs.
Someone mentioned above in the thread that the MRR companies are not listening to "us". Well, let me tell you, if we did not buy what they offered fo sale, it wouldn't take long for some changes would it??!!! You don't make money with your products sitting on the shelf. WE, the MRR people DRIVE this market with our purchases. We have far more clout than you realize. I have recently retired from a major semiconductor company, I have a very good handle on what customers can and cannot dictate in the marketplace.....don't seel yourselves short gentlemen!!

grayfox1119

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by grayfox1119

This is no different than what has happened in many industries in the country, just look at Computer industry. Digital Equipment Corp was the leader in the world in 1989 in mid size computers, where are they now? Gone with the wind, along with Data General. The auto market, the steel industry, banks, all the same. It takes real good CEO's to keep a company in competition, it takes GREAT CEO's to GROW and expand a company. You must listen to your customers, anticipate their needs.
Someone mentioned above in the thread that the MRR companies are not listening to "us". Well, let me tell you, if we did not buy what they offered fo sale, it wouldn't take long for some changes would it??!!! You don't make money with your products sitting on the shelf. WE, the MRR people DRIVE this market with our purchases. We have far more clout than you realize. I have recently retired from a major semiconductor company, I have a very good handle on what customers can and cannot dictate in the marketplace.....don't seel yourselves short gentlemen!!

grayfox1119

Grayfox is right: MONEY TALKS AND BULS*** WALKS. Everytime that you go into your LHS and spend money your voting for one company and voting against another. If your LHS wont handle what you want to buy, you'll go somewhere else and he'll either get what you want or go out of business.

A lot of the forum members don't have layouts and don't spend a lot of money on the hobby so they can sit here all day and talk about what they're going to do, but if they don't spend money - look at the caps at the top of my reply.

About all of the mergers - when your in business EVERYTHING is for sale if the offer is right.

Have a happy New Year
Bob