Toy train operating and collecting

That about sums it all up brianel!
Good post.

Let the kids run 'em!

Take them to see and ride real trains.

Sell upgradable starter sets for under $150 at Wally World.

Buckeye Riveter wrote:

twaldie wrote:   We seem to be lousy ambassadors. BINGO!  You gotta put the kids hands on the controls.

Yep.

Farm a loop of track and a few switches for a variety of routes a train can safely take without running off a dead end siding.

Give the kid the DT400 and allow him or her a few minutes with it.

AFTER establishing a max top speed in program track the engine can safely do on that particular track BEFORE the kids get there.

Let em run trains a few minutes. They will get a blast from that. Especially if the unit had Sound onboard.

The last GATS show in Little Rock had what they called "Races" and the goal was to get to the end of the straight first. (I tried it and lost.) I noticed some of the parents were drawn into it by the children's excitement. It might not be assaulting Altoona with big steam and strings of steam era rolling stock but for the kids it was FUN because they get to do something themselves instead of being told "look, dont touch" all the time in other parts of the show.

As a child I knew it was near the Holidays when the area fire-halls got started with thier annual exhibits of trains running for the public to come and enjoy (Plus a donation here and there is nice)

I wonder how many firehalls around the USA have a way to share the holidays with the public?

casconi wrote:

I can tell you that I am 23 and I have been in this hobby since I have been 10. It took my dad giving me his old Lionel trains (now priceless) to get me hooked. Lionel should hire a guy like me! I'll tell them what to do!

Like drop prices?

Will he someday choose G Scale or O Scale?

Exposure is the biggest thing.  Take advantage of the things like Thomas and Polar Express.  Lionel is finally coming around on the Thomas thing, but look how much time they are getting out of the Polar Express, to catalog several years worth with add ons, etc.  Appeal to Hollywood and network TV to put some train related scripts together "Polar Express 2"?, or other programs with the enthusiasm of ie: Mandy Patinkin, etc.

Price, as stated earlier, you need to have more starter sets at lower cost.  People don't jump into the hobby and purchase high dollar items for the kids.  You want reliable, sturdy, action packed entertainment at a affordable price.

I have mentioned this a long time ago, but will repeat for this topic.  Last year, I went to a department store with the family.  While looking through the Christmas section, ornaments, etc, I spied a Polar Express set sitting idle on  a display.  The CW80 had its green light on, so I snuck to the inside of the barrier and started the train rolling.  A few blasts of the whistle later, and the display was surrounded by people wanting to purchase these sets for the kids.  Static displays only do so much, you have to give them hands on and see action.  This is why "Authorized" Lionel dealers have to have a operating layout.

Lastly, when possible, you have to support your local hobby/train store.  That is where people will drive by or stop in and see trains running.  If you don't support them, they won't be there.  I stated "when possible" and I mean that I have seen stores charging 150% of catalog price for trains, ie Hobby Lobby's prices for Lionel starter sets.  They are only a good deal if you can get the 50% off, which is only 25% off MSRP.

Dennis

Brian wrote:

"The adult train buying public has become something of a spolied rotten Frankenstein monster with the "me me me me" attitude: we want THIS, we want it NOW, and after we said we wanted it, we won't buy it until it becomes a blowout."
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For the past six or seven years, I've been saying (and writing) that the worst enemy we have in this hobby is us.  Not everyone, of course, but a good number who have, in my humble opinion, worked incessantly to re-make the O gauge toy train segment of the hobby--three-rail O gauge, that is--into something it was never intended to be.  And just about anyone who has been around the toy train side of the hobby long enough, and who has followed the various forums on a regular basis over the years, will probably nod his head in agreement.

I can't speculate on whether or not it's too late for things to change course--that's kind of up to the various manufacturers at this point, I suppose.  It won't really impact me much one way or the other because I already have more than enough trains and nowadays just look forward to enjoying what I have.  But to my way of thinking, toy trains--not near-to-scale model trains--have long been the portal that led folks into this hobby, be it at an early age or later in life.  In the world of three-rail O gauge, that all changed in the mid- to late-90s, and what we see today is, by and large, the result of that Frankenstein (as Brian describes it) that we helped to create and which the largest of the manufacturers bought into.  All of them need to wake up and recognize that all the Big Boys and fancy control systems in the world, at equally fancy prices, are not going to do a thing to grow their customer base.  If they're smart--really smart--they'll start paying a whole lot more attention to improving what is offered in those entry level starter sets and related items.  There's no need to totally neglect the high-end market as long as it continues to exist, but there is a need to take steps to assure that the ladder leading up to those types of items isn't missing so many rungs that few will even attempt the climb.

Thank you Allan. I know you and I don't always see everything the same, but this is one issue we have some common ground on. there's obviously demand for the high end stuff, but not that much demand that it necessitates the majority of anyone's catalog being devoted to it.

Unlike others, I HAVE spent time at shows with a simple yet interesting display layout in which kids were invited and welcome to operate. If a kid wanted to run the trains, he got the chance. No rope barrier either. Nothing expensive and NO command control, and yet my display was easily if not more popular than the more ellaborate expensive displays. The crowds around my non-command layout were just as large as those around the other command layouts running expensive locos with many signs saying "Do not touch the trains." And from the many comments I got, I know my layout made more of an impression on young families than did the more impressive trains that those families knew they could never afford anyhow.

"Do not touch the trains." Doesn't that just warm your heart? Family hobby? Yeah, right. Signs like that go a long way to explaining the sad state the hobby is in today. Good thing J.L. Cohen didn't promote the hobby with signs like that or we'd be reading about this hobby as a postscript in a history book.

Anyone who follows the recording industry knows that Neil Young has been one of the most outspoken voices against digital recording, even when the entire industry had already gone digital. Even after the music buying general public had overwhelmingly agreed they wanted CDs over vinyl. Analog recording tape isn't even being made anymore. Neil still issues his records on vinyl, not that anyone cares.

Now comparing digital versus analog recording is like comparing alligators and apples. But in my mind, it brings up an interesting counter point. The 3-rail train hobby on the other hand, has not gone entirely digital control. Traditional users still make up the vast majortity of operators as do non-scale operators. Makes you wonder if anyone at Lionel really understands the concept of marketing? They want more people to be introduced to the hobby, yet keep producing technology with related prices increases that continually reduce the numbers of folks who can afford to be in the hobby.

Take a gander over at the CoilCouplers website and see all the clarifications about the new Lionel "Lunacy" Cherry Vanilla flavored TMCC. Dang tootin' Hoss, even the die-hard train guys can't figure it out, never mind some 8-year kid with his parents. For me, the trains are suppose to be about FUN, not frustration from trying to even figure out how they are suppose to work (providing that they even do out of the box). And how about this quote from Clyde concerning the new "Lunacy" Cherry Vanilla  Big Boy:

"WOW! What a sensation! I really think you need to try this yerself folks. Words don't do it justice! These really are the good ole days!"

Hate to wake you up Clyde , but the alarm has been going off for the past decade and these ARE NOT the good old days...

In the good ole' days, the trains were TOYS meant to be played with and were marketed to KIDS and their DADS - and not just DAD, like today. There was also nationwide advertising and nationally recognized brand tie-ins that made Lionel the most recognizable toy brand name in the country. Which by the way, is how WE ALL got started in this hobby, including Clyde.

In the good ole' days, the trains were for sale everywhere. They had visability and discount prices could be had anywhere after the holidays, not just from a few select mail order venues.

In the good ole' days, Lionel was still a pretty penny, but there wasn't all the competition for consumer leisure dollars like there is now. And even though even then, the trains were on the cutting edge of technology, you didn't need a college degree in computer science to figure them out! Dang! Put 'em on the track and they ran out of the box! What a concept!! Made in America... another concept, now made overseas! Folks can knock postwar and MPC, but at least when I hold one of those items,.I know that train helped employ an American worker.

In the good ole' days, fun and operating items were the keys... not chuff rates and rivet counts. Back then our IMAGINATIONS were not as stiffled as they seem to be now. Funny how in the catalog text way back when, even a simple smoke pellet and an air whistle was REALISM. And that level of superb realism was NOT out of the price range of most working families as it is now.

And with the approximate two grand cost of the "Lunacy" Cherry Vanilla  Big Boy, I kinda suspect that a whole load of us will not be trying it out anytime real soon. Unless the guy in the orange suit that loaned one to Clyde, wants to go on a nationwide tour. Go over to Cylde's site and request a Boy Boy loaner.... haha.

As for me, I stopped doing shows. I did my part and now it's time for Lionel to do their part. I can't count the times I heard "where'd you get that?" when folks saw all the current road names on my smaller low end trains. It doesn't cost that much more to slap Norfolk Southern or Conrail on the side of a loco as it does PRR or NYC. Even the same exact ATSF war bonnet scheme could say BNSF and still be prototypical! What good does it do me, or anyone to go out and promote a hobby for a company that seems on the surface to have little interest in truly making their products accesible to working class folks, which is where the future lies.

The Polar Express set has been one piece of good news on this front lately. Time will tell if Lionel can maintain the momentum of the Polar Express success, or will answer the banging on the door from the never satisfied Frankenstein monster and focus on the momentum control of  "Lunacy" Cherry Vanilla flavored TMCC.

Maybe the new "Lunacy" Cherry Vanilla  Big Boy will come with a sign for shows that says "Do not touch the trains."

I think it would be nice to have an annual "State of the Hobby Address."

The address could address such  topics as:

- which scales and gauges lost or gained hobbyists

- demographics such as median and mean age, state-by-state listings etc

- an honest state of the toy train industry, done by someone who is not a company insider

etc

I have to agree with many folks who say that Lionel (& MTH) need to get displays out to the public.
Coke & Pepsi are not household names all this time for nothing, they spend untold millions every year on the magic pill called advertising. Toy Train manufacturers, IMHO,depend way to much on catalogs and word of mouth to get their product sold.They must get those AFFORDABLE starter sets out and running in the public arena. Not just train shows, but, department stores and hardware stores.Like they did back in JLC's day.

Some radio and tv announcements wouldnt hurt, either. Kids and their parents need to be more exposed to the hobby, with a "hands on" approach, if were going to purpetuate the hobby beyond todays collectors, operaters. On the other hand, this hobby has gone through lean periods before and still survives today. So i dont think it will go completely extinct. (I.E. stamp collecting, coin collecting).

I have to agree with pennsy_fan that the industry as a whole needs to spend money on advertising and not lawsuits, the lawsuits only hurt the hobby and make people think negatively about the hobby!  Let's see more advertising than just in toy train magazines.  

Not only do we have Lionel & MTH but others like; Williams Weaver, Third Rail Brass, Atlas O.

Also in the last 12 years I have seen three hobby shops close in south Florida that dealt mainly with trains, one in Ft. Pierce-can not recall name, one in Port St. Lucie-Lee's Hobbies, one in West Palm Beach-BT&L Railroad-mainly H.O. trains.

Lee F.

There has never been a better time to be in this hobby, there's something for everybody.  I love the growl of my postwars, but they get boring and I'll feel a need to switch over to sounds and speed control.  Williams run great for the money, Atlas look great, just a great selection of stuff out there, but it is all relatively expensive albeit some more than others.  IMHO, there needs to be more of a hook like Thomas the Engine and after school comercials like Lionel used to do, and way out concepts like L.A.S.E.R., but doubt that's gonna happen.  My thoughts are when you buy it, don't plan on much of a return on the resale, cause it's all heading to bottom out someday- soon.  I am an adult, I do love trains, I spend too much money on em, and the funeral director won't have to spend too much time wiring a smile on my face!  Why can't God make an adult that lasts longer than a Lionel?

Rich F. 

Buckeye Riveter wrote:

Will he someday choose G Scale or O Scale?

Oh, oh, I would choose........................................BOTH!

Lionel or another brand needs to get a tie-in with some kid show.  Think about it!  They need to have some kid who plays with his O gauge trains, then imaginatively jumps on his "Lionel Lines Train of Thought" and has some wild adventure or something!  Man, I could make a billion dollars with this pitch - but they need to do 2 things:  1) foolproof, kid friendly train and track set so Mom will buy it for the kids (Dad probably would anyway, but Mom is the one who tends to spend on kid stuff) and 2) a foolproof Lionel Transformer that works right every time (CW80-V2).

I really wonder if it helps the hobby or reflects reality to be whining about the trend toward hi-rail scale models?  This is the trend that doubled the size of the market in the 1990s mostly through MTH's efforts.  Pages in CTT increased dramatically, and OGRR the magazine went from one step above a club newsletter to a real magazine.  Obviously that stuff was selling or MTH's sales wouldn't have gone from close to zero to 40 million per year with Lionel's staying the same or growing slightly.  Also, moaning about TMCC II and the Big Boy because they are way out of your league seems to be in the same ballpark as scale guys making fun of Lionel postwar, or two railers snickering about three railers.  What we like is what we like, and if someone else doesn't like it, they can go suck eggs :).

That having been said, if you look at the current Lionel catalog there are dozens of pages of conventional locos and train sets to complement the dozens of pages of command locos and scale rolling stock.  There are still plenty of whimsical accessories and postwar like operating cars.

The problem is not in our stars, dear Brutus, but in ourselves.  The public doesn't want to spend hundreds of dollars, much less thousands on three rail trains.  That's been so for most of the last 50 years, and likely won't change.  This will remain a niche hobby that appeals to a tiny percentage of the population, as it does now.  The same is true of model railroading in general.  Advertising and products for three rail trains were always geared towards adults, who were the only ones who could afford the stuff, then and now.  Kids just aren't interested today the way they were when these were the premier toys.  I think we should learn to live with that instead of flagellating ourselves and assigning blame for "who lost toy trains as a hobby?"

Neil, you make some observations that are worthy of addressing. I'm sorry you think of my comments (and maybe others) as moaning. I have a lot of fun with my trains which are not loaded with the latest electronics or details. I think there's a cultural perception that you can't enjoy something unless it's the best and most expensive. It's a little bit of the "keeping ahead of the neighbors' attitude."

The train companies have all talked about growing the hobby and introducing trains to younger people. But then they make the very minimal effort to that goal. I'm certain they all realize that their bulk of sales are currently coming from the older adult buyers. That's fine, but then they shouldn't talk about wanting to grow the hobby. Because as Jerry Calabrese admitted in the OGR interview, it takes a lot more work and effort to introduce the hobby to newcomers than it does to cater to estabished buyers. But there's liability in that too.

The established adult buyers today are very demanding. I know for a fact that the company reps typically hear comments at YORK like "well, if you won't make this, I'll buy one from the other company" or "so and so makes a new F3, so why don't you?" Which helps explain why there is so much duplication of new product offerings. Combine this with the tight economy, inflation (fuel costs), the intense (and often bitter) competition, the lawsuits and the expense of all the new product tooling: it's not easy street for the train companies and I'm sure they are struggling to stay in business more than most of us realize. Heck, you have small local hobby retailers closing their doors every week. That alone says something.

As far as my comments on "Lunacy" Cherry Vanilla TMCC I stand by them. All statistics and evidence I've seen and read shows that digital control is still the minority of users. The last numbers I saw from Lionel were at 25% (probably a little more now), and bear in mind that TMCC has far more users than DCS. So all this effort and investment into the digital control systems does not benefit the vast majority of modelers. Though it may benefit those who are spending larger sums of money on trains. BUT how much longer will that continue? We've all read threads from guys who say they have more than enough trains, or who say they are buying far less than they did a few years ago. That doesn't bode well for the future.

By Lionel's own admission, their strongest area of sales is in starter sets and related items. And my guess is that means the sets under $300 list, the $30 starter cars, and the reasonably operating cars/accessories: the aquarium car and ice loader fall into that category. Matter of fact, I notice fewer blowouts on these items than I do the higher end items or the higher priced items like some of the PWC reissues. And my feeling is that many of the PWC cars are over priced to begin with. $45 for a simple two-dome tank car on a folded sheet metal frame? That is unquestionably over priced. As are many items given the overseas cheap cheap cheap labor costs.

There is no arguement over the contrbution MTH made to this hobby. But what's good can also be bad. The bad blood between Lionel and MTH has also led to more divisions between hobbiests too. I do doubt that MTH's sales have stayed at that $40M figure. My gut feeling is that they're down. And my gut feeling is that when the lawsuit judgement day arrives, it may put one of those companies out of business. At the very least it will effect them in a big way: I doubt Wellspring wants to swallow a $40M loss, and I think MTH needs the money far more than we realize.... they've spend millions on tooling and probably more into their own Korean production facility.

As far as the general public and the train hobby goes, yes, things are not the same today as years ago. I personally have done far too many train shows and talked to many familes with kids and I know for a fact there is interest in the hobby and interest in trains. There is a definite nostalgia appeal to this hobby. But as noted above, there is the list price factor too... if Mom thinks the trains are too expensive, there's a greater chance they're not going to get bought. And if local shops are folding left and right, then chances are greater that the newcomer isn't going to buy a first train set. The top ten Lionel dealers are all discount mail order businesses for good reason. And truth be told, if those discount mail order places didn't exist, and all Lionel dealers had to sell at full list, Lionel's sales would plummet.

And Neil, in the current Lionel catalog of 2006 offerings, here's a breakdown, not including specialty or licensed items: 3 pages of affordable separate sale steam engines versus 14 pages of high end. A single pages for affordable diesels (with just one road diesel, a snowplow and a trolley) and 11 pages of higher end diesels. Out of a 184 page catalog, there are just 2 pages of introductory priced separate sale starter cars. And yes, there are many train sets this year... a wide variety to be sure, but the big sellers are probably contained to the first few offerings, as these are the ones with the lowest list prices. And probably those top ten mail order discount sellers do a bulk of those sales.

As far as Clyde Coil's comments on the new Big Boy, the reality is those kinds of items are not big money makers and not big sellers. Lionel and MTH closely scrutinize production runs of high end items. Otherwise Lionel would make 10,000 Big Boy's and MTH wouldn't cancel so many items that fail to garnish enough preorders. I think it makes far more sense to put a llittle more effort into affordable technology on items that people will actually buy. The new Big Boy may be the best dang thing Lionel has ever made, but what good does it do the company if only a few hundred people get to experience it?

How many times have you heard about a expensive restaurant that has the best food ever. People tell you "you gotta go there." And probably it does. But it's pricey, so business is marginal and they go under. The popular family restaurant may not have as good food as that expensive one, but given the price, it stays in business and thrives. Or like the automobile industry, it's the expensive luxury cars that get all the press attention, but it is the affordable family economy car with value that win in sales. I may not be running a train company, but it sure does make sense to me that if these companies want to increase the market, that example should be followed.

Unlike the auto industry, people need a car, they don't need a train layout. Though they may want to have a train layout. Trains are discretionary income purchases. If you make decent products that fall within people's discretionary budgets, chances are you will sell more trains... maybe. Which brings us back to marketing, exposure. wholesale distribution and retailing.

And if you think this is moaning, this is NOTHING. Wait until Lionel/MTH lawsuit judgement day... the train forums will ALL have a whole one big load of moaning... stay tuned.