Your subsciption money covers the cost of getting your copy to you.
Johnny
Trains doesn't make money selling subscriptions, it makes money selling advertising. An advertiser such as Knoxville Locomotive Corporation in Knoxville chooses to advertise in Trains because it knows certain readers may buy its product but not most; and that is just fine. I am not in the market for tie inspection either, but somebody else is. Enjoy your excellent photos and superb articles with crisp writing because someone pays for the advertising. Trains has also kept advertising about railroads and railfans thoughout the time it has been published. THANK YOU KALMBACH PUBILSHING!!
It was the November Issue. I look also for upcoming railfan events which I can get for my Model Railroading side but no list in Trains Mag.
cashonly "This months Trains reads like Industry mag Railway Age as opposed to a railfan mag.". A large number of ads for railroad equipment, I dont think my local hobby shop is going to carry railroad car sensors or full scale derailers anytime soon. Unless of course I will the lottery or hit it big in the stock market and build a half mile narrow gauge railway across my cornfield to the hunting shed out back. Does the industry read Trains? Does Mike Ward have Trains in his bathroom next to the Sports Ilistrated Swimsuit Edition and a Certain Mag that is put out by a old guy who wears a housecoat all the time and smokes a pipe.
"This months Trains reads like Industry mag Railway Age as opposed to a railfan mag.".
A large number of ads for railroad equipment, I dont think my local hobby shop is going to carry railroad car sensors or full scale derailers anytime soon. Unless of course I will the lottery or hit it big in the stock market and build a half mile narrow gauge railway across my cornfield to the hunting shed out back. Does the industry read Trains? Does Mike Ward have Trains in his bathroom next to the Sports Ilistrated Swimsuit Edition and a Certain Mag that is put out by a old guy who wears a housecoat all the time and smokes a pipe.
First of all, you fail to identify which issue, exactly, that you are complaining about. If you are going to express a complaint you need to be more specific. Subscribers already have their December issue, and could rightly call it their current issue.
My bet however, is you are complaining about the November issue, which I found refreshingly tech oriented. I have otherwise become sick to death of reading saccharine tripe recounting how "Uncle Norm saved the orphanage by pushing the cut of malt-o-meal cars up the abandoned siding with his Edsel all the way to their kitchen door just in time for breakfast" etc ad nauseam
Balance is refreshing.
D.Carleton, don't you mean "Trains IS not just for railfans..." Ha! I've always wanted to do that!
When I last posted, I was relying on my aged memory as to the cost of a lifetime subscription. When I managed to put four dollars together for my first one year subscription, fifty dollars was just as much out of my reach as one hundred dollars was. As I recall, my income was limited to what I earned by repairing other people's radios.
I still cherish the picture on the cover of the April, 1952, issue of Trains & Travel (the only issue I ever bought from a newstand)--a man and his son are standing in Joliet, watching the Abraham Lincoln.
That issue has ads placed by EMD, Minneapolis & St. Louis Railway ("dependable freight service"), Unit Truck, Timken, Alco, AAR, Rock Island (no mention of passenger service), Erie (no mention of passenger service), N&W (no mention of passenger service), and Magnus (solid bearings--"Right for Railroads"). Obviously, these ads were not keyed to passenger service, but to the industry.
I receive both Trains and Railway Age. It's indicative of my interest in some aspects of railroading that go deeper than what a railfan-oriented publication should have to be concerned about. Yes, some of the ads are pretty much the same.
I don't remember the lifetime subscription cost going above $75.00. That's what I paid for mine, and I now get my money's worth nearly every year. I suspect that there are now fewer than 100 of us "lifers" left.
P.S. Johnny, I don't think Murph was offering to buy any trolls. In his reference, he would receive $500 for a correct answer...question, I mean! I, personally am glad to be a troll these days, when it's a Yooper who calls me dat...I mean, that!
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
Who looks at the ads?
I second that. TRAINS very definitely circulates throught he Class I RR world - it did at my railroad. The fact that you see railroad oriented advertisers shows that quite clearly.
Deggesty Firelock76 Advertising helps pay the bills folks. You don't want the price of the mag to go up, do you? It's up enough over what I paid when I began subscribing 62 1/2 years ago. Of course, my income is somewhat higher than it was back then. Ah, if only I had been able to scrape together the $100.00 for a permanent sbscription!
Firelock76 Advertising helps pay the bills folks. You don't want the price of the mag to go up, do you?
Advertising helps pay the bills folks. You don't want the price of the mag to go up, do you?
It's up enough over what I paid when I began subscribing 62 1/2 years ago. Of course, my income is somewhat higher than it was back then. Ah, if only I had been able to scrape together the $100.00 for a permanent sbscription!
AH! YES! That $100.00 "lifetime" subscription ! It would have been a bargain at twice the price.
Back when a $100. dollars meant it was most of the money many of us (kids?) ever figured we'd see at one time. Model trains could be bought for anywhere from $3.00 up, and locomotives ( A Mantua 0-6-0 for less than $20.00 and then there werr Brass engines! .That PFM 2-6-6-2 'Sierra' was, I think, around the middle hundreds$$$ when it was first offered ...
If we only "knew" then??? That $100.000 subscription was the real bargain...
I wonder if Kalmback is still delivering any magazines, on that one???????
{ It is probably going to Murphy Siding's friend, Spel Czech }
Please bring Spel Czech back!
Murphy Siding Ding! Ding! Alex...... What is TrainFinder?I'll take internet trolls for $500 please.
Ding! Ding! Alex...... What is TrainFinder?I'll take internet trolls for $500 please.
Just in case the OP does read this far down, he should note that Trains has co-sponsored various industry equipment-oriented conferences that are decidedly not railfan material, and this is not new but has been going on for a few years. The regular columns by Frailey and Phillips are also commenting on industry issues, and only from time to time on pure railfan issues.
Moreover Trains has for some time had advertisers that were not aimed at railfans per se. Going way way back the railroads themselves, or at least their passenger departments, were advertisers; I suppose one could argue they were aimed at the railfan trainrider (remembering when the magazine was called Trains and Travel). But looking at a random issue in the glory days of David P Morgan as editor, November 1970, the column by John Kneiling was hardly aimed at railfans but rather at the industry (and often "aimed" in the weaponry sense at rail unions). There were large ads by Southern Railway, Milwaukee Road, Santa Fe, KCS, SCL, and CP rail aimed at shippers, as well as ads for some 3 foot gauge equipment. The following issue had a full page color ad for GE locomotives, and many of us recall the magnificent color ads that EMD ran in Trains magazine for years. (If you wrote to EMD they'd mail you versions of the ads suitable for framing.) Moving forward in the same bound volume, the June 1971 issue had not only a full page ad from Montreal Locomotive Works for one of their ALCo models, but the Penn Central spent some of its precious funds on a full page ad, again aimed at shippers.
I conclude the OP has not been paying attention.
Dave Nelson
tree68 In the meantime, yep - most of the signs of a troll. We'll see if the OP ever comes back into this thread.
In the meantime, yep - most of the signs of a troll. We'll see if the OP ever comes back into this thread.
I must agree, the last is a telltale sign.
I think we discussed Trains' dilemma a while back. Is it a railfan magazine, or a rail industry magazine.
In reality, it's a little of both, which explains the crossover. I'm not complaining. I've looked more closely at some of the "non-hobbyist" items with an eye to how they might help our RR.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
When the ads that seemed pitched toward to industry and not toward railfans began to appear, I had the impression that the advertisers deemed it worthwhile to place such in a magazine which has seemed to be pitched towards admirers of the industry and not towards the industry.
If the ads had not attracted buyers, I am sure that the merchants (that is not the proper word to use, in my opinion, but I cannot, at the moment,think of a more suitable word) would have ceased placing them. After all, for example, how many of us non-railroad employees would be interested in buying derailers (and the ads selling these have appeared several times)?
NorthWest Dakotafred, due to several things. 1. Railtrail has disappeared, and will reappear as another name. He has for a long time. 2. Similar gramatical mistakes to the posts of other trolls that have been forced out. 3. Inflamatory content on the first post, without much of any logic behind it.
Dakotafred, due to several things.
1. Railtrail has disappeared, and will reappear as another name. He has for a long time.
2. Similar gramatical mistakes to the posts of other trolls that have been forced out.
3. Inflamatory content on the first post, without much of any logic behind it.
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
cashonlyA large number of ads for railroad equipment,
Will one find Trains Magazine in the officies of the large railroads? As one who has to frequent those posts as part of his job the answer is categorically 'yes.' Trains are not just for railfans anymore.
Editor Emeritus, This Week at Amtrak
cashonly A large number of ads for railroad equipment, I dont think my local hobby shop is going to carry railroad car sensors or full scale derailers anytime soon. Unless of course I will the lottery or hit it big in the stock market and build a half mile narrow gauge railway across my cornfield to the hunting shed out back. Does the industry read Trains? Does Mike Ward have Trains in his bathroom next to the Sports Ilistrated Swimsuit Edition and a Certain Mag that is put out by a old guy who wears a housecoat all the time and smokes a pipe.
I would try another hobby shop for my purchases if were you. This one has gone to the Dark Side.
How do the three posters above know Cashonly is a troll vs. one of those newcomers we're not supposed to run off with our hostility?
Occupation: Fool
The credibility of this forum is maintained by the watchfulness of its posters!
Go Murphy!
She who has no signature! cinscocom-tmw
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
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