There is some of the old and quite a bit of new in Caboose. The old owners weren't really sure what they were going to do as late as August 2016. They knew they had to vacate the old location by October. The sale to the new owner was made very close to the move-out date.
Most, but not all, of the inventory was sold off. The new and old owners were sorting what would go where as the store was being moved out. All the shelving had to go, with most going to the new owner, with much of the moving being done by remaining Caboose Hobbies employees. Some of those employees are moving to the new store, some are not.
An attempt was made to open the new store before Christmas, but that was never going to happen.
Fred W
--Steven Otte, Model Railroader senior associate editorsotte@kalmbach.com
Frankly, I just am very confused about CABOOSE. They are using the old Caboose Hobbies website but they have nothing on stock from what I saw. They are in a different location, different people and none of the old inventory. Makes no sense.
I wish the new guys luck and applaud opening a hobby shop in this day and age of nothing but closures. I really liked dealing with Caboose Hobies and hope the new guys can relicate what they worked so hard to build up World Wide.
Personally, Kleins has the best prices, biggest inventory and a real time inventory that works so I doubt if I will be sending much business to Colorado.
My 2¢,
Roger Huber
Deer Creek Locomotive Works
oldline1 Frankly, I just am very confused about CABOOSE. They are using the old Caboose Hobbies website but they have nothing on stock from what I saw.
Frankly, I just am very confused about CABOOSE. They are using the old Caboose Hobbies website but they have nothing on stock from what I saw.
Is the new The Caboose ower re-using the old Caboose Hobbies website? How do you know?
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
riogrande5761Is the new The Caboose ower re-using the old Caboose Hobbies website? How do you know?
http://www.caboosehobbies.com/catalog/index_brief.php
I went to the website and it's the same old one.
I just got my 2017 GMRR Planning. There's an ad for CABOOSE in there. They claim "Sharing our passion for trains since 1938" in the ad just like Caboose Hobbies did????? New location, new owners, new store, new name??????? Not picking on the guys but.......isn't that a rather strange claim to make?
riogrande5761 oldline1 Frankly, I just am very confused about CABOOSE. They are using the old Caboose Hobbies website but they have nothing on stock from what I saw. Is the new The Caboose ower re-using the old Caboose Hobbies website? How do you know?
In the margin of the Home page it reads,
HAPPY NEW YEAR
Grand RE-Opening Celebration
******* SOON *******
******* Early January ******
Thank you for stopping by our website, faithful friends of Caboose Hobbies
ONLY Pre-Orders are being accepted, until the new web site is up and running.
NOTICE: Quantities shown as in-stock are not accurate!
So, time will tell how the new owner plans to deal with the web site.
Rich
Alton Junction
Interesting - I'm wondering if the new owner is allowed to use the Caboose Hobbies website (and name/logo etc) then why is his store not using the Caboose Hobbies name and logo? If there were legal issues, I would think it would be all one way or all the other. Dang confusing to me and probably lots of other people.
If the new owner does not have rights to the old Caboose Hobbies name and logo, then the only thing that makes sense is he was given temporary access to the old site to aid in notifying customers of his replacement shop and help them with orders that the old Caboose Hobbies can no longer fill due to it having completley shut down. Once that transition period is over, the old website may be closed and he open a new website labeled with his shop name, logo and contact details. Either that or the old website revised per the above so that it can be used to advertise, sell etc. but be re-branded.
I stopped by the new location about a week ago as they had days/hours open post on the website. They are not open yet, they told me about 2 weeks, I figure end of January before they open their doors. Fairly large former Auto Parts Store, Lots and los of shelves that appeared to be the same/Similar as to what was in the Old Caboose on Broadway.
Hope they make it, we used to have a bunch of train stores on the front range.....Caboose, Mizell, Trainmaster, Mainline maybe others I have forgotten.
New Location is good, outside the City which is a blessing, seems every idiot and their brother is moving to Colorado making traffic worse every month. I refuse to have anything to do with the city of Denver anymore, too much hassle and traffic. Newe location on the west side on a frontage road to Alameda, not to bad to get in and out of.
slotracerI stopped by the new location about a week ago as they had days/hours open post on the website. They are not open yet, they told me about 2 weeks, I figure end of January before they open their doors. Fairly large former Auto Parts Store, Lots and los of shelves that appeared to be the same/Similar as to what was in the Old Caboose on Broadway. New Location is good, outside the City which is a blessing
New Location is good, outside the City which is a blessing
Sounds like it is on track and should be a good train shop!
seems every idiot and their brother is moving to Colorado making traffic worse every month.
Welcome to my world! My parents and sisters were already in the Washington DC suburbs of northern Virginia. During the height of the great recession, unemployment in the DC area was still very low so every idiot and their brother was moving here - traffic horrible of course. I moved here from a place I also wasn't from (am I from anywhere being a military brat?) to the DC area cause I needed a job in 2009 - upstate NY was dead economically and decaying - still is from what I saw around Carrier circle last year. It sounds like people are moving to Colorado because the economy is booming - can you blame them? Unemployment sucks. Whats creating all the jobs there these days?
Please open a store here in Northern Virginia. We could use a good brick and mortar store.
A note of caution is in order: The Caboose is a shop in Wolcott, CT. It has a long history in the business and can be found at https://www.thecaboose.com
Do not confuse Caboose with The Caboose. It would be unfair to both of them.
riogrande5761 Interesting - I'm wondering if the new owner is allowed to use the Caboose Hobbies website (and name/logo etc) then why is his store not using the Caboose Hobbies name and logo? If there were legal issues, I would think it would be all one way or all the other. Dang confusing to me and probably lots of other people. If the new owner does not have rights to the old Caboose Hobbies name and logo, then the only thing that makes sense is he was given temporary access to the old site to aid in notifying customers of his replacement shop and help them with orders that the old Caboose Hobbies can no longer fill due to it having completley shut down. Once that transition period is over, the old website may be closed and he open a new website labeled with his shop name, logo and contact details. Either that or the old website revised per the above so that it can be used to advertise, sell etc. but be re-branded.
richhotrain I was under the impression that the new owner will continue to use the name, Caboose Hobbies, for his brick and mortar store. Is that not correct? Rich
Apparently from what I've been reading, the new store is not called Caboose Hobbies but simply Caboose. The site where I saw photo's of the new store is down right now but as I recall, the sign did not say Caboose Hobbies, nor was the old logo on it.
As pointed out above, The Caboose is the name of a shop on the east coast and that probably affected the naming of the new Colorado shop; avoiding a duplication - or maybe it was trademarked and not available.
I don't know anything about copywrites and all that but CABOOSE HOBBIES and THE CABOOSE existed in the same world for many, many years and I never heard of any confusion among modelers.
I feel it will be VERY confusing naming the new store CABOOSE as THE CABOOSE is still a very active and high quality shop.
The whole CABOOSE/CABOOSE HOBBIES name and website thing is just strange to me.
So other than 1/2 a name and the empty shelves, just what is the incentive to purchase anything from the old Caboose Hobbies?
The email list or web page?
Jim
Maybe they should call it Crummy Hobbies. Maybe not. How about The Cabin Car? They could specialize in Pennsy. Or Bobber Hobbies - Nah, sounds like fishing tackle. I give up.
I think we should give them the benefit of the doubt.
Let the store actually get open and functioning.
The owner is a man with means and things take time, so lets see it open and running then bash the bejesus out of it.
It's a tough crowd here. In a hobby where you can probably count all the new train stores opening this year on one hand (and maybe have fingers left over) we are closer to boycotting the store than welcomeing the new owner into the hobby.
They aren't even open and people are complaining of poor service, their business plan, their predecessors website and even their name. If a train store in CT is easily confused with a store in CO, I don't know how you possibly find your way to a Home Depot, a McDonalds or "The Diner".
No doubt Mr Kevin Ruble has his hands full with sub-contractors, distributors, bank loans, website designers, building inspectors and future employees. When it finally opens, maybe one of you could visit the store and tell him "You didn't build it" and get back to us with what he has to say about that.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
BigDaddy It's a tough crowd here. In a hobby where you can probably count all the new train stores opening this year on one hand (and maybe have fingers left over) we are closer to boycotting the store than welcomeing the new owner into the hobby. They aren't even open and people are complaining of poor service, their business plan, their predecessors website and even their name. If a train store in CT is easily confused with a store in CO, I don't know how you possibly find your way to a Home Depot, a McDonalds or "The Diner". No doubt Mr Kevin Ruble has his hands full with sub-contractors, distributors, bank loans, website designers, building inspectors and future employees. When it finally opens, maybe one of you could visit the store and tell him "You didn't build it" and get back to us with what he has to say about that.
On the one hand, it is a forum, and a forum is all about conversations and dialog. I think that the issue here is that a nationally known hobby shop has closed and things will never be the same. At least, that is the perception among some forum members. So, why not let everyone talk it out?
On the other hand, as Henry has said, give the new owner a chance to see if he can match the performance and reputation of the former owner. I guess what everyone is waiting for is the appearance of the new web site and the grand opening of the new location of the brick and mortar store. Time will tell.
On Saturday, we had a record setting, storm driven surf along the California Coast. I've never seen anything like it and, trust me, the video doesn't do justice to first hand experience.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wunCZ7LZ63A
Now this may seem irrelevant to the discussion topic, but I want you to imagine the scenes in the YouTube video taking place in a (very small) teapot and you have this thread in a nutshell (how's that for mixed metaphors?).
I will admit this is a new one on me. I'm used to hearing people wailing and gnashing their teeth when a hobby shop closes. This is the the first time I've seen the same thing happen when when one opens (well, maybe not yet, but soon).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRc1oZShp-E
Andre
Very well said, Andre!
Some folks are just not happy when there is nothing to whine or moan about!
BigDaddy It's a tough crowd here. In a hobby where you can probably count all the new train stores opening this year on one hand (and maybe have fingers left over) we are closer to boycotting the store than welcomeing the new owner into the hobby.
I'm used to hearing people wailing and gnashing their teeth when a hobby shop closes. This is the the first time I've seen the same thing happen when when one opens Andre
Hold the phone. Some of the recent posts seem to be accusing others in this topic of negatives which aren't really there. Gnashing of teeth? Tough crowd? Really?
To be fair, there has been a lot of confusion and not many details regarding the reported "re-opening" of Caboose Hobbies, which by all indications is what customers and the public were initially lead to believe, or maybe the customers let themselves to believe with a false hope that the original Caboose Hobbies would somehow revive in a new location. As things have slowly unfolded, the scenario has been different than that, but certainly not bad and if anything, arguably good news.
Tempest in a teapot? Maybe in the minds of some, but others simply wouldn't mind a straighforward description of the new store, name, logo and are they Caboose Hobbies resurrected and legal rights to the name or is this basically a totally new store which is, in effect, filling the void that Caboose Hobbies left, but only has the word Caboose in the name. Not what the public first thought but again, by all indications, very good news, especially in this modern climate of brick & mortar stores closing down in favor of online stores.
There really isn't anything constructive IMO about accusing topic or participants of something nefarious or ill intended. I think most of us are more curious than anything and ar just trying to sort things out; "the truth is out there:. I seriouisly doubt anyone here has any wishes other than for Caboose to thrive and be very successful. Try to keep it positive.
riogrande5761 Hold the phone. Some of the recent posts seem to be accusing others in this topic of negatives which aren't really there. Gnashing of teeth? Tough crowd? Really? There really isn't anything constructive IMO about accusing topic or participants of something nefarious or ill intended. I think most of us are more curious than anything and ar just trying to sort things out; "the truth is out there:. I seriouisly doubt anyone here has any wishes other than for Caboose to thrive and be very successful. Try to keep it positive.
What troubles me is the need by some to want to suppress honest and fair discussion on the forum. I don't see anything negative in any of the replies, no flaming, no name calling, so what is the problem?
There really isn't anything constructive IMO about accusing topic or participants of something nefarious or ill intended.
Who said anything about "nefarious"? A tempest in a teapot is much ado about nothing, especially a tempest about a business that's not even open yet.
Maybe in the minds of some, but others simply wouldn't mind a straighforward description of the new store, name, logo and are they Caboose Hobbies resurrected and legal rights to the name or is this basically a totally new store which is, in effect, filling the void that Caboose Hobbies left, but only has the word Caboose in the name.
There's a really powerful word I learned as a kid. That word is PATIENCE. We're going to learn within a fairly short time exactly what the scoop is, so why not wait and see? In the meantime, the people actually involved with getting the business set up are busy doing whatever is necessary to get the doors open for business. Everything else is idle speculation.
And for crying out loud, it's a new store, in a new location, under new management. By definition it's going to be different from the old store even if the entire surviving inventory was purchased, the new owner hired everyone who worked at the old store and the old name was kept. Is it going to be better than the old store or worse or somewhere in between? We don't know, nor can we until the place has been in business for a while and we have sufficient information to make a judgment, allowing for the issues that will arise as the new business gets under way. AND there will be issues that arise and kinks to work out.
As for any new information about the store:
http://memecrunch.com/meme/54U2P/all-in-good-time-my-little-pretty/image.jpg
EDIT: It doesn't matter a whit what is said by anyone (the owner included) before the store opens for business. Whatever the new owner's vision is doesn't matter, either, unless he can actually implement it and whether or not it's in line with creating a successful business. The only way any of us will be able to determine whether or not the business is a success is if we decide it's a business from which we wish to buy.
It does seem confusing.
The website uses the address of the "old" store, and the Facebook page is the original Caboose Hobbies page. The FB banner says "Caboose" (no 'Hobbies') with a tagline about "Sharing our passion for trains since 1938". However, recent FB postings give the distinct impression they are still establishing dealer accounts.
Perhaps there are vagaries in Colorado law regarding selling closely held corporations that prevent the business from being sold. Perhaps Caboose Hobbies ownership was unusual (which is none of our concern at this point).
In any event, it looks like the new owners seem to be doing things right. Time will tell of course, and going into a venture like this these days is daunting despite the Caboose Hobbies pedigree.
@Andre, My point is, reading comments like gnashing of teeth and this is a tough crowd escalates the negative tone in this topic. Maybe not nefarious, but not good either.
In this day and age of the internet, peoples' expection for information is not like a long time ago where you had to wait weeks or months to read about something like this in the magazines. It's unrealistic to expect people to be "patient", especially in a "high profile" store closing and claims that Caboose Hobbies is reopening. When we read something different, it's confusing and we would like it clarified. With internet, it's not difficult to provide a brief explanation and put confusion to rest. These days companies like Rapido, Tangent, ExactRail etc. communicate more directly with customers via forums, webpages etc, yes, we have come to expect a little more forthrightness and communication; it's becoming more and more the norm.
I'm going to make a generalization not aimed at any company or shop, but good communication tends to generate a lot more "good will" from customers vs. less comunication, which tends to have the opposite effect. With that, I think I've said enough and let this lie now.
riogrande5761 I'm going to make a generalization not aimed at any company or shop, but good communication tends to generate a lot more "good will" from customers vs. less comunication, which tends to have the opposite effect. With that, I think I've said enough and let this lie now.
Comunication is overrated..................... Who cares at this point? No business is open as of yet. We know what we know.
Personally they could be talking all about who/what/why they are Caboose vs. Caboose Hobbies?!?!?!?!?! The question is why? Opening a business, locate and setting up a store and getting a functional website up and running(assumption here) are all more important than me wasting my time explaining the logic behind every one of my own decisions to people that it does not matter to.
I think they are doing it the smart way. Shut up and get the job done. People know a new store is opening. Assumption on a new website going up(or rebuild of the Caboose Hobbiesone). They are getting free advertising right now over the whole Caboose vs Caboose Hobbies thing.......................
The guy has the means. Assuming he has the talent(appears so), let it roll and I'm betting it will be something good for all.
All right, that's enough for this thread. I'm locking it. Start a new one when you actually know something.