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I'm fortunate enough to have four hobby shops within a reasonable distance, and all four are different. Two I'll give my money to, and two I wouldn't spent a buffalo nickel at. Let me explain briefly: 1. The first shop is mostly D&D and Magic cards, with one aisle devoted mostly to cheap kits and a few depleted scenic material displays. The woman who runs it is about 50, dresses like she's 20, and is always hanging on some college guy, usually in the 18-25 range, behind the counter. The whole place is creepy. I try to stay away from there. 2. The second place is the place the old timers go: mostly Lionel stuff, old kits and accessories, everything is way to expensive, and the owner is a grump who reserves a special degree of disdain for the newbie who happens to wander in. They wouldn't even let me use their restroom![xx(] 3. The third shop is a Hobbytown USA, your typical chain store shop. The best of the four in terms of scratchbuilding materials, and the guys there are pretty friendly, but if you're looking for an answer to a model RR question, better go elsewhere. 4. The last place is a shop that's been around for fifty years, and is run by the daughter of the guy who started it and is now deceased. She can answer any question about the hobby you could ask (which is partly why the local model RR club doesn't like her too much), and though her stock is mostly ten years old or more, so are the price tags, so I get some pretty good deals. Plus she knocks off twenty percent if I pay cash instead of debit so she doesn't have to pay VISA a service fee. In short, it's the service that makes that shop a great one. Granted, I find myself having to go to ebay for the hard to find stuff, but even if the prices were the same as everywhere else, I would still do business there, because it's nice to still find a few small businesses that operate as such and don't try to a mini version of Wally world. When you know the guy or girl who runs the shop on a first name basis and they know you, you know you'll get good service. The only thing missing there is the cigar/pipe tobacco smell that always lingered in the hobby shops I went to as a kid. Anybody else have that memory?
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