The owner of An Affair With Trains in Phoenix is Internet savy and aware of the pressures on his business even in a stronger economic climate. He issues weekly product, pricing, and promotion updates to the customer base via emails and he is working on a spftware update to allow e-orders.
He does special orders for the regulars without pre-payment. I do notice a high incidence of gray hair among the customers.
Do any readers know of any new shops opening? Now, that would be a pleasant read!
HZ
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We had a shop to close because of the owner's declining health..
As Paul Harvey would say..
Now for the rest of the story..
Another person bought the shop and will reopen it.
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
John,I must ask why the shop closed..
Did the owner retire?
Was it health reasons?
Family health reasons?
Divorce settlement?
Poor stock?
Details John,details!
Everybody likes to moan the demise of their LHS but,very few if any gives any details.I know there is more to the story then meets the eye or gets told.
As Paul Harvey would say
Page 2!
We read about the internet taking over the hobby but what most don't realize is that many of the internet sites are in fact hobby shops. Those who stay with the times stay in business. Shops that rely on local business only and ignore the potential of the internet tend to decline unless they expand into other hobbies such as RC. Another reason many shops close is that the owners retire and cant find a buyer or don't try hard enough.
Springfield PA
It seems the only way brick-and-mortar stores can stay in business these days is to also have an internet mail-order business.
One of real close LHS has no internet service, and one about 45 mins away has a internet mail order business, Guess which one will likely survive?
I must admit, I am fast becoming a "buy it online have it shipped to me shopper".{I am usually a "tactile guy-like to see, smell, touch, taste, feel a product}. I can go to a store and look at something, maybe try it on, but I can get my exact size online when I can't in the store, or I can just look online and hunt and poke. And I have been inpressed with how quickly things come when ordered and have relatively almost never been disappointed, and so far and yet to even send anything back. I often even order from the LHS 45 mins away {wholesaletrains.com} as its a wash whether I pay for gas to get there or pay shipping to get it to my doorstep. If I go to the store, howver I can very easily be tempted to and sometimes do spend more!
I have friends who buy EVERYTHING online except food and autos. They, do however, do all thier research online for a car before a purchase. They did look up furniture and purchased some online and some at a brick and mortar store when tehy moved to a new {huge} house. They even bought their {large} area ornate rugs online.
Signs of the times and future I guess.
-G .
Just my thoughts, ideas, opinions and experiences. Others may vary.
HO and N Scale.
After long and careful thought, they have convinced me. I have come to the conclusion that they are right. The aliens did it.
CNJ..
I have read many of your postings and you seem to have a decent grip on the status of the hobby today. First...what shop? And do you think that these many closings we so often read about are the hobby getting smaller or buying changes shifting to on line shopping. Or just poor business management? In my travels I have visited many successful train stores. Quite frankly I go out of my way to support these brick and motar shops as there lies the future of the hobby.
I grew up in northern Jersey (Teaneck) and during the decades of the 40's. 50's, and 60's and beyond this was once a hot bed of model railroad and general hobby shops. Every Saturday morning with my 50 cent allowance, I'd ride my JC Higgins across the Cedar Lane bridge, turn left on Main St in Hackensack and then pedal just a few more blocks to Hobbyland. The place was full of kids and bikes strewn about outside with customers waiting at the counter to purchase a "whatever". Are these happenings now a part of American folklore? But then again during this period, I could have pedaled just about a few more blocks further and spent the entire day just watching Erie K-1s on the points of so many three or four car passenger trains. Or hang a 180 and pedal back up Cedar Lane to the four track main of the West Shore (NYC) and watch the K-3Q's and Mohawks hauling passengers and freight. My generation was indeed lucky and these were our seeds. Today?? I just don't know how inspiring 3rd generation diesels and long strings of boring stack trains are. Possibly things are proportionate to the times.
I am old enough to remember when even small cities had stationary shops and pen shops. Too specialized to make a go of it in today's brick and mortar world. Property taxes alone see to that. I am also old enough to remember when there were typewriter and radio repair shops -=- those are gone because they became obsolete.
I don't think model trains are obsolete -- I think it is more than the sheer mass of available items has made the brick and mortar train shop a very difficult commercial proposition given the internet and train shows. The trend is inescapable. It might not be due (or entirely due) to declining numbers of hobbyists.
I note that the same is true of other types of very specialized retail outlets: independent book stores, "record" (CD) stores, sheet music stores, -- the explanation is not so much a decline of interest but the availability of cheaper internet alternatives.
Like the book or record or sheet music stores, in all these cases, something is lost when browsing is no longer an available option. A good hobby shop serves many important secondary functions - social, bull session, clinics, posting notices, -- for the local health of the hobby. Unfortunately many of those functions make little or no money for the owner.
Dave Nelson
The suburbs north of New York City were a hotbed of model railroading from the days of the hobby's very inception, a region that once hosted better than a dozen model railroad establishments including arguably the largest model railroading store in America! However, the past decade or two has witnessed a very steady decline in regional hobbyist numbers and yesterday marked a grim milestone in that decline.
The last remaining brick & mortar model railroad hobby shop in the 150 mile stretch between the northern city limits of NYC and Albany, east of the Hudson River, closed its doors yesterday. It will now be over an hour's drive to any other store that caters largely to the model railroading hobby - and this in is a region where the population is well in excess of one million persons.
CNJ831