We have seen many local hobby shops close their doors, and we all seem to think that it is a shame, and caused by the Internet. The truth is, and this has been the case for ALL business throughout time, if you don't keep up with the times, your business or shop will go out of business or fail. Most of the local hobby shops as we know them were started up in the 1950's and 60's when people in the work force started having more leisure time on their hands and took up hobbies as a way of fighting boredom and to pursue their individual interests. People shopped at local stores, thus local hobby shops opened to serve them too.Then came mail order. The local hobby shop was challenged to provide better services and lower prices. Times changed and businesses changed. Some who didn't change, went out of business. They didn't keep up with the times.Now we have the Internet. Most of the hobby shops that sell by mail order changed their way of operations to include and embrace the Internet. The original local hobby shop owners that started in the early days are now older. Computer technology escapes them and they refuse to embrace it, still relying on local sales which is no longer enough. They are closing their doors. This is what we are seeing, and it is nothing new. I have seen this with my local hobby shop. The owner, who is in his seventies, decided it was too much trouble. He also tried to sell the business, but because of the lack of technology and low sales, no one bought it. He didn't keep up with the times and thought he could get by.There are some local hobby shops that are surviving and still doing business. These shops have changed with the times and kept up with it. Three that come to mind are Peach Creek Shops, M.B. Klein, and Toy Train Heaven. I am sure there are others. All three have kept up with the times by providing mail order sales, and embracing the Internet and selling by electronic means. Orders are taken on-line and payment are made by credit card and PayPal. Advice and research about anything is available on the Internet, so to learn about something, you don't have to leave your house.Is your local hobby shop keeping up with the changing times, or are they going to close their doors?
Elmer.
The above is my opinion, from an active and experienced Model Railroader in N scale and HO since 1961.
(Modeling Freelance, Eastern US, HO scale, in 1962, with NCE DCC for locomotive control and a stand alone LocoNet for block detection and signals.) http://waynes-trains.com/ at home, and N scale at the Club.
A nearby hobby shop has been in business for literally a hundred years. You walk around their shop and it's huge, covering all gauges. Looks old fashioned but the majority of their business is over the internet. They've kept up with the times and are thriving.
http://www.nstrains.com/index.html
Springfield PA
I agree wholeheartedly.
The closest LHS that carries enough MR inventory to make it worth walking through the doors is over an hour drive each way. They do have a reasonable selection as far as rolling stock goes but they are very lacking in other items (building materials, kits, scenery products, etc). Even so, I used to make the drive frequently in order to satisfy my "want it now" thirst and to also support the brick & mortar store. Their prices are at least MSRP and seem to raise rather frequently.
They do have a web presence but it is an amateur effort at best. I guess I have to give them credit for trying to "keep up with the times" but IMHO, they are doing more harm than good to their reputation.
I must admit that I have found myself forgoing the trek to the store in favor of buying on-line. Not as much for the lower prices (which does add up) but spending time & using gas only to return home without what I needed does get old. Understandably, they aren't able to stock "everything" but it seems that the more I get involved in the hobby the less reason I have to make the trip. I have found a couple of well stocked on-line dealers that ship quickly and have much better prices than I can obtain locally. The bulk of my $ now goes that direction.
As with any business or industry, if you don't evolve, you cease to be. Sad in a way, but it's a fact of life.
We have Caboose Hobbies here in Denver, and they are doing great. They are always busy when I'm there. I believe they do alot of internet sales, but there are always customers there.
The most important thing is they are friendly and always willing to help me.
There is another hobby shop that is close by where I live that's in Westminster called Mizell Trains. It's a smaller shop but they have great prices but they can't keep up with Caboose. I beleive they also do internet sales but not as much. I think they are doing ok.
Michael
CEO- Mile-HI-RailroadPrototype: D&RGW Moffat Line 1989
Generally I would agree with you but my LHS The Model Railroad shop in Piscataway NJ debunks your theory 100%. They have been around since Christ was a corporal and dirt was new. They sell trains and only trains no r/c planes or cars, no games nothing except trains and a few die cast collectible fire department pieces. They have a website but no internet ordering or online purchasing. If you want something and don't feel like driving to the store no problem you give them your order and credit card over the phone to a real live person and they box it up and mail it to you. you call them up. It seems like thye have the entire Walthers catalog and then some in their little store and then some. To be totally honest I kinda like it just the way it is. We all get too caught up in the internet I want it now mentality of instant gratification. I see nothing wrong with doing things old school some times. You take care of your customers, provide them with good service and fair prices and have the dedication and passion that your customers have and you will survive and flourish. They are getting the word out by advertising via the internet so I guess they are sort of combining both old and new to make it work.Even before they created a website I don't think there was a model railroader in the state who didn't know about these guys. I look forward to going there when I can and have enough stuff to make it worth my while. chatting with the other patrons, swapping stories, and how to techniques, etc. heck I've had total stranger I've met in there offer to come help me work on my layout to get past a particular problem or just to lend a hand
I personally feel that the demise of many hobby shops these days has more to do with the state of the economy and the lesser amounts of disposable income then it has to do with the internet and keeping up with the times. I say it safe to say that there is always an exception to every rule and these guys are it.
let's not loose our perspective. i too lament the passing of well stocked local hobby shops but i am not a model railroader just to keep somebody in business. i don't eat to help the local grocer either. i do it to stay alive. i bought a vehicle because i don't want to walk or ride a bicycle, not to support the auto manufacturer. it doesn't hurt to support a business if you want them to stay around and if you like to buy at retail for the experience of visiting the shop, then go ahead. you have the right to do so. those who keep up with the times will survive and maybe even flourish. those who do not will fail and rightly so.
grizlump
gandydancer19...Is your local hobby shop keeping up with the changing times, or are they going to close their doors?
...Is your local hobby shop keeping up with the changing times, or are they going to close their doors?
Actually, several have closed. The only three near me now are primarily Lionel/3 rail dealers. I have been doing most of my buying on line and at train shows for years now. The last time I stopped at one the shops to buy some paint, the owner told me he had discontinued carrying paint.
Enjoy
Paul
Some shops can buck the trend and not do internet sales, just have a basic website giving shop hours and location, but they are usualy in a large city that has a huge modeling base to sell to, combined with being well known and customer service orientated keeps them going. But your smaller shops in smaller citys that need to pull from surrounding areas to keep afloat need to keep up with the times. Many out of town folks that come to the better of the two LHS's only do so in person every couple of months, but will either have him ship stuff to them, or keep it in the back room till they make the trip to the shop. With gas prices like they are, a long round trip can take a huge bite out of what you can spend at the shop. I try to support the local shop as much as I can, but most of my spending is at the tables of used trains at shows, ebay and to friends that are down sizing thier collections. Just like any other business, the ones that are strong, keep up with the changing ways of doing business and stay customer service friendly whether you buy something each time your in thier shop or not, will survive. The rest will fail or struggle and complain about it till they fail. Cheers Mike
LHS mechanic and geniune train and antique garden tractor nut case!
I have recently posted about my LHS closing but his was not caused by the internet as he had on line orders, his was caused (apparently by a bank error which then wanted it corrected immediately and he was not able to do that). After quite a bit of back and forth he was forced to close his shop but will be on line.
As per my preference, I really like walking around a well stocked store and browsing for that item that you would not have thought about purchasing without seeing it. It also gives you ideas for your own use. I miss having shops around. There are still some left in the Lower Rainland area, (Central Hobbies in Vancouver and On Track Hobbies in Port Moody) but they are further and further away.
If you cannot fix it with a hammer;
You have an electrical problem!
For a LHS that relies on walk-in sales, it's the old real estate cliche - Location, Location, Location.
I would expect a well-stocked LHS just off the campus of RPI, Cal Tech or MIT to do a brisk trade with the technologically savvy student body (and faculty) right on their doorsteps. Being adjacent to Football HS or Basketball U might not be so advantageous.
Then, too, the inventory has to match the desires of the walk-in customer base. A shop adjacent to an Air Force base would be well advised to devote a LOT of space and inventory to model aircraft. If the nearest large structure is a race track that hosts NASCAR...
Back when I was a student/customer, there was a nice little LHS directly across the street from the Bronx High School of Science - with a couple of thousand geeks in attendance, many of whom were model railroaders. The owner was doing well.
Some time after I graduated, the school board saw fit to move BHSS from its ancient facility to a nice shiny new campus a good distance away. On the first of the month after the last students left the old building, the LHS was replaced by a 'For Rent' sign in the now-unadorned show window. The owner took immediate action and quit while he was still ahead. Without the Science trade, the neighborhood wouldn't have supported his light bill. (This was a long time before the beginning of the PC revolution, and anything like the internet was a subject for science fiction authors...)
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - a long drive from my nearest LHS)
Sadly, my LHS is fighting the exception to your observation.
Bug Four Hobbies in Plainfield has a website. It's also not the greatest to use for them, but it was what's in the budget. Right now, the store is open with no signs to say otherwise, but I worry sometines sinbce there diesn't seem to be a lot of business. They do great service, keep stock up to date, and mark down prices to the best of their abilites. It's right off of US 40, near Interstate 70 by 5 minutes. Sometimes though, the website is not the key, it's just your numberthat's called.
-Morgan
My LHS is large occupying what used to be a grocery supermarket. It has several departments with separate managers. A large portion of the business is devoted to cameras, The other departments are plastic models, radio controlled models, trains and crafts. They are doing good business and don't appear to be in any danger of failing.
Well my closest LHS is Wm K Walthers itself, so let's hope they are doing OK. (They just spiffed up the outside for the NMRA 75th anniversary convention next week). There are others that I try to patronize regularly. Personally I am more or less beyond the locomotive/car/structure buying aspect of the hobby so I am by no means an ideal customer. When you focus on the fact that, huge as they are, the Walthers catalogs are by no means complete presentations of what is available in HO or N, and that S, O and large scale all seem to be coming out with new products, it would be an incredible challenge to try to operate a train oriented LHS these days. No matter how much inventory you have, you are bound NOT to have something the next guy coming in the door really wants.
I have told this story before but there was an excellent hobby shop here in the Milwaukee area run by a group of expert modelers who were young and frankly rather idealistic (the classic story was of them opening up at 3 am after an anguished phone call from a modeler buddy who was in the middle of a project and needed some detail part or bottle of paint).
They made a go of it for a time but their rent was crushing (and they were in by no means the swankiest strip mall I had ever seen). When they finally went under what I remember best of all of their last day of operation (when everything was at least 70% off, and often more than that) was the almost intact wall of detail parts from A-line, Cannon, Detail Associates, Details West, etc. -- nearly their complete lines.
They themselves, and their model railroad friends, were the kind of modelers who intensely detailed their cars and locomotives, following those wonderful articles in Mainline Modeler, Prototype Modeler, Railmodel Journal, Model Railroading (the articles with the huge parts lists) -- and they learned the hard way that what seemed to them the way model railroaders should practce the hobby was in fact a niche.
Maybe the point is, hard to be a model railroad hobby shop when in many respects there is no one model railroad hobby.
Dave Nelson
I'm fortunate that we have several LHS's here in Omaha. Two have not embraced technology and I don't know how much longer either will be with us. Both owners are at least in their 70's and I think they have their shops more for having something to do than to make money. Another has fully embraced technology and has a fairly small store. The forth purely train LHS I'm not sure about, he turned the operation over to his father for a few years before coming back into it as a full line LHS. I haven't gotten to his store since just because it is on the far side of town.
Businesses, all of them, must adapt of take the chance on failing, been there done that, and I think I still have one T shirt left from the store!
Ricky
I basically agree with your premise and do believe that businesses such as hobby shops do need to embrace some form to technology to stay alive. Like it or not, we live in a technologically charged environment and while some of us grew up reading newspapers, relying on the post office and buying groceries at the local mom and pop store, the upcoming generation does not have that as their mindset. It's difficult for those of us that grew up with these venerable institutions to see what is happening to them today, but in some respects the demise of these - and some of our LHS - are as a result of their unwillingness to stay up with the times.
Now I have posted many times about my LHS which is about 4 miles from where I live. They sell everything from telescopes to RC planes and cars and they manage to have about 4 aisles devoted to trains - one of which is Lionel and another is N gauge. I feel a little guilty for not buying more from them, but for me it comes to how I am treated as a customer. I have said many times before that the 'train guy' is just plain rude and never even so much as says hello when I walk into his area. The inventory rarely turns and when I have tried to use their web site, its just plain awful. So despite the variety of products they may sell, it's the lack of customer service and assistance that keeps me away.
Now having said all that, I have found another shop which is about 25 miles away. This place is literally out in the boonies, all they handle are trains and they have just an amazing inventory that is always discounted and is constantly being updated. There is product literally hanging on every wall, behind every counter and hanging off the ceiling - in fact, I have found things in that shop that I couldn't find anywhere else. It's always fun to go there and it's probably where I spend a majority of my hobby shop dollar.
But I am afraid that one day technology will catch up with this one as well. The owner is older and the shop is probably a hobby for him. The building is in need to work and I honestly don't know how he knows what inventory he has - or how he maintains it.
The truth is that if either of these fail it will make me sad. But it will more than likely be of their own doing because times are changing and any business needs to constantly be evaluating its plan and making improvements that are necessary to maintain a customer base.
There's never time to do it right, but always time to do it over.....
Coquihala and Rock Creek I have recently posted about my LHS closing but his was not caused by the internet as he had on line orders, his was caused (apparently by a bank error which then wanted it corrected immediately and he was not able to do that). After quite a bit of back and forth he was forced to close his shop but will be on line. As per my preference, I really like walking around a well stocked store and browsing for that item that you would not have thought about purchasing without seeing it. It also gives you ideas for your own use. I miss having shops around. There are still some left in the Lower Rainland area, (Central Hobbies in Vancouver and On Track Hobbies in Port Moody) but they are further and further away.
Change or Fail?
Change to what? Yet another internet store? I don´t think this is the answer.
In the "good old times" the LHS was the place to go to buy your trains, your building materials, your brass tubing, sheet stock materials for scratch building, your - whatever you needed. The LHS had it on stock, and the folks running the place could afford the inventory, because they made a good margin on the sales of locos and rolling stock. Now, as bargain hunting is the name of the game, that business has gone to the internet shops. A LHS cannot live off selling wire, tubing, rods - the little bits we need.
As long as we do not change our buying habits, there will be more of those brick-and-mortar shops closing down, leaving a huge gap in our supply chain
Sir MadogChange to what? Yet another internet store? I don´t think this is the answer.
I guess I'd say "adapt or fail." My LHS, Maine Trains in Chelmsford, MA, (www.mainetrains.com) has a "web presence," and does some mail order. Still, I think the biggest thing he has going for him is service. He will patiently help solve yoru problem, whatever it may be. His workbench is in the customer section of the store, so you can see the projects he's working on for customers. He's got an in-store layout to show off new stock, and to test-run locomotives.
When I need something that's not in stock, I order it through the shop. He gives discounts to the regulars, and I don't have to pay for shipping.
I'm sometimes the only customer in the shop, but usually I have to wait while he deals with other customers. Each customer, in turn, gets full attention. And that may be the real secret...
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
I'd have to say that Sir Madog's most recent post has come closer to assessing the actual situation than anyone else. Honestly, I don't think a number of posters even recognize the basic inequality between real and Internet shops and that "change" isn't really going to make the difference in the long-term survival of the former. The brick and mortar hobby shop has considerable, even crushing, overhead these days. Those that are currently successfully maintaining a walk-in shop are doing so mainly because of one of two specific situations:
1. They are located in an area where model railroading is far more popular than elsewhere in the country and thus enjoying a much higher customer base than elsewhere (there is a surprising disparity in interest across the country, with only small pockets where the hobby remains surprisingly popular).
2. Income from the Internet presence/sales of a given shop are being used to prop up and keep open the otherwise marginally profitable brick-and-mortar shop part of the business. In the long-term, this drains the profit margin of the Internet branch of the business and is an economic mistake for the business.
There remains a distinct faction within the hobby, made up mostly of the senior citizen hobbyists, that are not (and never will be) computer-savvy and who must largely deal face-to-face with real hobby shops to continue in the hobby. But the rest of us are almost universally bargain hunters for one reason or another who scan the Internet "shops" for the lowest possible prices. This is affectively shutting out the brick-and-mortar examples who must sell at higher prices (unless they are giants like Train World) just to keep the doors open. In the end, this second group's approach will unquestionably win out, eliminating many of the older Baby Boomers from the hobby and bringing about the total demise of all but a select few of the brick-and-mortar railroad hobby shops well before the end of this decade.
CNJ831
Sir Madog Change or Fail? Change to what? Yet another internet store? I don´t think this is the answer. In the "good old times" the LHS was the place to go to buy your trains, your building materials, your brass tubing, sheet stock materials for scratch building, your - whatever you needed. The LHS had it on stock, and the folks running the place could afford the inventory, because they made a good margin on the sales of locos and rolling stock. Now, as bargain hunting is the name of the game, that business has gone to the internet shops. A LHS cannot live off selling wire, tubing, rods - the little bits we need. As long as we do not change our buying habits, there will be more of those brick-and-mortar shops closing down, leaving a huge gap in our supply chain
Yes,those was the good old days of cheap prices..With today's high end DCC ready locomotives inching toward the $200.00 mark along with high end freight cars inching toward $50.00 mark many will be looking for a better deal.
Why can't a old fashion HS owner enter the new era and use internet sales and remain open for local customers?
If a shop owner fails to modernized to include a discount he will fail and blame the internet.
Guess what Mr. Failed Hobby Shop owner..You failed simply because you clung to the old ways.
Now,I am at that stage where I need to buy very little so,I am slicing my internet orders to as needed and will use the local( not really,its a 52 mile RT) shop since he showed a williness to work with me on prices.This is a big plus in his column...
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
Allegheny2-6-6-6Generally I would agree with you but my LHS The Model Railroad shop in Piscataway NJ debunks your theory 100%.
How are their prices? My LHS is 20% off everyday and on orders. That's why they are thriving.
BRAKIE Yes,those was the good old days of cheap prices..With today's high end DCC ready locomotives inching toward the $200.00 mark along with high end freight cars inching toward $50.00 mark many will be looking for a better deal. Why can't a old fashion HS owner enter the new era and use internet sales and remain open for local customers? If a shop owner fails to modernized to include a discount he will fail and blame the internet. Guess what Mr. Failed Hobby Shop owner..You failed simply because you clung to the old ways. Now,I am at that stage where I need to buy very little so,I am slicing my internet orders to as needed and will use the local( not really,its a 52 mile RT) shop since he showed a williness to work with me on prices.This is a big plus in his column...
I agree the LHS has to change but they have a lot of overhead expenses that an Internet only type of business does not have to pay. The LHS in most cases has several thousand dollars in rent, light, heat and general business tax expenses that most smaller internet business do not have.
Let's hope some of the larger train shops can offer discounts at the store and still make a profit. Trainworld seems to do this but I have noticed lately their sale prices are not so low any longer except on blow out sale items.
I spend a fair amount of money locally but very little brass is available except consignment brass. Most of the small shops cannot stock the expensive items unless they are special order for the customer. My thought on that is I am taking a risk to order and pay for something I have never looked at.
Most LHS close when the owner retires since the P&L will not justify a bank giving a loan on the business to a new owner. Sad but true.
Driline Allegheny2-6-6-6Generally I would agree with you but my LHS The Model Railroad shop in Piscataway NJ debunks your theory 100%. How are their prices? My LHS is 20% off everyday and on orders. That's why they are thriving.
Got one here that is 20% off everyday and offers workshops on kitbasing and scratchbuilding. It also is a bit of a social hangout as well------
I think it takes more than just prices though--as well---it might be an idea to do workshops on stuff---even if the store is kinda small--which this one is. Another point--may be have the store out in the boonies--as most downtowns have become property tax h---l----TO no longer has a hobby store within its limits---North York has it now---same as London. We used to have Dundas Hobbies years ago but---
Any argument carried far enough will end up in Semantics--Hartz's law of rhetoric Emerald. Leemer and Southern The route of the Sceptre Express Barry
I just started my blog site...more stuff to come...
http://modeltrainswithmusic.blogspot.ca/
The cost of a layout is not at all locos and rolling stock, nor the lumber, plywood and foam board. It is the ground cover, the trees, the wiring, the odd length of track, the little odds and ends we need. Of course, the LHS will be able to offer discounts, but at the expense of the inventory for those little items. How many times have you driven to your LHS, only to find out, that it did not have the material you needed? Keeping slow moving inventory can only be financed, if you earn good money with high value and high margin items. A shop offering high discounts will not be able to stock the sheet of styrene you need to complete your scratch building project, the decals you need to number your cars.
Internet shops are usually not interested in that "detail" business - unless you are willing to pay high handling and shipping charges. Ever ordered a $ 5 part and paid an additional 5 bucks to get it?
For me, there is no alternative to the friendly neighborhood LHS to keep our hobby alive.
My gripe/praise with my local hobby shop is the service. Their prices are a little high but unless I am ordering a bunch of stuff on line, their price is about the same as I would pay when factoring in shipping. The gripe is one of the guys in the MR section has this know it all attitude and if your not doing his way your doing it all wrong.. and God forbid that I am modeling a modern era and not the late 40's steam era he is modeling. But then there this other guy who works in there and he is very friendly, offers up a lot of help and advice and when I preordered a couple Atlas Dash-8's coming out this Nov, he did it without deposit and gave me a smoking deal on them. If it was not for him I dont think I would be shopping there at all.
agree the LHS has to change but they have a lot of overhead expenses that an Internet only type of business does not have to pay. The LHS in most cases has several thousand dollars in rent, light, heat and general business tax expenses that most smaller internet business do not have.
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That's true in some cases but,those small "basement operators" is slowly getting squeezed out of the business by Walthers,Horizon and bigger and stronger on line shops that is a B&M shop as well.
There's no doubt the deck is stacked against the local hobby shop that's why its imperative that they modernized..One can now order direct from Atlas-at full MSRP.Of course this is direct compitition for a full MSRP hobby shop...Walthers has their monthly sales again direct competition to hobby shops.
Bdewoody The other departments are plastic models, radio controlled models, trains and crafts. They are doing good business and don't appear to be in any danger of failing.
Hi Bob...
You bring up an interesting point.
I've lived in the Ft Worth area for many years now and there have been several hobby shops that have closed - they were not dedicated to trains only but diversified into R/C, plastic kits, dungeons&dragons, etc. One of the shops owners, passed away suddenly and the decision was made by the powers in charge , to liquidate and close.
Another in Dallas, was the same thing in terms of diversity but they too, could no longer afford to keep the lights burning- the reason? Both shops that closed offered good selections of stock items but at the MSRP.
We live in an entitlement society that has conditioned us to expect a discount on everything from groceries to automobiles.
Once that price- battle starts, its hard to go back.
Many Hobby shops started offering discounts on almost everything in stock, years ago and it has had an impact on LHS that do not offer discounting..some could not compete due to the forementioned lack of internet marketing or mail order.
Obviously, most retailers are now discounters in the hobby.
Discount Model Trains in Addison, TX(Dallas) offers the modeler a large train store(trains only) with about 90% of what you'd find in Walthers catalog, but at a 20% discount on almost everything in the store except DCC and a few other items.
I'll drive to Dallas (about a 25 mile hike)just becuase you always run into a club member or other modelers and there is a commoradary that exists... that is something the internet can't offer.
They also always have a train video or instructional video going so there' a place to watch that too.
These are the things that the LHS owners will have to start coming to terms with, if they want to stay in business and having a regular clinic or special on selected items in their stores will help keep cusotmers coming back.
I have a shop owner here locally that sells everything at MSRP and if you don't like it, he'll tell you to get out of the store - he's no business man by a long shot and doesn't understand that if I were to get some type of cost savings on a few items, I'd have more money to spend and he'd end up selling me more in the long run AND retain my business.
As a result - he gets nothing except overdue bill notices every month.
Until the smaller shops(with relatively lower overhead) begin to make changes to their inventory and pricing structure, making it more attractive for customers to do business with them, it will be increasingly difficult for LHS to survive against the bigger establishments.
HeritageFleet1
CNJ831 There remains a distinct faction within the hobby, made up mostly of the senior citizen hobbyists, that are not (and never will be) computer-savvy and who must largely deal face-to-face with real hobby shops to continue in the hobby. But the rest of us are almost universally bargain hunters for one reason or another who scan the Internet "shops" for the lowest possible prices. This is affectively shutting out the brick-and-mortar examples who must sell at higher prices (unless they are giants like Train World) just to keep the doors open. In the end, this second group's approach will unquestionably win out, eliminating many of the older Baby Boomers from the hobby and bringing about the total demise of all but a select few of the brick-and-mortar railroad hobby shops well before the end of this decade. CNJ831
I resemble that comment about the old people. I am 74, use the internet every day and do a lot of business on it. Of course, in my younger years I was sent to IBM school, taught programming, systems design, etc. and used that knowledge to hold high paying jobs while I pastored small churches that couldn't afford to pay a full time pastor. But, I still teach seniors how to use the computer and many of them pick it up and do quite well with it. I would guess computer dummies exist in every age group, so you can't blame one segment of society for the failure of the hobby shop.
Bob
You can imagine that this discussion has happened before and what I find is that this hobby is so diverse that you can't have a local hobby shop that supports it and the ones that survive will have a social aspect to them (people still like to talk to real people face to face). Remember when there were a lot of electronic stores around (still a lot of people into that in case you didn't know), but there is only one left locally that I can find, The reason is it has become a hangout for those in that hobby and they are nice to people that are in other hobbies but need an item from theirs! In fact they are very helpful and if you tell them what you are trying to do they will give suggestions. Remember slot cars, they are still popular but I remember hobby shops dedicated to them in the 60's. Out here we had a computer chain of stores that owned the market at one time. They sold ready to go computers and parts to build your own. They would install parts but at a high price even if you bought the part from them at MSRP and we are not talking hard things to install, things that only took a pull one item out and replace with new item that was in some cases higher capacity, no software updates etc. to deal with except in a small way on some items. They were slow to realize that they would sell alot more plug and play at MSRP if they installed for free but buy the time they did they had already lost their customer base. They made lots of similar mistakes and people started to buy elsewhere, they are no more.
There remains a distinct faction within the hobby, made up mostly of the senior citizen hobbyists, that are not (and never will be) computer-savvy
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John that's a mighty wide paint brush you're using..A lot of us older folk at quite comfortable with computers..
Then exactly who do you think thought the young computer programmers? I know a lady my age that teaches computer for a college and she's not the lone ranger that teaches computer science.
Sorry my old amigo but,you're being a tad arrogant with that statement..