NittanyLion IRONROOSTER Hobby shops are dying. I've watched the number decline in Northern Virginia for over 40 years. The train oriented ones that are left are mostly 3-rail O gauge. There are a few general hobby shops such as Hobby Town around, but they too are decreasing. I think the future is hobby shows and Internet shops plus a few very large shops in areas with lots of hobbyists. Paul Why would I wait until Saturday to drive from Alexandria to Fairfax, Chantilly, or Manassass and then find out they don't have what I discovered I need on Monday when I can order Monday night from MB Klein and have it on Friday?
IRONROOSTER Hobby shops are dying. I've watched the number decline in Northern Virginia for over 40 years. The train oriented ones that are left are mostly 3-rail O gauge. There are a few general hobby shops such as Hobby Town around, but they too are decreasing. I think the future is hobby shows and Internet shops plus a few very large shops in areas with lots of hobbyists. Paul
Hobby shops are dying. I've watched the number decline in Northern Virginia for over 40 years. The train oriented ones that are left are mostly 3-rail O gauge. There are a few general hobby shops such as Hobby Town around, but they too are decreasing. I think the future is hobby shows and Internet shops plus a few very large shops in areas with lots of hobbyists.
Paul
Why would I wait until Saturday to drive from Alexandria to Fairfax, Chantilly, or Manassass and then find out they don't have what I discovered I need on Monday when I can order Monday night from MB Klein and have it on Friday?
I live in Manassas and have lived in the Herdon, Chantilly area since 2009 and haven't found any hobby shops worth going to except for very basic stuff like Atlas sectional track, track nails or rail joiners. There was a decent shop south of Springfield on the way to Ft Belvoir, but it closed a year or so ago. I have heard there is a shop in Ashburn that I haven't been to yet, so I'll have to see if it is anygood, but my expectations are low. Do you know of any shops I have missed? Mostly I go to the Timonium show or the occasional Greenberg show, or mailorder - and occasional trips to MBK if I'm already in the area for the T-show.
JOHN BRUCE III I posted this because I've been slowly recognizing that my local place is goiing down, and I've been a customer for 40 years or so. It's a little like losing a relative, even if it's expected. The posts here are helping me to recognize what's been happening. I think it's too late to do anything about my local place
I posted this because I've been slowly recognizing that my local place is goiing down, and I've been a customer for 40 years or so. It's a little like losing a relative, even if it's expected. The posts here are helping me to recognize what's been happening. I think it's too late to do anything about my local place
Shops need lots of business to survive - no one can save a shop on it's own. When I used to live in another town, fellow modelers would almost make it a "moral imperative" to support the LHS or I was disloyal. Hello ... I struggled alot on my own financially - I cannot treat an LHS like a charity and donate extra money I can't afford - not with court ordered child support and other major obgliations, and periods of unemployment in an area with a bad job market. Since then the cost of the hobby has gone up sharply so getting items at a discount is more necessary than every to be able to afford them.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
Howdy.
A wise hose fellow that used to run the hobby store where I live once told me:"The only way to make a small fortune in the model railroad hobby shop business is to start with a large fortune."
I miss that fellow.
Jaime
I miss the local "Mom & Pop" train shops that used to be all over Southern California! The bigs shops are still here; Allied, Whistle Stop, Train Shack, etc. But, I am not sure it was only economics that killed them. I lot of the ones I frequented the owners either retired or passed on. I know I paid more for items there, but the cost of the item came with service, advice, & friendly conversation. I used to have a job that required me to travel all over Southern California and I knew where they all were. And, the owners all knew me! It was fun.
I have to confess I mostly buy online now. Mostly Caboose, Trainworld, Fifer, Ebay, Amazon, Walthers, etc. I also buy direct from Manufacturers.
I get advice from this forum, You Tube, etc. But, it isn't the same.
I too would be interested in thoughts from Hobby business people. I wonder if there perspective would indicate the hobby is dying? I am in my sixties and don't know if there are a lot of young people interested in it any more?
I got into a conversation with the owner of the one hobby store near me. He said he makes most of his business on RC cars and aircraft now. He still has a "train guy" working for him but that business has really softened. He didn't know if the hobby was dying or had just moved on line. Has anyone done a study on that?
Tim
riogrande5761 I live in Manassas and have lived in the Herdon, Chantilly area since 2009 and haven't found any hobby shops worth going to except for very basic stuff like Atlas sectional track, track nails or rail joiners. There was a decent shop south of Springfield on the way to Ft Belvoir, but it closed a year or so ago. I have heard there is a shop in Ashburn that I haven't been to yet, so I'll have to see if it is anygood, but my expectations are low. Do you know of any shops I have missed? Mostly I go to the Timonium show or the occasional Greenberg show, or mailorder - and occasional trips to MBK if I'm already in the area for the T-show.
The shop near Ft Belvoir - Trains Etc - sold some (maybe all) of his stock to the hobby shop in Warrenton. But the Warrenton shop this year has reduced it's store size to less than half and no longer has a decent stock of trains - less than a quarter of the new store area. Most (all?) of his train stuff has been on the shelves a long time at list price.
The Train Depot on Willard Road in Chantilly and KMA Junction in Manassas are the only all train shops that I know of in Northern Virginia. Both are small and seem to focus more on 3-rail O gauge.
Like you, I mostly buy at train shows and online.
Enjoy
IRONROOSTER riogrande5761 I live in Manassas and have lived in the Herdon, Chantilly area since 2009 and haven't found any hobby shops worth going to except for very basic stuff like Atlas sectional track, track nails or rail joiners. There was a decent shop south of Springfield on the way to Ft Belvoir, but it closed a year or so ago. I have heard there is a shop in Ashburn that I haven't been to yet, so I'll have to see if it is anygood, but my expectations are low. Do you know of any shops I have missed? Mostly I go to the Timonium show or the occasional Greenberg show, or mailorder - and occasional trips to MBK if I'm already in the area for the T-show. The shop near Ft Belvoir - Trains Etc - sold some (maybe all) of his stock to the hobby shop in Warrenton. But the Warrenton shop this year has reduced it's store size to less than half and no longer has a decent stock of trains - less than a quarter of the new store area. Most (all?) of his train stuff has been on the shelves a long time at list price. The Train Depot on Willard Road in Chantilly and KMA Junction in Manassas are the only all train shops that I know of in Northern Virginia. Both are small and seem to focus more on 3-rail O gauge. Like you, I mostly buy at train shows and online. Enjoy Paul
I rely on Hobby Works in Fairfax for things like paint, tools, and scenic supplies. Only thing I wish they carried was Evergreen styrene. They have Plastruct.
I worked as a store manager in retail many years ago, when the internet was in its infancy. Our store was hugely successful, but in a very competitve industry (video rental). Some things never change. And the biggest thing that never changes is the certainty of change.
Many or most brick and mortar owners just don't adapt to change. And many of them are lousy businesspeople to begin with. Any business owner with dead stock should be slapped in the back of the head. Yes, you paid your distributor $175 for that loco you're selling for $200, but if you can't move it at that price, you need to find a way to move it, or you're out $175. Period. Inventory is like seafood. After it's been there a while, it really begins to stink.
And BTW, these huge online places (like Amazon) have overhead, pay rent and taxes, and salaries just like the little guys. If they're not renting space, they're forking out large amounts of capital to buy it. They just have a better business model for moving product.
The LHS has two big advantages over the internet: instant gratification and expertise. Most LHS owners miss the boat on both of these, as reading the last 3 pages of posts will show. My boss used to press us mercilessly to stay up on movies, because he knew what separated him from the competition was that he had employees who would engage customers, make recommendations, and be able to answer questions like "What was that movie starring Nicholas Cage and Cher?". That store drove all the other small guys out of business, and competed successfully with Blockbuster. Sadly, retailers seem to have lost the bubble on this.
The problem with expertise is that people want to go in to your store, use your expertise, and then go order it on line for cheaper (there actually is a business term for this, although it escapes my mind at the moment). It's what's killing Best Buy. Thing is, though, this can be mitigated by well-trained, enthusiastic staff. Stick with the customer, be enthusiastic and friendly (not grumpy that he's interfering with your game of Candy Crush), and if he seems disinclined to purchase, try to close the sale -- and empowering employees to deal really helps here. When you can say, on the spot, "I'll tell you what, I can let you have it for 10% off" really helps.
Unfortunately, having the resources to have an inventory big enough for "instant gratification", and the savvy to keep changing out that inventory to follow what does move (lower inventory quantities with more frequent reorders also helps, but is more labor intensive), as well as the time,knowledge, and inclination to train your staff to the level required, is more than a lot of business owners want to do these days.
Connecticut Valley Railroad A Branch of the New York, New Haven, and Hartford
"If you think you can do a thing or think you can't do a thing, you're right." -- Henry Ford
There is an old adage & that is that, "nothing happens until sombody sells something" The single most important aspect of any business is sales. Regretably most store clerks are not sales orientated - they just don't know or have the skill & sales techniqgues to sell anybody anything. Sure, they will accept money from a store patron who hase made a purchase descion possibly before entering the store. They are, to a sometimes limited extent, reaonably good at being an order taker, but sales focused, no, I don't think so. There are exceptions, clearly, but just think of the last time you were actually sold something as distinct from entering the store with a purchase in mind already & leaving with just that item.
And all of that idle chit-chat that doesn't result is sales is just a plain waste of time, effort & money. Cordiality, amiability a friendly disposition, product & industry knowledge are all important as well as interpersonal skills. Also important is a stores ability to buy wise to be able to sell compeditivly.
ctvalleyrr has raised some pretty valid points that I have followed on from based on a period in my working life as a commercial traveler selling to the retail trade. That was a goodly number of years ago. We had sales targets to meet & the companies I worked for made sure we kept up our sales focus. As a consequence of this, & although its been many years since then, I still critique store clerks sales technique, if they exist at all, but mostly I am left with this silent scream in my head - "for pittys sake, sell me something".
Dusty.
from my perspective - strictly as a one man (no employees) hobby shop - I can tell you that almost no traditional retail advice helps with a model train shop these days. Just check the advice in this thread and ask yourself how you would run a model train shop. I see that some folks think I would still be in business if I only made an effort to sell someone something. Fine and dandy, except easily 75% if not up to 90% of the customers that came into my store just wanted to be left alone to browse. Some accused me of "watching them to make sure they weren't shoplifting" (when I thought I was making myself available to them for assistance by stepping out from behind the counter). Others were offended by the simple phrase "Hi, how are you? Let me know if I can help you find anything." (That was too pushy for some folks.)
Everybody wants everything cheap, high quality and right now. Not going to happen. Can't have all three. To hear anyone complain about the stock being low in a model train shop these days is simply someone who is ignorant of what has happened in the last five years. 18 months ago, I was having trouble getting Atlas track products in stock. I was accused of: being too poor to afford to restock... or, must have credit limit problems with the distributors... or, you're only trying to get us to buy the more expensive brands of track products... or, you're too stupid to know you are out of track nails... Yet here we are, been out of business for over a year and I hear you still can't get rail joiners. But everyone complains about a place not having inventory. How about we ask Exact Rail why train shops don't have inventory? How about we ask any of these made to order "manufacturers" why the train shops don't have inventory? Why don't we ask wholesalers who can no longer afford to keep product on the warehouse shelves why there is no inventory?
Let's dump product on the internet. Great idea. Now that we are all connected, why would I ever buy anything in a brick and mortar shop when eventually it will show up on eBay for less than cost? Let's say in Little Rock, Arkansas, that I was dumb enough to stock a Boston & Maine Genesis F7. 6 months later, it's still on the shelf. (Horizon recommends dumping it in 3 months) OK, put it on eBay and get rid of it. How does the shopowner in New England feel about that??? Does that help him sell items in his store? From shop owners to manufacturers, dumping stuff on the internet is shooting yourself in the foot.
"You should sell on the internet." I agree, if I had employees. But you cannot give personal service to your customers (chat with them) - something you can't get on the internet - if you have to be on the computer all the time checking orders and answering endless e-mail questions.
"You should discount." I did discount 10 - 20%, sometimes more. That's not enough.
"You should offer service... repairs." Tried to get parts out of anyone lately?
The idiots who run things think a 9% sales tax is a good idea for a b&m shop, but either don't have the brains or the cajones to enforce it on internet sales. Then they complain that their budgets are coming up short for filling the potholes.
Prices are up, quality is down. Availability is hit and miss, mostly miss.
Modelers are dying off and they are not being replaced. New people came into the store all the time. "We want a cheap engine." You show them the 80 dollar Bachmann that you can sell for 64 and they say no... this is just for a kid, where are the cheap engines... THAT IS THE CHEAP ENGINE.
Most comments on these "why can't a train shop be better?" are from people who think they know how to run a train shop because they have shopped in a train shop. The reality is, even traditional retail techniques don't work in a model train shop. "Inventory should turn over at least four times a year." Good advice, except you get inventory in February, you are sold out by July and when you reorder... out of stock for six months. (Or a year)
You need to budget. Also a good idea. I will pre-order 1000 dollars of Athearn that will arrive in June because I can afford to do so. I will pre-order 1000 dollars of Athearn in July because I can afford to do so. July rolls around, and here comes your 1000 dollar July order, 500 dollars from the June order that just now arrived... 300 dollars from February that is really late, and 250 dollars from your September order that came in early. Now you are in a budget crunch, especially if some customers... who have had six months to a year to save the money for the stuff they ordered... don't pay for it right away.
You asked for an opinion from behind the counter, there you go. Actually, you can dispute an opinion... all 800+ words of this is fact that you cannot dispute unless you have walked a mile in my shoes.
After 16 years in the model train business, I can tell you a small shop with one guy running it needs three things to be successful... 1: The guy behind the counter needs to be a model railroad expert. 2: The guy behind the counter needs to be a people person. 3: The guy behind the counter needs to be a great business person. Hard to find someone who has all three qualities.
One Track Mind from my perspective - strictly as a one man (no employees) hobby shop - I can tell you that almost no traditional retail advice helps with a model train shop these days. Just check the advice in this thread and ask yourself how you would run a model train shop. I see that some folks think I would still be in business if I only made an effort to sell someone something. Fine and dandy, except easily 75% if not up to 90% of the customers that came into my store just wanted to be left alone to browse. Some accused me of "watching them to make sure they weren't shoplifting" (when I thought I was making myself available to them for assistance by stepping out from behind the counter). Others were offended by the simple phrase "Hi, how are you? Let me know if I can help you find anything." (That was too pushy for some folks.) Everybody wants everything cheap, high quality and right now. Not going to happen. Can't have all three. To hear anyone complain about the stock being low in a model train shop these days is simply someone who is ignorant of what has happened in the last five years. 18 months ago, I was having trouble getting Atlas track products in stock. I was accused of: being too poor to afford to restock... or, must have credit limit problems with the distributors... or, you're only trying to get us to be more expensive brands of track products... or, you're too stupid to know you are out of track nails... Yet here we are, been out of business for over a year and I hear you still can't get rail joiners. But everyone complains about a place not having inventory. How about we ask Exact Rail why train shops don't have inventory? How about we ask any of these made to order "manufacturers" why the train shops don't have inventory? Why don't we ask wholesalers who can no longer afford to keep product on the warehouse shelves why there is no inventory? Let's dump product on the internet. Great idea. Now that we are all connected, why would I ever buy anything in a brick and mortar shop when eventually it will show up on eBay for less than cost? Let's say in Little Rock, Arkansas, that I was dumb enough to stock a Boston & Maine Genesis F7. 6 months later, it's still on the shelf. (Horizon recommends dumping it in 3 months) OK, put it on eBay and get rid of it. How does the shopowner in New England feel about that??? Does that help him sell items in his store? From shop owners to manufacturers, dumping stuff on the internet is shooting yourself in the foot. "You should sell on the internet." I agree, if I had employees. But you cannot give personal service to your customers (chat with them) - something you can't get on the internet - if you have to be on the computer all the time checking orders and answering endless e-mail questions. "You should discount." I did discount 10 - 20%, sometimes more. That's not enough. "You should offer service... repairs." Tried to get parts out of anyone lately? The idiots who run things think a 9% sales tax is a good idea for a b&m shop, but either don't have the brains or the cajones to enforce it on internet sales. Then they complain that their budgets are coming up short for filling the potholes. Prices are up, quality is down. Availability is hit and miss, mostly miss. Modelers are dying off and they are not being replaced. New people came into the store all the time. "We want a cheap engine." You show them the 80 dollar Bachmann that you can sell for 62 and they say no... this is just for a kid, where are the cheap engines... THAT IS THE CHEAP ENGINE. Most comments on these "why can't a train shop be better?" are from people who think they know how to run a train shop because they have shopped in a train shop. The reality is, even traditional retail techniques don't work in a model train shop. "Inventory should turn over at least four times a year." Good advice, except you get inventory in February, you are sold out by July and when you reorder... out of stock for six months. (Or a year) You need to budget. Also a good idea. I will pre-order 1000 dollars of Athearn that will arrive in June because I can afford to do so. I will pre-order 1000 dollars of Athearn in July because I can afford to do so. July rolls around, and here comes your 1000 dollar July order, 500 dollars from the June order that just now arrived... 300 dollars from February that is really late, and 250 dollars from your September order that came in early. Now you are in a budget crunch, especially if some customers... who have had six months to a year to save the money for the stuff they ordered... don't pay for it right away. You asked for an opinion from behind the counter, there you go. Actually, you can dispute an opinion... all 800+ words of this is fact that you cannot dispute unless you have walked a mile in my shoes. After 16 years in the model train business, I can tell you a small shop with one guy running it needs three things to be successful... 1: The guy behind the counter needs to be a model railroad expert. 2: The guy behind the counter needs to be a people person. 3: The guy behind the counter needs to be a great business person. Hard to find someone who has all three qualities.
Everybody wants everything cheap, high quality and right now. Not going to happen. Can't have all three. To hear anyone complain about the stock being low in a model train shop these days is simply someone who is ignorant of what has happened in the last five years. 18 months ago, I was having trouble getting Atlas track products in stock. I was accused of: being too poor to afford to restock... or, must have credit limit problems with the distributors... or, you're only trying to get us to be more expensive brands of track products... or, you're too stupid to know you are out of track nails... Yet here we are, been out of business for over a year and I hear you still can't get rail joiners. But everyone complains about a place not having inventory. How about we ask Exact Rail why train shops don't have inventory? How about we ask any of these made to order "manufacturers" why the train shops don't have inventory? Why don't we ask wholesalers who can no longer afford to keep product on the warehouse shelves why there is no inventory?
Modelers are dying off and they are not being replaced. New people came into the store all the time. "We want a cheap engine." You show them the 80 dollar Bachmann that you can sell for 62 and they say no... this is just for a kid, where are the cheap engines... THAT IS THE CHEAP ENGINE.
I couldn't agree more with your reply.
It is unbelievable how so many on these forums (any of them) think they know more about a subject and have never been there!
Also am a Hobby Shop owner!
BOB H - Clarion, PA
I have a question to those that have opened a train and/or hobby shop. Has going into the business made you less interested in the hobby, even to the point of not even having a layout anymore? I have known a few people over the years that have started a business that involved something they were passionate about as a pastime, only to see their interest waine as the business took over.
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
BATMAN I have a question to those that have opened a train and/or hobby shop. Has going into the business made you less interested in the hobby, even to the point of not even having a layout anymore?
I have a question to those that have opened a train and/or hobby shop. Has going into the business made you less interested in the hobby, even to the point of not even having a layout anymore?
Yes, less interested. The passion is coming back slowly, though
I closed my retail shop fifteen years ago. I can honestly say I was burned out of the railroad hobby. But I moved on to a real, paying job; I helped to raise two kids; and completed a masters degree necessary in my new career field.
I am now getting back into the hobby. Both of my kids are in college, and I have more free time. I don't have space for a layout; and when I closed my shop, the modular club that was associated with it withered. The HobbyTowns we have had since then aren't really interested in stimulating the local clubs.
One mistake is taking orders without any money down, what kind of buisness dose that! Another glaring mistake is not keeping the overhead down. If you plan on being in buisness a long time, rent is a suckers game, I mean that, and that goes for anyone including your primary residence (thank you tenents for paying my bills and helping me retire for the first time at 29, the landlord).
Tried demanding payment up front for pre-orders. Didn't work. Doesn't work. Won't work. Again, traditional retail rules do not apply. When I tried to enforce that rule, complaints skyrocketed and orders evaporated. My overhead, not including my "salary" - was 20%. Good or bad? Seriously looked into building my own space instead of rent. You tried to build anything lately? A bare bones small structure was going to cost close to a half million. And do you know why? Because they require you to have this, require you to have that... gotta have a paved parking lot, gotta have this many of this kind of tree and this many of that kind of bush in the landscaping. I was paying 500 a month in rent for 4100 square feet. I'd say I did all right in the overhead department.
I did make plenty of mistakes, and one of them was the 4100 square feet. When the model train industry changed the business model to "inventory is bad" - then it became a challenge to keep a large store looking full.
rrebell One mistake is taking orders without any money down, what kind of buisness dose that! Another glaring mistake is not keeping the overhead down. If you plan on being in buisness a long time, rent is a suckers game, I mean that, and that goes for anyone including your primary residence (thank you tenents for paying my bills and helping me retire for the first time at 29, the landlord).
Another typical that knows better than those of us in the business.
Renting is a LOT different than doing retail
I would never want to be a landloard and have to get up in the middle of the night to go fix a renters problem and still have to go to work as most of the small Landloards I knew over the years!
But some people are gluttons for punsihment!
And if you are a large Landloard - you have workers that to the grunt work - so that is an entirly different situation - we have been speaking about single person Operations.
As was stated - the public won't go for the Monety down thing - even I don't do it when I have to pre-order non model related products!
And we think that a Hobby Shop is a crap shoot - Try owning a Speed Shop!
I did that too way back when a person could work and Modify their cars and it was fun and easy to do.
Made some bucks on that - If you think Modelers spend money - Guys hopping up their cars would come in and drop thousands in an instant and be back next week and do it again - if they were racing - what ever was hot last week they had to have.
I then went into the Engine Rebuilding Shop.
Once the Emissions became too popular ended the roll of a Speed Shop and the machine Shop as one had to just replace the complete unit instead of the car owner doing their own work.
So don't give me this crap about knowing the Modeling Business - You don't know!
Yeah, I'm a bit leery of much of the boilerplate "retail in 10 easy steps" advice here. As a customer, when I shop I already have a pretty good idea about what I want and how it all fits the budget. It's a difficult hobby to pin down in terms of what your customers want. It's not just a boxcar, for instance, but a 1952 40' car from a specific RR with a specific road number. Very hard to stock in anticipation of that. But somehow that's what a successful LHS has to do these days. You can only sell so much impulse-buy items. But it's often the case that things like rail joiners, paint, styrene, etc are also staples of the hobby and frequently unavailable and not restocked as well as it could be (given availability at wholesale, of course.)
cmrproductsSo don't give me this crap about knowing the Modeling Business - You don't know!
Bob,
I hope you didn't treat your customers in the same dismissive, know-it-all fashion as you do your fellow forum members. People's opinion may just be that, take yours for example, but there's almost always something you can learn from them. That doesn't happen when you treat them like knaves, bums, and fools. Guess it makes you feel better or something...
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
I can sympathize with some of the obstacles the former store owners here are outlining. On the other hand, several things come to mind:
I can't judge why some shops I don't know personally have failed. The owner of my local place, who in my judgment is stubborn and complacent, blames miscalls by Atlas and others in failing to keep merchandise coming, but that's not the only issue. I needed an Atlas #6 and couldn't get one. Well, will a Peco medium radius fit in the same space? Good question, one I've never seen answered. Has a shop ever gone on Facebook and announced yeah, we know nobody can get Atlas, but we recommend this workaround? Never seen it.
Every situation is different. My local place is (almost was) aimed at the high end, brass buyer, superdetailer, narrow gauger, expert. I think it did well enough at that for 40 years or so, but certainly the cases are still full of brass that's been there for years on end, and there's been no serious move to the higher-end hybrid or plastic from BLI, MTH, etc. He has drawer on drawer full of Micro Scale decals, I would assume tens of thousands of dollars worth, that he'll never, ever sell. His current staff doesn't even know where the Micro Scale decals are.
I would almost think there are ways to make lemonade out of lemons. The store invested in a new stock of Tru Color paint with Floquil leaving the business -- why not have a Facebook page giving advice on what Tru Color shades are equivalent to old Floquil? Well, you'd have to have staff that cared and listened to customer advice. Doesn't happen here any more.
A $60 loco may be too much for a teenager, but you can find locos for $20 at swap meets, yeah, old bluebox or whatever, but good for a teenager. There are shops that buy estate items or whatever, lots of bluebox, and put it on sale at equivalent prices. There are workarounds for all this stuff.
I can't address situations I've never seen, but there are some I've seen that have me shaking my head.
CTValleyRR mentioned he was in the video rental business "back in the day"- because, today, that business exists only as RedBox kiosk machines in grocery stores or outside drugstores! Blockbuster, Hollywood Video, the little local video shop- all gone, and within the proverbial blink of an eye! Done in by technological change and the rise of easy internet delivery of service- and all within 15 years.
With hobby shops, I noticed a sign the other day on a Hobbytown franchise store's front door: Help Wanted- RC experience a must!. And thereby hangs a tale! Sure- they have a few model railroad things- some Bachman RTR rolling stock, some train sets left over from the last Christmas holiday season, but their main business is the RC plane and car models that they sell, service and stock repair parts inventory for. Plastic models, which used to cover an entire wall of their store- now cover a few shelves in a corner. I went in for some Plastruct styrene sheets and some L angles- tucked away far in the back now- and only one partially-stocked wire display tree, wher there used to be two full ones! I am lucky they still had something left in inventory I could buy. Even their paint selection is less robust that it used to be.
On the other hand, I can shop to my heart's content online- with no clerk "watching me"; if I need advice- this forum is an excellent resource, not to mention just googling a topic and letting the "search engine" lead the way; I buy what I need (or can afford at that moment) and then get the (to me) pleasure of anticipating it's arrival at my house in the mail. No gas costs, rarely a sales tax issue, etc.
One idea that some online model railroad stores might take up- use advanced graphics to create a virtual store, where you use your mouse or finger pad to "stroll down aisles filled with inventory", then by clicking on an item, you "pick it up" to inspect it, etc. Avatar clerks could be programmed to be accessed to give advice or refer you to other resources, and it would be a simulcrum of the old hobby shop on your computer!
Like the video rental stores that now no longer exist, the physical train shop is becoming a pale ghost of itself- as much as I love the past, I must live in the present and adapt...
Cedarwoodron
mlehmanI hope you didn't treat your customers in the same dismissive, know-it-all fashion as you do your fellow forum members. People's opinion may just be that, take yours for example, but there's almost always something you can learn from them. That doesn't happen when you treat them like knaves, bums, and fools.
That is exactly what soured me against a lot of hobby shops and several "Mom & Pop" busineses..
As we all know some of us has stood on both sides of the counter or seen why a hobby shop failed while the owner moan and goan about on line shops,train shows and e-Bay.
A shop without a on line presence is doom to fail-research why big box department stores and other stores needed on line shopping.Research why hobby manufacturers is now selling direct.Hate it or love it on line shopping is here to stay.
Hobby shops needs to turn over their stock by any means including dumping it on e-Bay,at Train Shows or a on sale table.
Words of wisdom from a customer's view?
Seeing the dust covered stock from 4,5 or even 10 or more years ago shows me nothing other then showing me a very good reason not to return.
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
BRAKIEHobby shops needs to turn over their stock by any means including dumping it on e-Bay,at Train Shows or a on sale table. Words of wisdom from a customer's view? Seeing the dust covered stock from 4,5 or even 10 or more years ago shows me nothing other then showing me a very good reason not to return.
Larry,
I think you sum up what is at the root of success in this business now. Thing is, it's the same thing that was true 40 or 50 years ago, it's just that everything happens at a much quicker pace now. It's what's hot and people haven't seen before (or recently) and which is publicized and marketed that sells.
If you've got an inventory that mostly sits and can only afford a small sip of what's new, you're in deep trouble after a year or two now. People have seen it all before, they had a chance to get it at closeout somewhere else and if they come across it again in your shop, it has to be marked down to sell. At the same time, if chosen well and marketed on the internet, it could turn out to be something someone has searched for and suddenly found and may be willing to pay more than a walk-in customer would. That's just one example of many that could be made, but if a LHS isn't thinking in those terms, their future is probably all red boards.
At its heart this is about inventory turnover. If it doesn't sell, it doesn't contribute to the bottom line. You can keep something on the shelf at full MSRP for years and carry it on the books as worth so much, but unless it sells, it conrtributes nothing to the bottom line. I know we both used to be in the grocery business and it's a high vloume/low profit industry. How do they stay in business? Turnover. I forget some numbers quoted but they ranged from something like 13 turns and up a year for profitable stores (and this may have changed, as that was pretty much pre-Walmart).) Yes, a grocery store must sell roughly the entire value of its stock every month or they can't keep the lights on. Someone mentioned 4 turns/year for hobby shops earlier. That sounds about right at least proportinately to grocery stores. I make no claims to be an expert, but did look into opening a hobby shop about two decades back. Decided I didn't have the capital to make a go of it despite a prime location, etc. You have to have funds you can let sit for awhile to get into the biz, but the only way to really make a going concern of it as a storefront is turning things over to the best of your ability.
EDIT: It just occurred to me that we often talk about this LHS puzzle as if it's all about selling products. Sure, that's a big part of the picture. But something that's rarely considered is the service aspect. Things like DCC installs, both rolling stock and home systems; museum and display contracting; layout construction and wiring; painting and decaling; inspection, evaluation, and repair of brass; and many others all can contribute to the bottom line.
mlehman Bob, I hope you didn't treat your customers in the same dismissive, know-it-all fashion as you do your fellow forum members. People's opinion may just be that, take yours for example, but there's almost always something you can learn from them. That doesn't happen when you treat them like knaves, bums, and fools. Guess it makes you feel better or something...
Here is a thought from Wm Shakespeare.
"Thr fault dear Brutus is not in our stars, but in ourselves that we are underlings"
Dusty
mlehman Yeah, I'm a bit leery of much of the boilerplate "retail in 10 easy steps" advice here. As a customer, when I shop I already have a pretty good idea about what I want and how it all fits the budget. It's a difficult hobby to pin down in terms of what your customers want. It's not just a boxcar, for instance, but a 1952 40' car from a specific RR with a specific road number. Very hard to stock in anticipation of that. But somehow that's what a successful LHS has to do these days. You can only sell so much impulse-buy items. But it's often the case that things like rail joiners, paint, styrene, etc are also staples of the hobby and frequently unavailable and not restocked as well as it could be (given availability at wholesale, of course.) cmrproducts So don't give me this crap about knowing the Modeling Business - You don't know! Bob, I hope you didn't treat your customers in the same dismissive, know-it-all fashion as you do your fellow forum members. People's opinion may just be that, take yours for example, but there's almost always something you can learn from them. That doesn't happen when you treat them like knaves, bums, and fools. Guess it makes you feel better or something...
cmrproducts So don't give me this crap about knowing the Modeling Business - You don't know!
Funny - you go against the grain here and you get scolded
I have been in business for many years and it is strange, the customers keep coming back bringing new ones
Becasue they get the truth not Opinion as so many on these forums like to give out.
I say the truth and I get this - which shows - the only way to make one look good - is tear down some one else - which is typical on here.
And trying to get emotions into typing is near impossible - so one will take everything I type the wrong way - IF they don't agree with my views.
I don't have to try and explain my methods of handling my customers - they seem happy enough when I fix their problems and in the process explain how and why they ended up getting in trouble in the first place.
This explaining the theory of how the products work helps them learn why they may be getting trouble or maybe expecting more of the product then what it is suppoed to be able to do!
I used this same method when I was teaching at a Job Retraining Center back in the mid 70's. And I get a lot of my former students come up to me many years after and thank me for helping the back then.
Bob - you and I both know people don't want to hear the truth, "they can't handle the truth." So the messenger gets shot. Which is why I have avoided commenting a great deal on this topic until now. But, with my store closed and nothing to lose, maybe it is time someone points out the brutally honest parts of running a model train shop in this environment.
I know that things don't always translate well online. I doubt you intended to be so off-putting, as I can sense you're making a contribution. It's just that everyone of us has something that's useful to contribute to the discussion, even if we disagree with it.
Since this is a forum with folks of all levels of experience in the hobby, it can be tremendously discouraging for new and lesser experienced members to hear they just don't know what they're talking about. And this discussion wasn't just about what LHS owners think, but how their customers experience reflects both the good and bad. I think we need to accept that these can be very different, yet at the same time both be honest and true, even as they often diverge. The world is never exactly how we see it as individuals, but how millions of us see it.
One Track Mind,
Not sure what truth can't be handled here. I made a point of emphasizing my general agreement with what Bob said, but that might have been missed. I just thought the way it was expressed was counterproductive.
I really don't think there's any single "truth" here anyway. LHS that close their doors do so for a lot of reasons, MOST of them having not so much directly to do with the "health of the hobbty". Someone already mentioned that a majority of small businesses that start up fail - and the LHS is no exception. That's from all sorts of basic flaws, from being undercapitalized to misjudging the market they serve to health problems.
This discussion is still worth having, because changes in the industry have had a significant impact in the last couple of decades. That transition alone is repsonsible for hundeds of casualities. But it's rare that even this is exclusively the reason for a LHS closing.
mlehman One Track Mind, Not sure what truth can't be handled here. I made a point of emphasizing my general agreement with what Bob said, but that might have been missed. I just thought the way it was expressed was counterproductive. I really don't think there's any single "truth" here anyway. LHS that close their doors do so for a lot of reasons, MOST of them having not so much directly to do with the "health of the hobbty". Someone already mentioned that a majority of small businesses that start up fail - and the LHS is no exception. That's from all sorts of basic flaws, from being undercapitalized to misjudging the market they serve to health problems. This discussion is still worth having, because changes in the industry have had a significant impact in the last couple of decades. That transition alone is repsonsible for hundeds of casualities. But it's rare that even this is exclusively the reason for a LHS closing.
Agreed. At some point after I closed my store, I identified five reasons why it was time for me to close what at one time had been a growing and successful store. Some of those five reasons I can't discuss on this forum. But one of them was my own pervasive bad attitude, an attitude that I did not have at one time.
People ask for opinions about the health of the hobby from store owners, or in my case... recent store owners. So I stated some, and of course we see that some don't agree.
The truths, as I saw them in my store, have been debated on here and other forums. I post things based on fact, not opinion, and yet some people still don't want to hear about how trends are hurting this hobby.
Ultimately it's not about the loss of one store. The loss of hundreds of stores is a problem, though. I was a model railroader long before I was a store owner. And I am still a model railroader. It's a great hobby, and for that reason, some of the trends I saw from behind the counter are very worrisome for the long-term health of the hobby.
But if I gave anyone the impression that today's hobby business practices are the only reason I went out of business, then I need to clarify that is not the case. But it was the biggest reason.
One Track MindBut one of them was my own pervasive bad attitude, an attitude that I did not have at one time.
Having worked on the other side of the counter I can understand that..Customers can be a royal pain.
However.
Nothing sours me faster then a shop owner being a grump or know it all..I came to spend money,so,be nice if you(general speak) want my cash and want me to make return trips to spend more cash in your shop.
The shop owner should know in today's computerized shopping world I don't need him as much as he needs me as a repeat buying customer.A cold fact overlooked by some shop owners.
So,let me be as I start picking goodies from the shelves and don't start ringing the sale up as I stack my selections on the side of your counter or I will get the feeling I'm being shoved out the door before I can gather the rest of my purchases and that means I won't be back since it would appear you don't need me as a customer.
Wow, this thread not only evokes a lot of responses, it evokes a lot of long responses.
The only thing different about this thread from all the other threads on the same issue is that this thread is the latest thread on the issue.
The issue: Brick and Mortar Hobby Shops - - Dying Out or Salvageable?
Well, that's real easy. They are dying out, nearly dead.
Local Hobby Shop (LHS) ?
I live in the southwest suburbs of Chicago.
There is nothing local that even resembles a LHS.
There are no brick and mortar structures that cater to anything even resembling a hobby of any type.
Shop? Just places like Dunkin Donuts, Subway, Verizon, Batteries Plus. No model railroading shops.
The Internet didn't replace the LHS or drive it out of business. it just filled a void.
The reason that the LHS died is that its one time large customer base passed on to that Great Layout in the Sky. There are few of us left.
If it weren't for the Internet, the hobby itself would already be dead because there would be no place to buy anything.
Rich
Alton Junction
richhotrainThe Internet didn't replace the LHS or drive it out of business. it just filled a void.
Ask any serious gamer the best place to buy games and he will give a on line store web address.
Ask young modelers where's the best hobby shop and he will give you the addy of his favorite on line shop.
The hobby is far from dying..The old dinosaurs fail to realize we are living in a computer world and the days of Saturday morning trips to the LHS that's full of old dusty stock is over or gasping its last breath...Train shows will follow due to the near MSRP many dealers are demanding on old box worn stock or worst asking today's MSRP for older blue and gold box P2K locomotives.
I doubt the modeling hobby will die. I hear large train shows in Japan command attendance in the tens of thousands. The UK has some 4 mainstream model railroading magazines.
What has changed is the world is getting smaller due to the Internet age. You need to start looking beyond your back yard for what's happening in the hobby.
Right now I understand there are no major craftsman structure makers (like Bar Mills or Fos or Campbell) in the UK. There's an opportunity for you... Why folks in Europe even enjoy modeling North American prototype railroads.