The recent Bowser moving production to China thread got me thinking about where model railroad production is heading. Obviously, this is mostly speculation based on trends each of us perceive in the hobby.
FWIW, the key change I see in the near term is the death of plastic kit production - in structures (although it will take longer for structures) as well as cars. Plastic locomotive kits and their die cast predecessors are already essentially dead. By dead, I mean no new tooling or models, not the cessation of production. Production using old tooling or even somewhat updated old tooling will continue for a while longer.
Plastic RTR is still alive and kicking. RTR sells in higher volumes over which to amortize tooling costs. More RTR is sold to each model railroader because he doesn’t consume his time assembling kits. Much larger collections of rolling stock are possible in much less time, given sufficient funds. Nowadays, collections of 100+ cars are almost normal for anybody with more than a 4x8 or 2x8 shelf layout. I don’t think owning 100+ cars was so common in the past, even in the Athearn BB days.
RTR sells at higher prices despite very similar costs for kits. Model railroaders are willing to pay more for size and assembly. With kits, you have to pay labor to count and package parts. With RTR, the same labor assembles the kit. For kits, extra parts have to be produced and available for the inevitable miscounts, modelers who broke or lost parts, etc,. And you have to have knowledgeable labor to answer the parts requests - for which the business owner will receive little to no reimbursement. RTR quality slips are typically handled with a much smaller parts reserve. After all, it’s much more obvious when a part is missing on an assembled model than a boxed kit as you get ready to ship. Often, it’s cheaper to handle an RTR QC problem by replacing with new because of the minimal labor
Excellent analysis. I find little to disagree with you about. The money flows like this, the President borrows money from China, gives it to Americans (hoorah free money!), then Americans go to Wal Mart and buy Chinese products (quality to the wayside- we want falling prices), which Wal Mart gives back to the Chinese. Now the President has a debt to pay back, the American consumer has an inferior unsafe product, and the Chinese already have the original money that was lent laundered through the US consumer, yet expect payments on the full amount of the original loan until it is paid back. The Chinese double dip (a la mafia style), the US gets 1/2 value and looses a job. Repeat repeat repeat and hope the economy recovers.
The good news is that in the future our hobby items will come with free egg rolls.
I don’t agree that counting parts into a box is the same labor as building the kit. Most plastic kits consist of the parts still on the sprue and counting a few sprues into a box is faster and requires less training than separating and assembling the parts. Second, assembled models require larger packaging, especially for structures. So I think the manufacturer’s costs are higher with RTR.
Whether the costs are higher enough to justify the higher retail price increase is something I don’t know. But the hobby markup seems to be 100%. So if the kit costs $2 to make, $4 at wholesale, and retails msrp for $8, bumping the cost to $3 for RTR, bumps the retail msrp to $12.
I find it interesting that you equate plastic kits with craftsman builders. When I started in this hobby 35+ years ago, craftsman kit builders looked down their nose at anyone who built plastic kits which were derisively know as “shake the box” kits. IMHO plastic has improved considerably and rivals (and at time exceeds) other materials in quality and detail. None the less, I find building a detailed plastic kit is considerably easier than the craftsman kits of wood and metal. I admit I still have a bias towards wood and metal kits, but I don’t think they necessarily result in a better model - I just like them.
I also have a small bone of contention here with the term scratchbuilder as it seems to be commonly used on this forum by many. Scratchbuilders don’t buy parts, they make them.
I think there have always been those whose hobby focus was mostly or only on model building and those whose focus was mostly or only on running a railroad. What RTR does is remove the building requirement for the latter group, which has turned out to be larger than some people thought. This does result in a smaller market for kits, but I think the hobby overall is stronger for it. Besides, I still see a lot of parts at the train shows I go to.
Must be one of those extremists.[(-D][:-^] Would you suggest they mill their own trees? I’m at that point—[:-^][:-,]
I could get piculous and start asking about production of styrene in the home—know anyone into plastics production? The parts can be milled out using cnc milling–something that myself and a friend of mine are getting into. There were those that did not make their own parts but—you can’t quite call them kitbashers either.
As for RTR. They are useful—for bases for further modifications if need be—[^]
Mr. Tangerine, Sir; We DO NOT borrow money from China. You are aware, I’m sure, that The U.S. Government has printing presses? We PRINT MONEY, and then sell the interest on the debt to the (fill in the blank) country, and hope that we will have the productivity in OUR future to cover both the debt as well as the interest on said debt. It is directly related to our GDP. The president doesn’t have the authority to pay ANY debt, as I"m sure you’re aware; all spending bills originate in the HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES; (please see Constitution Of The United Sates Of America): hopefully you’ve voted recently. Having said that, please inform me of whatever un-safe products to which you refer (sans pet food) so I may avoid them in the future. 1/2 value?? Please explain?? Also, as I’m sure you are aware, we (United States) are a NET IMPORTER of outsourced jobs.
One thing that I am hoping will not eventuate is the reduction of brass detail parts from Bowser in their Cary and Cal-Scale ranges.
I noticed included in my latest order from Bowser that several of the Cal-Scale parts were made in China so I hope that this indicates Bowser continuing with the supply of detail parts. I do hope also that this is not a flawed analysis coz I’m sure having fun detailing my RTR steam locomotives. Soon I’ll move on to my small fleet of diesels.
Ok Jimmy, you win, it seems Bush isn’t to blame after all. I stand corrected, the government can simply print more money to pay debts and fund projects and I’m sure the workers at John Deere and Hawker aircraft will take comfort in the knowledge that the products they used to build can still be purchased in the US.
Sorry for the spelling errors, my war injuries often make it hard to type on damp days.
There has been a lot of talk about this splitting up of the hobby into these camps. The reason being may end up being that some of the smaller niche producers may have to start looking into people who build model buildings for example. I know of a few people around up here who just buy building kits or even scratchbuild them for display. You will probably see RTR being one segment and something along the fine scale modelling being the other side. This may end up looking like what is occurring in Europe right now. I’m not advocating this, I’m just saying that this could happen. Another potential for market issues would be some LHS’s reducing their product lines they sell to RTR. As those sell a lot more—
And as already stated before. There is an issue with kit supplies now because many manufacturers have dropped their kit lines completely so there is a potential there for small niche producers to fill. Although one can argue that
While I would differ by degrees to some of what Fred has to say in his initial post, the trend he describes above is sadly very apparent within the hobby already. Just look at how Internet forums have segregated themselves by the level of modeling skills.
If one is truly honest about the situation, it must be acknowledged that a considerable percentage of today’s hobbyists, particularly newer ones, have a great deal more in common with those folks from the 1950’s running Lionels and Flyers than they do with the tranditional adult scale model railroading hobby as practiced down through the years. When our hobby becomes no longer about building, craftsmanship and creativity in most, if not all, of its many and varied aspects, then it ceases to be scale model railroading and becomes simply a modern version of playing with toy trains as kids did in days of yore. And, as I have pointed out before on this forum, scale model railroading as a whole totally divorced itself from that approach to the hobby more than 50 years ago. Collecting and simply creating a display from all store bought RTR items is not what has been regarded for decades as model railroading.
I agree with Fred’s outlook that in the not very distant future the hobby will split itself into two totally separate hobbies. It only remains to be seen just which path such magazines as MR will follow, either to become a flagship for the collectors, or to maintain the long association with the smaller traditional element in the hobby - there is unlikely to be any middle ground.
Personally, I use parts freely, but then I don’t say I scratchbuilt it. If you fabricated everything from basic materials such as rods, sheets, scale lumber then you scratchbuilt it. If you bought brake cylinders, ladders, stirrup steps, etc. then you parts built it. If you mixed the two then you scratch/parts built it.
I just find it absurd when folks say: I’m scratchbuilder, but I can’t buy …
I’ve run across some MRR’ing books from the 60’s that indicate that while there was a fairly strong craftsmen’s segment in the hobby the writers felt strongly enough that there was a tendency to not work on the models even then. They had to encourage people to kit build the lokes, rolling stock, and buildings. This tendency has probably been what is at the base of many a thread on this topic. If one would rather “play with the train” then the argument would be to RTR the thing. In the 50’s the market seemed to be dominated by Lionel and American Flyer( I still have an American Flyer set that I had when I was around 10 years old–not in an original box though). The adult model builders had a fair representation in the overall market but it appears that judging from the paltry number of 50’s MR that I have they were never that many to start with. The thing though that I find interesting was that there were a large number of scratchbuilding supplies–and yes, I know, that was because many still HAD to scratchbuild their lokes and things( which says some
As someone who has been through his lifetime more of a modeler than just a model railroader, I can tell you the trend towards RTR is not limited to our segment of the hobby world. Go into your non-RR specific LHS and you will find many other examples of the move away from kits; RTFly, RTFloat, RTMotor, etc. Today you can buy a fully assembled model of just about anything you used to build from a kit involving trains, planes, and automobiles.
Some of it makes a bit of sense to me. If your real interest is in flying the planes, running the trains, or motorcross with your R/C 4-wheeler, then RTR allows you to fast forward straight to the part of the hobby you really enjoy.
On the other had there is a local “hobby shop” in my area that sells nothing but preassembled display models of cars, and also the odd military vehicle. Not a kit in the store the first & last time I was there. You take the models out of the box, put them on a shelf, and then you look at them.[zzz]
Barry - Since this thread deals with the evolution of model railroad products, let me take a moment to review a bit of the past so that all here may better appreciate the current situation.
A certain degree of RTR has always been a part of model railroading. This having been particularly true in the case of quaility RTR locomotives, which dates back to Lobaugh, Alexander, et al. in the 1930’s. When shake-the-box cars came along in the early 1950’s, it was lamented to some degree but even these usually ended up being further detailed, modified and weathered by the hobbyist. Most of the remaining modeling aspects were left to the hobbyist to create out of personal skill.
There were, of course, the newbies even then whose layouts were composed of basically RTR Mantua locos, Athearn S-T-B cars, plasticville structures, LifeLike trees and foam tunnels. The difference from today was that these folks were in the process of learning the necessary skills to become craftsmen of one degree or another. To help them along on their journey for a number of years in the 50’s Kalmbach was publishing Model Trains magazine. This publication was a simplified version of MR, offering basic modeling knowledge, projects and layout plans for the newbie. Nevertheless, in the mid 50’s first MR and then RMC decided that some distance should be put between those (particularly the kids and their Lionels) who were just toy train enthusiasts and the serious hobbyist. From that point forward you only saw the best of the best in the pages of publications like MR, plus an endless stream of craftsman projects.
Fast foward to the past ten years and we’ve seen a significant transition in the type of individual joining the model railroading community. A considerable percentage have no inclination to learn the traditional skills, take up an airbrush, be creative in fabricating th
Fred,That is a excellent analysis but,we could go a tad deeper…
We must not overlooked the highly detailed locomotives and some higher end freight cars that come RTR and other improvements-even the RTR former BB cars is a tad superior to the old kits…Gone is the warp frame and weight…Coupler height is spot on…We can’t overlook the current road specific detailed locomotives on the market-even Athearn has join the ranks.One can’t really compare the BB GP38-2 with its current RTR release to include scale hand rails and metal grabs,numbers in the number boxes,crispier lettering,sharper painting.
There is a unspoken factor in play when this discussion comes up.
As a CNN breaking news story RTR is not truly RTR…[:O]
We still need to change out couplers to KDs and do a overall preservice inspection.One can still add uncoupling bars and air hoses if one so desires.
So,there is modeling to be done even with RTR.
The other impact of higher-priced RTR is/will be the reluctance to tinker with these expensive models. Using a $5 (or even $10) BB as a basis for a kitbash will go by the wayside. It already has happened in locomotives - one either gets to build from scratch or wait until the specific model is produced. There aren’t any new generic, less expensive starting points being made anymore. And it’s a whole lot easier to start a kitbash from a kit than a completed model.
Think so? There is still Athearn locomotives that can be starting points…On other forums I seen a P2K GP9 kitbash into a GP10.I seen a Atlas GP38 turned into a GP39s…The Atlas forum has a lot of
I’ve run across some MRR’ing books from the 60’s that indicate that while there was a fairly strong craftsmen’s segment in the hobby the writers felt strongly enough that there was a tendency to not work on the models even then. They had to encourage people to kit build the lokes, rolling stock, and buildings. This tendency has probably been what is at the base of many a thread on this topic. If one would rather “play with the train” then the argument would be to RTR the thing. In the 50’s the market seemed to be dominated by Lionel and American Flyer( I still have an American Flyer set that I had when I was around 10 years old–not in an original box though). The adult model builders had a fair representation in the overall market but it appears that judging from the paltry number of 50’s MR that I have they were never that many to start with. The thing though that I find interesting was that there were a large number of scratchbuilding supplies–and yes, I know, that was because many still HAD to scratchbuild their lokes and
uh, ok, maybe Bowser should push the kits to china too…
I think there is an obvious trend we have fewer skilled people that can handlekit making. We still have Precision scale and so on. Mantua was curious but was generic but I never got into buying them, tho I own a couple of engines (0-6-0, 0-4-0) but to make them really good operating engines takes skill, like I did with NWSL parts.
I think its a mix of skill (lessness), money, profitmindedness, and international relations. China is more industrious now and may be cheaper. In a way I wish Bowser wouldn’t think like this for the hobbyist.
They should keep all in stock, when a model gets low, remanufacture it at some reasonable, albiet close to break even level.
I like the MDC Roundhouse kits, they were better to tweak to your prototype.
If any good new kitmaker gets out there they may need new technical advances but also to make them moddable to your railroad of interest so the rare engines that can’t be done effectively on a profit level can be done at a lower level. Just do it for the hobby, it might be a lower profit, dang it, just DO it.
Somewhere in my collection of mags there is an article on using index cards for strips of clapboard for HO scale buildings. I’ve been in the process of working out measurements for believable clapboarding in N scale( sometimes I wonder about myself----)myself using some index cards. I see these kinds of projects more as a challenge not as an obstacle like some have. I’m starting to think that it is in how one thinks something is that ends up controlling what one does with those challenges. I can see where getting stymied might come from but the solution would be to keep plugging along. Not, as it does appear to be, give up and buy RTR as such—RTP(Ready To Plop?–for buildings—). But there we are. And as one poster just mentioned it is everywhere like this. Besides, my wife has just been telling me that of all the people we know who are in the antique area of collecting there are VERY FEW people who make their own quilts–my wife happens to be one of them. She also does weaving—about 25 years ago there were a lot still doing this. Now, not so much. And the answer is basically that there isn’t the interest or desire to do these----[:-^]
So, I can see that tendency to do less if one can get away with it. This brings up the split in the hobby as well as other issues—
All of which ends up as part of that "Evolution of Mod