Mainecentral229, the wife likes to visit LLBean in Freeport every June when we head up to York area for a few days. Is the Maine Model Works on Route 1 in Falmouth? I know that Falmouth is not very far from Freeport, I would like to stop by that HS to check it out in June. Thanks Mainecentral229,
Maybe the shop stocked E&C Car Shops stuff, stopped before E&C changed to LBF, LBF never removed that shop from the list, and he does not know about the name change.
I wish I would have made it to Tucson while it was SP’s major PFE shop.
You had that many?? Man, up here in Phoenix we just have the one, and he’s not all that great… no where near the selection I expect if I’m going to make the 1.5 hours round trip drive to his Mesa store!
It’s really sad that there aren’t that many good train shops left anymore out west.
Yep. I had a great LHS just a couple miles from my home. The owner and his staff were great, they had decent inventory and discount prices. Sadly, the owner had a family situation and had to close up in February. What a drag. The next closest HS is equally nice but almost everything is full price. [:(]
Another hobby shop I used to visit during trips to my home state of Ohio is also closing this month. The owners (husband/wife) both work full time outside of the shop and it got to be too much for them.
I have four, at varying distances. 20 miles away I have a large scale (mainly G) specialist, going there invariably takes ages as you always end up spending hours talking and running their demonstration layout… Then I have another two, 50 miles away in opposite directions - one is good for finding older Hornby models but charges almost full list, the other is superb in most scales (shortage of US HO scale, but good prices on UK OO, G and N scales). Finally, at 60 miles away, there’s the only specialist HO scale stockist. They’re terrible - have no detail parts, a very strange inventory (I think they order stuff for people then put it on the shelves - I’ve tried ordering through them and got nowhere). Best of the bunch is probably a little too far away to call Local - around 70-80 miles, so I don’t get there all that often, but when I do I usually come away with an interesting selection of items. They have a lot of used models, including some very esoteric and oddball items (Lima O Scale SNCF diesel loco last time I was in, as well as piles of old Hornby-Dublo stations that were eminently restorable). Wish we had a good store closer to here!
[;)]Well, not exactly in Lexington but you could try Scale Reproductions Hobby Shop in Louisville, KY.
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grayfox1119 Yes it is on Route 1 between Portland and Freeport, according to the ad on Pg. 116 of the June Model Railroader. I haven’t been there yet, but the next time I go to Portland, I will have to stop in[:D]…and shop[dinner]!
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Within the last year, WISCONSIN N SCALE, in Cudahy (a suburb of Milwaukee) has gone under. I have never seen a shop with a more comprehensive inventory of rolling stock and motive power. His selection was truly amazing. He had originally started out selling just n scale items. He eventually turned half the store inventory into HO scale items, probably in an effort to boost sales. In the last couple of years, he started selling those collector card games (such as Yugioh) that young people seem so fond of these days. He even had evening gatherings where the neighborhood kids would come to the shop to play these games in a group setting. I’m only speculating, but I think he resorted to this in an effort to generate enough income to keep the shop open. There are at least 15 hobby shops within a 20 mile radius (including WALTHERS) in Milwaukee, so I’m sure he had a difficult time. I also remember him advertising in MR magazine in the 1990’s. I think a fair chunk of his business was by mail order. The prices in the shop were always full MSRP, but his selection of motive power and rolling stock was the best.
BR1116,
If you model in HO scale, the best hobby shop in the Phoenix area is An Affair With Trains on Bethany Home Road, just West of I-17. Probably the runner up is Roy’s Train World on Country Club in Mesa. There’s a newer shop that opened around May 2004 on, I believe, Central Avenue, that is exclusively HO and N scale, but I don’t remember the name or exact address of it.
A friend and I spent an entire day going around to every hobby shop we could find in the Phoenix area last year. He models N and HO; I model HO and G, so we went to them all. Only one G-scale dealer could be located on McKellips Road in north Phoenix. What a disappointment. He is listed as a G-Scale shop but is 95 percent Lionel O-scale.
There’s one hobby shop left in Tucson that sells trains-- an Ace Hardware on 22nd Street, that handles G, HO, and N. Every time I have been there, it is packed, but the majority of customers seem more interested in the radio control cars and airplanes than the train items.
ericsp,
I doubt that Tucson Hobby on Pima Boulevard formerly sold E&C Car Shops products because the only train items I saw were the cheesy Christmas train sets from the likes of Bachmann, Model Power, or LifeLike. He had no other train items at all, and even though I was there on a Saturday afternoon, I was the only customer in the place. The owner seemed to have a real sour attitude, too, which may explain his lack of customers.
Mine almost did
A long period 10 or 20% sale saved it
Not sure then if I would have missed that shop, the owner was a bit suspicious of young people and adolecesnts like me (though i still liked the owner, and his shop had great selection, i guess i would have missed it
Recent change of ownership has changed the view on youngsters
Perhaps in a couple of years I will work there after school
Anyone who knows the Acton Model Railroad Center in West Acton, Mass will know what im talking about
Mainecentral229 you need to get to Maine model works on RT 1 it’s all trains all the time no R/C no airplanes just TRAINS and more TRAINS…
I live in Lewiston and thats were I go, Its a bit of a ride but worth it.
bill
The hobby is not what it was thirty years ago, but in some ways, it is better. Look at the models that have come out in the past two years!!
I believe many small shops will go away when the owner retires since the money that is being made does not justify one of us buying it and keeping it open.
Some of the larger shops will be around, but it is not a high profit business and the owner must stock up on each limited item and hold it if he wants models to sell.
Most of the shops I visit have no sound models or the more expensive trains to sell except for the consignment sales. They simply cannot afford to have them on display for us to look at and then buy from ebay or the internet hobby shop.
We have all contributed to this problem by buying from wholesalers and now Ebay or the internet. I know we have saved money by doing this, but the local shop is important to this hobby to generate interest for new people in the hobby.
Look at General Motors, many Americans buy imports and now, GM is in trouble too!!
Don’t expect you local hobby shop to stay open for conversation, he has to make a living to stay open.
Hey mainecentral229. please contact me off list. I am also a MEC modeler.
Josh (nhguy21@yahoo.com)
average 65?? not likely…but yes we are aging…so is the population at large, so of course our average age is going up too…right now more dollars.(real dollars) are being spent than ever before on model railroading…death is obviously NOT imminent!
The times change…the hobby will last each of us at least til the end…next generation or so? a decline does seem likely. Fewer hobby storews will survive…as will fere Jewelery stores, Watch repair shops etc…the economy is switching to internet bit by bit …it has its advantages, such as price and selection, but it has a downside as well. The buggy whip industry got a huge shock when Henry Ford introduce cheap autos, much the same is happening to retail outlets…im sure they will never totally cease to exist, but there will be less of them…it is what it is…deal with it
Aging is happening everywhere, not just in terms of hobbies but in general life
“The People Paradox: World in the balance” program on PBS gives a thorough explanation of that
Recently, House of Hobbies went out of business in Holland, Michigan. It was a nice store that had a lot of trains of all scales. The reason why it went under was because the prices were way too high.
I will miss looking around that shop.
And on what published figures do you base that statement?
CNJ831
Bangertl has a pretty good handle on the situatiion
“Most of the shops I visit have no sound models or the more expensive trains to sell except for the consignment sales. They simply cannot afford to have them on display for us to look at and then buy from ebay or the internet hobby shop”
We consumers are going to get exactly what we want and it won’t be available at a local hobby shop. One of the important points missed by most model railroad buyers is that hobby shops are retail businesses, not display warehouses for the internet. You pay full retail for your haircuts, your hamburgers, and your coffee, …why not for hobby products?
Store owners can sell pretty much anything they want as long as it is legal and profitable. How do we intice someone to sell the products we want? We don’t do that but telling him to lower his prices and profit margins. He may decide to sell ice cream cones instead of hobby products. Have you ever heard of ice cream shop patrons threatening to buy ice cream cones over the internet?
When a hobby shop owner realizes that he or she can make a better living working for wages, that’s when another hobby shop will disappear. We are hurting ourselves when we encourage store owners to find better ways to make a living. Breaking even, or even surviving, is not enough these folks. They should be able to generate the same buying power and disposable income that we enjoy. If we don’t stop beating them over the head by bragging about the great discount prices we are getting over the internet, then we are encouraging them to throw in the towel. They will be thinking about our attitudes when they are contemplating their balance sheets/income statements.
I live up in Central New York and the nearest shop of any quality to me is almost 40 miles away in Syracuse, which on a good day, with no construction on the highway is a 35 minute ride. We used to have one here in town, but the owners decided to switch and cater to minature dollhouses instead of trains like they used to do. There are a couple of “hole in the wall” shops between here and Syracuse, but the quality and quantity of supplies are not satisfactory and extremely overpriced. I always wanted to own my own Hobby store that catered to model railroaders. Maybe now would be a good time to open one up here in my neck of the woods, because there are a ton of people around my parts that are into model railroading, ranging in all ages and sexes, and all of them that I know complain about the fact we have no decent supply shop here.