I was just ‘surfing’ the Walther’s site and saw this…
25% off all Athearn, Athearn Genesis, Roundhouse, and MDC ‘G’ Scale items…
Wondering what’s up with this…
Old, old news. Both Athearn and MDC/Roundhouse have ben bought by a competitor of Walther’s, Horizon Hobbies. Walthers is selling off the remaining stock of their Athearn and MDC stuff. From now on, you have to go through Horizon to buy their stuff.
Since Walthers only buys at ‘Distributor prices’ the only Athearn you are likely to see are ‘Contract Items". (example): The ‘Super Chief’ F’ LABC engines are only available through Walthers, exclusively.
Since Walthers only buys at ‘Distributor prices’ the only Athearn you are likely to see are ‘Contract Items". (example): The ‘Super Chief’ F’ LABC engines are only available through Walthers, exclusively.
No!
No!
Horizon is taking a big risk. For a lot of people, including hobby shops, if it isn;t available from Walthers it does not exist. That is why smaller manufacturers place so much importance in getting picked up by Walthers and being included in the catalog. There are a lot of brands that are not handled by Walthers, but they tend to be the marginal ones which clearly Athearn and MDC are not.
'Twill be interesting to see if they can make this decision stick. I sense a bargaining ploy myself …
Dave Nelson
In the meantime, I’m glad I stumbled across this discussion – just ordered a bunch of Athern rolling stock from them at the sale price. [:D]
Why are ya’ll so hung up on Walthers they are so high priced and are usually out of stock on everything. Most anything I have bought with the walthers anme on it has left in the great trash bin what a joke they are. I will shop elsewhere
They would not work with Walther’s so there is no mention of them in the 2005 catalog, you will also see alot less Athearn on e-bay and other internet sources:
Horizon hunting unauthorized resellers
Champaign, Ill.-based distributor Horizon Hobby is taking steps to prevent unauthorized distribution of its proprietary products on third-party and auction Web sites by hiring Net Enforcers to head up that initiative.
In an e-mail sent by Horizon director of sales Mike Feeney to the National Retail Hobby Stores Association, the company says the move to hire Net Enforcers “is designed to protect you, an authorized dealer and your respective online sales from unauthorized resellers.”
According to Steve Hall, Horizon vice president of business development, an unauthorized reseller "would be any retailer or agent that does not have a direct retail agreement with Horizon Hobby.
“Unauthorized distribution erodes margin from the hobby industry … for our legitimate dealers who have to compete on the unleveled playing field that this situation creates,” Hall says. “That’s a major problem for our dealers, and so it’s a major problem for us. The issue spans both R/C and non-R/C.”
As part of the initiative, Horizon entered into a confidentiality agreement with Coral Gables, Fla.-based Net Enforcers to provide Web site addresses and eBay, Yahoo! and Froogle seller IDs. (Dealers should provide Horizon with the ID numbers they use by Sept. 1.)
“Net Enforcers has working agreements with eBay, Yahoo Stores and other auction sites to quickly and effectively enforce their clients’ intellectual property rights,” Hall says. “The auction sites are very cooperative in removing auctions that violate manufacturers’ trademarks, copyrights or distribution rights and in terminating IDs that are repeat offenders.”
Horizon also warned in the NRHSA e-mail that "any authorized dealer who distributes Horizon brands to an unauthorized resel
I am beginning to wonder if maybe an antitrust lawsuit could be coming against Horizon, since they have blocked out all of the other distributors in the world. If the other small distributors could get together and bring this against Horizon, it might change the way they do business.
I am surprised that Walthers did not consider this option.
So if I find a bunch of Athearn or RDC stuff at a great price (boxes banged up, stock reduction sale etc) and sell them on ebay I can expect to get sued by Horizon? Hmmmmm.
What about if you are selling ‘older’, used Athearn products you no longer want/nned on EBay?
As i said in a recent post, Walthers sent me an E-mail that they were negotiating with Horizon. I have not got a reply as a result of this. Toy train Heaven E-mailed me and said no more blue box or MDC. There was another person who posted about this subject and I agree " lets wait and see".
Because it is not an option, any more than Ford dealerships suing General Motors for not selling them cars is an option.
Horizon can distribute their own brands through whoever or what ever channels they want to. Since they are in competition with Walthers, why would they want to sell their own brand products thru them and put revenue into the pocket of a competitor? Do you see Walthers distributing its own brand products through Horizon? They have clearly made a strategic decision to try and limit sales of their brand products through specific distribution channels. They are trying to protect their own retail store dealers and limit the ammount of heavy discounting on the web.
I do not blame them at all for cutting Walthers out of the loop.
Personally, I think they are nuts for cutting out the web retailers as they will surely see a very large drop in sales volume of the Athearn brand and MDC brand products. However, they may be more interested in trying to protect the bricks and mortar hobby shop and thus the retail channel for all their RC toys as well.
The end result will be fewer Athearn models available out there - no “weekend warriors” at area train shows or on the Net. Also Horizon forbids discounting of their products by more than 15%, so this in effect increases the prices from any of their authorized dealers. The end effect will be fewer Athearn models being sold. So how is this going to benefit Horizon? It seems that their interest is “less is more”. [:(!]
Bob Boudreau
Well, they ain’t doing a good job of it, at least as far as my usual LHS is concerned. I was in there today and talked to the owner about Athern, and he said he’s having a hard time getting a deal with Horizon, and will probably just stop buying Athern, and the other Horizon brands. And this isn’t a small shop (Granddad’s in Northern VA)…
Walthers is an important model railroading product supplier to a very large number of retail hobby shops. A bottle of Testor’s paint on your LHS’s shelf may have been purchased from Walthers at roughly the same price as offered by many other wholesalers. Walthers sells lots of stuff, not just Walthers branded products.
At least Walthers gained Scenic Express while losing Athearn and MDC.