I have been informed by one of my internet vendors that Walthers will be having a price increase of approximately 10% effective April 1st on all their own lines, i.e. 433, 920, 931, 932, and 933 products (Lifelike, Proto, Trainline, Walthers Rolling Stock and Cornerstone).
I have better review their last flyer to see if I can save any money.
When you charge $20.00 for your catalog , you shouldnt be allowed to raise your prices . Oh well , i dont buy anything from walthers anyway . RON
So selling 1000+ pages of catalogue at $20 (about $.02/page) should preclude Walthers from raising prices? Interesting concept.
The newstand price of Model Railroader is $5.95. The April issue is 96 pages including covers. That’s $.062 per page. If you eliminate advertising (fully paid for by the advertiser), the cost/per page goes a lot higher. I counted 19 FULL pages of nothing but advertising (eliminating any page that was self-advertising by Kalmbach).
Sheesh, maybe Kalmbach should not only be prohibited from raising prices, but also prohibited from charging anything for the magazine. After all, they don’t charge us a thing for use of the website even though creating, maintaining, and improving it has got to cost them money.
Andre
Geee…I wonder why this doesn’t surprise me?
Mark
WGAS
At least model railroader has articles , columns , editorials and how to articles . All walthers is is a commercial . RON
Boy…you know cabin fever must be getting to people when “the cost of…” topics keep coming up…[:-^]
So, just save up for what you want…hey…what can I say…you want the goods but you want it cheap? OK…ain’t gonna happen when costs of mfg keeps going up…
Go figure. I was waiting for the next sale to buy 8 Walthers #5 turnouts for my yard. I may as well buy them now as the next sale price is today’s regular price.[:'(][(-D]
Brent
Maybe it’s just an “April Fool’s” joke?
Mark
WGAS
The April 1st date makes me suspicious, too. Even if it’s true, that date is a poor choice for any company to announce a price increase or other bad news.
Tom
Is it because they increase the prices a lot, or because it’s slated for april 1st?
It confuses me more (see above) than it suprises me.
It wasn’t that long ago that $1.00 Canadian would get us $.65 U.S. So you can guess how much that $250.00 U.S. Loco would cost us Canucks. Now as the U.S. dollar continues to plummet $1.00 Canadian gets us $1.03 U.S. I think the cost of anything purchased offshore by the U.S. such as train stuff from China is going to go through the roof and this is only the beginning. My last box of Shinohara track was $54.00 cheaper than the first one I bought in 2005. It is good for the model train consumers in Canada and other countries that benefit by the free fall of the U.S. dollar, but I do do feel for our U.S. modelers.
Brent
For something a little more concrete: Atlas and Intermountain sell their sound and DCC locos for approximately $260-$280 list price.
Walthers already charges over $400 list for a the Proto E units with sound
Yes, there is a steeper discount offered by Walthers, but if they are goign to discount them that much then why set such a high MRSP in the first palce? And now thaey are goign to add another 10%?
Life-Like used to be slightly lower priced than the other guys, and it’s not like they’re making them any differently now. Please, explain to me again how Walthers buying them out has made thing better for the average modeler?
–Randy
Want an “eye” opener, just got a sale listing from Train World on the Walthers 20th century equipment, passenger cars for $35.99!!! E7’s with “all” of the toys for $129.99!!! AB sets for $239.99…these are with sound & DCC!
Now my guess would be that they still “aren’t” loosing any money there, maybe not making much or any, but it gives you an idea of what they have in this stuff if they can offer it to Train World and you know “they” are making money on the deal.
As my dear departed Mother used to say, “I smell something rotten in Denmark”.
Mark
WGAS
Why, its almost as if external market forces drive products costs to be higher!
Why aren’t baseball cards 50 cents for 12 cards, a sticker, and a piece of gum? Now they cost $3 for 10 cards and no gum.
I guess if you are a model railroad mfg you are supposed to do these as a charity now…[:-,][(-D]
I say hogpickles on that!
Even chinese labourers are going to be getting more for their labour…you want them to continue as they were? Doubt it…
Too add a little to this…take it from one who is a part time musician type now…
mmmmmmm…let’s see…I put in about $1,500 for an 8core computer system with 16Gb of ram and 2 2Tb Hard drives…plus a couple of external hard drives and 2 22" monitors at $269 each. A pair of KRK MR8 reference monitors at $159 each. My primary DAW is Cakewalk’s Sonar X1 which went for the upgrade price of $99. Then came the numerous hours of learning the thing then the hours of installing the softsynths and FX racks there in…then there is the small matter of Guitars( I’ve got three here) Basses(2 more) and all their effects and amplifiers…all told around $6,000 worth, then came the modular synthesizers that can cost upwards of $1,000 per module…if you go after the rtr/kit versions,those I spent somewhere in the range of $3-4,000 there… plus the acoustic treatment for the studio—another $2,000 there…All told I think I spent about $16,000 or more…
Model railroading too expensive? Naaaah…you just gotta know where to look…
Ah, nuts. I buy a variety of equipment and most fall under Walthers and Bachmann, three of my favorite rolling stock pieces being Walthers. Oh well, at least my hobby shop sells Walthers for dirt cheap prices. And, this is off topic, but my Walthers catalogues are FREE OF CHARGE, thank you.
If you wanna play… You gotta pay!!! Thor,
I would ask who pays Walthers regular prices for any rolling stock?
Dave
I got that same E-mail. I was expecting it. I didn’t think anyone in their right mind would pay $65 for a passenger car, without lights. Or $400 for an AB Proto diesel set. I knew they would be blowing them out for half of list, but I didn’t expect it so soon.
Methinks Walthers got a sudden reality check on current economic conditions.