The remark wasn’t meant as a put-down, so why interpret it as one?
I can afford the expensive models, but I’m still uncomfortable with the high prices for European trains.
My point is, that the big manufacturers seem to cater more and more to mature hobbyists with a large disposable income and ignore the people with less deep pockets. This seems a short-sighted strategy to me, as this market will dry up in 10-20 years and then what? And I don’t believe that young people aren’t interested because of Playstation et al. We’ve heard that story before, only then it was slot-car racing, transformers, etc. Young people can be drawn into the hobby. But we can do all the promoting we want but without availability of affordable models nothing will come of it.
I understand that high-end models generate more profit, but it still is wise to offer a choice. If you don’t, you lose customers. This hobby has done so well because a LOT of people could afford to get involved. Catering only to a small market of affluent buyers is short sighted and will dimini***he hobby in the long run.
Fbrand, this and your previous post tend to contain both solid truths and some decided errors.
I’m afraid that there is absolutely no question that, at least in the U.S., HO model railroading is dominated by hobbyists with an average age in the mid-50’s. Every study or survey taken in the past decade indicates this and that the figure is rising very steadily.
However, I agree completely with you where it concerns the current aim of manufacturers. They are purposely targeting th
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QUOTE: Originally posted by CNJ831
The manufacturers are no fools and understand that, just as you say, in 10-20 years there likely won’t be a viable market for them to operate in. Thus, now is the time to maximize profits. Once the Baby Boomers fade into history, hobbyist numbers will steadily decline. There is simply no follow-up generation with a widespread interest in model trains to take their place. The slot car situation occurred in a completely different era, one in which kids still recalled their Lionel and Flyer Christmastime train roots. As they aged, that interest and the fond memories returned. There is no such association with folks born in the 70’s, 80’s, or 90’s. At the same time, exposure to real trains has been largely limited to wrecks covered on CNN. AMTRAK is all but dead and to the public freight trains are viewed as an obstruction or hazard to gradecrossing traffic! Like many hobbies, model railroading is largely based on an interest expressed by a certain generation. When they are no more, so essentially is the hobby.
Young people today also typically lack many of the practical skills necessary for building model railroads. Ours is a hand-on hobby, not one where the push of a button on a game paddle executes and completes the operation. These kids are used to a world where things can be had RIGHT NOW, not labored on for months or years. This is a completely different outlook from that of the majority of today’s hobbyists and can not, in my mind, be overcome in the future.
So, you ask, what will the manufacturers do if the hobby disappears in the future? You saw that Life-Like trains was just a minor division of a much larger foam company. If the train division had started to loose money, it simply would have been cut. Other companies might well be able to shift to the importation (remember hardly anyone is “manufacturing” in the States today) of other small electronic devices. Most of the bigger companies are today run not by former hobbyists
Let’s say I am an uncurable optimist.
But I see your point about the newer generations. That has me worried a great deal. At school we learned to do complex calculations straight from the head. Only later were we allowed to use calculators. Try that one on the younger crowd. I don’t think they are less able than we, they’re probably superior to us in several skills. But I agree their outlook is totally different to ours, and I wonder wether old fashioned hobbies that require designing and building things that take a lot of time would appeal to them.
Also, I don’t see the interest that modern trains (in Europe) have for them. Mind you, I like to ride on the snappy Eurostar and TGV in real life but they make a poor model train in my view. They just zip along and thats it. Container trains, hmmm. All modern European engines have that same CAD design look, only the colors are different.
I prefer trains from 1910-1960, wether it’s in the UK, Germany or USA.
Steam engines, fascinating technology, the sense of history. I love studying period photo’s and advertising and recreating that in miniature.
The history of German railroads of 1914-1950 alone makes fascinating reading, both in technology and the immense impact of two world wars.
But, you’re right, it is unlikely that the younger generations are interested in this. History is just boring old stuff to most of them.
The situation in the US is worse. At least in Europe, people are accustomed to travel on trains. And goverments actively support railroading and rail public transport.
As you said, Amtrak is fading away and the only trains people see are anonymous freights that lumber by as they wait at a RR crossing. It is encouraging that a lot of big cities are building light rail systems, but overall the outlook is not very encouraging.
I think it’s true that when the postwar generations disappear the market will shrink significantly. I just hope that somehow the
Hate to burst your bubble, but here in upstate NY, they both carry the low end of the LL trainsets. Toys -r-Us has it more often than Wal-mart (usually at X-mas for Wally World).
JP
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To be fair to CNWFAN, my local Toys R us does carry low end LifeLike and our Walmart certainly did have trainsets at Xmas. However, I would agree that they don’t carry anything for MRR [:D]
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I 'm not that “worried or frantic” about Toys R Us,and Wal Mart carrying train stuff,though here inFDL,WI
both of these stores dont carry any MR equip.,and neither does the Hobby Lobby for that matter.Hobby Lobby has train stuff,but very little.The 2 hobby shops in FDL,they dont carry what some are looking for.One is so cluttered your lucky if you can walk through the store!!!The other one is a joke…he “ONLY” orders through Horizon.He told me that he is still waiting for the current Microscale decal catalog to be sent to him through Horizon.Gee…and I just called Microscale and got my catalog a few days ago.Hmm…is something wrong with this picture?[%-)]
For the last few years LL Proto prices went up much faster than any of its competitors. They have incredible detail that was previously seen only on brass models but most of their issues were sold out before they reached the hobby shops. LL has a lot of annouced models that nobody has seen yet.
Walthers money will make them able to finally get all those models to the market and I would bet on new issues of previous short runs.
Walthers has more or less being doing the same thing with their own models - produce a batch and retire the molds. There have been many posts inquiring about the tug boat and other models in their waterfront series. Why should they be any different with LL models? They surely know that “limited run” models usually sell out, so they don’t have to pay the cost of warehousing several thousand copies of the model, hoping they will eventually sell. Unsold models sitting on the shelves cost a firm money.
I’m just waiting for them to bring out some engines and cars cut in half lengthways, call them Backround Trainyard Flats and charge way way too much for 'em.
One thing I will say is Walthers does have a good history of supporting the hobby, so I think we’ll keep seeing P2K . But I bet the MSRP goes up a bit.
Just like everything else- KMart&Sears, UP&SP, etc, they still want our cash, so lets see how they go about parting us from it.
I contacted Mike at Walthers about running problems I was having with newly purchased proto 1000 c-liner and an RDC. He said they had not received the inventory of life like and to call back in about a month. He indicated that the warranty would be honored. I hope so. But I too feel that the prices for life like will start to be expensive. I saw almost no life like in and ad in model railroader from trainworld but then again they often rotate between two and four page ads and this was their two page ad. However I have always though Waltheres was over priced for all but the well heeled in the hobby. Just my opinion.
I re-entered model railroading in 2003 after too long of a break when my wife purchased an IHC light mountain dressed in Southern green along with a Walthers catalog. We began purchasing rolling stock slowly until I noticed a cost spiraling trend, eliminating kids and young people from the market in favor of the affluent.
I commented to my wife, “That’s just great. The same thing happened after I built my first drag race car”. That hobby went from shade tree mechanics need for speed to a hundred K $ in order to be nationally competitive according to Hot Rod Magazine.
The drag racing sport still exists, but so many small local drag strips went bankrupt that today’s teens use public streets rather than older adult supervised drag strips, killing many of themselves and citizens just driving home from the grocery store.
The same thing happened to the housing industry in the '70s after some get rich quick rich people caused home prices to spiral out of the grasp of younger couples for many years.
I really feel insecure about the model train industry. I wonder how long we baby boomers will keep supporting the spiraling prices.
I feel angry every time I pick up a boxcar costing more than $20 when I purchased similar kits for $8 to $12 two years ago. One of the larger local model train shops recently went out of business.
I assume everyone has noticed when Walthers puts sale prices on items; a lot of them disappear completely from the market. This also seems to be starting a lot of panic buying.
I heard about General Motors’ iron fist hitting the HO and N scale vehicle market Saturday. Peachy, another door slammed in our faces. If you want any more Chevy’s on your layout, it’s time to panic purchase again!
Thanks for gathering around the soapbox. [soapbox]
If you think that the hobby has become to expensive for the youth market, check out the price of an I-Pod. Even the least expensive, no display, random play unit is $100 . However no assembly is required of the unit, only seven trips to the store to find out how to get “something” loaded into it.
The good news is that the “baby boomers” in the hobby have grand kids to pass on the hobby to. The market palce will dictate whether the rocco’s will go away or the Athearns and Life Likes will continue to manufacture product within a different corporate structure. Sounds like “Blue Boxes” are coming back into stock this fall as the product works its way through manufacturing packaging and distribution. May we “live in interesting times”.
Will
Not just I-Pods. I am constantly amazed that there are Jr. High School kids with cell phones that cost four or five times what mine cost. I can only imagine what the bills are (my son is only 11 and doesn’t have one) when I see scores of kids on their phones are they walk out of the school!! Look at the cost of the video game players and the games.
fbrand,
You bring up some intersting points about today’s kids. I think you will find this useful. Several years ago while working on my masters, I had to take a statistics class. Always having loved math I enjoyed estimating the answer before working the problem and working many of the problems long hand. The guy next to me would chuckle his butt off at me as he showed me his super calculator which did all the computations with only a few keystrokes. Of course it was quite humorous to watch him on the final when his calculator battery died!
starwardue
As you are part of the younger set of this hobby, I have to ask you this. Was their an adult in your life that showed you the way? I’m betting that somewhere along the way there was a parent, a teacher etc. that groomed and encouraged this.
I realize that I am coming into this thread near it’s conclusion, however, I feel compelled to add my own two cents worth here.
If, as stated in an earlier message, Life Like was purchased by an investment group sometime back, to me this all makes perfect sense. One of the things that aquisition groups do, is buy up multi pronged companies with an eye to selling off the lesser lights of the prong. These company divisions may be profitable in there own right, just not profitable enough for the purchaser. Buy selling off these arms of the company, the purchaser has in fact paid for his aquisition of the whole. If not in full, then certainly more than half way. If that arm of the company is profitable, the more the seller can ask as a selling price. I believe Life Like to be just such a company.
Enter Walthers. With the loss of the Athearn and MDC lines of product over the last couple of years, their bottom line is probably suffering somewhat. Not enough to put them out of business, but enough to make them notice. Along comes Life Like’s toy division. What better way to try and recoup that loss to the bottom line than purchase a company that offers a line of product which is basically an exact match to the product line you have lost? When you think about it, Walthers is in a better position with this purchase than they would be dealing with an independant producer. All costs are controlled by them from manufacture to sale with no middle men to worry about.
Again, to me, makes perfect sense. Obviously Walthers thought so too!
What this means to the purchasing hobbiest remains to be seen. I recall when Horizon bought out Athearn. The threads of doom and gloom ran rampant. Price increases, lack of availability and on and on. I have noticed while reading the various hobby forums, that for every person willing to offer a positive viewpoint about a subject, there are just as many people taking the negative position. Classic glass half empty, half full type stuff.
As I own quite a number of
Life-Like was bought for $72M by the "investment group a couple of years ago. Walthers has just purchased the model train division, by taking out a bank loan. I think it is save to assume that the investment company did not take a loss on this deal, meaning that Walthers paid over $72M for Life-Like, which included all their warehouse inventory. That is how they can deliver to Wal-Mart on-time for Christmas.
We don’t know the exact figures of this deal because Walthers is a PRIVATELY HELD company…they are not on the stock market ticket. I feel it is a good move by Walthers, because as more hobby shops in rural areas "go under’ (sob) , with gas prices where they are, people will not drive 100’s of miles to a big city area to a HS, when they can go on-line and order from Walthers who has a great selection of just about everything, and growing even larger with these types of buyouts.
Yes, time will tell as it always does, but on the surface, this looks like a good financial move to me, and, before loan rates go any higher.
I was really sorry to hear about Roco, I hope someone will help them out. Since I do not model any particular railroad, I have several Roco steamers and in fact, all my passenger rolling stock are Roco. I found that the Roco models are about the most detailed on the market. I hope they survive.