a little OT - Unhappy events at Athearn Models

Do you think Horizon won't raise prices or shrink its discounts after they monopolize distribution? If you want Athearn you will go through them. You can try to just pass the costs on but it won't work.

In June or in a year come back and tell us if Horizon is selling you Athearn at 48 percent off list or has not raised the list price.

As a seller of Athearn (ne Horizon) products, "Mike" is doing the correct thing if he does not like the Horizon distribution terms: not to carry or sell their products. If enough other dealers do the same thing, Horizon may accede to some of Mike requests; if not, Mike may decide to carry Horizon again. That's the way the market works.

For Mike to succeed, the eventual end user (that's most of us) will also have to not buy Athearn products for some reason: quality is down, prices go up, whatever. If we buyers see no difference in price or quality, then we consumers probably won't change our buying patterns. Again, the market at work.

Ed.

in article snipped-for-privacy@posting.google.com, MrRathburne at snipped-for-privacy@aol.com wrote on 1/15/04 8:39 AM:

Ed,

Another factor is 'market presence'. A lot of purchase may be made via Internet/mail order dealers or train show dealers. If the only marketing channel is via a 'hobby shop', then you need to get folks in the door. A lot of 'walk in' trade is at train shows - it is cheap entertainment to take the family to a 'train show'. What remains to be seen is how much 'hard core' model railroaders will be purchasing Athearn products. They will drive and seek out the hobby shop at the end of the strip mall. The other new 'walk in' business needs to have a reason to go to that mall location(hubby and the kids 'find' the hobby shop while mom shops(sorry if I am stereotyping, but it still applies in many cases). As I have stated before, the marketing channels are being reduced, and the presence of the Athearn product is not as wide.

Jim Bernier

"Edward A. Oates" wrote:

Please remember that the original email was from my dealer not me. I will however rethink any purchases of Athearn products. Most of the diesels I want are made by someone else and steam I'll buy what I can from BLI as they have been excellent engines. I don't know what I'll do for a Challenger, maybe brass. Since I don't model a road that had one it might be a moat question.

Lionel?

HSD going broke? Somehow, that does not compute.

BG

Note: A copy of this post is being cc'd to the folks at Athearn in the hope that some official input can be made.

I actually have a hobby shop less than 3/4 mile from my home (Scenarios in Fremont, CA). Up until a year or two ago they stocked a limited amount of HO, N, and O gauge stock. Athearn products (Blue box only) made up slightly over 70% of the sales display shelves. Now this 70% included ALL railroad products irrespective of scale. I took this to mean Athearn products was their #1 railroad seller. As close as the shop was I would very rarely buy from this shop as their pricing structure was either MSRP or a few cents below. I started in the 1960s buying and building Blue boxed kits from two local discount department stores. They were close by and they were in the price range I could afford. I was a very happy camper as I had cars and engines that were much nicer than Tyco and Bachmann and just a little more in price (usually only $0.50 to $1 higher). Perhaps buying Athearn at a discount as a youth spoiled me but to this day I will not pay retail for a Blue boxed kit. I will and have paid retail for their RTR line although I prefer to find them discounted. Back to Scenarios. I guess the railroad hobby lines were interfering with their core customer group and they dropped railroading altogether.

I now drive 17 miles to Hayward to a hobby shop there. This is a nice but rather small hobby shop, similar to the types I frequented way back then. For me it is the place I would go to buy the more expensive lines or to see what it is I am buying. In my case that would be items by Durango Press, Kato, Intermountain, and whatever else not readily found discountable. I also buy most of my magazines and reference books there. They also offer a realistic discount on their items unlike Scenarios. Their one problem, and this is the one that will do damage to (Athearn products) Horizons intent to restrict access to Athearn products, is they do not have anymore free space to set up Athearn Blue box displays. The hobby shop actually has very few non-locomotive Athearn blue box kits. Honestly I am not sure they have any at all. I have never looked for them there as I always ordered these from discount mail order places or train shows. In order to set up more Athearn, they would have to drop other lines or drop their R/C, plastic scale models, and/or hobby tools and accessories. Which they will not be able to do as far as I can see.

There are two larger nationally advertising (or Internet) Hobby shops (one for sure in Campbell) in the south bay area. These I am sure will increase their quantities of Athearn products as they determine the need. But these shops are 10,000-20,000+ sqft each and can easily restructure themselves. They are too far for me to go unless I am in the area anyway. I have not been by either of them in over a year/two years respectively. Without a mail order division, hobby shops tend to serve only local customers. If your local shop does not or cannot offer a particular line (as cheaply as possible) and you cannot find it at a discounted mail order establishment, you will do without.

I have reached the same conclusion as Jim, If Athearns exposure is reduced (and I cannot see it being otherwise) then actual sales of Athearn products will significantly drop. I expect this to affect their blue boxed line the most. It quite possibly could kill the line as well unless Horizon, at some future point and in time, reverses its decision on distributorships and retailers.

Ed, you could add that the end user may not have to consciously make the decision to boycott Athearn products. The potential unavailability may be enough to do the job all by itself. I would like to continue buying the Athearn products that work in my layout. I plan on doing so but maybe not on the scale I used to. Only time will tell if Athearn products go out of my reach financially. I already stated my feelings for the blue boxed kits and I figure on not buying more of those unless pricing remains low. Roundhouse is of similar quality and I can always get them at a decent discount.

I wanted to thank the folks at snipped-for-privacy@athearn.com and snipped-for-privacy@athearn.com in helping me resolve my issue with the RTR Frisco 8000 gallon Tank car. They were able to find a truck frame to replace one broken at receipt. I would also like to ask if you could maintain a spares inventory. The RTR cars are more expensive and are worth repairing when broken.

Thanks,

Art

If you drive 17 miles to Hayward, you might consider driver about the same distance to The Train Shop in Santa Clara (Pruneridge and Winchester, not far from 280). They have lots of blue box and other Athearn, as well as all of the high-end stuff you mention below in N, HO, O, and G scales. And they sell at discounts. Mostly, I find that their stuff is about the same as internet discount retail after factoring in shipping (internet) and CA sales tax (The Train Shop). They also sell Digitrax decoders, but aren't very knowledgeable about DCC. The folks who work there are pretty much old line train modelers.

The shop in Campbell, D&H Hobby has a smallish train department in terms of variety; San Antonio Hobby in Mountain View doesn't discount much, but their inventory of Euro trains and Lionel is terrific.

It will be interesting to see how the Athearn / Horizon merger affect TTS.

Ed.

in article n4ENb.11834$ snipped-for-privacy@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net, Art Marsh at snipped-for-privacy@earthlink.net wrote on 1/15/04 2:00 PM:

I know about D&J in Campbelli (96 N. San Tomas Aquino Rd), where is D&H?

Right next to the J key on my keyboard. I meant D&J, sorry.

Ed.

in article zIENb.63743$nt4.91599@attbi_s51, Paul Newhouse at snipped-for-privacy@pimin.rockhead.com wrote on 1/15/04 2:43 PM:

Thanks Ed,

I was thinking of San Antonio and D&H respectively. D&H used to have a lot of space set aside for model railroading (mostly large scale) but has been loosing it for the last 13 years that I know of. I have been thinking on that and it may be at least 3 years since I last set foot in D&H (I even thought they were named D&J for some reason they are San Thomas Aquino right?)

I forgot about the Train Shop, I do like that one if only to ogle all the Brass and man do they have some nice brass locomotives, cars, and cabeese. But it is a lot farther to drive down to and some of the nastiest freeway driving in the Bay area.

Marsh

themselves.

establishment,

MrRathburne

DARN!! I was hoping there was another B&M LHS worth visiting in Campbell!! *8->

Paul

Save money. It is Athearn and UnionParasite so kill two birds with one stone.

Is that legal?

Definitely a different Rick Jones. :-{)

100% on the mark!

Dave

Your on! I'm adding a note to tell you what the outcome will be as of September

1st. Anyone here can remind me on that day and I'll verify the current pricing available to me. If need be I can get independent verification of that pricing. That is the best I can do as your mindset is all doom and gloom. If you think I'll forget (possible as I am over 50 ) then remind me September 1. That will be 6 months from the March 1st "A-Day" (A for Athearn that is). I'll go so far as to bet you $25 towards a steak dinner that the discount price will not vary more than 2% (there are fluctuations with all lines and distributors so that seems more than fair).

Dave

Nope. Screaming not needed. It would be but a temporary inconvenience at worse. We have had situations like this occur. Those times they were R/C products. We wanted them so we added the new distributor to get them. This goes on several times a year in the pursuit of products my customers want. Examples: Bandai was coming in exclusively via Sentai Distributors, Firebirds via Horizon, Trumpeteer via Stevens International. I use each of these distributors. they are not near my top 5 but we do use them several times a month. Over the years the shop has gotten Athearn from Bev-Bel, Pan-Am, Walthers, United Models, Great Planes, and most recently Horizon over the last year. Our number two distributor was United and it was bought out by our number one Great Planes. Instead of whining we added Horizon as the number two. Screaming about it doesn't change a thing. Doing whatever you can does (although in my personal opinion a boycott likely still won't materialize nor work). The hobby is much more fluid as far as product movement from manufacturer to the consumer than you might imagine. If you play the game well you'll win. Play badly and it's adios store (or even mail order firm).

Dave

Sigh, you just don't understand how retailers, distributors, and the hobby industry operates at all. I'll put up my experience against yours if you had any. Do you? This is the second time I've asked you for some factual basis for you "opinion".

Dave