Heljan Class 23 Baby Deltic

I saw them in two different liveries at the Heljan stand at the Warley show. They looked superb and up to the usual Heljan high standard.

There were also a couple on the Hereford Model Centre stand which happened to be right next to the Heljan stand. I compared prices and discovered Heljan were asking £5 more than Hereford Model Centre. When I pointed this out to the Heljan marketing manager, who was one of those manning their stand, and asked if they would match the price he told me, in no uncertain terms, that what I should do is buy it from Hereford.

Strange marketing strategy that.

The real bummer is that when I went straight back to the Hereford stand they had all been sold in a matter of minutes.

Archie

Hi folks, anyone got theirs yet? I know they started sending them out last Thursday.... Mine will not be here until at least tuesday as there was a problem with my payment card (funny how it worked just fine when they called me and I re-read the numbers...)! been looking forward to this model's arrival for a long, long time. Badger.

The cynics answer would be they knew HMC would sell out and ....But perhaps Heljan have an agreement that they wont sell retail at less than a set price. If they did sell lower then many retailers wouldnt take any and Heljan would lose out on distributors.

cheers, Simon

Why is it strange? If they know they've met their target to sell quantity X through wholesale channels and they are confident of selling their own retail stock at full RRP then it's no skin off their nose if someone is undercutting them. I would say it's quite a sound business decision, maximising return for the owners, or for re- investment in the business.

MBQ

It's generally considered bad form to undercut your customers. Don't think there's anything preventing it legally, however. I'm just wondering why the OP didn't buy from HMC straight away in the first place. Big show like Warley's a seller's market.