Kader have bought Sander Kan!

Jerry said the following on 18/11/2008 10:31:

But if they have Hornby's custom, they have more sales. Companies don't exist just to survice, they exist to maximise sales and profits.

Do you really think that model railway sales are unlimited, especially in such economic times?...

"Jerry" wrote

Our Hornby rep called this morning & he'd absolutely no idea that Kader had bought Sander Kan, although he knew the latter had been taken over by its bank and was being offered for sale.

He's pretty sure that Hornby own their own tooling.

Apparantly Kader's original factory & that formerly owned by Sander Kan were both very close together. This meant that the skilled (as opposed to the manual) workforce tended to trade their skills to whichever was willing to pay the highest wages. This take-over might just stop that and mean that their is more stability in the workforce(s).

John.

Who is "we"? Hornby's financiers or shareholders may be interested but I suspect most modellers are only interested in a continued supply of models. I don't give two hoots how hornby achieve that, within given cost/quality parameters.

If Hornby made such a statement, what would you do? If Hornby made a statement that they are in deep doo-doos, what would you do differently?

MBQ

Didn't it also use an ancient design push-rod engine derived from from the Ford Anglia because one of the new engines wasn't ready in time?

MBQ

That's slightly different to refusing the sale simply because it's to a direct competitor, which was your original argument.

MBQ

And which engine would that be?...

I think the then "new" Fiesta had an all new engine, so probably yes.

Cheers Richard

You tell me. I just recall reading about it at the time.

MBQ

You believe everything you read, the problem wasn't that a 'new' engine wasn't ready, more that the car had been designed around older 'Kent' engine, remember that the Ka was a concept car design (by a body-stylist) that Ford put on one of the motorshow stands where both dealers and public started to show interest by asking when the new model would be released (!) - thus Ford had a bit of a rush on to launch the car before a competitor got ahead of the game. Ford had to do quite a bit of reworking to get the newer Zetec unit to fit, eventually...

Unless written by you?

So they initially used a 1.3l pushrod engine that could be traced back to the Anglia 30 years previously, until the Zetec unit could be fitted "eventually". Sounds pretty much like what I wrote.

MBQ

VW kept its old Golf and Jetta designs after new versions were released, and sells them at a lower price as City Golf and City Jetta.

The New Beetle is/was built on a Jetta chassis, costs more and has less interior and luggage space.

On 18/11/2008 18:35, MartinS said,

Isn't the Daewoo Nexia basically an old Vauxhall Astra?

The timing is immaculate:

"All your factories belong us!" :o)

(kim)

Who owns Dapol nowadays? If they have enough funds avaliable, they might be able to expand significantly. Ther is also a small chance that Fleichman might try to move into the UK market.

I don't believe Kader would be stupid enough to raise RTR prices such that etched kits become cheaper again, but if this kills off Hornby then there is a chance that Heljan will be able to take the place which Bachmann took a decade ago, although given the much smaller difference in quality between Bachmann and Heljan today compared with Hornby and Bachmann then make this much less likely.

But that's exactly why they will need Hornby's custom otherwise their newly acquired factories won't be running at their full capacity.

Fred X

Whoooosshhhh....

"Jerry" wrote

Not a chance, everything Hornby expect to receive in the run up to Christmas will already be on the high seas on in the air (for Warley Show).

John.

"Paul Boyd" wrote

AND if they have Hornby's custom they can, to some extent, control Hornby's prices!

Talk about having your cake & eating it. :-)

John.