Why is the hobby in trouble?

ModelRailroadForums.com is a free Model Railroad Discussion Forum and photo gallery. We cover all scales and sizes of model railroads. Online since 2002, it's one of the oldest and largest model railroad forums on the web. Whether you're a master model railroader or just getting started, you'll find something of interest here.


kbkchooch said:
As far as the hobbies current health, true, prices are on the increase. But so is everything else including the price of crude oil. The same crude that a lot of the plastics we use today come from. The manufacturers are not making a killing on this stuff by any means.

So why are they making special items, limited runs and just about every variant of the F-unit that ever existed? Cuz YOU all asked for it. Maybe not you personally by name, but as a hobby group, yup, we did it.:o Simple economics, supply and demand, follow what the market wants and they will beat a path to your door. All the lamenting about the evils of RTR is our own fault. IF we would have left the BB kits alone and didn't superdetail them, then maybe they wouldn't have seen the demand for detailed cars, ready right from the box. :rolleyes:

So what do we do about it? Blame this manufacturer or that? Blame the Chinese or the oil companies? Whine about the demise of the 2 dollar freight car kit, which was crude by todays standards.In 1960 was only 2 bucks, gas was .28 a gallon. Today, that same gallon cost @2.53 (what I paid today per gal) so that 2 dollar car should cost you (round numbers) 9 times as much as it did in 1960 = $18.00 for a blue box flatcar. Would you pay that today??? I don't think so. Pick your time period. I got my license in 1977, gas was .58 pr gal, the bluebox kits were about 4 bucks then. It all works the same...
Click to expand...

You make a good point, cooch. The cost of kits has not gone up.
The quality of money used to purchase the kits (and everything else) has gone down. So the degradation in the quality of money does not have a causal relationship to the state of model railroading today.

...It's not that bad. We just need to be steadfast stewards of the hobby, and learn that it is going to have its ups and downs. The market will take care of overpriced items for the most part. Supplier issues will come and go. But this attitude of "the sky is falling" is nothing more than equine excrement and if unchecked, will sink us all.
Click to expand...

I agree...
Has anyone noticed the number of new babies around them lately? You may not know it yet, but there's another baby boom going on, and in the years to come they will swell the ranks of model railroaders again. :)

Greg
 
Kit cars are becoming a thing of the past. My hobby guy said that Athearn has stopped making kit cars. Half the price as a ready to roll and it came with nuckle couplers and metal wheels, Round house kit cars are gone too, because Athearn owns them, Accurail is good detail and quality car but the wheels and couplers are not good.
 
well If the kit cars are a thing of the past then Im glad who ever is helping this along. Today I bought 30 undec 'Beer can" tank cars for $60 shipped

at the rate I have been buying old undec cars I will need a yard to hold 1,000 cars.
what I think is even better is when people ask me where I bought all the odd cars I have...
 


doct0rnic said:
Kit cars are becoming a thing of the past. My hobby guy said that Athearn has stopped making kit cars. Half the price as a ready to roll and it came with nuckle couplers and metal wheels, Round house kit cars are gone too, because Athearn owns them, Accurail is good detail and quality car but the wheels and couplers are not good.
Click to expand...

Starting with the re-release of their 89' flat car, all future Accurail releases will have metal wheels, but will still have the horrible accu-mate couplers.

Athearn stopped making kits because they can't price them competitively and still make money.
 
I was recently speaking with LHS owner about this. He said no one wants them. He showed me probably 30-40 kit boxes on his shelf and pointed out the dust. No one even looks at them. Everyone wants RTR. He said he has many many in a storage trailer behind his place. At this point if I asked for a kit not on his shelf I would assume it wouldn't be worth the effort to dig it out. I am no longer purchasing much and now disability makes it so hard to assemble anything. I think I would rather RTR But I remember the day when I bought coal car kits by the case. If I were starting now and was physically able to assemble them I would be throwing a fit. Not that it would do much good, but I believe my LHS owner would probably go on a kit hunt with his distributors.
 
I enjoy building kits, but if they cost almost as much as a RTR and requires even more money to put metal couplers and metal wheels on the model, which makes them MORE expensive than a RTR.

Also, most cars in kit form that are sitting on the shelves are before the era that I am modeling.
 
JDETRAY WROTE ,<<<" I am involved in 4 workshop/technical hobbies, or as I think of them, "hands-on hobbies":

Model Railroading
R/C Aircraft
Amateur Astronomy
Ham Radio

In all 4 of these hobbies, the refrain is the same: "This hobby is in trouble. Where are the youngsters?" >>>

I dabble in all four too. The one with most brightness end of tunnel is RC. There are now helicopters and planes that can actually be flown safely indoors in a living room and cost about $100 complete with transmitter and radio. Simple and cheap to get started with a non trivial and actually a sort of exciting setup. I don't know of anything similar in trains, but it would help...
 
TWaters said:
JDETRAY WROTE ,<<<" Simple and cheap to get started with a non trivial and actually a sort of exciting setup. I don't know of anything similar in trains, but it would help...
Click to expand...

I really think a lot of the high tech stuff that's adding to the cost of Model Railroading is way over priced. The small market adds to this and there is no interest to adapt existing items instead of custom building. My son and I were discussing the possibility of 'blue-tooth' controlled locomotives and he things (and he's the one who would know) that it would be doable and cheap! It amazes me I can buy a singing birthday card for $5 dollars but a sound module costs $30. Perhaps if manufactors saw a market here that would buy cheap electronics, it wouldn't cost $200 to set up one set of crossing gates.
 
Gary B said:
I really think a lot of the high tech stuff that's adding to the cost of Model Railroading is way over priced.
Click to expand...

As a newbie to the hobby I'm very shocked at how reasonable the prices in this hobby are. I guess I've been involved in other activities that are very expensive such as photography, golf, and biking. In comparison to them, my wife is actually glad I picked this hobby.
 
Janry said:
As a newbie to the hobby I'm very shocked at how reasonable the prices in this hobby are. I guess I've been involved in other activities that are very expensive such as photography, golf, and biking. In comparison to them, my wife is actually glad I picked this hobby.
Click to expand...

Until you start bringing some brass loco home :D

But yeah, price arent that much, but some items are just overpriced, because i can have a really good mp3 player for 40$, in what a sound decoder is different ? (in fact it dosent even have a screen !) for that reason i think i will get a digitrax soundbug an dmake my own soundfiles, will see how it compare to a tsunami.
 


I guess this is true with most hobbies, but what you can amass over say 30 years is scary. I recently inventoried my locomotives, and assigned a value to each. Scary when the wife pointed out that the sum total of the inventory would pay for a very elaborate funeral, and a heck of a party after my passing!!:eek::eek::eek:
I'm too scared to inventory the rolling stock, structures, etc.:o
 
kbkchooch said:
I guess this is true with most hobbies, but what you can amass over say 30 years is scary. I recently inventoried my locomotives, and assigned a value to each. Scary when the wife pointed out that the sum total of the inventory would pay for a very elaborate funeral, and a heck of a party after my passing!!:eek::eek::eek:
I'm too scared to inventory the rolling stock, structures, etc.:o
Click to expand...

Scary that she hasnt thought about a nice trip around the world, but your death :eek: Lock all your kitchen knife in a safe !!!
 
What? Me worry? (Alfred E. Newman)

Seriously, its cool. I'm worth more to her alive than dead, so she says she's content to wait:rolleyes: Whatever than means!:p
 
One of the first rules of hobbies is NEVER make a list of what you've spent. You don't want to know and you don't want Her to find out!
 
OK I got to thinking about cost this morning. RC aircraft was mentioned as I thought about it I realized we are not looking at the other hobbies correctly. I will use RC aircraft as an example.
I can get a kid a RC helicopter for $50.00 +- and it will break in a couple of days. I know I did it. When it rains or snows put it away. Yes you can fly it in the house. Just make sure Mom is no where near, you know what I mean. now don't play dumb. Or you can get one that will last a while for $150 +-. Trains well you can get a set for $50.00 it will last a couple of years. Or for $150.00 a set that will last a lifetime.
Now if you want to be serious in these hobbies. Lets look at MRR first.
1.Good quality loco DCC with sound Lets say $300.00
2.Good rolling stock 5 @ $20 each $100. (I think that is a little high)
3.DCC Power supply, Mid range. $300.00
4.Track. I will just say $50.00
5.Total $750
Now for serious RC. I will stay with helicopter
I am not an RC modeler so I will just give this a best effort.
1.A good quality helicopter appears to be $400 to $500, remember I am not an RC person.
2.Radio controller $350
3.receivers $50 I assume only one is needed
4.total $800
About the same price When you look at it that way. One thing I didn't put into the equation is insurance
Model RR - $0
RC Helicopter liability - $??. I don't have a clue. But give it some thought what if________.

Do you have a place to fly it or would you need to join a club?
Do you have room for an oval of track or would you need to join a club?

All hobbies have gotten very expensive. I just choose Railroading.
 
I don't know about it dying, it appears the popularity has shrunk, but I remember when I was younger being able to go into a department store and able to buy accessories (about 35 + years ago) but these days you may be lucky to find a train set there
 
posted by kbkchooch:
"Scary when the wife pointed out that the sum total of the inventory would pay for a very elaborate funeral, and a heck of a party after my passing!!"

As for me I am just getting back into it after about 20 years,and with DCC, it can get quite pricey, and if that was my wife, she'd decide I didn't need it and sell it
 


I just get amazed with how realistic they look, and watching them run there is a club about 10 miles from here, they rent a location (CMRRA), set up their boards and run them there, I just wish I had that kind of space
 
You must log in or register to reply here.




Affiliate Disclosure: We may receive a commision from some of the links and ads shown on this website (Learn More Here)

Back
Top