New or Old Locomotives and Rolling Stock

I don't know how many of you guys are active in the HO/OO model train arena, but it seems to me that prices are quickly becoming insanely high.  This year for example with the announcement of the new Hornby range for 2022 we have seen a price rise across the board of approximately 20% which is claimed has been caused by increases in production and transportation costs.  While the initial response from me was simply they are trying to 'gouge' their customer base this changed to a realism that we all know shipping costs from China to the rest of the world have increased dramatically post pandemic and of course the days of 'sweat shop' wages in China are long gone and the workers are now demanding more realistic wages to improve their way of life as well as they are beginning to realise what people in other parts of the world doing similar jobs are earning.  It is also obvious that Hornby are not the only model maker in this market whose prices are rising rapidly year on year.

This could lead one to conclude that maybe these companies should consider the radical approach of moving their production from China back to the UK as this would allow them to improve the development cycle as designers could work with the manufacturing team in the same building rather than having to wait ages for production samples to get shipped half way round the world, only to have to modify it and then wait for the next sample, etc...

However I don't think this would solve the entire problem as one of the issues about the pricing is that each new release is getting more and more detailed, thus taking far longer to design and manufacture as well as costing more in assembly etc...  One of the mitigations Hornby tried in recent years was to divide their range into two distinct lines, "Railways" which is effectively the latest and greatest high detail models and "Railroad" which are models based on older pre-existing tooling which have less detail and separately fitted parts and which are therefore cheaper to manufacture.  However as the years progress they seem to be slowly phasing out the cheaper "Railroad" range as it is probably taking sales away from their more expensive "Railway" offerings.  The thing I don't think they have realised is that these lost sales of the more expensive models are probably already lost for a number of reasons.  Firstly the prices are now at the point that nobody apart from the very rich can buy as many of these new "Railway" range models as they would like.  Secondly although the "Railway" models are stunningly beautiful to look at they are also relatively fragile in comparison to their "Railroad" cousins.  So if you actually want to run (or should that be "play with") your trains the expensive "Railway" models can get damaged pretty easily as all these extra added detail components are often very small and fragile and open to damage if the model is handled too much.  Thirdly when they decided to re-use the old machine tools for the cheaper "Railroad" range, being Hornby they did actually go to the effort of improving the mechanical running parts in line with more modern models and of course although lacking some of the detail parts they still apply a much better quality level of decoration to this cheaper range.  This makes it sometimes difficult to tell the two ranges apart at a glance and you only find out which is which by looking closely at the detail levels.  Finally the "Railroad" models not having all these individually added parts are ideal to be used on a working layout or to be used by your kids.

I should point out here that this issue is not one facing only Hornby, all of the major UK manufacturers such as Bachmann, Dapol, etc... are also constantly increasing their prices dramatically.  But unlike Hornby most of them only have the one main range containing beautiful but expensive models.

Anyway to give you a clue as to what I mean about these price increases and the effect it is having on the hobby let me give you some examples of price changes over maybe the last 10 or so years.

A small 0-4-0 loco, ideal for kiddies would not so long ago have cost maybe £20, not exactly pocket money back then, but the kids could if determined quickly save to buy one or could have one as a special treat or a birthday gift.  Now a similar type loco is priced at around £50 which makes even an adult think twice rather than just make a snap purchase.

Yesterday I noticed the latest version of a Bachmann class J83 0-6-0 loco (affectionately they are known as 'Jintys') is now priced at £129 - I remember when you could buy the same class of model for £30!!

Pacific class locos or more realistically any 4-6-0 configuration steam tender locos which used to hover just below the £100 mark are now well around £230 each, if you want a DCC fitted or god forbid a sound enabled DCC version you could be looking at anywhere between £300-350 each.  That of course is just for the standard releases, anything that is a numbered limited edition have prices that can be massively more than that.

Train Packs - typically a loco + either a couple of matching coaches or a rake of wagons to make a specific type of train or a named train service used to come in at around £130, which compared to buying the loco and rolling stock separately was relatively good value and saved you having to hunt for specific rolling stock to go with a loco.  These are now priced typically around £300 or more.  One recent release for example was the Hornby version of the latest Hitachi high speed passenger train, this is a 5 car set, one powered car, three passenger cars and a dummy car.  While it is nice it is priced at around £450 - who can afford that as a casual purchase?!?

Even standard rolling stock is getting silly, £20+ for a single tank wagon, £15+ for a simple open wagon or box car, coaches at £50+ each!!  The point is that these prices are rapidly making the hobby inaccessible to youngsters even if granddad tries to get them interested by buying them a starter train set for Christmas as the days of granddad or dad taking the kid to the local model store to add a new piece of rolling stock, a building or other accessory is becoming a once in a while event rather than something that can be weekly spend of pocket money (maybe topped up) or even a monthly trip.  This leads to loss of interest in the kid who likes to see his train set growing and instead leads to boredom as he doesn't have anything new to add and play with.  Ultimately this could mean the end of the hobby as if you can't get new blood into the hobby eventually the current generations of collectors and modellers will eventually pass away and where does this leave the manufacturers?

My solution to this sad state of affairs is to turn increasingly to the 'pre-used' market.  While I love the new models and will when I can afford them buy them I find myself having to be increasingly choosy about what I buy to add to my collection hence why you may have notice most of my new stuff these days tend to be unusual or rare items that have simply never been made in the past.  Instead I'm happy to buy models from say 10-20 years ago as the level of detail on those is plenty good enough for a working layout (which is my ultimate aim) and yet can be picked up at much lower prices.  You also are not sacrificing much either as the mechanisms from that era are generally pretty close to what we have offered to us in new models and often you can find models that were purchased by collectors purely for display.  Which means they are often pristine and so long as you are confident enough to open them up and clean/service/lubricate them before use you will often end up with effectively an unused or only test run model which is nearly as good as the current ones, but just missing the latest detail levels which I've already discussed the plus and minus points of.  I'm also using it as a source of items to give to my nephew in order to feed his growing interest in trains and modelling.  Sure at this point he is only really at the 'play' stage, but he is quickly becoming hooked and wants to expand his collection.  This is far more affordable as I can often find good models at very reasonable prices which for me keeps the hobby alive.

So the question is what is your view?  Do you do the same and dip into the used market or are you considering or even got to the point you have given up the hobby as it is simply becoming too expensive..?

That is one of the reasons why I collect plarail/tomy/trackmaster trains.  I did look into collecting HO train when I first start my "train" hobby.  Like you said, the rollng stocks and engines are quite expensive and not to mention it can get extremely complex when you have to install wires here and there.  I already have a headache just to install EZ Bachmann tracks.  

If you are into model trains, I would only buy used rolling stocks and not engines.  Rolling stocks are easy to fix.  Engines on the other hand requires a lot of skills like soldering and parts replacement.  The drawback of the used market is that you may have to acquire more than what you need as the market place may want to sell their items in lots as oppose to individually.    I wouldn't bother to repair trackmaster/tomy tender engines (the ones where there is a wire connected from the firebox to the tender). 

If you are still young, don't spent too much money on model trains as you may lose interests down the road.  I initially started my train hobby with wooden railway and then I move to battery operated trains.

Maybe most OO railway enthusiasts are primarily modellers rather than collectors, preferring to concentrate on their layouts rather than amass new items as they are released?  I'm not sure how this impacts the discussion, it's just an observation.

Another thing that comes to mind is that as well as the online market for second-hand model railway goods, there's the actual physical 'fairs' with real traders and heaps of goods to tempt you, for example these. I love going to these. Although I almost never find any BPT stuff, I always come away with a bunch of things for conversion projects, and even for the OO layout that I might build sometime in the dwindling number of years I have left.

To be honest, I fully agree with Nigels. Often here in Australia, an average new release steam locomotive costs $300+, The bachmann class 117 sells for between $496.95 and $659.95, while an Auscision 280HP walker railcar (which, may I add is something you can see in action without having to go to another country) for $400. Yes, the walker is shorter but the difference shouldn't be almost $100, the Bachmann class 158 is $80 more despite also being a 2 car unit.

Maybe most OO railway enthusiasts are primarily modellers rather than collectors, preferring to concentrate on their layouts rather than amass new items as they are released?  I'm not sure how this impacts the discussion, it's just an observation.

Another thing that comes to mind is that as well as the online market for second-hand model railway goods, there's the actual physical 'fairs' with real traders and heaps of goods to tempt you, for example these. I love going to these. Although I almost never find any BPT stuff, I always come away with a bunch of things for conversion projects, and even for the OO layout that I might build sometime in the dwindling number of years I have left.

That's a valid point about modellers, but at the same time a lot of those modellers wouldn't use ready to run models anyway, they are the type who will either scratch build their loco's and rolling stock or make them from these white metal or brass kits because they have 5 more rivets and therefore are more accurate

I know what you mean about shows and fairs as a few years back I visited a fair at the bluebell railway and I used to be a regular to the Brighton model engineering exhibition which always used to have a healthy number of trade stands as well.  But as I'm sure you're as painfully aware as me those events have just not been on during the pandemic years, although there are signs of some coming back this year - so long as nothing else happens.

The point I was getting at really though was if the manufacturers want to keep shifting stock and making money they really should consider two tier models, the expensive rivet accurate models for the collectors who tend to just put them in a glass cabinet and then less detailed robust models for those who want to use them on a layout, but who are not so precious about the fact the wheels are 1mm too large to be truly to scale etc...

Regardless though, the price increases are one of my major concerns as if I buy a loco I like to have some suitable rolling stock to go with it that would be prototypical.  But it is just becoming unrealistic to do that and increasingly I tend to find myself contenting myself with carriages that just look nice rather than being correct for example.  Also the prices are like petrol prices, every opportunity they go up, but then when costs do eventually drop the prices don't...

That is one of the reasons why I collect plarail/tomy/trackmaster trains.  I did look into collecting HO train when I first start my "train" hobby.  Like you said, the rollng stocks and engines are quite expensive and not to mention it can get extremely complex when you have to install wires here and there.  I already have a headache just to install EZ Bachmann tracks.  

If you are into model trains, I would only buy used rolling stocks and not engines.  Rolling stocks are easy to fix.  Engines on the other hand requires a lot of skills like soldering and parts replacement.  The drawback of the used market is that you may have to acquire more than what you need as the market place may want to sell their items in lots as oppose to individually.    I wouldn't bother to repair trackmaster/tomy tender engines (the ones where there is a wire connected from the firebox to the tender). 

If you are still young, don't spent too much money on model trains as you may lose interests down the road.  I initially started my train hobby with wooden railway and then I move to battery operated trains.

I totally take your point and to be fair this is primarily a PlaRail site.  But the one good thing about HO/OO scale models is if you do invest in them you are very unlikely to lose your money.  If anything you will likely find if you come to sell them you are likely to get as much if not more than you paid for them new so long as they are in good condition and working order.  The continual price rises being what they are you could often probably make more money investing in these models than you would earn by leaving your cash in a high interest savings account or similar.  There was an example of this when 'Black Friday' hit the money markets some years back.  In the 3 years between the crash and recovery they reckon if you invested your money wisely on the stock market and made no mistakes over that 3 years you could have earned around 20% increase of your capital.  However during that same period if you had invested the same money in Lego sets and kept them sealed/pristine and sold them 3 years later your capital growth would have been 50% plus due to the collectors market and constant lego price increases and range cycling.  Well these days HO/OO models trains are pretty much in that same bracket, if 5 years ago you had bought the right models at say £100, now you can probably sell the same ones at £200 due to the new versions now being priced at £250-300.

A classic example of this market are the Limited Edition Hornby Dublo models that Hornby released to celebrate their 100th anniversary in 2020.  They were stunning models made with fully diecast chassis and bodies like the original ancient Dublo models from the 50's but to higher levels of precision and detail.  They proved so popular that they have continued to add to that range year on year (there are 4 models coming this year for example).  I managed to get hold of one of the Merchant Navy 'Elder Fyfes' models at the end of last year, like all of these releases these are limited to 500 models of each release.  At the time it cost me £235 which was a big price in my opinion, but I just wanted one of these.  Now these trade on eBay at between £400 and £450 each - so if I wanted to make a quick buck I could almost double my investment by selling a model I only bought about 3 months ago.

But this sort of thing is not limited to just the limited edition models, it seems that many normal models are only single runs of the model in each particular livery.  As you may have noticed I posted about the Hornby W1 'hush-hush' I managed to get on pre-order.  Again that was quite expensive, £180 or thereabouts for a normal non-limited edition model.  But it sold out in days and they have since changed hands on eBay at silly prices, one was seen to sell at £890!!  Why?  Because the first version was made in a special prototype grey livery.  The market has cooled down a little since the height as there have now been other versions released in other liveries including another in the grey livery, albeit a different variant.  So the first model is now down to a little more reasonable £280 or thereabouts.  But that is still £100 more than I paid for mine...

The sad thing is this sort of speculation is destroying the market for collectors who also want to run the locos as they simply can't get them unless they pre-order them which then encourages the manufacturers to keep pushing the price point up to a breaking point.  I should of course make it clear this is all manufacturers not just Hornby, I was just using those as an example as they are models I picked up.

My personal opinion on this matter is maybe to just not buy the new models, maybe that way Hornby will see sense and decrease the prices, I myself like to buy the old Hornby Railways stuff from the 80's as it is quite reliable and can be picked up for some pretty cheap prices if you look carefully, though it's not up to me to decide what you do

Nigels, do you subscribe to any mainstream OO/HO model railway newsgroups, forums, etc.?
Are there similar conversations happening there?

[Super]

Well...with soaring prices with any products...so goes the prices in the used Markets where there is a much better chance to get gouged.

... maybe that way Hornby will see sense and decrease the prices...

I wonder if you've had a look to see how profitable Hornby PLC is? 

Take a look at the Wikipedia entry for Hornby Railways.  There's a reasonably up-to-date summary of their financial position at the bottom of the section titled 'Financial troubles, PAM takeover'.

There does appear to be some light at the end of the tunnel in the form of an upsurge of interest resulting from the lockdowns of the last couple of years, but whether that will be sustained into the future is questionable.

British toy companies have a long history of going bust after a few years, then being bought and re-launched by someone who thinks they can turn them around with a new business model. Mostly it doesn't work.