Old happy memories, and the sad demise of Hobby stores....

[Hibernaculum]

G'day,

First proper post in a fair while. As usual, I thought I'd start a philosophical/nostalgic topic rambling about "why we love the hobby", as opposed to all the usual nuts-and-bolts technical stuff.    Please excuse the length if you're all in a hurry. (Best if you grab a cup of coffee and settle in)....

I know there have been discussions here in the past about whether the R/C hobby is dying. And topics about the quality of service at Hobby Stores. So this sort of falls in between...

What about the health of the Hobby Store industry? And will we miss Hobby Stores, if they ever disappear completely?

Last weekend, I visited two old Hobby related stores. One an actual Hobby shop, the other more of a model car/plastic kit shop. And before anyone howls me down with the distinctions between these two (which I personally feel should not be so sharply divided, but I digress!), I'll just point out that against the backdrop of hundreds of other types of shops (picture your average shopping mall), these two kinds of shops are more closely connected than ever. If for no other reason than they are both starting to look like relics of a bygone era.

It was the first time I had visited either of these particular shops in several years. Both were once leaders in their respective areas, and very good stockists. Both stores were large and filled with interesting things, and both seemed to have stood the test of time remaining unchanged for many years.

I expected this latest visit to find them just as they had always been.

But I was clearly naive. It turned out that both stores are now about a third the size they used to be.

The model car store seems to have suffered the worst - moving from the nicer end of town in recent years, to the rubbish end. It looked very out of place now - teetering on the edge of a construction zone, sandwiched between a dozen scrappy Chinese take aways, mobile phone hucksters and "money lent!" pawn shops. You could hardly imagine a more inappropriate location, given the kind of customers they expect.

The owners of this store had originally had two shops in two different suburbs. But the smaller one had been closed down a few years ago, and they had pooled all their stock into the remaining one. Which itself, has now shrunk to a tiny size.

As for the Hobby Store, it had seemingly had a wall inserted inside, splitting it down the middle with half of the shop space being sold off to someone else. Yet the newly created adjacent store was empty and up for lease. So again, I got the impression that things had been downsized to save money.

There's an old philosophy that I think has kept many Hobby Stores alive for years: "If customers need us, they'll find us".

But what will they find?

The past 10 years feel like they've gone by quite fast. They haven't, of course. (Perhaps it's old age kicking in But since this is the decade in which I've done the bulk of my Tamiya collecting, I can clearly see some big changes. My visit over the weekend was only the latest disappointment in what appears to be a steady trend.

10 years ago, I recall that there were about 12 Hobby stores within 2 hours drive of where I lived. Or at least, 12 that I knew of and used to visit from time to time.

Now, only 7 of those stores remain in business, and the rest have shut down. The closures included what I considered to be the very best Hobby shop of all - a shop that had existed for at least 20 years and was closed in 2002, after months of seemingly dwindling stock levels where it was painfully clear the business was dying.

Of those 7 remaining stores, 3 have moved to smaller premises, presumably to cut costs.

Was this a natural adjustment due to an oversupply of Hobby Stores, or will this trend continue indefinitely? When you look at the long term trends, is the same thing happening elsewhere?

For all the inflated prices, shoddy service, and lack of Tamiya stock that we complain about, it will be a truly sad day if Hobby Stores die out completely. It probably won't ever be a complete death. But if your nearest store ends up being hours away, how often will you stop by? I suspect in years to come, generations will look back and marvel at the peculiar convenience of Hobby stores....

"Really?? There used to be a Hobby Store in this State, Grandpa?? And they had Tamiya??

What's a Tamiya?"

At the beginning of the 1990s, I actually felt like I was a latecomer - finally old enough to earn my own money and buy up the Tamiya toys that I had largely missed out on in the 80s, but too late to find most of the great kits of the 80s as they were already gone from the shelves.

I tried to buy up vintage Tamiya spares and materials whereever I went, but I knew that what I was finding were essentially like the archaeological remnants of a lost era. So I turfed through bargain bins full of Sand Scorcher and Rough Rider tyres in boxes, going for $10 a box. I missed out on the last few NIB original Hornets. I passed up the chance to buy complete sets of Wild Willy tyres for $30. But at least I purchased probably Australia's last NIB Monster Beetle.

Wins and losses, but fun memories along the way.

Yet in contrast to how things are today, I feel really fortunate that I had the chance collect those remnants. It was good fun. You know the feeling you get when by chance you come across a vintage Tamiya car or part? I remember pulling $1 sets of Subaru brat and Frog decals out of a bin, and getting a little glow of contentment . People who aren't vintage R/C collectors must think we're nuts. But it really is a lot like kicking over gold nuggets in the ground.

These days, the goodies are all but gone. Obviously, that was inevitable. But to a degree, it seems that the culture and the venues are disappearing too. And back in the 90s, I must admit never saw that coming. I just assumed that Hobby Stores would always be around in healthy numbers, regardless of what brands or toys were popular in the future.

As Tamiya get into the spirit of nostalgia and bring back the old cars, it seems that in the intervening years the culture of the Hobby Store has died significantly. There are pressures on all sides now - the rise of the internet, the fall in overall R/C popularity, the rise of video games and other passtimes, and so on....

I know of one particular Hobby Store that is actually really tiny, yet has survived for something like 30 years. I know the owner, Peter, and (by an amazing coincidence) he also happened to know my fiance, before she and I had even met. One day we visited his little shop, and talked for ages  about how it was going. Peter talked openly about how times were a lot tougher than they used to be. He said he felt that the public were still interested in Hobbies, but they were just too distracted most of the time. He said "If I get someone to stand outside the shop and drive an R/C car up and down the mall, I'll immediately get 10 people in here asking about it.". But then he expressed dismay, because he said nowadays there was a real risk that if the car hit someone in the foot, they might take legal action. So the risks of performing such displays far outweighed the benefits to his business.

He went on to describe that he had once started an R/C yachting club on the nearby river, which had grown quite popular with local children. But the club was shut down when the local council demanded that he pay a huge insurance premium on the activities, in case of accident. It seemed to him that at every turn, his tiny Hobby shop was hitting a brick wall. Hobby related activities seem less visible, and less welcome, than ever before.

Despite all this, Peter still manages to employ one assistant. He sells a few things over the internet. He specialises in model plains and trains. And his store has even survived at least one armed holdup, where he and his assistant stood their ground against an intruder with a rifle.

There's a lot of dimensions to this subject, and there's no conclusive point to what I'm saying. I guess I'm just lamenting the loss of simpler, happier....less litigious times.

Remember those days back when we were kids, when it was exciting to visit Hobby Stores, and see all the great stuff they had high up on the shelves and in the cabinets? Didn't you just wish you could have it all....

I actually believe we collectors draw a lot of our inspiration from these early experiences. We probably owe something to Hobby stores. I know I do. In a way, this whole obsession with amassing collections of cars, parts and kits, is probably a reflection of Hobby Store memories. It's as though we're building our own little hobby stores inside our homes, as a way of reliving childhood memories or dreams of seeing collections of all those cool and exciting toys.

The only places I ever saw such collections, were Hobby stores.

And I still remember my very first visit to a Hobby store.

Dad and I had travelled by train to a larger suburb, to see the NeverEnding Story during the school holidays. It was only my second trip ever to a movie theatre, and I thought the movie was the most enthralling thing I'd ever seen. After the movie, we walked up the town to visit the Hobby store. I remember walking in and seeing the Frog, Hornet, Grasshopper etc high up on the shelf. I could only dream, and I knew such cars were too complicated for a 7 year old. I remember looking at the cabinets full of model trains, and then begging my Dad to buy me one of those tiny (but expensive) little HO scale cars to go with train sets (which he did). Later, I remember sitting with him on the platform waiting to catch the train home, and not being able to wait to take the little car out of the paper bag, just to look at it.

Such priceless memories, to me. I can't help feeling it'll be a shame if kids of the future miss out on similar experiences.

cheers,

H.

[Cul-Tech]

Wow thats a good thread dude.[]

Not sure why the demise in rc, when I was young most boys on the block

had one and we all drove together. In the neighborhood I now live in I

rarely see them, and most surprisingly when I take some of my various

runners out for a scoot the kids could care less.[:S]

Only time will tell........

Mike

[eek!]

Hibernaculum, I really enjoy your posts.  They are often so

thought-inducing and emotion-filled that they frequently remind me of

many things I too have experiened or wondered about this hobby. 

It's one of the things I like about LiveSteamMad and his showroom

writeups.  While some may think they are long (ok, maybe some are

a wee bit, but then heck so are some of mine! I'm with ya Alistair, all

the way![] ), the honesty and effort is appreciated.

I too have seen hobby shops close, to great dismay.  Even worse,

the dreaded downsizing.  I think this is the greater of two evils

as to me it's a slow-death and painful to watch.  Some of my most

cherished memories from early childhood were browsing the mom and pop

hobby stores and drooling over all those beautiful Tamiya's and

die-cast cars.  The best stores in my memories were those with

fully built Tamiya models sitting on glass counters near the register,

just within reach of my grubby fingers and huge ear-to-ear grin. 

Of course customer service was usually first rate at these smaller

stores and any questions I asked, a friendly clerk (usually the store

owner's family member) were happy to answer and even let me poke and

drool over their prize display model.  As a kid, this made me feel

special (unlike all those kids before me that also handled the car with

their grubby fingers[]).  Wow...those are great memories. 

Just throw in some late Seventies/early Eighties music, a shiny new Hilux 4X4 and I'm off

to the land of daydreaming.

I don't know if the disappearing hobby shop is necessarily due to the

R/C world shrinking or just changing.  My reasoning would be, I

work for a large HMO here in the states and if you replace "hobby

store" with "Dr's office" one would notice something similar. 

Small businesses often suffer this fate, but that doesn't mean those

customers (patients in my case) or providers (MD's, nurses etc) are

gone or even less in number.  What often happens of course, is

change.  In the case of my HMO or from a retail standpoint, say

Walmart (America's super brick and mortar store), the big guys gobble

up the little ones.  Or the little one's refuse to change and

disappear, or lastly they change and sell another product/service

sometimes becoming big guys themselves.

Regardless what happens or how it occurs, from my experiences I think

you are correct.  Many of those great, small hobby stores that lit

up my face as a child are gone now.  Some literally as there is

nothing left, the buildings themselves physically gone (sniff). 

Whatever memories I had are now only that, memories.  On a happier

note, I find new hobby shops opening.  While usually a chain store

(Hobby People aka Hobby Shack here in California) they are sometimes a

mom-and-pop store!  The guy I bought my third Hilux 4X4 from

opened his own hobby shop (to my amazement) and it is a runaway

success.  He changed his tastes however to keep up with the

times.  He sells some Tamiya, but his focus is primarily off-road

racing which means most of his stock is Associated, HPI, Traxxas etc.

and with his own track he is the premiere hangout for local R/C

racers.  I of course don't race nor am I interested in most of his

current stock but it reveals to me the pulse of R/C goes on, just to a

different beat.

Best,

[mr_pushrod]

It must also be remembered that financial constraints are to blame, recession and incresing prices of necessities will mean people have less to spend on leisure items.

[secretsg]

I think the successful pure hobby shops in the future will be the ones

who sells online and locally. There's 2 big local hobby shops doing

well but they're also involved in the online business. The other 2

local hobby shops who does not sell online has multiple locations in

the city but they diversify onto other products.

[theshopkeeper]

The internet and price disparity have more to do with it than anything else, in my opinion on hobbies.  In general though retail is b*****red due to the actions of the Superstores.

When I was first into this type of thing as a teenage (late 80's) although I sent off for odd price lists from Japan, where things were just as cheap then as they are today, there was no way of actually purcahsing these things without great difficulty.

This meant that stores worldwide could compete locally or nationally but not internationally.  This meant that if the cost of an item in the UK was higher than in Germany, 1 no one knew and 2 if they did know it didn't make a lot of difference.  I'm not defending this, it's just the way it was.

There is NO INCENTIVE now to open a hobby store in the UK (and I suspect most other countries) if the first 10 people through the store each day just tell you that they can get the goods cheaper than you can get them trade. This is not entirly down to greed of any importer or distributor - EC countries have higher land and tax costs than the US and vastly more than parts of the Far East. Many eBayers sell things at a loss or as a hobby and make no real money for themselves, but equally add another nail to the coffin of the stores selling their lines. No way around it to an extent.

As for Walmart (or ASDA as they are known in the UK and Tesco for that matter to a lesser extent) they are killing trade worldwide in a way that most who are not in retail will never notice. Example: I went to buy some shirts a few weeks back - a few years ago, I could go to all manner of UK stores and get a reasonable quality shirt for about £10 - I'm talking day-to-day here not dress suit - typically from C&A, Littlewoods, BHS etc, the sort of thing that would last a couple of years in general use without the collar losing it's colour and the buttons falling off. C&A and Littlewoods have effectively gone broke and closed in the UK.  BHS only have a very small menswear range now with huge gaps.  I spend two hours going round the shopping centre here (bear in mind it's a big place with over 200 stores).  End up with the choice of Tesco (£4 each or two for £9 - work that out - "every little helps" - their shareholders presumably) where I bought a couple, which are lousy quality, and with Primark which were £3 each and total carp. Or I could spend £20+ in one of the many sub-designer-but-overpriced outlets here.  The Supermarkets kill off the middle ground market, so the small shops that do survive (and many will survive, despite the hopes of Tesco/Asda) have to go up price and up market.

Sorry for the rant, but it really pees me off. I had the same problem buying a TV at Christmas and had to get one from Tesco too.  Really want to get some decent wearing, mid-price non-designer sweat shirts too and a new Sofa which isn't "half the price we made up five minutes ago" and actually available to be delivered when I want it - not six weeks later, but the outlook for that is pretty hopeless round here.

[DJTheo]

Hibernaculum, your post expresses many of my feelings. I also with pain watched all good old hobbyshops from my youth shut down, one after another, especially in the early 90s, when RC cars got a bit out of fashion and home computing, Virgin Megastores etc was the current "new thing" for the youth.

Weirdly most the ones which survived or opened after, somehow just don't do for me. They are too modern, bright, empty and full of cheap Asian stuff, I really am willing to pay till 30% more compared to Internet, but they have almost nothing nice or interesting in stock!

I really miss the great 80s hobby shops, with their little 14" TVs playing the Tamiya promo videos and me watching them over and over for hours, the wall with the now vintage spare parts, where with my pocket money I could get new tires for my Holiday Buggy, ah those were they days... Last summer I passed by at my small LHS from my youth in Greece (where I got my first 2 Tamiyas, HB and Hornet) and saw there a NIB Thunder Dragon. I am not a fan of this car and wasn't sure if to buy or keep it, but when the owner told me he was going to retire in 2 months, I bought and decided to keep it as a little memory of those great times.

As you say, hobby shops will never be big like back then, unless there is a big boom in our hobby, which I strongly doubt. Also internet doesn't make things easier for them, although clever shop owners sell parallely on internet too, I think in the long run the only way to survive.

@ Shopkeeper: You talk about higher prices in the EU due to higher taxes, which I agree, but still there a huge differences between EU countries themselves and this is mainly due to distributours high margin differences, but hopefully they will wake up one day before its too late.

Cheers

[Corpse Thrower]

Interesting you bring this up......today of all days!!

I went for a drive down to Niddrie today to see if I could find Orchards Hobbies where I bought my Sand Scorcher body and my Futaba Magnum 3 channel more than 20 years ago.....

Couldn't find it.[]

[AirBoston]

My $0.02:

I worked in a hobby store while in High School in the late '80s. It was a great place to be at that age. We were in a mall located just across from the food court. After work a bunch os us would go out to the parking lot and run-what-we-brung. By-standers would sometimes come into the store the next day to talk to us, that would lead to sales. Sometimes, I would even let a kid try my cars. This store was know in the Boston area to be high priced, but we still sold some RC stuff, and lots of train and plastic models. We were told to always have the TV/VCR running to promote the hobbies. When things were slow, the employees would work on their own models and that would generate even more business. Things were good.

There are now NO local shops here. There is now no place to go get help or brows the new stuff. In my opinion, the internet pricing wars closed the local guys for good. Without the local guys, the hobby will die a slow death. How can you get someone to drop $300(usd) if theve never seen first hand what these "toys" can do. Strangers to the hobby see all RC as equal. Why spend big money on hobby quality stuff when you can get a 1/6 scale monster at Toys-R-Us for under $100 (usd).

Case in point, a new hobby store open up in my town a few years ago. I went to check things out and walked away with a new interest in RC planes, electric flight to be exact. Why is this? Because one employee was flying his newly hopped up Zero in the parking lot. Unfortunetly, the store closed before Christmas. I'm told it was due to lack of street viewed signage. Because this was a large chain store, the prices were close to that on the internet.

Internet = Low prices

Low prices = tough compitition

Tough Compitition = Closed local stores

Closed local stores = death for RC and some other hands on hobbies

To have kids involved in computer games is bad for society in so many ways. Limited to gaming is also bad for todays kids. This leads to a "pay others to do things for you" society. The RC hobby helped me to develop mechanical skills. Because I could tear apart and rebuild my "toys", I figured I could to the same with my vintage Porsche. Shoot, a bearing is a bearing; you just need bigger tools.

Ok, I'm done. If you read my ramblings, thank you.

[mobias]

I think Ebay pays a huge part in things. I'm all for supporting my local hoby store and try my best to buy small things from them when I can but there is no way I'd actually buy a NIB car from them. I just bought my NIB TXT from a German Ebay hobby store - £209. Wonderland Hobbies here in Edinburgh -£400 for the same kit (when they last stocked it) Its almost half the price, there is no way Wonderland can compete with that price but there is no way I'm going to miss out on a bargain. Thats the bottom line and all LHS are up against it.

Ebay has single handedly fueled Tamiya's recent rebirth in RC but no one accept Ebay (and Tamiya of course) has made much of the profit.

Its just an unfortunate fact of modern living that more and more of us are spending our well earned money online where everything is cheaper.

[DJTheo]

I personally don't see this evolution so unfortunate, business isn't getting less, just changing, people were also against the steam machine revolution, thinking it would make everyone unemployed. If you look in the human history it was always like that, some professions were becoming obsolete and new ones were born, humans always had to and managed to adapt. Also online shopping has many advantages, look at the variety of stuff you can get, before you were limited only to products supported by your LHS or distributed to your country, also service and availability are great, as most know before you needed often to beg several times at your LHS to order a part for you and wait for months. Lets not become pessimists that "everything was better back in the good ol' days", it wasn't, its just that human memory just filters out the bad things, so we tend to remember only the good ones.

Cheers

[Hibernaculum]

A lot of great replies, guys. Thanks for the discussion!

Following on from Theo's last point about positivity vs negativity - this aspect is quite true as well. The Internet and eBay may have played a role in the demise of many hobby stores, but from a consumer point of view they have given us access to a world of vintage cars and parts the likes of which I could hardly dream about as recently as 1996.

It's a strange twist of fate that the end of the "vintage era" of Tamiya, and the disappearance of most kits and parts from hobby stores during the early to mid 1990s, coincided with the rise of the Internet. Two completely unrelated disciplines - yet one gradually seemed to take the place of the other. Hobby Stores were running of interesting vintage stock in the mid 1990s, and eBay didn't really catch on with the public until about 1998/1999. In between I do recall there being a period that I refer to as the "dark years" - pre-Internet time when I could hardly find any vintage parts anywhere, yet the Internet was still too young to help out.

But imagine if the Internet had not started at all? Hobby stores would still be less interesting now than they were in the 1980s (from a vintage point of view) as their old stock disappeared. In that hypothetical world, no matter how we managed to source our vintage materials, we would never have access to as much stuff as we do today via the Internet.

The Internet does lack one thing though, and that's the real-life experience. Which would you rather? Walking into Hobby Store and finding a bargain hidden on the top shelf, or buying it on-line?

There's something to be said for the fun of actually being there when you find some great piece of R/C memorabilia. Buying things on-line is fun too, but it's less personal.

cheers,

H.

[Tamiya King]

You have written such a great piece, that it would probably take me an hour to respond properly to it, but I will just sum it up in one word..........WOW!

You have caught my exact feelings when I read that, and I am sure many others feel the same.

My first Hobby Store was back in Gettysburg Pennsylvania (USA) where I was born and raised. It was called Gilbert's Hobbyshop. They had a big store in town and I remember the old wood creeky floors they had inside. It gave the store a distinct smell too.

They had a whole wall full of models on the one side. From the floor to the ceiling. The other side was a wall full of Trains. Kits and individual cars and engines. I remember looking at the O scale (Big Boys) and only dreaming of having a set. (Now I Do) In the front window they had a very nice 4'x8' HO set up. I used to spend hours there watching the display. I made such good friends with Mike, a guy that worked there, that he would once in awhile let me come behind the counter and run the trains. (I collected N scale at the time).

In between these walls of models and trains were shelves of train buildings and accessories and of course the RC cars. I remember looking at the boxes of Frogs, Hornets, Grasshoppers, Monster Beetles, Blackfoots, and Hotshots and so on. Even several models of Marui. My first purchase from them was a Tamiya Striker. I loved that car and it was my choice as it was the cheapest buggy I could find. I later purchased a Marui CJ-7 from them and later traded my Striker in for a Bolink Round Tracker (Sprint Car).

Gilbert's Hobby was not just a store to me, it was my after school and weekend hang out. It became a part of my life and everyone knew me and welcomed me to hang out when coming over. But after a few hard years, they ended up moving stores acrossed town. Now it ended up being a bike ride for me vice a walk. They got rid of the RC cars and only sold Trains mostly and a few models. BUt the store was more open and they built some huge Train displays.

My Mom is the Assist. Vice President of the local Bank there, and Gilberts Son who now runs the shop was in the bank the other day. My Mom said she talked to him and after all these years he still remembers me. So when my family and I go home for 4th of July I am taking them into Gilberts to meet him and share some old memories. I am even thinking of taking my Striker I have now back home with me just to show him what a big impact his store was on my life and how this wonderful hobby has been past onto my daughters. I will take pictures of his shop and post them when I get home. If his displays are still anything like they were back then, they will be breath taking.

Cheers and thank you for listening to me babble on and thanks for the great start of this thread! Always good to bring back such great memories from the past!

[Old Busted Hotness]

Another view from behind the counter:

Getting people in the door is hard, but once word gets out of a good shop, customers will come back. Getting them to spend their money is easy, sometimes too easy. We have a customer who ordered a second HPI Baja 5B (the 5th scale gasoline buggy) before he'd even picked up his first one. AND, he paid for the thing two months in advance.

The hard part, as has been noted, is making any kind of profit. Margins on the big-ticket items (like the Baja) are disgustingly low, especially considering the amounts the owner has to pay out. And in a low month, if nobody buys a T-Maxx, you've got several thousand dollars sitting on the shelf collecting dust. But if you only have one in stock, sure enough you'll get a customer who wants two, today.

There are still a few stores that sell car & truck RTR's at MSRP. As in, $290 for the same electric Rustler you can buy online (or in our shop) for $155. They don't sell too many of them.

Tamiya's decline (if there really is one; I think it's more of a market shift) is due to the enormous popularity of Ready To Run (or as I secretly refer to it, Ready To Ruin), the no-attention-span required approach to RC. Buy it, run it, wreck it, bring it back and demand a full refund because you hit a tree at 40 mph during the first break-in tank. How many vintage Tamiyas got treated this way? Damned few, because when you spend a day building something you develop some respect for the thing, and for the man who designed it. Ready To Ruin strips that away. But frankly, many of the RTR customers are so self-absorbed they wouldn't know the meaning of respect anyway.

Tamiya, once the dominant name in RC, is now seen as a footnote, but are they really? What other company has Tamiya's range of product? Literally something for everyone, from the Wild Ceptor to the TRF415 touring car to the Knight Hauler, in addition to the usual buggies and stadium trucks. Tamiya is a giant, and their products stand as classics. I know scaleart.de might make a better scale semi-truck replica than my Knight Hauler, but it's also $2,800. And ten years from now, I'll be able to get parts for the Knight at any Tamiya dealer on the planet (and there's a fair few of them).

So I'm not shedding any tears that Big T has moved upmarket. They've remained true to the customers who made them what they are: the builders, not the whiny RTR types.

As to old shops, I remember riding my bike 10 miles (past K-Mart, past the mall) to get to Hobbyland, a great shop that's been open since 1959 and is still around, for plastic models. The shopping center they're in is dying, but Hobbyland is still there. Now I've moved to another city, (and work in another LHS) but there's another old shop near my home; a plastic-model shop, open since 1962. This one is a fabulous dump, models stacked to the ceiling, dust everywhere, badly in need of paint, half the Testors rack are vintage colors (or old Pactra bottles) and the aisles are wide enough for .75 people at a time. I hope they never close the place.

As a side note to that, when's the last time a kid today rode a bike 10 miles each way for anything?

[TamiyaMan]

Personally I'd just like to see Tamiya America put more effort into their website and allow absolutely everything to be purchased (and backordered) directly from them over the internet.

[DJTheo]

Excellent posts guys, couldn't agree more, keep them coming! [H]

Cheers

[Incredible_Serious]

Another view from behind the counter:

Getting people in the door is hard, but once word gets out of a good shop, customers will come back. Getting them to spend their money is easy, sometimes too easy. We have a customer who ordered a second HPI Baja 5B (the 5th scale gasoline buggy) before he'd even picked up his first one. AND, he paid for the thing two months in advance.

The hard part, as has been noted, is making any kind of profit. Margins on the big-ticket items (like the Baja) are disgustingly low, especially considering the amounts the owner has to pay out. And in a low month, if nobody buys a T-Maxx, you've got several thousand dollars sitting on the shelf collecting dust. But if you only have one in stock, sure enough you'll get a customer who wants two, today.

There are still a few stores that sell car & truck RTR's at MSRP. As in, $290 for the same electric Rustler you can buy online (or in our shop) for $155. They don't sell too many of them.

Tamiya's decline (if there really is one; I think it's more of a market shift) is due to the enormous popularity of Ready To Run (or as I secretly refer to it, Ready To Ruin), the no-attention-span required approach to RC. Buy it, run it, wreck it, bring it back and demand a full refund because you hit a tree at 40 mph during the first break-in tank. How many vintage Tamiyas got treated this way? Damned few, because when you spend a day building something you develop some respect for the thing, and for the man who designed it. Ready To Ruin strips that away. But frankly, many of the RTR customers are so self-absorbed they wouldn't know the meaning of respect anyway.

Tamiya, once the dominant name in RC, is now seen as a footnote, but are they really? What other company has Tamiya's range of product? Literally something for everyone, from the Wild Ceptor to the TRF415 touring car to the Knight Hauler, in addition to the usual buggies and stadium trucks. Tamiya is a giant, and their products stand as classics. I know scaleart.de might make a better scale semi-truck replica than my Knight Hauler, but it's also $2,800. And ten years from now, I'll be able to get parts for the Knight at any Tamiya dealer on the planet (and there's a fair few of them).

So I'm not shedding any tears that Big T has moved upmarket. They've remained true to the customers who made them what they are: the builders, not the whiny RTR types.

As to old shops, I remember riding my bike 10 miles (past K-Mart, past the mall) to get to Hobbyland, a great shop that's been open since 1959 and is still around, for plastic models. The shopping center they're in is dying, but Hobbyland is still there. Now I've moved to another city, (and work in another LHS) but there's another old shop near my home; a plastic-model shop, open since 1962. This one is a fabulous dump, models stacked to the ceiling, dust everywhere, badly in need of paint, half the Testors rack are vintage colors (or old Pactra bottles) and the aisles are wide enough for .75 people at a time. I hope they never close the place.

As a side note to that, when's the last time a kid today rode a bike 10 miles each way for anything?

 

AMEN Brother...

[Mad Ax]

This is really interesting reading, given that I've just got back into RC cars after about 8 years off...

I used to spend hours in Bath Model Shop during the early 90s.  It

was a tiny building, the windows piled high with boxes of tamiya cars,

die-cast trucks, yachts, train sets, and inside it was a dark, dingy

treasure cave.  No light filtered in past the window displays, and

the strip-lights overhead did little to illuminate.

The guys who ran the place were really friendly, and would tolerate me

standing around for hours gaping at the high-stacked boxes of Tamiya

and Airfix, fully-built RC planes hanging from the ceiling, train sets

and soldiers and sheets of balsa and landscaping material stacked all

over.

The last time I used them was around 1996 or 97, when I had a weekend

job and earned enough to by myself a NIB Kyosho Sandmaster.  My

obsession with it lasted barely a few weeks before it destroyed itself,

and I gave up RC cars.  The shop was much the same at that time as

it was back in 1990 when I first stepped inside.

It seemed that around 1999 there was an explosion in nitro cars here in

the UK, with every other local lad rushing off and buying one. 

Maybe this was prompted by the internet, or perhaps the sudden

popularity in touring car racing - most nitros here were touring

replicas.

Nowadays, places like Halfords (a major motor factor chain) sell a

large number of RC kits - mostly touring cars or stadium trucks. 

Not Tamiya, tho.  Ebay and other internet sites deal RC stuff

cheaper than stores can manage.

Fast-forward to a month ago, when a colleague was talking to me about

the fun of building RC aircraft.  I remembered my days of building

and maintaining Tamiya cars, and decided to pop down to Bath Model Shop

to have a look around.  Imagine my surprise when I saw the

Midnight Pumpkin - my all-time favourite, always wanted but could never

afford - in the shop window!

The shop has changed loads in the last 10 years.  The windows are

still piled with boxes, but the lights inside are brighter, and the

stock has been re-arranged into tidy displays rather than piled

randomly in huge teetering stacks.  The old dusty desks covered

with stock and paperwork and bits of kits are gone, now replaced with

clean glass display cases arranged in tidy perfection.

Gone is the magic of the old shop - and with it, most of the appeal to

young kids who like to lose themselves among such treasure troves, but

now the shop has a greature appeal to adult enthusiasts.  It no

longer looks like a dusty old library for kids and old guys with suede

elbow patches on their jackets - being a hobbyist no longer means being

a boring old guy painting Spitfires, now it's cool for anyone to be a

hobbyist.

I think it's a good sign that the shop has changed to suit the new

market.  Kids don't want RC cars any more - I mean, what

self-respecting 13yo would stand outside in the sunshine with a Tamiya

when he's got Nintendo, Playstation, X-Box, 44 Gigabit ultra-wide 5.1

digital surround sound streaming porn..?  Adults, however - with

time to spare and money to spend - like me, remembering my childhood -

are getting back into the challenge.

For what it's worth, I know I can get some stuff cheaper off the web

than I can from the shop, but I still use the shop for pretty much

everything I need as a payment for the help, advice and friendship that

they've given me over the past few weeks while I get back into the

swing of things

[eek!]

This one is a fabulous dump, models stacked to the ceiling, dust everywhere, badly in need of paint, half the Testors rack are vintage colors (or old Pactra bottles) and the aisles are wide enough for .75 people at a time. I hope they never close the place.

Mad Ax quoted: 

It was a tiny building, the windows piled high with boxes of tamiya cars, die-cast trucks, yachts, train sets, and inside it was a dark, dingy treasure cave.  No light filtered in past the window displays, and the strip-lights overhead did little to illuminate.

 

I love these kinds of shops.!  Aisles so narrow if you turn around quickly you could end up knocking off a kit with your elbow.  Shelves that look like they were stocked by a teenager with ADD.  Piles of kits and boxes stacked to the ceiling and even the shopowner doesn't know what's in them....sigh.  Do I smell (snifffffff)...a vintage Tamiya in there?[]

 

Best,

[Mad Ax]

I love these kinds of shops.!  Aisles so narrow

if you turn around quickly you could end up knocking off a kit with

your elbow.  Shelves that look like they were stocked by a

teenager with ADD.  Piles of kits and boxes stacked to the ceiling

and even the shopowner doesn't know what's in them....sigh.  Do I

smell (snifffffff)...a vintage Tamiya in there?[]

Aah, sweet nostalgic memories [] Kinda puts me in mind of the type of shop you'd expect Harry Potter to visit

Incidentally, I popped in the shop yesterday to check the book price on

a chrome pumpkin, and although it's a lot lighter and tidier than it

always was, it was no better ventilated.  We're having somewhat of

a heatwave in Bath at the moment, and there was sweat running down our

faces as I stood chatting to the shopkeeper.

After 10 minutes we could bear it no more, and stepping outside into the cool breeze of the street was like being reborn []

[DJTheo]

Ah yes, love and miss those shops, remember the little shop of the Greek Tamiya importer, 2 tiny floors (each propably only 15m²) but full of Tamiya kits, remember the old coloured bodyset boxes stacked over each other and the Sand Scocher "Now in Stock" poster at the front door, a memory I will never forget...

Cheers

[eek!]

Stop Theo your starting to make me cry!![:'(]  I'm sure glad TC

and you "vintage" guys are here (still weeping), good therapy in my

opinion[].

My best friend probably thinks I'm crazy anyway to get emotional over 20 year old model cars.

Best,

[akemag]

Slightly?!? off topic but anyway...It´s funny, or scary perhaps. But i´ve had a reoccuring  dream about a hobbystore that has mostly old modelkits of all kinds stacked to the roof. It´s only ordinary kits and no r/c, perhaps since i collected older kits before i came back into r/c. This store, even though it has been located in different places in my dreams, is the same inside. And sometimes i have wondered if they really were dreams when i wake up, since they haved been so vivid. A real dream hobby store! (well, when i think of it, thats just what it is LOL)

But now it would be more fun to dream about a store with Scorchers, Hilux and 934:s stacked from bottom to top.

[Snake Plissken]

Slightly?!? off topic but anyway...It´s funny, or scary perhaps. But i´ve had a reoccuring  dream about a hobbystore that has mostly old modelkits of all kinds stacked to the roof. It´s only ordinary kits and no r/c, perhaps since i collected older kits before i came back into r/c. This store, even though it has been located in different places in my dreams, is the same inside. And sometimes i have wondered if they really were dreams when i wake up, since they haved been so vivid. A real dream hobby store! (well, when i think of it, thats just what it is LOL)

But now it would be more fun to dream about a store with Scorchers, Hilux and 934:s stacked from bottom to top.

thats scary as I have a similar dream of a local hobby shop that sells used rc cars including all that classic ones: modified frogs, hotshots and the likes. I guess my subconcious works overtime...

[DJTheo]

Very correct, our subconsiousness works overtime, I also dreamed few times a LHS and warehouse with many vintage kits, even Tamiya presenting a new 3 speed almost one year ago.

Cheers