Interesting video of the Piko production line, including some ‘G’ scale construction and pad printing. Seems to be totally female workforce!
Maybe they just couldn’t get men to quit playing with the choo-choos long enough to build them?
Women are more careful with small pieces of trainset, it seems.
Cue a little war story…
Back in the early 1980’s, I was a member of the British Military liaison mission to the Group of Soviet forces in Germany - the former DDR. Out on a ‘liaise’ one day in late november, we had broken down not too far from Dresden, but a long way from civilisation. There was, however, a large house along the track about a mile or so, and after pushing the car as far as we could - there were three of us on a tour - I was volunteered to go and make contact. The reason for this was simple, I spoke German, Russian and English, the tour officer only Russian and English and the driver only Geordie.
I knocked on the door of this large house and after a couple of minutes it was opened by a very distinguished-looking lady in her sixties, I’d guess. Standing a good distance away from her to avoid causing any distress at the sight of a British Army uniform, I explained that if possible, I would like to be able to use her telephone to ‘phone home’ and arrange a vehicle recovery. To my surrpise, she responded in near-perfect English, and gladly agreed to let me use the telephone in the hallway. Meanwile, her husband arrived, and after making our introductions, invited me into the house. I had to refuse, after all, we were not supposed to fraternise with the local population, but he pointed out that there was nobody about within three kilometers and I could stand in the hallway if I felt uncomfortable about it, and chat through the open door of the main room while his wife made me a coffee.
So that is what I did.
After making the call, and giving them a written explanation of the circumstances of our predicament in case anybody ever asked about it [phones were tapped 24/7 in the DDR in those days], I watched what the pair of them were doing in their evening.
One sat on each side of a large table, which was covered from end to end with boxes of model train components in H0 scale. There were passenger car lighting units, trucks with couplings, car interiors, locomotive circuit boards and all the paraphernalia of a busy workshop making trains. All in their living room. I explained that I, too, was a collector of model trains, and had often taken advantage of the very low prices and high quality of the PIKO Sonneburg range of H0 trains made here in the DDR.
‘Yes,’ said the old man ’ WE are making them here for you.’ He went on the explain that about 75% of all PIKO products were assembled by home-workers like him and his wife, and although the pay was very small [read VERY VERY small] it all helped now that they were both pensioners, and they could still listen to the radio while they worked in the evenings or whenever they felt like it. All they had to do, he explained, was to read the monthly schedule and arrange their little lives around it, so that they never got behind in production. The work was varied, and kept them busy, and anyway, while they were chatting they didn’t have to think about their circumstances, which were, not to put too fine a point on it, pretty dire.
They were living, they said, on the equivalent of $12 a week, and getting paid $6 a week in extra-mural occupational activities - building trains.
He had been retired for about two years, he said, and his wife for three years, and luckily they had both had good jobs in Dresden in the same location.
She had been the senior professor of comparative linguistics in the university, and he had been the Director of international studies in the same building.
…and here they were, making toy trains in the evening of their lives, so that they could afford a luxury good.
tac
www.ovgrs.org
Supporter of the Cape Meares Lighthouse Restoration Fund
and I get this email from Trainworld yesterday:
Quote:
. . . HELLO, THESE ENGINES ARE NOT MOVING FAST ENOUGH FOR US, SO WE ARE LOWERING THEM EVEN MORE. I DON'T PLAN ON RESTOCKING THEM EITHER, SO ITS FIRST COME FIRST SERVED, MY LOSS IS YOUR GAIN.#37410 DB “TAURUS” ELECTRIC LOCO
REG. $269.99 SALE $215.99 BLOWOUT $199.99#37411 SIEMENS DISPOLOK TAURUS ELECTRIC
REG. $269.99 SALE $215.99 BLOWOUT $199.99#37412 OBB V TAURUS ELECTRIC LOCOMOTIVE
REG. $269.99 SALE $215.99 BLOWOUT $199.99#37413 HUPAC V TAURUS TAURUS ELEC.LOCO
REG. $269.99 SALE $215.99 BLOWOUT $199.99#37505 DBG V BR 218 DIESEL LOCO
REG. $269.99 SALE $215.99 BLOWOUT $199.99
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Terry, very interesting story, thanks for sharing!
cale
We used to pay the following prices for PIKO steamie locos - I’m looking at the boxes right now -
Br86 - a 2-6-2 tank loco - eastmarks - 119.75
Br01 - 4-6-2 pacific passenger loco - eastmarks 175.50
Double-decker commuter passenger car set [two cars plus talgo-style connectors, with lighting] - eastmarks 68.25
We were getting paid half in Deutschmarks and, when ‘on tour’ half in Ostmarks. Ostmarks at the diplomatic rate were 16 to 1, so my thousand Dm = 16,000 Osties.
As I used to walk around with four or five thousand DM in my pocket, I was carrying about 80,000 osties - the price of a small house, or about ten times a very good annual salary at that time.
Any one of us could have walked into any store in East Germany - anywhere - an emptied it of everything on the shelves without even noticing. We used to use the one electrical store in Treuenbrietzen, just south of Potsdam on Route 2. Going in there on our way back to base in Potsdam we’d check out the latest trains. The dealer there knew us all well, and we were good to him. We always asked him, when something new appeared, if it had been vorbestelt’ - previously ordered - by a local, some of whom would have been paying it off at ten marks a week, and if all the locals had had their loco, we’d buy one. It would only have taken my pocket change to empty out his store, and he knew it. One of our team who was not so kind, had gone into a store in the south, and bought everything in it, leaving the locals fuming with indignation and shame for their poor circumstances. They were human too, just like us, and had their pride.
tac
www.ovgrs.org
Supporter of the Cape Meares Lighthouse Restoration Fund
Great story Terry.
A delightful story Terry, I found it most enlightening.
Any insight on PIKO’s sale prices at TRAINWORLD? BYE-BYE Piko? Bye-Bye USA at TRAINWORLD?
TRAINWORLD’s “blow out” prices are still higher than prices for Piko at Wholesale Trains.
http://www.wholesaletrains.com/GProducts2.asp?Scale=G&Item=pkoloco
tac Foley said:Perhaps, but why is it that if you'd have said something similar about a supposed ability of [i]men[/i] you'd be sexist, and maybe get sued? ...... (Yeah, I know it's also the same reason that only white folks can be 'racists', lol.)
Women are more careful with small pieces of trainset, it seems.
So I still think it must be just because the guys get distracted and play with the trains… or the girls. 
Addendum: Kim has informed me that the above statement is not entirely correct. Men are more capable of the following tasks, and you won’t get sued for saying they are ‘better at’: Taking out the trash, catching a mouse, spider etc., and pushing a stuck or stalled car…
Women often do better in tests and training and actual job retention for jobs with light/small/fine assembly work.
Great story tac. I have some DDR era H0 and H0e trains, including Piko, technomodell, and Zeuke. Amazing how much is still made to-day.
The old ‘kombinat’ was Piko, Schichte, Zeuke and Gutzold. Zeuke’s thing was TT scale - still very popular in and around Germany. About 75% of all their production was made by ‘Heimwerk’ [home factory] labour.
There was no cheating with prices either, most of the plastic manufactured stuff in the DDR had the price actually moulded in to it. We still have some garden tools, made in Suhl, that clearly show the price moulded into the plastic handles and grips.
tac
www.ovgrs.org
Supporter of the Cape Meares Lighthouse Restoration Fund