There’s been some discussion about this over on MLS as well, let me clarify my position about costs and quality by reposting a reply from over there, its a bit repetitive as some of this has already been discussed here:
…Theres been ALOT of discussion about this on the other site, it boils down to the most likely scenario:
>Kader (99.9% probability) OWNS the tooling for ALL of Aristo products (possibly USAt btw)
>Scott retains ownership of the rights to market Aristo named products.
This is a standard business practice for chinese mfr. the mfr owns the means of production, the client pays for the name and marketing for those specificly tooled and labeled products.
>Kader will by all appearances, NOT take any new orders for Aristo labeled products, until all of the products Kader produced for Lewis has been paid for.
>Kader also just bumped the starting price for new product 40%, that ACROSS THE BOARD and affects EVERY company that was relying on Kader to produce for their products (read USAt).
> Bachmann, being owned by Kader, should not effected by this bump, but it remains to be seen if Kader also raises prices on its own products as well.
Basically the days of cheap trains from China are GONE! When Bachmann’s street price for the C19 is $800, for an engine that’s NOT that much different than the Connie which was $250 street, (LSC edit: yes, the C19 is vastly better drive wise, I wanted an example of how expensive plastic engines were becoming) that’s not the way to grow the hobby. In regards to Aristo, the 0-4-0/caboose set price, from Scott’s site, is $320, add Kader’s new increase brings it to $460.00 add shipping and taxes that’s close enough as makes no difference to $500!
$500 bucks for a starter engine? LGB isn’t any better, their basic Porter MSRP is $350, for an starter set engine I once paid only $75 for. The ONLY difference being the electronics boards that IMHO have done nothing but drive prices up to unreasonable levels.
Sorry folks but at those prices alone, I dont see much of a broad future for Aristo, GeneratioNext, USA or Bachmann if Bmann also bumps prices accordingly. If large scale continues its going to be MUCH more like the days when LGB was the only game in town, by that I mean, EXCLUSIVE. not a broad hobby, but a specialized limited hobby for those who can afford the high price of trains, track and support.
Maybe in the long run, that’s the ONLY way large scale will survive. Because maybe the ONLY way we are going to get rugged reliable outdoor quality trains who’s wheels don’t fall off like my goddam Aristo 0-4-0 did, is to pay threw the nose. But that goes back to the manufacturers, IF they produce rugged LGB quality products then paying top dollar may not be a bad thing, but if they keep making the same cheap questionable quality product that breaks or has QC problems out of the box like we’ve been plagued with for over a decade, something AC & Bmann have been notorious for, yet still claim the higher pricing we are seeing today, then the gauge is doomed to retract to a couple brands that people will trust, because people will NOT pay top dollar for problem plagued product.
All this is just my personal observations…
Back to LSC, my point is that I fully understand costs are up and will stay up, and that it costs less to load the stuff with the electronics as its only one assembly line vs two, and that for the majority of buyers they want the electrics. I’m clearly in the minority these days. As a result I’m also probably priced out of the 90% of the new market and will have to trawl Ebay for most of my stuff from here on out, that’s something I’ve resigned myself to.
The questions to me are:
Will quality also now get a bump up? The latest Annie and the C19 bode well for Kader/Bachmann.
Will USAt be priced out of any new production runs, is this intentional on Kader’s part?
Will Scott ever be able to sell off all of Aristo’s old stock, and even if so, will Kader honor any new orders?
Does Kader already have something else up its sleeve and has had since Aristo’s demise?
The Chinese may openly scoff at us for “playing with toys” but they also like the smell of our money and will continue to produce model trains (in all scales) for the American market, they are way too entrenched financially in the smaller scales to do otherwise. They can see that even in large scale there is money to be made in the US market and they are not stupid enough to walk away from it (well…we’ll see) but the business model has changed dramatically.
