Hornby cutting production

[chappy]

junior that's a bummer.
So the blue panel van is out there, and maybe didn't sell that well, but I did my share with 2.
I wonder if the green and white window van will come out.

[JULES]

Slothead,

As interested as I am in the fate of Scalextric – and I have a vested interest in the brand’s success – it would not be appropriate to go into the finer detail of what I really think about the slot car industry in general.

My home truths, opinions and analysis on the subject are left littered over various forums. Some of them still exist, some have been removed.

I’ll try and say it short and sweet so as not to upset anyone:-

1/ There is more trouble looming. I predicted the Scalextric problem this time last year.
2/ There are still way too many slot cars being made.
3/ You all need to be buying at least 10x as many cars as you do right now.
4/ Slot cars will get more expensive (or stay the same price but you’ll get less for your money).
5/ Digital will eat itself unless the main players adopt a single digital standard.

You asked if Dave K. or I thought that a competitors problems was good or bad news. From my POV, Scalextric are not really a competitor. Probably originally designed as such, yes, but I have carved a very small niche out of a very small pie and at the moment that is good enough.

You have Carrera fans, Scalextric fans, Slot.it fans and to a lesser extent a small hardcore of Pioneer fans. Most of the time you never swap T-shirts. For some guys, the ’69 Scaley Camaro is the Trans-Am model that can do no wrong. For others the Pioneer Notchback is the mutt’s nuts.

I was waiting to see if Scaley would continue with the Javelin. It looks like they will. I shall continue with our version and hang back to release until Scaley reveal all. If the inline config pleases the racers, the quality is high and it’s a sweet runner I shall have a think about what we do with the Pioneer chassis. At the moment I’m tempted to leave it as a SW so that all Pioneer T/A cars run the same.

Jules

[Junior]

[slothead]

Jules - thanks for the reply and sharing thoughts. I appreciate your perspective that there are too many slot cars on the market for the current demand. Until about 3 months ago I was buying 2 cars a month on average, but now I have more than enough for my purposes and the infields of both my tracks are overflowing. Plus, like most people I have specific tastes - Trans Am and World Sportscars from the 60's - early 70's. And in both cases I'm only interested in the large displacement cars - Mustangs, Camaros, Cougars, Javelins, etc. for T/A,and Ford GT40's, Ferrari 512's, Porsche 917's, and Lola T70's for World Sportscars. Like everyone else, only a portion of the available range catches my eye.

As for the tug of war between quality and cost, I'm willing to spend more. As I've expressed on HRW before, even though Fly makes some dream liveries from the LeMans era I love, I won't buy another car that will probably need tuning before it can make a lap on the track. Your cars run great right out of the case and can be tuned as desired, not out of necessity. Keep making quality T/A cars and I'll probably keep buying them even if I have more than I know what to do with.

Slothead

[dreinecke]

Interesting points all around. However, Digital aside, I think we all buy cars we like - no matter the brand. My T/A collection consists of Scalextric, SCX, Carrera (yes they made one!) and a few Pioneer. Likewise most of us have Fly, Slot.it, etc. in the collection as well. The cottage-producers are there as well and will never compete in volume or pricing with Scaley or Carrera.

I however, will NOT be spending more to purchase a car that I like. Suggesting that manufacturers raise prices almost double will kill the market immediately in my opinion. That however, would leave Carrera in a very enviable spot in their price point...

We were just discussing Digital at HRW this past weekend. Without a standard, each company will continue to spend money that could be better spent elsewhere. If you want the youth market playing, this has to be fixed. Model RR figured this out already, I cannot understand the lack of this thought process in slot cars.

I will throw one more unpopular thought out there though: Besides a few select individuals (one of whom runs this website) - how many people are ever queried about the state of slot cars? Has anyone asked anyone else in the USA what they like or is missing? Sure, there are some American cars being produced and for that we are grateful to a point. I know a few manufacturers have had a "race day" or something like that in certain places. However, I'm hearing that the turn out for these is typically low. I know marketing is expensive, but if you don't get the product in front of people, they will never know it exists. I have so many people come to my house that are car guys even and they all say "I had no idea these were still around!". I'm not saying I have the answer, but slot cars are poorly advertised at best. Funny that everyone boo-hoos the brick and mortars going away but then only seems to point to their website for advertising.

Lastly, producing the same cars over and over among three or more manufacturers is completely bad for business. As an example: ask me which GT-40s I have - Scalextric. 6 of them to be exact. Why? That's what was available when I got into the hobby. That's roughly $300 when originally purchased. Why should I now spend another $300 for the Fly ones, another $300 for Slot.it or NSR's? I won't and some folks simply can't.

Good, open conversation as always here - something HRW can always be counted on.

Personally, I think we have it pretty good in the hobby with great cars and parts. I only hope that things can get sorted and that we don't lose another company...or companies.

[chappy]

Thanks Junior, I think I will.
I remember seeingnthese old vans, and the VW pickups at races either pulling a car trailer or having one set in the back of the pick up style. As much a part of the history of racing as the big haulers became. I sure hope the Red one comes out next year, after all it is a simple re livery.
Bob

[DaveKennedy]

So in the short term if a competitor announces that it's cutting models (especially so drastically) it's obviously good for the other people who are selling slots in the market because not only does it directly free up from consumers that won't be spending money on those models directly but the indirect effect is to soften the feelings of consumers about that brand.
Before I left SCX i saw this coming with them. They had not made any digital products since before i started working with them (I started with them now over 9 years ago) and digital wasn't selling in their home market.
Economics-the whole of the European market is soft aside from the German market which is stronger. This has effects for people that sell toys in those markets.

Personally I see competition as a good thing.

On the topic of digital (and i really don't want to turn this thread into a "will digital take over the world" thread trust me), this is something that is usually brought up by non-digital people... so I'll state the case again... the will never be a standard. Period. Especially when ALL the OTHER companies who were making them are in financial trouble. Does it make sense that the other companies (aside from Carrera I mean) now abandon money put into making our digital system their standard? No, it makes no sense. If you think that digital "won't grow because there's no standard" it's because you're not a digital user, don't know that each year we see growth in the digital market, and understand that most of what we sell is digital in this market.

[TsgtRet]

I think Jules, DR and Dave K all have valid points and pretty well cover most of the territory. I'll throw a couple others out there. The Doc is right when he says car guys are amazed in the "these are still around?" vein. Since I've moved into my neighborhood the folks that have seen my track in the garage (semi pro rally owner/driver among them) all ask where they can get the cars, etc. I point out internet sources, show them HRW (of course) and generally try to advise them on the hobby. In doing this, I come to another point, and this is aimed primarily at Jules and Dave K (they being on the supply side of things); we have 3 pretty nice hobby shops in Fayetteville, one over 40 years in business another over 60.....slot car availability? ZERO. In talking to them about it, none of the suppliers/manufacturers they've dealt with has ever shown consistent support in that area. They have stated to me if the suppliers had a viable range and could be depended on they would at least like to have the ability to order items even if they didn't stock them.
Finally, the guys with limited funds (like moi) have to be selective about what they buy so we buy things we know we'll be able to use without a bunch of (expensive) fine tuning. Most families with kids fall into this category, I believe. So, while I think the LMM type cars are beautiful and I lust after them, I'm not going to throw my limited funds that way because the "fun return" is limited. I think Carrera is on the right path by keeping things affordable and I thank them for it. Just my :twocents-mytwocents:

[DaveKennedy]

Please send me the information for those shops and I'll see what I can do...

[Mayberryman]

[proxieken]

[Nor Cal Mike]

Finally after all of these years I have finally come around to looking digital, and now I see stressful signs coming from the company that won me over to the other side. :( Since I have been chipping cars like crazy, the great majority of my digital cars are not Scalextric. But a loss of company support in terms of digital replacement parts and chips along with new product development could be a serious problem for me. :think:

[DaveKennedy]

"Well, first of all, none of the manufacturers is based in the US and the decision makes at these companies simply do not know or understand either the unique needs and preferences of US slot car hobbyists or the history of American racing, upon which the slot cars needed to conquer America must be based."

Simply untrue...

[dr fabio]

Out of interest Dave do the demographics of this site match the demographics of the majority of your sales market in the US? Id say no but I could be wrong.

[TsgtRet]

A thought has occurred to me while reading through this and thinking on US markets of the past. Who now owns the rights to the Strombecker, Eldon, K&B, etc names? If one of the current manufacturers was to acquire one of these names and market a line in the US under that name perhaps it would go a little ways towards enlarging the slot fanbase here. A small dent, perhaps, but at this point the hobby could use all the help it can get on this side of the pond. Meanwhile I will take whatever comes down the pipeline that I like and be thankful.