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Post by harborbelt70 on Jan 9, 2020 11:07:45 GMT
Regarding the new/next catalog, there have been hints in the last few hours from Charlie Nassau and Notch 6 Derek (on OGR) that there are Vision Line products (plural) in the offing. That might mean freight cars, which is not a great temptation for me although like others I have been puzzled as to why Lionel has never re-issued the Ethanol Tank Cars.
I have very little in the pipeline in terms of Lionel products I was prepared to order, as in 3 UP Excursion train cars. Nonetheless it will be interesting, from the point of view of the future direction of the hobby, to see what they come up with. Real innovation from Lionel and MTH is presently at an all time low, IMHO.👎🏻
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Post by Deleted on Jan 9, 2020 11:27:13 GMT
Let's talk BTO while the subject has come up...
To me other than calling it BTO, this has been happening for years by all manufacturers. Just look at the items cancelled in the MTH and Lionel catalogs of the past before BTO was the buzzword because an item didn't have enough orders. BTO assures that the dealers can only buy what they think they can sell rather than having engines sitting on shelves and being blown out at the manufacturer's level. Yes there is a risk of the item being wrong but that hasn't changed. The manufacturers can no longer afford to make 500-1000 engines and have them sit in the warehouse because they don't sell and a dealer should know his audience so he doesn't have surplus either.
Don't get me wrong, the manufacturers though have to do a better job of getting them correct but this is really nothing new. To me a bigger issue is parts.
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Post by josef on Jan 9, 2020 11:32:13 GMT
To me a bigger issue is parts. Agree.
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Post by harborbelt70 on Jan 9, 2020 11:37:35 GMT
Well, BTO is a dirty word for some but you are right, it has been around in some guise or other for years before Lionel made it part of their catalog wording. Aside from MTH, which in the past would catalog an item and wait nearly two years before producing it to ensure sufficient orders, 3rd Rail/GGD expressly condition production on a minimum level of orders.
What really prompts me to comment on this is that yesterday I had an MTH circular email on items that are now at stock levels of 5 or less. It was a long list of a large variety of engines and rolling stock. In their shoes I would not want to have that level of unsold inventory. I think that this just represents what is on hand at MTH itself and not in the dealer network.
P.S. I also second the reference to parts concerns. I have just laid in spare RS4 components (audio and power boards) because the ones I might need are scarce. But for some recent Legacy products there are no parts at all and I have never been able to penetrate MTH’s spare parts website.
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Post by rockymountaineer on Jan 9, 2020 13:53:49 GMT
... What really prompts me to comment on this is that yesterday I had an MTH circular email on items that are now at stock levels of 5 or less. It was a long list of a large variety of engines and rolling stock. In their shoes I would not want to have that level of unsold inventory. I think that this just represents what is on hand at MTH itself and not in the dealer network. ... That is correct. Those MTH alerts only represent what MTH has in their warehouse. They do NOT reflect the inventory out in their dealer network. An increasing number of dealers do use the MTH Product Locator system. But there are still quite a number that don't. So it never hurts to call around when you're hunting for something special that MTH's website shows no dealers have in-stock. That just means the dealers who regularly and conscientiously use the Product Locator database don't have it in-stock. As the old adage goes... you can lead a horse to water, but you can't force it to drink. 
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Post by harborbelt70 on Jan 9, 2020 14:02:57 GMT
As an aside, I guess that this circular also gives an indication of what has sold really well at MTH and what has not quite done so. By number there are many fewer steamers listed than diesels (but I am really surprised to see a couple of Daylight SP GS-4s left, as well as four in American Freedom Train livery).
In the past, these circulars have been useful to me in flagging up products that I had totally missed. The prime example is a Chicago South Shore and South Bend Little Joe (PS2) that I did not see cataloged or on the shelf at either of my LHSs.
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