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Post by josef on Dec 20, 2023 22:23:49 GMT
I never knew this before. Friend sent this and if I had known this, I didn't.  |
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Post by Adam on Dec 20, 2023 22:27:15 GMT
Interesting!
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Post by steveoncattailcreek on Dec 21, 2023 0:01:33 GMT
I never knew this before. Friend sent this and if I had known this, I didn't.  Uhm, I'm having a bit of a problem with the math. Let's see: 350,000 units sold at a dollar each -- even if there were no manufacturing costs at all, that would yield revenue of only $350,00. Hard to credit sales of just that one item for a turnaround from a loss of $300K to a profit of $2M! Am I missing something?
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Post by Adam on Dec 21, 2023 0:05:42 GMT
My guess is that customers bought other things but the thing that dragged them to the store was the Mickey handcar.
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Post by af3020 on Dec 21, 2023 0:42:13 GMT
It's a nice story but it isn't true. Ron Hollander wrote a history of Lionel titled All Aboard - The Story of Joshua Lionel Cowen and His Lionel Train Company. It is considered to be the best and most thoroughly researched history of the Lionel Corporation ...and on page 141 we have the following...
"The wild popularity of the Mickey Mouse handcar drew attention to Lionel's more profitable trains. (Included with every handcar was a brochure describing the rest of Lionel's line.) This enabled the company to finish in the black for the first time in four years. Lionel's 469 creditors were paid the $296,000 owed them. Bouck received a $20,000 fee for his services, while Frankel got $7500. And Lionel was able to report a net profit for the year of $29,600. On January 21, 1935, the receivership was discharged and the company was turned over to Cowen and the board of directors."
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"Bouck credited the Mickey Mouse handcar with saving Lionel, and the story was picked up with glee by newspapers and radio commentators hungry for happy financial news. "Little mouse saves big lion of corporation" was the tone of most of them. Lowell Thomas commented on the fairy tale quality of Lionel's successful journey on the little wind-up railroad of Mickey and Minnie, bravely pumping around their circle of track. There was irony in the world's greatest electric train company being saved from extinction by a turn-of-the-century wind-up train. But the greatest irony was that the story wasn't true. There was simply not enough profit margin in a one-dollar toy to have brought Lionel the income needed to save the company.( (One dollar was the retail price. Lionel sold the handcars for closer to sixty cents apiece, and the cost of labor and materials plus Disney's percentage had to be deducted before computing profit.) No doubt Mickey's publicity helped greatly, but it was the Union Pacific followed by the rest of the electric train line that put Cowen behind the throttle once more."
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Post by healey36 on Dec 21, 2023 15:30:50 GMT
Yup, I'd agree with that, but I do think there's some truth in the myth. The Mickey handcar was a marketing novelty aimed at getting folks into the electric train section of the toy department. Increased foot traffic got you more looks and more potential sales. Remember, you could get an entire mechanical train set for two bucks:  But no way sale of the Mickey handcar drove profits on its own; just not enough margin. |
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Post by healey36 on Dec 22, 2023 17:24:52 GMT
A contemporary take on the Mickey/Minnie handcar, by Schylling:  |
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Post by edlloyd on Dec 23, 2023 1:49:09 GMT
Funny seeing this posting. I just picked up a Mickey and Minnie handcar. One of Lionels newer models were they are dressed as Santa and Mrs. Santa. I have a plan to use them in a Disney themed Christmas layout. Should be fun.
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Post by bobthetrainguy on Dec 23, 2023 19:42:59 GMT
Didn’t Lionel just release a Mickey handcar recently for the 100th anniversary of Disney?
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Post by edwardh on Dec 26, 2023 12:57:15 GMT
Didn’t Lionel just release a Mickey handcar recently for the 100th anniversary of Disney? Actually six different versions. www.lionel.com/handcar/Initially just the red, orange, green and maroon were advertised with no specific information regards on purchasing information. Here is the breakdown of the first four: red = 2892 produced, readily available orange = 300 produced, Lionelstore.com exclusive green = 135 produced, New York Comic Con exclusive maroon = 514 produced, shopdisney.com exclusive The two platinum versions for announced later, both Disney exclusives platinum with standard Disney color figures = 542 produced, Disney D23 members only platinum with purple accent Disney figures = 112 Disney D23 members, convention attendees At this point only the red and maroon versions are still available. For Disney collectors who wanted the entire collection, it certainly wasn't easy to obtain through initial purchases.
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