Do you think so? Certainly membership of, for instance, the 16mm Association is up to well over 4000 now. When I first moved into the hobby 27 years ago it was around 1500 and a Merlin Mayflower cost me £450. I do think that locomotive prices should be compared to incomes at the time. We certainly had had a blip a few years ago in terms of Accucraft coming onto the market with cheaper locomotives, but they are nowadays increasing in price as the savings from far east production drop. I would say that the prices are around the same as they always were in terms of purchasers income, but standards of manufacture have increased enormously. Early Roundhouse and Merlin locomotives were comparatively crude (although Roundhouse always had the edge on logistical backup).pauly:97009 wrote:Gone are the days when you could buy a brand new Edrig for little over £400 and a second hand one for £300 odd.
I think in the next 10 years we are going to see either a huge shift in the consumer base or the market is simply going to crumple in on itself, its heading towards a crash
There will of course be variations in business due to recessions etc and each one of these is different. For instance during the recession in the late 80s, Roundhouse sales went up as people were early retired. This is something that won't be happening during the current unpleasantness and I don't know the financial position of this company of course, but they ARE expanding with more staff and extra factory space. Accucraft are also expanding and other businesses (such as Simon Whenmouth's Anything Narrow Gauge, GRS and Trackshack are moving into new locomotive supply.
On an individual level we all hate to see prices rise and of course the longer we are around the cheaper our recognised price point will be (I purchased one of the first R/C Roundhouse Fowlers for £630 on launch) and that seemed a hell of a lot of money at the time. My pension now however, is significantly more than twice my then salary!!
So no – I don't see any signs of impending doom. Even on the electrical front the sales of PIKO are continuously improving and, while I have little info on LGB there does seem to be more of it about..
