Hornby 2022 - Trains on Film

[Global]

9 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

 

If Hornby were to reckon they can reach 300+ more retailers than Rapidos recent claim of 100

At the end of the day its business, and businesses make money… its not personal nor is it emotional.

 

So don't cut off your nose to spite your face… nothing is stopping Hornby making a duplicate tooling of Lion and going head to head against Rapido in which case i’d weight the risk against Rapido, as aside of our little microcosm of the internet.. Hornbys name and reach are greater than Rapido in the UK, so odds are in Hornbys favour to sell more, regardless how good Rapidos is.

 

 

 

 

Although Hornby seem to struggle with making money despite the extensive reach they apparently have over their competitors!

 

So Rapido’s 100 retailers might actually work better for them, quality over quantity is certainly valid here!

[Classsix T]

I think we've been here before folks. Hornby trying to be all things to all people within the marketplace and the more recent entrants being rather more laser focused (by being modellers themselves) on what they believe they can deliver to like minded consumers.

 

The general gist of the content of this thread is that it is seen as underhand of Margate to think they can ride roughshod over the plans of other firms. Especially when if Hornby did Hornby products correctly, there is no reason why they shouldn't do very well for themselves. Chasing after someone else's marketing whilst your own festers is poor business imo.

 

C6T. 

[2mmMark]

3 hours ago, BoD said:

 

You’re obviously not in the right supplier tier. 

Fawlty Tiers?

[2mmMark]

2 hours ago, stonojnr said:

I take it every actually watched the film on BBC2 this afternoon if not it looks to be on iplayer for the next month.

I watched on BBC2 HD. The combination of the remastered print and HD transmission made the film look truly lovely.
 

[adb968008]

1 hour ago, Global said:

Although Hornby seem to struggle with making money despite the extensive reach they apparently have over their competitors!

 

Lifting this thread to a 50k ft view, (generic, high level)..shareholders want to make money, not lose it.

Ever duplicating toolings in a war doesn't help that in what is a small industry.

 

So focussing a company on its strengths, rather than its weaknesses can bring change, especially if opportunity comes at lower capex costs.

 

There are a lot of “small companies” out there tooling up an arms race. Most dont have a retail network, or a high street brand to make it easy to sell. Rather than Hornby going toe to toe on duplicates, perhaps adopting a model of own branding a white label of someone elses under utilised tooling presents a lower cost way to market without further tooling expenditure, and those smaller companies get license revenue from extra sales opportunities having a Red name box brings ?

 

I can certainly think of a number of models that I reckon Hornby could sell quite well to the high street, that high street modellers whom don’t know these small names, nor trust  on pre-pay requirements with delivery dates measured in years…

 

it could be down the road, changing economic winds, constrained supply lines, and slowly rusting moulds 5000 miles away accumulating storage fees sees that being a small company tooling model railways isn't as lucrative as it was, and hence opportunity to cash out those toolings may also present itself.

 

Theres many ways to succeed in sales it doesnt just have to be aggressive, being smart works too, as does having good relationships all round.

 

Thats my opinion anyway.

 

 

Edited February 4, 2022 by adb968008

[wombatofludham]

I think any suggestions of "badge engineered" items appearing in the Hornby range (apart from Oxford who they pretty much own) is unlikely, given Hornby don't seem to want to build anything remotely looking like a bridge with anyone else, be they retailers, producers or rivals.  If anything, they seem to have a hubris bordering on arrogance and are enjoying a rare old time destroying their retail base and reputation with a combination of thermo-nuclear missiles and Napalm.

The biggest threat to the future of the company is their own attitude to their customers, be they retailers of their products or their non-trainset market - and if they continue to mess around retailers, it could end up making a noticeable dent in their Aunty Fanny and Uncle Dick trainset market too.

[Classsix T]

26 minutes ago, wombatofludham said:

The biggest threat to the future of the company is their own attitude to their customers, be they retailers of their products or their non-trainset market - and if they continue to mess around retailers, it could end up making a noticeable dent in their Aunty Fanny and Uncle Dick trainset market too.

And haven't they already gone through this and then subsequently had to make amends with stockists? I mean ffs, learn from the mistakes for crying out loud!

 

C6T. 

[GWR-fan]

Many of us "colonialists" will remember how the company tried to shoot itself in the foot a few years ago by banning UK retailers from selling Hornby products outside the UK and I presume Europe at the time.  It seems that local distributors were upset with the "grey" imports undermining their attempts to maintain full retail pricing.   "Discounting" and "box shifters" are  dirty words in their vocabulary.  Hattons and no doubt Rails will attest that Australia is a large market for them outside of the UK.  The company seems to have a death wish.

 

Edit: on second thoughts with Rails no longer able to sell new Hornby products and Hattons a tier 3 retailer,  then perhaps there is a defacto ban on Hornby products to the colonies.

Edited February 5, 2022 by GWR-fan

[Bucoops]

12 hours ago, Free At Last said:

Probably the cat has got back into the bag.

 

It's off to the vet to be neutered.

[MrTea]

Has anyone on here pre-ordered either of the ‘Trains on Film’ packs initially announced from the Hornby website? I would imagine they will get some (email?) communication about their order at some point, so it would be interesting if they could share what they receive. That would potentially fill in some gaps for those of us taking an interest in this story. 

Edited February 5, 2022 by MrTea
Clarity

[rembrow]

There is a change at Hornby's management, that doesn't seem to have gained much interest, I doubt it's connected with this debacle, but may lead to other managerial changes. They are looking for a new CEO. As of late January, Lyndon Davies has moved to Executive Chairman, currently carrying out both roles until the new CEO is appointed.

[30801]

5 hours ago, MrTea said:

Has anyone on here pre-ordered either of the ‘Trains on Film’ packs 

 

I'm curious if anyone here ordered the Titfield one. Buying the Rapido one seems a no-brainer to me. 

Edited February 5, 2022 by 30801

[PaulRhB]

1 hour ago, 30801 said:

 

I'm curious if anyone here ordered the Titfield one. Buying the Rapido one seems a no-brained to me. 

What and risk the ire that Hornby are receiving?  

[boxbrownie]

13 hours ago, melmerby said:

The problem with the regionalisation of DVDs was it wasn't very enforceable at the player end of the market.

Although a computer DVD player I had was properly Regionalised, neither my last three TV DVD players have been, all being sold as "multi region", all from proper dealers.

There were also ways to unlock some that were regionalised.

I assume that originally there was an agreement with the studios to make single region players, there must have been wriggle room somewhere as I can't recall any manufacturers being prosecuted, for later going multi region.

The region locking was a lot to do with different censorship levels, I remember importing discs from the states that had a lot more violence than the U.K. releases, although this was early days back then.

Only a very few mainstream DVD manufacturers machines could not be unlocked with entering a code sequence on the remote.

As for computer DVD drives these were all unlocked from new but you could only enter the code three times after that it was locked for good, I suppose for ham fisted builders although nowadays the drives would be cheap enough to buy two but back then they were quite an expensive drive.

When the internet became fast enough to download films in minutes rather than days or many hours I think they all gave up and just upped the cost to the consumer, and censorship issues……well what happened there then? 

[Dunsignalling]

12 hours ago, adb968008 said:

Do I really need to answer that ?

Theres a saying in sales..you can be right, and you can be dead right. Its anecdotally suggested from these pages that Hornbys lost this battle, but its by no means certain they have lost the war.

 

Its worth pointing out for the last decade Rapidos model in the UK has been exactly what ive proposed.. Realtrack, Locomotion etc… are made by Rapido.
Hornby themselves make very little, its from other 3rd party suppliers in China.

 

If Hornby were to reckon they can reach 300+ more retailers than Rapidos recent claim of 100, and Hornby’s name is more recognisable than Rapidos… then it costs Rapido nought extra to bag up another batch and 3rd party label it…and it keeps a competitor at closer arms reach on one product line, whilst still making an extra margin on additional sales they may not have otherwise made.

At the end of the day its business, and businesses make money… its not personal nor is it emotional. its called profit, its the way to make money above the cost of producing.

 

So don't cut off your nose to spite your face… nothing is stopping Hornby making a duplicate tooling of Lion and going head to head against Rapido in which case i’d weight the risk against Rapido, as aside of our little microcosm of the internet.. Hornbys name and reach are greater than Rapido in the UK, so odds are in Hornbys favour to sell more, regardless how good Rapidos is… by all accounts Hornbys 71, Terrier, Prairie have done quite well…there is nothing stopping Lion joining that list.

 

EFE / Bachmann has in all regards done quite well with Kernow and Heljan 3rd party products recently, so its not without recent industry precedent, nor the wider world…

 

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/m-s-perfect-match-valentines-day-b1999383.html

 

 

 

Always supposing that Hornby doesn't indulge in another bout of attempted self-destruction, the most recent of which it is still (quite slowly) recovering from. Hornby is nothing like as mighty as current levels of activity make it appear, and I suspect a certain degree of "betting the farm" has been happening in the attempt to speed up that recovery.

 

A poorly judged head-to-head contest in which a competitor beat them to the market on a high profile model by a season would do them a power of no good. "Lion" really doesn't qualify at that level.

 

I think we've probably seen the last of the "Trains on Film" train pack concept, if only to put "Titgate" behind them, but the real proof of the pudding will be if a Hornby "Lion" and/or Loriot wagon ever emerge at all.

 

If not, it's reasonably certain that none of this stuff was past the "point of no return" in development, beyond which relatively little further investment might save the project.  

 

John

Edited February 5, 2022 by Dunsignalling

[Dunsignalling]

2 hours ago, 30801 said:

 

I'm curious if anyone here ordered the Titfield one. Buying the Rapido one seems a no-brained to me. 

 

I know a few retailers had started taking (provisional) pre-orders, but had Hornby been doing so on their own website?

Edited February 5, 2022 by Dunsignalling

[PhilJ W]

13 hours ago, adb968008 said:

Lifting this thread to a 50k ft view, (generic, high level)..shareholders want to make money, not lose it.

Ever duplicating toolings in a war doesn't help that in what is a small industry.

 

So focussing a company on its strengths, rather than its weaknesses can bring change, especially if opportunity comes at lower capex costs.

 

There are a lot of “small companies” out there tooling up an arms race. Most dont have a retail network, or a high street brand to make it easy to sell. Rather than Hornby going toe to toe on duplicates, perhaps adopting a model of own branding a white label of someone elses under utilised tooling presents a lower cost way to market without further tooling expenditure, and those smaller companies get license revenue from extra sales opportunities having a Red name box brings ?

 

I can certainly think of a number of models that I reckon Hornby could sell quite well to the high street, that high street modellers whom don’t know these small names, nor trust  on pre-pay requirements with delivery dates measured in years…

 

it could be down the road, changing economic winds, constrained supply lines, and slowly rusting moulds 5000 miles away accumulating storage fees sees that being a small company tooling model railways isn't as lucrative as it was, and hence opportunity to cash out those toolings may also present itself.

 

Theres many ways to succeed in sales it doesnt just have to be aggressive, being smart works too, as does having good relationships all round.

 

Thats my opinion anyway.

 

 

Hornby have their 'Railroad' range for the mass market and that appears in many supermarkets and chain stores (those that are left). I can't see them giving up these bread and butter lines and going over to on-line only. Its possible that some of their 'specials' will be direct sales only in the future, or only available through select traders, (tier 1?). Their generic Victorian coaches seem to be doing quite well, some of the more popular liveries have sold out but that doesn't bother me as those that I have purchased are for repaint anyway. 

[PhilJ W]

4 hours ago, rembrow said:

There is a change at Hornby's management, that doesn't seem to have gained much interest, I doubt it's connected with this debacle, but may lead to other managerial changes. They are looking for a new CEO. As of late January, Lyndon Davies has moved to Executive Chairman, currently carrying out both roles until the new CEO is appointed.

Very interesting. He is SK's boss in effect anyway. The question is who will be the new CEO? That will depend on the outcome of the Titgate debacle, SK could possibly be shown one of two doors, one marked CEO and one marked EXIT.

[The Stationmaster]

1 hour ago, Dunsignalling said:

Always supposing that Hornby doesn't indulge in another bout of attempted self-destruction, the most recent of which it is still (quite slowly) recovering from. Hornby is nothing like as mighty as current levels of activity make it appear, and I suspect a certain degree of "betting the farm" has been happening in the attempt to speed up that recovery.

 

A poorly judged head-to-head contest in which a competitor beat them to the market on a high profile model by a season would do them a power of no good. "Lion" really doesn't qualify at that level.

 

I think we've probably seen the last of the "Trains on Film" train pack concept, if only to put "Titgate" behind them, but the real proof of the pudding will be if a Hornby "Lion" and/or Loriot wagon ever emerge at all.

 

If not, it's reasonably certain that none of this stuff was past the "point of no return" in development, beyond which relatively little further investment might save the project.  

 

John

In this case I think that Titgate would count to some extent.  They knew a long while back that 'somebody' (which turned out to be Rapido) had pipped them to the post but they made it known they would be doing 'Lion' in any case and they then made a decision to go in for their 'inspirational'  Titfield Thunderbolt.  If they were going to hit their estimated delivery date they must have at least 'pressed the button' on design work and booking production slots in order to get delivery this year.  So they will have spent time and that means they will have spent money on design if nothing else.    

 

There is of course nothing to prevent them producing a model of 'Lion' so anything spent on it need not necessarily be wasted although the market will have shrunk to some extent.  Anything spent on the coach body from Dan's house would presumably have to be written off but they could no doubt produce the Loriot if they are so inclined but it is really a poor choice when considering its prototype rarity and that Rapido are selling it as a separate vehicle.    The other expenditure is on various promotional items and the associated artwork but that won't be massive in the overall scheme of things unless they have to withdraw or alter unsold catalogues.

 

So certainly not as big a hit as they might get with a really high profile model but that is something which we might never hear about anyway because of the way their development cycle works.  Fortunately for them some of what we have seen thus far has worked in their favour when it comes to their 'spoiler' announcements because they have either been well advanced or have had the wherewithal (in the case of the Terrier in particular) to get something advanced very quickly from existing work that was otherwise not being taken through to completion and tooling.  But with other people increasingly turning to not announcing before they show well advanced EPs or even completed production versions of new models they could be increasingly exposed to financial risk (which might be why they are not going in for major re-toolings of diesel outline locos?).

 

I think that it might be reasonable to assume that no tooling has yet taken place for the Titfield models as it could have been left until after CNY and still hopefully hit their stated delivery period although in present circumstances in China that would make that delivery date no more reliable than many others which are being missed.   But they might have been prepared to tolerate that in view the sort of market area where most of the train packs would be sold was not heavily tied to hitting delivery for Christmas.  So perhaps they will have at least have avoided major abortive expenditure there and even if 'Lion' has been partially tooled all is not totally lost as they can still release it in that form.

 

The big question is whether or not what appears to have happened in this instance will put them off childish attempts at taking on newcomers?  Overall I reckon the answer might well be 'no' as long as they have something in the background with a lot of work already done but never taken to tooling and which they can quickly bring forward as they did with the Terrier.   Thus far where they have done this sort of thing they would seem to have had good sales as a result of, in effect, using someone else's decision that there was a market waiting to be tapped but then having made the early announcement starting from scratch with development work which allowed Hornby to step in.   So maybe others might well be more wary of announcing early in order to avoid giving Hornby the ideas which they can't come up with for themselves?

[The Stationmaster]

6 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

Very interesting. He is SK's boss in effect anyway. The question is who will be the new CEO? That will depend on the outcome of the Titgate debacle, SK could possibly be shown one of two doors, one marked CEO and one marked EXIT.

I reckon your latter comment ignores the main internal 'heir apparent' (or indeed two potential internal 'heirs' neither of whom is SK who is further down the pecking order).    The new CEO might well not reflect Titgate in any way at all although maybe a possible departure might.

[adb968008]

33 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

Very interesting. He is SK's boss in effect anyway. The question is who will be the new CEO? That will depend on the outcome of the Titgate debacle, SK could possibly be shown one of two doors, one marked CEO and one marked EXIT.

CEOs usually originate from a Sales /Commercial background.
 

The role of CEO is to sell the benefits of the company on behalf of its shareholders, not market, design or manufacturer products to its customers.

[JohnR]

39 minutes ago, The Stationmaster said:

I reckon your latter comment ignores the main internal 'heir apparent' (or indeed two potential internal 'heirs' neither of whom is SK who is further down the pecking order).    The new CEO might well not reflect Titgate in any way at all although maybe a possible departure might.

 

Who is it that you see as the Heir apparent?

[Pmorgancym]

23 hours ago, Zunnan said:

 

Yes, they presumably have a license for that. But given the Titgate faux pas, for how long do they get to keep that license? 

Bizzarely though, railway children and Harry Potter, aren't part of Trains on Film, both of which would be ideal and probably bigger sellers.

[boxbrownie]

15 minutes ago, Pmorgancym said:

Bizzarely though, railway children and Harry Potter, aren't part of Trains on Film, both of which would be ideal and probably bigger sellers.

You not thinking the Trains on Film promotion was a hastily thought of and poorly executed excuse for the Hornby Titfield Thunderbolt surely? 

[The Stationmaster]

1 hour ago, JohnR said:

 

Who is it that you see as the Heir apparent?

If you have a good look at who does what at Hornby and their past roles elsewhere you could probably work it out - I'm certainly not going into the realms of mentioning names.   But it all depends on whether or not they go for an internal candidate and in any case no doubt Phoenix will have a very big say in who gets the job and they might even have somebody lined up in the wings ready to walk onto the stage.