Hornby Tier System- An Update.

[Dunsignalling]

I have one of these on pre-order from "the H in Tier 3" who haven't yet received stock.

 

However, I am 100% confident that I won't receive anything packed by them in that kind of state....

 

John

Edited May 11, 2022 by Dunsignalling

[Pmorgancym]

16 hours ago, adb968008 said:

Here its been done…

 

 

 

whats more its got dead rail out of the box.

 

That's sort of what I'm getting at there are good starter systems out there Brio, The Japanses Tomy stuff that lego trackmaster is based on, even Hornby's playtrains.  But there's nothing between that and 'grown up trainsets', if you take a play trains loco, put it against a Railroad 47, which has more appeal?  The one with remote control, lights, sounds or the 47?  (I reckon there's enough space in a railroad diesel body for a rechargable battery pack, ir receiver, maybe a simple sound a speaker set up, even if it's just a horn, no of the technology involved is novel or expensive. 

[Dunsignalling]

2 hours ago, Pmorgancym said:

That's sort of what I'm getting at there are good starter systems out there Brio, The Japanses Tomy stuff that lego trackmaster is based on, even Hornby's playtrains.  But there's nothing between that and 'grown up trainsets', if you take a play trains loco, put it against a Railroad 47, which has more appeal?  The one with remote control, lights, sounds or the 47?  (I reckon there's enough space in a railroad diesel body for a rechargable battery pack, ir receiver, maybe a simple sound a speaker set up, even if it's just a horn, no of the technology involved is novel or expensive. 

Many of us are unfortunately thinking about toy trains as being something that a high proportion of kids want/get as was the case fifty or sixty years ago.

 

The modern reality is very different, for a number of reasons, but largely because train travel has become less central to most people's lives. Mum and/or Dad may commute by rail or occasionally travel further on business, but family outings will almost exclusively be by car.   

 

Most modern children get little-to-no exposure to real trains other than through the odd visit to a heritage line. Thomas the Tank may fill the gap to some extent but that may be a bit of a chicken and egg thing. Essentially, though, if you don't see, you don't want. 

 

However, if any sort of "intermediate" toy-to-model transitional train product was really the kind of potential goldmine that some of us seem to think, why has nobody jumped on it? 

 

Truth is, even Railroad is a commercial aberration designed to wring the dregs of income from obsolete tooling; a strategy that works for Hornby because they have plenty of it.

 

However the return almost certainly doesn't justify investing in truly new product at that level. If it did, Design Clever would still be with us, and competitors would be attacking Hornby's market share in the category.

 

That neither has been, is, or looks remotely like becoming the case, tells me all I need to know.

 

John 

 

 

[SamThomas]

On 05/05/2022 at 21:25, JohnR said:

 

They dont own the old factory, the whole building was sold off, and they now rent the offices from the new owner, who uses the old factory space to store his collection of 1:1 scale locomotives. 

The older part of the factory is not in the best of condition, old, drafty, poorly lit & due to its design probably unsuitable for current production anyway. The costs of updating would go a long way towards a new more efficient faciity. Updating would almost certainly require completly re-wiring, new lighting, new heating/ventilation, updating insulation & so on. Less cost to install in a new "box" when you take into account the costs of stripping out the old infrastructure & dispposing of it.

 

When Hornby produced their products in the Westwood factory there were many small toolmaking companies in the Thanet area for support.

 

The Hersedon Warehouse is a few miles from Canterbury towards Margate & around 20minutes by HGV from the A2 or A299 (both duel carriageways). Not the best place for a distribution facility but logistics wise not too bad - the goods dispatched are relatively small (logistics wise), probably more large parcels than pallet loads.

You also have to factor in that the rent/costs per sq metre of a warehouse in East Kent will be less than the same facilities closer to the M25 (as an aside a lot of freight is "trunked" overnight thus avoiding the daytime traffic levels).

 

Should Hornby ever consider returning production to the UK there is ample factory space in the Thanet area*** & a relatiovely cheap labour force available.

 

*** & almost certainly financial incentives from the likes of local authorities to do so.

[Chris116]

I have just visited the Hornby website to see what their S&DJR four/six wheel coaches look like. I entered 'S&DJR coach' in the search box and the first item list was a GBRf Class 66 followed by three packs of track. Seems the search engine is as good as their tier system. I have removed the shortcut to their website and will use those of the larger shops and my local shop to check for items in future. No wonder Hornby are in trouble with a website search engine that appears to be as useful as a chocolate teapot.

 

 

[Steamport Southport]

31 minutes ago, Chris116 said:

I have just visited the Hornby website to see what their S&DJR four/six wheel coaches look like. I entered 'S&DJR coach' in the search box and the first item list was a GBRf Class 66 followed by three packs of track. Seems the search engine is as good as their tier system. I have removed the shortcut to their website and will use those of the larger shops and my local shop to check for items in future. No wonder Hornby are in trouble with a website search engine that appears to be as useful as a chocolate teapot.

 

 

 

Use the drop down menus. Far easier. This took less than a minute.

 

https://uk.Hornby.com/catalogue/train-sets-rolling-stock/coaches-coach-packs?encoded=nZCxasMwEIZfJUu9GIOt0DQZjgwZunrKEoQ4y1db2JXESYLo7aumNA1k63Z8P3z_3R1XtFOPcYbZsR1yk5bqw6yROFw8uzHpqDyT45FYwj36NLZgo0lC-wfx-gvF7vVJMw9ZpUURo7yITc_UvLNL3thp0-3f2qY7CCEhcqIHox0xOs7qh6ghy7tPY6SpZBJODvVMoX4Ru_o21z3qJVQeJ1JmhG13eNompOHBELMnhetaBcextMC-YtLl6qB8qf0Wwba9CaGrjPUpnnFNdJrL-2iEf936BQ

 

 

 

Jason

[Chris116]

13 minutes ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

Use the drop down menus. Far easier. This took less than a minute.

 

https://uk.Hornby.com/catalogue/train-sets-rolling-stock/coaches-coach-packs?encoded=nZCxasMwEIZfJUu9GIOt0DQZjgwZunrKEoQ4y1db2JXESYLo7aumNA1k63Z8P3z_3R1XtFOPcYbZsR1yk5bqw6yROFw8uzHpqDyT45FYwj36NLZgo0lC-wfx-gvF7vVJMw9ZpUURo7yITc_UvLNL3thp0-3f2qY7CCEhcqIHox0xOs7qh6ghy7tPY6SpZBJODvVMoX4Ru_o21z3qJVQeJ1JmhG13eNompOHBELMnhetaBcextMC-YtLl6qB8qf0Wwba9CaGrjPUpnnFNdJrL-2iEf936BQ

 

 

 

Jason

Thanks for the information but there are no drop down menus on my phone! They only work on the laptop which was why I tried using the search engine with such pathetic results.

[InterCity80s]

If you just search for "djr" the coaches come up straight away. Suspect the "S&" is confusing the search algorithm. 

[The Stationmaster]

At the moment it looks like tears might be more relevant than tiers in Hornby HQ.  Although it might well be linked to wider fears about about disposable income spending Hornby shares hit a new low in trading yesterday with the bid price at one time dropping to almost 26p although they managed to close at 28p.  They've so far recovered slightly in trading today.

 

Interestingly the shares fell from 33p on Wednesday to 28p yesterday and apart from the wider economic situation this fall coincided with an announcement regarding Hornby's relationship with Rawnet -the company which is Hornby's 'digital adviser'.   Rawnet is indirectly controlled by Phoenix - who also own 74.66% of Hornby's issued shares.   The relationship was declared in Hornby's 2021 accounts as a 'related company' so nothing appears to be out of order as that has been public knowledge for around a year. Hornby started using Rawnet in February 2020 and that company didn't come into Phoenix's indirect control until  it purchased Rawnet's beneficial owning company in February 2021.

 

Hornby spends a lot of money with Rawnet, in this year's accounts it is reported to amount to £0.81 million and in last year's it was £0.72 million.   Quite what prompted the statement about all this is unclear but I do wonder if a Hornby shareholder started asking questions for some reason?  However Hornby's independent advisors have made it absolutely clear that everything is above board and has been properly disclosed when it should have been disclosed.   So seemingly no more than a brief strong wind in a teacup and Hornby;s shares have dipped because of a real storm in a far bigger tea cup.

[SamThomas]

Pardon my ignorance but what exact function does a "digital advisor" have (apart from advising on digital matters) ?

[AY Mod]

5 minutes ago, SamThomas said:

Pardon my ignorance but what exact function does a "digital advisor" have (apart from advising on digital matters) ?

 

You can do your own specific homework here - https://www.rawnet.com/about - https://www.rawnet.com/our-work/hornby-hobbies

[SamThomas]

Thank you Mr York - I'd already checked out their very basic one page website & I'm still not much, if any wiser.

Although for just over £1.5m (not my figures) over two years they could do something with Hornby's website, I found it very diffecult to track down a Rivarossi item I'm looking for (& then found it not currently available or to pre-order).

[AY Mod]

18 minutes ago, SamThomas said:

I'd already checked out their very basic one page website

 

You've obviously not used the navigation of the site; there are several pages.

[SamThomas]

21 hours ago, AY Mod said:

 

You've obviously not used the navigation of the site; there are several pages.

The homepage was initially uninspiring enough to discourage me from looking further. I now have a better idea of what "digital sdvisors" purport to do.

 

IMHO Hornby would have spent their money better by looking at forums such as RMW & the magazines supported by them than to indulge in a load of corpospeak twaddle.

 

Thank you for your assistance in this matter.

Edited May 14, 2022 by SamThomas

[woodenhead]

53 minutes ago, SamThomas said:

The homepage was initially uninspiring enough to discourage me from looking further. I now have a better idea of what "digital sdvisors" mpurport to do.

 

IMHO Hornby would have spent their money better by looking at forums such as RMW & the magazines supported by them than to indulge in a load of corpospeak twaddle.

 

Thank you for your assistance in this matter.

That website is aimed at other companies who need to redevelop their ecommerce offerings, it is not directed at the general public so it will be full of corporate language and references to software solutions.

[SamThomas]

2 hours ago, woodenhead said:

That website is aimed at other companies who need to redevelop their ecommerce offerings, it is not directed at the general public so it will be full of corporate language and references to software solutions.

I'm fully aware that websites like those are not for the general public & will be overflowing with corporate bovine excrement.

Lets just knock this on the head shall we ?

[woodenhead]

48 minutes ago, SamThomas said:

I'm fully aware that websites like those are not for the general public & will be overflowing with corporate bovine excrement.

Lets just knock this on the head shall we ?

You’re the one making all the animal references.

[Bishdurham]

It must be that A2 "Duel" Carriage Way  it is handbags at 50 paces!

[Mike Bellamy]

Rawnet need to employ someone to proofread their own website - saw this on the Hornby page Andy linked to earlier

 

Quote

Integrating international brands into the online portfolio - Electrotren, Lema, Rivarossi and Arnol, UF (international brands) - as they were badly represented previously

 

 

Searches were mentioned earlier as well - this is what they say
 

Quote

 

Another area we addressed was search. Our new taxonomy solution means that finding a personalised collection of more relevant products is much more straightforward - customers can even shop by enthusiasm and interest. 

We leveraged third party software Elasticsearch to provide fast response times on search and product listings for thousands of products

 

.

[APOLLO]

 

Brit15

[AY Mod]

9 minutes ago, APOLLO said:

 

Brit15

 

Except they're easier to get hold of.

[APOLLO]

Ah well. While it's Friday the 13th here's a bit of Railroad excitement.

Model this if you dare !!!!

Crazy Yanks !!!

 

 

As to Hornby - my best wishes for the company.

 

Brit15

[Enterprisingwestern]

8 hours ago, AY Mod said:

 

Except they're easier to get hold of.

 

Not if Hornby was made sole supplier!

 

Mike.

[Matt]

9 hours ago, APOLLO said:

 

Brit15

I know we’re way off topic… but I think there is some truth in this (I laughed BTW - thought it was great). As a teenager my friends were dabbling in this area and drinking, and the combo of having to earn money and have things I wanted to save up for (latest Lima in another colour) made me see this as a waste of money and not partake. I can recall being in a pub and thinking “£1.20 for a pint - if I don’t have a few of those I can get XX wagon from the model shop”. Maybe that’s just me… having a hobby maybe helped steer me away from that world?  And it didn’t end well for some of my friends who fell from straight A students to, well that’s another story.

[SamThomas]

16 hours ago, Balgrayhill said:

Is there a tw*t emoji?

Now theres a good idea, it could be accompanied by a pedantic emoji & one for spelling errors.