Hattons Model Railways to close

[n9]

Damn. Think I must be the last person to learn of Hatton's demise. Literally just found out when I went to their site. And I'd recently been posting stuff on here as if they were still with us, completely oblivious to the fact.

 

I am well and truly shocked. And I'm going to miss them dearly. Proper old school shop and service. What's more, finding myself living overseas, I found their Trunk service and DHL Express combo to be absolutely brilliant, in large part because it made Brexit customs hell completely painless. No other shop that I've come across does that.

 

But generally, they were just brilliant and I loved shopping there.

 

A huge hole has been left in the hobby. I wish them all well for the future.

Edited February 18 by n9

[kevinlms]

On 17/02/2024 at 23:49, Widnes Model Centre said:

From todays BBC North West News.

 

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-68317449

 

That photo of Mr Hatton, must show his remaining stash, from buying the remaindered stock from Hornby-Dublo! It was advertised for years afterwards.

[n9]

Bless 'em. They're still there doing the right thing. This from Amanda who just processed a previously agreed (before the closure) partial refund for me today for some second hand locos that weren't quite as advertised. I wrote to them yesterday not being sure if anyone was still there:

 

"There are a few of us still here dealing with the last emails and calls. I will complete the refund for you today, there will be a separate email sent to confirm this has been completed. 

 

Thank you for your kind words and I shall pass this on to the remaining team.

 

If I can be of any further assistance please let me know and I will be more than happy to help."

 

TBH, the refund didn't cover all the parts I replaced but I don't care, no argument from me, I'd much rather have Hatton's back.

 

I hope that when the dust settles and the sky is blue again, a bunch of them will team up and continue, because 50 pages and counting to me says they were doing an awful lot right. And it's not just the volume, it's the words.

[Steamport Southport]

5 hours ago, kevinlms said:

That photo of Mr Hatton, must show his remaining stash, from buying the remaindered stock from Hornby-Dublo! It was advertised for years afterwards.

 

There was still loads of it left in the 1980s and all that Wrenn!

 

Unfortunately it wasn't stuff I was interested in, that was all the Mainline and Airfix he had.

 

 

Jason

[2E Sub Shed]

If it was Mainline you were after, model shop in Swindon seemed to be able to sell new boxed Mainline well in to 2010's, I was told they bought the entire factory stock at closure, not sure if true.

[Steamport Southport]

Just now, 2E Sub Shed said:

If it was Mainline you were after, model shop in Swindon seemed to be able to sell new boxed Mainline well in to 2010's, I was told they bought the entire factory stock at closure, not sure if true.

 

It was Hattons that bought the entire stock and sold them on. Look in the adverts in Railway Modeller and see how much they had and the prices compared to elsewhere. The entire shop was piled to the rafters with them!

 

They even had the LMS 2P 4-4-0 that very few shops got. Mine even came in a Mainline box, but most came without it and then in a Dapol box.

 

 

Jason

[Dunsignalling]

48 minutes ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

It was Hattons that bought the entire stock and sold them on. Look in the adverts in Railway Modeller and see how much they had and the prices compared to elsewhere. The entire shop was piled to the rafters with them!

 

They even had the LMS 2P 4-4-0 that very few shops got. Mine even came in a Mainline box, but most came without it and then in a Dapol box.

 

 

Jason

 

It was a Mainline Standard 4MT 4-6-0 from Hatton's that got me back into the hobby after a couple of decades out of it. Eighteen quid IIRC.

 

I still have it, having worn out the original chassis and two Bachmann replacements. The second burned out its motor when fairly new having tied its rods in knots in a tunnel during a group open day. By the time anybody smelt it, it was too late.

 

Renumbered as 75009, it now has one of the nice ones with metal slide bars from just before they stopped selling spare ones, but is semi-retired!

 

Always had to file a bit off the top of the Bachmann chassis blocks to get the body to sit properly.

 

John

[1andrew1]

7 hours ago, 2E Sub Shed said:

If it was Mainline you were after, model shop in Swindon seemed to be able to sell new boxed Mainline well in to 2010's, I was told they bought the entire factory stock at closure, not sure if true.

Is this a reference perhaps to Replica who marketed the Kader-produced parts of the Mainline range until Kader did it itself under the Bachmann brand in 1991? They're now based in Swindon but at the time were in Lambourn, Berkshire. 

http://www.replicarailways.co.uk/menusep5/menucomhist

 

 

Edited February 20 by 1andrew1

[No Decorum]

15 hours ago, Dunsignalling said:

 

It was a Mainline Standard 4MT 4-6-0 from Hatton's that got me back into the hobby after a couple of decades out of it. Eighteen quid IIRC.

 

I still have it, having worn out the original chassis and two Bachmann replacements. The second burned out its motor when fairly new having tied its rods in knots in a tunnel during a group open day. By the time anybody smelt it, it was too late.

 

Renumbered as 75009, it now has one of the nice ones with metal slide bars from just before they stopped selling spare ones, but is semi-retired!

 

Always had to file a bit off the top of the Bachmann chassis blocks to get the body to sit properly.

 

John

Ah yes! Stunning models apart from the first green ones which looked as if they were coated in powder rather than paint. It triggered a weakness for Standard 4 4-6-0s which I didn’t get under control until I had thirteen of them. I never could understand the fuss about Airfix. Plastic wheels which were obvious from 3' away and motors which sounded as if they were about to short out the entire neighbourhood. Then Mainline produced the Jubilees – truly wonderful at the time.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

2 hours ago, No Decorum said:

I never could understand the fuss about Airfix. Plastic wheels which were obvious from 3' away and motors which sounded as if they were about to short out the entire neighbourhood.

All is forgiven for some of us, by their production of the N2 and Brush 2 which looked and performed like the real thuggish machines; and the N2 only lightly modified to take the sweet running 'Black Can' is still in production with Hornby. (The original motors in both were sound designs with running performance unimpeded by low precision manufacture, resulting all too often in the coffee grinder racket as they did the job. 'Tidied up' with a balanced armature and replacement bearings they ran as quietly as the best contemporary open frame motors, although the bogie mounted version quickly degraded due all the other high wear out 'features' .)

 

That, and the wagons, some of which happily made it into the Hornby range and were among the best they offered for over a decade until the decision to go for some new tooling from China.

[JSpencer]

18 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

It was Hattons that bought the entire stock and sold them on. Look in the adverts in Railway Modeller and see how much they had and the prices compared to elsewhere. The entire shop was piled to the rafters with them!

 

They even had the LMS 2P 4-4-0 that very few shops got. Mine even came in a Mainline box, but most came without it and then in a Dapol box.

 

 

Jason

 

When I worked at The Signal Box (a long time ago), the first batches of Dapol 14XXs came in Airfix boxes.

 

I remember one customer ordering one, we sent it out, it came back with a letter complaining that he wanted the Dapol one and not the airfix one. We sent it back with a letter saying it was the Dapol one and Dapol were using up Airfix boxes until they were exhausted.

He sent it back again, saying it was a lie, so we refunded.

 

Another used to send his orders in on the tiniest pieces of scrap paper, not much bigger than a stamp. We would send back a few sheets of A4, but still the next order was on a tiny scrap....

 

Fun times....

[CUCKOO LINE]

Good to see some of the ex Hattons people appearing elsewhere, so far seen a couple on TMC and Rapido now just picked one up.

[n9]

12 minutes ago, CUCKOO LINE said:

Good to see some of the ex Hattons people appearing elsewhere, so far seen a couple on TMC and Rapido now just picked one up.

That's good. Where are you seeing this? For over a month I missed the closure, so clearly I need help staying in the loop.

[JohnR]

1 hour ago, n9 said:

That's good. Where are you seeing this? For over a month I missed the closure, so clearly I need help staying in the loop.

 

Their new employers have announced it on their social media. I've seen Rails announce a new member of staff as ex-Hattons too. 

[CUCKOO LINE]

7 minutes ago, JohnR said:

 

Their new employers have announced it on their social media. I've seen Rails announce a new member of staff as ex-Hattons too. 

Picked it up from TMC and Rapido facebook pages

[ERIC ALLTORQUE]

Happier times many years ago,the Hattons HD sell off price list 1964 ish

[melmerby]

Strange that factory clearance stuff was going up in price!

 

[Dunsignalling]

40 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Strange that factory clearance stuff was going up in price!

 

 

I can't find the exact rates as I don't seem to be googling quite the right question (it's past my bed-time!), but I think Purchase Tax may have increased in 1964.

 

It mainly seems to have been the larger locos going up, so maybe Hatton's were taking the hit themselves on some items. 

 

John

Edited February 22 by Dunsignalling

[andyman7]

19 hours ago, melmerby said:

Strange that factory clearance stuff was going up in price!

 

Not strange at all - this wasn't a sell off in the conventional sense but a long term investment. Some of that stock was still being sold 'new' in the 1980s by which time items prices reflected the 'collectors' rates. I imagine Norman Hatton would have given short shrift to anyone that argued he should still be asking 63p (12/6 rounded up) for his Dublo Super-Detail coaches (Hattons advert below from the October 1982 Railway Modeller)

[adb968008]

I seem to remember there was still some brand new Dublo curves for sale until very recently, circa 2015-8.

The final Wrenn stock was very excitingly priced in the 1990’s I recall.

 

[kevinlms]

11 hours ago, andyman7 said:

Not strange at all - this wasn't a sell off in the conventional sense but a long term investment. Some of that stock was still being sold 'new' in the 1980s by which time items prices reflected the 'collectors' rates. I imagine Norman Hatton would have given short shrift to anyone that argued he should still be asking 63p (12/6 rounded up) for his Dublo Super-Detail coaches (Hattons advert below from the October 1982 Railway Modeller)

Any retailer is entitled to advertise items for whatever they like, it is upto would be buyers to agree to or decline that price. Nothing to stop anyone offering a lower price, but the seller is equally able to accept or decline and perhaps not so politely, if way off the mark.

Also an old label doesn't mean that is the current price.

 

Supermarkets can't generally do that, because they have a code of conduct and also many products have dates, beyond which they can't legally sell.

[St Enodoc]

8 minutes ago, kevinlms said:

Any retailer is entitled to advertise items for whatever they like, it is upto would be buyers to agree to or decline that price. Nothing to stop anyone offering a lower price, but the seller is equally able to accept or decline and perhaps not so politely, if way off the mark.

Also an old label doesn't mean that is the current price.

 

Supermarkets can't generally do that, because they have a code of conduct and also many products have dates, beyond which they can't legally sell.

Decades ago, at a well-known model railway shop in North West London (long gone), I found an item of interest that bore a marked price clearly well below what it should have been. I offered the price and the shopkeeper declined my offer, saying it had been marked wrongly, so I didn't pursue the matter. Afterwards, I wondered what my rights would have been had I been feeling slightly more bolshie than usual.

[Hal Nail]

My recollection from studying accountancy case law was that they are obliged to honour the price shown. The phrase invitation to treat is rattling around.

 

I should perhaps caveat this by pointing out I spectacularly failed law :)

 

edit: i backtracked below!

Edited February 23 by Hal Nail

[grandadbob]

Am I right in thinking that a price tag is only "An invitation to treat" and the vendor does not have to honour it?  Or has that changed?

 

Pipped at the post by Hal Nail.

 

Just found this:

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/experts/article-7616547/Ten-times-wrong-consumer-rights.html

 

 

 

Edited February 23 by grandadbob

[Hal Nail]

2 minutes ago, grandadbob said:

Am I right in thinking that a price tag is only "An invitation to treat" and the vendor does not have to honour it?

A quick Google confirms this. Obviously one of the questions I got wrong!