Karhedron Posted January 6, 2012 Share Posted January 6, 2012 An interesting range of views. I wonder at what price Kernow could have pitched these products to maximise their profits? I suspect that they have done their maths on this one. These models are usually batch produced so I imagine that Kernow have priced them at what they expect will just about sell the whole run. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold queensquare Posted January 6, 2012 RMweb Gold Share Posted January 6, 2012 Not only would i say the dry and chimney are expensive, I would say the prices are scandalous for what in essence is a casting using couple of quids worth of resin, yes I know they had to be modelled in the first place but I still think it is very expensive, but I expect they will sell to those with more money than sense. I can never quite understand this type of post. If you don't want one then don't buy one - simple. These models are not cheap but I don't think they are unduly expensive either - if you were to commision a profesional model maker to build you a one off model of these then you would pay an awful lot more than Kernow are going to be asking. All this talk of 'I made mine for £15 or £20' is completely irrelevant. Factor in the number of hours the model took you to build and multiply that by a sesible hourly rate and you will come up with a very different figure. The 'couple of quids worth of resin' is probably an over estimate, it is time and convenience you are paying for. I know when I work up a price for a potential customer the materials costs are far less than the cost of my time. Jerry Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kenton Posted January 6, 2012 Share Posted January 6, 2012 what price would those who are stating an intention to buy choose not to buy them believing them to be too expensive.  £200?  A week's pay? Everything is relative here - someone may be able to knock one of these together , quickly , cheaper and end up with something they own that is pretty unique to them. But not everyone has every skill to do so and simply chose tho use their time in other ways (even armchair modelling or simply watching their trains whizz round and round past their Kernow Clay Dry. Sure everyone will have their price and some will pay more than others before they simply change their plans and go with something cheaper or alternate RTP product. It is perhaps fortunate that modellers are a wide variety of skills and passions. I get my kicks out of building kit wagons and locos - once they are built I lose interest in them overnight and rarely paint them and as for weathering ! It is far more expensive to do than buy off the shelf from the RTR market and probably not as good (I guess you would want them painted at least) I consider my time in this pursuit as free. If I were to purchase these RTP production it would depend first and foremost on a desire to have one, then it comes down to how much - well for £200 I could buy a couple of locos in 4mm in both kit or RTR, probably getting many hours pleasure building those kits. would I get the same pleasure out of building my own clay dry (almost certainly not) but then there is the sense of achievement at having done so. Also for some of us £200 is far from a weeks salary and probably a mere trifle. How much do some spend on their weekend entertainment of football, drinking, clubbing ...? Whatever the price, the value we each put on any model will be quite different and not simply measured in monetary terms. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardS Posted January 6, 2012 Author Share Posted January 6, 2012 Also for some of us £200 is far from a weeks salary and probably a mere trifle. . Fair points Kenton but I was not suggesting that £200 was a week's salary, (although for some it is.) I was musing whether some people would be prepared to spend a week's salary of whatever amount on such items. Of course I know that some people would - just as some think nothing of spending large amounts on their other interests or activities. £200 a trifle? Not for the vast majority I suspect. What I think is really underpinning the view of those of us who question the pricing of the items is not so much whether they are affordable but whether they represent true value for money and that modellers are not being exploited through "exclusivity' and 'frothing'. Just how much would a modelmaker actually charge to produce a relatively simple cubi-form building - which could then be cast in resin umpteen times in a country where labour is allegedly cheap. My concern is that model railway 'stuff' is witnessing price inflation which is led by the willingness of people to pay the price asked but is disguised by justifications from manufacturers about rising labour costs in China, costs of raw materials and so forth. Justifications which I am sure are essentially true but how can we the consumer really know whether the effects are reasonable? I have also wondered why, once R&D costs are recovered for a particular item, the costs of subsequent production runs are not apparently lower and reflected in lower shelf prices. But that is OT. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Stationmaster Posted January 6, 2012 RMweb Gold Share Posted January 6, 2012 It has surely always been thus - price and value do not mean the same and just to complicate things further 'value', in particular, means different things to different people. We are moving out of an extended era of historically extremely low prices for many facets of the model railway hobby and in many instances prices are now outpacing longer term inflation rates although we can also see that 'quality' (another word with many meanings) has also improved. At the end it all comes down to what we have the skills to do to a standard which we are satisfied with and the money we are prepared or able to spend on those areas where our skills or time (a commodity as important as money to many of us) can't give us the result we wish to achieve or which satisfies us. Some card building kits now on the market seem to me to be very expensive compared with what I remember of, say, Bilteezi prices years ago - and then you still have to spend time and skill on them to get the result. Manufacturers, and more recently the commissioners, make their living out of providing what they think some of us want at prices we are able and prepared to pay and they would not be in business if we didn't keep buying. Kernow have no doubt priced these models in just the same way as any of their other commissions - i.e. to make an overall profit on the number they expect to sell against what they have had to pay for finance, development, production, packing and transport . If they've got it wrong they might be on bread & dripping for a good while, if they've got it right it will still be a roast on Sundays. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Karhedron Posted January 7, 2012 Share Posted January 7, 2012 My concern is that model railway 'stuff' is witnessing price inflation which is led by the willingness of people to pay the price asked but is disguised by justifications from manufacturers about rising labour costs in China, costs of raw materials and so forth. Justifications which I am sure are essentially true but how can we the consumer really know whether the effects are reasonable? I do not think there is such a thing as a "reasonable" price for hobby items. There is just the price that people are willing to pay. If manufacturers charge to much they will not sell their wares or they will be undercut by competitors. I have also wondered why, once R&D costs are recovered for a particular item, the costs of subsequent production runs are not apparently lower and reflected in lower shelf prices. But that is OT. They are in some cases. The Dapol 9Fs are significantly cheaper than at first release due to the R&D costs being covered. It might also have something to do with the fact that they wanted to corner the market before the Farish one was released. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium 7013 Posted January 7, 2012 RMweb Premium Share Posted January 7, 2012 Whilst I take your point Jerry I make these observations. (1) Time spent building a model is only an added expense if someone else is building it. If I am building it myself it is my time and I do not charge myself for time I have set aside for modelling. (2) R&D costs I can understand if it is a CL22 say where there is no prototype to measure, scan and photgraph so everything is a more complex process. However a stone building takes very little time to measure and photograph (I have photgraphed many dries) It is a building nothing more or less. AFAIK you do not get a researched history of China Clay working in Cornwall, at least with a loco you get a potted history. Having lived in the heart of China Clay country for many years I like and support all things China Clay and appaud Kernow for their efforts. However there does appear to be a strange anomaly amogst modellers when they can justify +/- £200 for a resin cast building but moan at paying £150 for a superbly detailed loco, c'est la vie I retire scratching my head. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Gwiwer Posted January 7, 2012 RMweb Premium Share Posted January 7, 2012 Just to be quite clear on one point the Kernow dries are not priced at or anywhere near £200. The two units making the entire structure are £118. Plus shipping of course, which is entirely reasonable, and less VAT for those living outside the EU zone. Where the costs do mount up is if one requires additional dries units at £73.95 each to represent a long building such as is typically found in Cornwall. Many of us will not have the space to do that and will have to compromise on the length of our dries just as we do with the length of our trains. Even with the generous space on my own layout a full train of "hoods" only comprises of 20 wagons not the 40 more commonly found in reality. Likewise the dries will be a representative but shorter-than-prototypical structure at least in the first instance. If I felt able to build my own to a standard even approaching the typical Kernow commission I might choose to not buy the RtP items but I have not the time (and at least for now not the skill) to do so and will happily pay what I consider to be a fair price for a limited-run product. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium spamcan61 Posted January 7, 2012 RMweb Premium Share Posted January 7, 2012 Personally I could see the chimney as a reasonable purchase, that sort of shape is a pain to scratchbuild; the dries then that does seem rather a lot of money for what is essentially a goods shed with half a wall missing; but hey, the market will decide if the price is reasonable, it's not something I'm foaming at the mouth about. Given the minimal amount of research required for a small generic 'dries' then a BWT or 22 represents much better value in terms of 'research per pound' IMHO. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold Brinkly Posted January 7, 2012 RMweb Gold Share Posted January 7, 2012 I suppose it's the same shift in building prices is the same as with loco prices. Look at the price of most new large RTR locos, most now top the £80 mark the same with rolling stock, Hornby's new LNER stock is about £30 per carriage, so looking at it in this way a limited edition resin model has just followed the same trend. As others have said if you lack either the time or the skills to build your own models, then purchasing the RTP example might be very useful. Regards, Nick Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kenton Posted January 7, 2012 Share Posted January 7, 2012 Whilst I take your point Jerry I make these observations. (1) Time spent building a model is only an added expense if someone else is building it. If I am building it myself it is my time and I do not charge myself for time I have set aside for modelling. (2) R&D costs I can understand if it is a CL22 say where there is no prototype to measure, scan and photgraph so everything is a more complex process. However a stone building takes very little time to measure and photograph  (I have photgraphed many dries) It is a building nothing more or less. AFAIK you do not get a researched history of China Clay working in Cornwall, at least with a loco you get a potted history. Having lived in the heart of China Clay country for many years I like and support all things China Clay and appaud Kernow for their efforts. However there does appear to be a strange anomaly amogst modellers when they can justify +/- £200 for a resin cast building but moan at paying £150 for a superbly detailed loco, c'est la vie I retire scratching my head. But I'm afraid your argument here falls down. I do not live anywhere near the prototype so even the simple aspect of researching the building to model my own will cost me well in excess of the *£200 not to mention the simple fact I do not know where to find the prototype and the considerable loss in income by having to take time out to do the photography (assuming I have a camera and and am competent in using it). Taking these aspects into consideration the *£200 starts to look very cheap indeed. As for price inflation and wether the modeller i s being ripped off... back to the area I'm more familiar with. Lets take a recent example. A brass kit with no couplings provided. A separate etch can be purchased form another "cottage industry" The unit cost of that is trivial yet the item price is considerable - I see that as being "ripped" off - even more so when there is no reason why the parts could not have been produced "free" on the wagon etch. Though don't get me wrong, the provider of the missing part needs to make some profit for providing the missing link but as a kit builder we see this over and over a couple of quid here a few more there all for parts that should have been provided, couplings, vac pipes, buffers, chimney, backheads, driver/crew, the list is endless and that's even before we get to the standard omissions of wheels, gearbox, motor, paint, transfers ... But we just seem to expect every man and his Chinese monkey taking their cut - that is just life. * £200 now being an arbitrary and illustrative figure I guess what the market requires is true competition. Some other company to come up with their own clay dries in resin, priced high enough for them to profit but low enough and with at least as good quality to compete. Or perhaps in a different medium ... A card kit perhaps ???? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardS Posted January 7, 2012 Author Share Posted January 7, 2012 Think I'll start a company making square resin buildings..... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold Oldddudders Posted January 7, 2012 RMweb Gold Share Posted January 7, 2012 Think I'll start a company making square resin buildings..... I expect you'd get plenty of customers - as Kernow will! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium 7013 Posted January 7, 2012 RMweb Premium Share Posted January 7, 2012 I wasn't going to write agin but I have not said people are being 'ripped off' I believe the price to be excessive to say the least and yes my £200 quote was for what I see as a 'normal' four bay dry set up. However one is only 'ripped off' if one pays over the odds for something, but it can be a subjective thing especially in model railways; clearly I would feel I am being ripped off if I paid that money for the dries, however given what you write you may feel it is worth it I am sure there will be plenty of demand for these especially as I believe only 500 are being made? I have uploaded a photo of part of my Dry, it is of a different design than the Kernow one Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium spamcan61 Posted January 7, 2012 RMweb Premium Share Posted January 7, 2012 But I'm afraid your argument here falls down. I do not live anywhere near the prototype so even the simple aspect of researching the building to model my own will cost me well in excess of the *£200 not to mention the simple fact I do not know where to find the prototype and the considerable loss in income by having to take time out to do the photography (assuming I have a camera and and am competent in using it). Taking these aspects into consideration the *£200 starts to look very cheap indeed. If this was an accurate scale model of a specific building then I could accept your point, but it isn't; it is, understandably, a generic scaled down representation of a dries. Therefore pretty much zero research is required, there are plenty of photos of dries in various books, the 'nuts and bolts' of a dries are well explained in an old RM article*, then there's the China clay Yahoo group**, with a fair few published references in their database. The building is hardly a complex shape, although I admit the corrugated roof isn't trivial. I'm certainly not arguing against RTP buildings, or anything else, we all have different approaches to the hobby; it's just I feel this specific item isn't particularly good value. *' China Clay' by C.J. Peacock, January '65 RM ** http://groups.yahoo....ay_branchlines/ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikeharvey22 Posted January 7, 2012 Share Posted January 7, 2012 Over the past 3 years or so the exchange rate between the UK pound and the chinese yuan has worsened by about 30%. It is not really a surprise to find that prices for newly tooled and currently produced items from China are higher than we expected them to be a while back. I have baulked at paying 50 euros for a Piko French N gauge coach which falls down in the accuracy stakes for me, and make mine from my own brass etches instead. But for an accurate RTR loco I am happy to pay the current going rate. Maybe we all need to recognise that pricing is generally about what an item can be sold for and not a fixed margin over costs. If the price/value relationship is right for enough buyers then the seller will sell out, and be keener to invest in another similar product producing the right sort of returns for them. Mike Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium spamcan61 Posted January 7, 2012 RMweb Premium Share Posted January 7, 2012 Over the past 3 years or so the exchange rate between the UK pound and the chinese yuan has worsened by about 30%. It is not really a surprise to find that prices for newly tooled and currently produced items from China are higher than we expected them to be a while back. I've taken a look back at similar size Skaledale buildings, which have indeed increased in price over the last few years, but even then the latest 2012 Skaledale goods shed is a similar size and shape:- http://www.modelrail...way-Goods-Shed/ Yet is around half the price, so we're left as individuals to decide whether the dries building represents good value to us, at roughly double the price. It is my understanding that all these resin buildings are made from soft moulds in fairly small quantities, so I'm not sure how much the 'limited edition' means in cost terms in this case. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RSLR Posted January 7, 2012 Share Posted January 7, 2012 I still prefer my to scale full length clay dry Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Karhedron Posted January 7, 2012 Share Posted January 7, 2012 I still prefer my to scale full length clay dry And I do not blame you, that looks a splendid piece of modelling. But how many hours did it take you to build? At what hourly rate would the Kernow one break even? Of course there is also the fact that not everyone has room for a proper scale-length model. Personally I don't have any RTP buildings on my layout as painting and scenic work is an area I enjoy doing myself but scratch-building structures is something I have not tried my hand at yet so I can see why they would appeal to people. Not everyone enjoys the same aspects of the hobby. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RSLR Posted January 7, 2012 Share Posted January 7, 2012 And I do not blame you, that looks a splendid piece of modelling. But how many hours did it take you to build? At what hourly rate would the Kernow one break even? Of course there is also the fact that not everyone has room for a proper scale-length model. Personally I don't have any RTP buildings on my layout as painting and scenic work is an area I enjoy doing myself but scratch-building structures is something I have not tried my hand at yet so I can see why they would appeal to people. Not everyone enjoys the same aspects of the hobby. Most probably a whole week in hours for the construction but I been working on it on and off for at least 3 months, But then that depends if you count the few days and evenings of research visiting the different kilns, measuring and making engineering drawings I also like to point out that the photo is at least 3 months old and the full dry and layout is now complete. I will agree the RTP buildings are time saving but it seems to take away that good feeling of 'I built that' I prefer the 'home made' and not that 'made in china' trademark haha It does work out cheaper as I think my dry cost around £20 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium 7013 Posted January 9, 2012 RMweb Premium Share Posted January 9, 2012 Very nice Dry RSRL. Like you I prefer mine to RTP too. There is a certain satisfaction about building your own, I know its not for everyone, but you never know what you can achieve unless you give it a go. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
steveb860 Posted July 30, 2012 Share Posted July 30, 2012 Had an email from Kernow today, they are expecting these in this week. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
steveb860 Posted August 2, 2012 Share Posted August 2, 2012 New email rceived today, order has been despatched. They are on the way Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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