Derek Russan

Some of the stock has now been put up for auction at the end of the month. See https://ams.uk/catalogue.cgi?preview=y&auction=2303 This is all I know so no questions please.

I am very sorry to have to tell you that Russan Limited, trading as Eileens Emporium has ceased trading and appointed liquidators. We have done our best to send out all the stock we have for pre-paid orders. I am sorry that we were not able to complete all of them. Any clains against the business should be sent to: Christine Vaines, Begbies Traynor, Suite C 11 Kingsmead Square, Bath, BA1 2AB | T: 01225 316 040 | Email Christine.Vaines@btguk.com

Black Friday Special Offers from Eileens Emporium For the first time we are joining the Black Friday revolution. We are holding a Black Friday sale offering up to a massive 20% discount. Special Offer The special offer is for website orders only, and only on items that are in stock. Out of stock items will be refunded. We offer 10% for order values over £30, 15% for order values over £70 or 20% for order values over £100. The offer is open now and runs until until midnight GMT on Sunday 27 November 2022 . Orders will be shipped as soon as possible. To take advantage of this offer simply type BF10 to claim the 10%, or BF15 for 15% or BF20 for the 20% into the Coupon box underneath the Shipping Method options and the discount will be applied at the final page. We look forward to your orders. Exhibitions The latest exhibition list is: Guildford 0 Gauge Trade Show, 26th November, Spectrum Leisure Complex, Guildford GU1 1UP Manchester Dec 10th/11th 2022 New venue – the Sugden Sports Centre, Sydney Street, M1 7H Manchester Model Railway Show Website We understand there is free a bus from Manchester Picadilly Station Southampton 28/29 Jan 2023, Barton Peveril College, Chestnut Avenue, Eastleigh, Hampshire SO50 5ZA Festival of British Railway Modelling 11/12 Feb 2023, Doncaster Exhibition Centre, Racecourse, DN2 6BB London Festival of Railway Modelling 18/19 Mar 2023, Alexandra Palace, London, N22 7AY York 8/9/10 April 2023 York Racecourse, York, YO23 1EX, York Model Railway Show Website Bristol Model Railway Exhibition, Thornbury, 28-30 Apr 2023, Thornbury Leisure Centre, Thornbury, Bristol, BS35 3JB Railex 27/28 May 2023 Stoke Mandeville Stadium, Stadium Approach, Aylesbury, HP21 9PP Further shows TBA Matt, Derek, Anita and Judith Visit eileensemporium.com Tel: 01531 828009 Gloucester GL2 8DN United Kingdom

Eileens Emporium Autumn Newsletter We have all enjoyed our summer holidays, the first since covid. After a long hot summer, the nights are now drawing in and many modellers are increasing their activity accordingly. Our special offer is designed to help you get stocked up for autumn in time for the clock change later this month. Special Offer Our Autumn offer is now open. The offer is for website orders only. A massive 15% off everything from now until Saturday 15th October 2022. Orders will be shipped as soon as possible. To take advantage of this offer simply type AUTUMN22 in the Coupon box underneath the Shipping Method options and a discount of 15% off all goods will be applied at the final page. If you do not enter the code, we are unable to retrospectively apply the offer. We look forward to your orders. Exhibitions We have added some shows to the list, so please check the list carefully. We are delighted to be back out at shows meeting many of our wonderful customers in person. Current show list. Poole and District Model Railway Show Sunday 16 Oct, Poole Grammar School BH17 9JU Great British Model Railway Show, Gaydon 29/30 Oct Thornbury & South Gloucestershire Model Railway Club 19/20 Nov New Venue Turnberries Community Centre BS35 2BB Manchester Dec 10th/11th MMRS Website New venue – the Sugden Centre, M1 7HL Southampton 28/29 Jan 2023 Further shows TBA Matt, Derek, Anita and Judith

Eileens Emporium Summer Newsletter The heat is getting to us all. So if you want to keep out of the sun and are looking for something to do instead, see the Special offer and take advantage of a bargain. Stock Status We are pleased to say that most stock levels are back to normal.Wheels are due imminently. We continue to see a number of significant price rises and are trying our best to absorb wherever possible. The rises tend to be in the 10% to 15% area and we expect those that have not risen will do so soon. Now is the time to stock up before further rises happen. Especially with special offer. Special Offer Our Jubilee offer was well recieved and by popular demand, we are repeating it for the rest of July. The offer is for website orders only. A massive 15% off everything from now until Sunday 31st July 2022. Orders will be shipped as soon as possible, but remember we are not in on the bank holidays. To take advantage of this offer simply type RMSUM22 in the Coupon box underneath the Shipping Method options and a discount of 15% off all goods will be applied at the final page. If you do not enter the code, we are unable to retrospectively apply the offer. We look forward to your orders. Holiday Shutdown We will be closed for mail order from our packing for the Wells show for about two weeks. We will not be able to ship anything from end of day 10th Aug until 24th Aug. The website will remain open. Post and Packing Having listened to feedback from our customers we have reduced our minimum post and packing for small light items send by Royal Mail Large Letter to £2.50 including VAT. Exhibitions There is a major clash in September with Stafford and Scaleforum being on the same weekend. It is physically impossible for us to have a full stand at both shows, so we have had a very hard decision. So we will be at Stafford with the stand. For this year only we will not take the stand to Scaleforum, so in order to service our customers there, Derek will be at the show both days and will take pre-orders for collection, and hopefully enjoy the show. He looks forward to greeting you all on the day. We are delighted to be back out at shows meeting many of our wonderful customers in person. Current show list. Railwells 13/14 August Expo EM (Summer) Wakefield 20/21August Due to family commitments we are unable to attend. Guildex 3/4 Sept New Venue - Bingley Hall. Stafford County Showground. Weston Road, Stafford. ST18 0BD Guildex Website Leigh 10/11 Sept Leigh Sports Village, Leigh Leisure Centre, Sale Way, Leigh, WN7 4JY Stafford 24/25 Sept Stafford Showground, now in the new halls. Scaleforum 24/25 Sept High Wycombe. We are unable to have a stand at this show, but will take pre-orders for both day Gaydon Great British Model Railway Show 29/30 Oct Manchester Dec 10th/11th New venue – the Sugden Centre, M1 7HL. Further shows TBA Matt, Derek, Anita and Judith

The kits need painting anyway. The grey is quite dark, so under the wagon may not.

JubileeNewsletter Welcome to our Jubilee newsletter. Our best wishes to the Queen on this magnificent achievement. We are all looking forward to celebrating the Queens Jubilee, and the associated days off. If you are looking for something to do instead, see the Special offer and take advantage of a bargain. Stock Status We are pleased to say that most stock levels are back to normal. The only on-going issue is wheels We have re-introduced selected items from DCC Concepts to our range, including Cobalt Digital Point Motors, Rolling Roads and Weathering Powders. We will increase the range if we see demand. We continue to see a number of significant price rises and are trying our best to absorb wherever possible. The rises tend to be in the 10% to 15% area and we expect those that have not risen will do so soon. Now is the time to stock up before further rises happen. Especially with our Jubilee offer. Parkside Kits Peco have now started shipping kits with their own wheels, in place of Gibson. So far this only applies to 3 hold disc wheelsets. We have looked at the new wheels and they are of different construction to the Gibson ones. The disc and tyre are all metal held to the axle with a small plastic bush. So they should be easily eased out to EM if needed. The only other observation is that they grey, not black like the Gibsons. The consequence of this is that we are no longer able to offer wheel swaps on 3 hole discs, as it is not viable stock or sell the Peco wheels released from the kits. We will continue to offer wheel swaps on all the spoked, coach, lowmac etc. It only applies to 3 hole disc. We do not like withdrawing this facility, but have no real choice. Thank you for your understanding on this matter. Special Offer To celebrate the Queens Jubilee we have a special offer, for website orders only. A massive 15% off everything from now until Sunday 5th June 2022. Orders will be shipped as soon as possible, but remember we are not in on the bank holidays. To take advantage of this offer simply type JUBILEE in the Coupon box underneath the Shipping Method options and a discount of 15% off all goods will be applied at the final page. We look forward to your orders. Exhibitions There is a major clash in September with Stafford and Scaleforum being on the same weekend. It is physically impossible for us to have a full stand at both shows, so we have had a very hard decision. So for this year only (hopefully) we will be at Stafford with the stand. In order to service our customers at Scaleforum Derek will be at the show both days and will take pre-orders for collection, and hopefully enjoy the show. He looks forward to greeting you all on the day. We are delighted to be back out at shows meeting many of our wonderful customers in person. Current show list. Scalefour Society AGM 11/June Bristol Members only Gauge 0 Guild Doncaster - We will not be attending this year. Railex Aylesbury 2022 ******* CANCELLED ***** Perth 25/26 June Perth Railwells 13/14 August Railwells Expo EM (Summer) Wakefield 20/21August Expo EM Summer Due to family commitments we are unable to attend. Guildex 3/4 Sept Guildex Website New Venue - Bingley Hall. Stafford County Showground. Weston Road, Stafford. ST18 0BD Leigh 10/11 Sept Leigh Sports Village, Leigh Leisure Centre, Sale Way, Leigh, WN7 4JY Stafford 24/25 Sept Stafford Stafford Showground, now in the new halls. Scaleforum 24/25 Sept High Wycombe. We are unable to have a stand at this show, but will take pre-orders for both day Manchester Dec 10th/11th New venue – the Sugden Centre, M1 7HL. Further shows TBA Matt, Derek, Anita and Judith

Easter 2022 Newsletter Welcome to our Easter 2022 newsletter. It has been an exciting time with the office move and the shows gradually returning, so we hope to share some of that with you in this newsletter. As expected the exhibition circuit has been turned on its head this year with shows trying to re-establish themselves. This is borne out by the simple fact that it is Easter and we are not at York, which had to be cancelled for technical reasons. We are optimistic that we will once again be at York for Easter next year. We have had to make some difficult decisions and the latest status is shown below. Stock Status We are pleased to say that most stock levels are back to normal. Some Peco items and most wheels continue to be a problem and will probably take some time to resolve. Cambrian kits stock levels are now good, and probably at their best we have ever had. We have noted a number of significant price rises lately and are trying our best to absorb wherever possible. Most notably, Plastics have gone up a lot, both the UK sourced sheets and imported ranges such as Evergreen. Also other imports such as Birchwood Casey (currently awaiting stocks at suppliers) have increased. New Premises We are now settled into our new site and it is working well for us. It is a great location and we look forward to growing the business here. We still have a number of items to find homes for and put away. There are still some we cannot find, but on the whole a great improvement. In the near future we look forward to inviting you for an open day. Please note, our telephone and postal address have not changed. Exhibitions As mentioned above the delicate balance of shows has been challenging on return to "normality" post covid. During lockdown we rationalised our show stand and dismantled one of the two stands we had. The reality was simply that preparing stock and attending two shows on the same dates was simply too much for the staff. Some shows have been permanently cancelled, others are changing venue, or moving dates or both. Some are now encroaching on traditional holiday times. Accordingly, there are some shows that we are simply unable to attend. The good news is that for the first time (in our memory) we will be at Bristol/Thornbury show. However the stand size will be quite a bit smaller than we would like, so we will have to carefully select the ranges we take. We intend to take Parkside and Peco, but are not able to take Cambrian. Also, we are unable to take large sheets of Styrene and Wood. So please pre-order wherever possible so as we can take your order with us. The last day that we can ensure pre-orders are dealt with is the end of working day, Wednesday 27th April 2022. We are delighted to be back out at shows meeting many of our wonderful customers in person. Current show list. Epsom 2022 ******* CANCELLED ***** Bristol (Thornbury) 29/30 Apr-1 May. Please note we have a reduced size stand so pre-orders are advised. Expo EM (Spring) Bracknell 14/15 May Scalefour Society AGM 11 June Bristol Members only Gauge 0 Guild Doncaster - We will not be attending this year. Railex Aylesbury 2022 ******* CANCELLED ***** Perth 25/26 June Perth Railwells 13/14 August Expo EM (Summer) Wakefield 20/21August. Due to family commitments we are unable to attend. Guildex 3/4 Sept New Venue - Bingley Hall. Stafford County Showground. Weston Road, Stafford. ST18 0BD Leigh 10/11 Sept Leigh Sports Village, Leigh Leisure Centre, Sale Way, Leigh, WN7 4JY Further shows TBA Matt, Derek, Anita and Judith

Our move to new premesis is now almost complete. We are out of the old building, and now trying to find everything to get the new place set up and operational. We hope to start tackling the backlog of orders on Monday 7th March and should be back to near normal by midweek. We are sorry for any inconvenience caused. We commenced the move on Saturday 19th Feb, and have processed all orders up to midday Friday 18th Feb. We are sorry but we have not been able to ship anything during the move, or answer the telephones. Our postal address will not change, nor will our telephone number. The website will remain open for orders throughout. We will be at Kettering this weekend as planned.

Short Shut Down We will be moving to new, larger and hopefully more efficient premesis, we are sorry but we will not be able to ship anything during the move, or answer the telephones. We intend to process all orders placed up to about midday Friday 18th Feb. We should then resume normal service on or around 1st March. Our postal address will not change, nor will our telephone number. The website will remain open for orders throughout. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Eileens Emporium 2021 Christmas Newsletter Hello hello hello! The Christmas season is well and truly upon us and Boss Elf has once again asked Daughter Elf to review his newsletter. When will he learn!! Eileen's Elves would like to thank all of our friends and customers for their support and patience during this pandemic and the challenges it has created for us all. We couldn’t have got through it by our-elves. All the Elves in the Eileen's workshop hope this finds you fit and well and you are enjoying your Christmas festivities. We are certainly all busy scrurrying around the workshop to get your Christmas goodies sent out to you in time for Christmas, whether it be pieces for your Christmas projects or gifts. Our friend Santa at Royal Mail is working hard too on his delivery rounds, but please bear with him during his busiest season. A mince pie or two might help him out! The sooner you can get any last minute orders into us Elves, the sooner we can get them to Santa! The Elves have been very busy over the last few months and would like to make a few announcements and keep you updated with availability, product developments and shows. Yes, we said shows! HOLIDAY CLOSURE Over Christmas, the Elves will be taking a well earnt holiday with the reindeers, closing the office from end of day on 22nd December and reopening 4th January. The naughty Elves may sneak in to get a few orders out in-between these closure dates as we just can't help our-elves. Please note there is no guarantee of orders being processed or shipped during this break. We recommend placing orders no later than Monday 20th December 2021 to give the Elves a fighting chance to ship them before they close up. The Elves will work very hard to get the orders out, but are unable to make any promises. Whilst doing our best to get them out for you, we cannot guarantee Santa's schedule of delivery and are at the mercy of his service (Royal Mail etc.) The website will remain open for orders throughout, and will be processed in order of placement. VOUCHERS Our Elves are very technologically advanced, so don't forget that they can whizz you off a Gift Voucher if you are unsure of what goodies to hide under the Christmas tree this year! You can buy these online in the same way that you would buy product. RELOCATION Eileens Elves are relcoating! We are currently building new offices and workshops a few miles away from where we are now. We hope the reindeers will help us fly everything over in the sleighs sometime between mid January and the end of February 2022 (as this is their quietest time of the year!) This will no doubt cause some disruption, but the bigger premesis will give us much more space to keep the reindeer happy and rested. Additionally, it will be easier to lay out the workshop more efficiently, hopefully cure our telephone issue and allow us to hold reindeer races in the evenings (Comet currently holds the record, to Rudolph's disgust!) Our mail order address remains the same, but if you want to visit us you will need new directions. We welcome visits, but please phone ahead as it would be unlucky to see Santa out of season! NEW PRODUCTS We are delighted that Peco have released the long awaited Parkside PC90 BR(E) 13T steel body hopper wagon in 4mm (our part KPC90). Supplies are still intermittent as Peco are struggling to keep up with demand. We have had several deliveries of these and currently are awaiting further deliveries from Peco. They were in stock as this is being written. Peco have also released PC91 and PC92 (our part KPC91 and KPC92) Tank Wagons. These are not new, but fully updated of their original Wonderful Wagons. A first look says they they will make decent models. All in stock. Slaters have released several Private owners wagons, RCH, Gloucester (both 5 and 6 plank) and Charles Roberts in both Side and Side/End door configurations. Yesterday we sold out of 4035, but all others are in stock. EXHIBITIONS The Elves were able to at long last grace you with their presence at Gaydon this year, over Halloween weekend. Boss Elf finally declared it safe for us Elves to come out to play! In general, exhibitions appear to be slowly returning to the circuit. Many will not return, or will be in a different location or format, mainly due to venue issues. Under the current circumstances all show bookings must be considered as subject to cancellation or change. The Elves will take a very cautious attitude to shows; we want to do our best to protect our customers and our-elves. The economics of shows presents a variety of challenges, with high fixed costs (including much higher hotel costs) and potentially lower attendances. Therefore we will be taking a reduced size stand to shows for the foreseeable future and strongly advise pre-ordering via our website. As you probably know Warley was cancelled. We attended Great British Model Railway Show, Gaydon which was very successful. We are progressively booking more shows. Show confirmed so far, subject to covid restrictions are: Southampton - Saturday 29th & Sunday 30th January 2022, Barton Peveril College, Chestnut Avenue, Eastleigh, Hampshire, SO50 5ZA (Satnav use SO50 5BX) Stafford - Saturday 5th February & Sunday 6th February, in the larger and better Bingley Hall at Stafford Showground, so should be a much better visitor experience. Doncaster (Festival of British Railway Modelling) - Saturday 12th February & Sunday 13th February, Doncaster Racecourse. Looking further ahead we are in process of confirming: Gauge 0 Kettering - Saturday 5th March Alexandra Palace, London Festival of Railway Modelling, Saturday 18th March and Sunday 19th March York Saturday 16th April, Sunday 17th April and Monday 19th April Epsom Saturday 23rd April and Sunday 24th April Scalefour AGM (members only) Bristol - Saturday 11th June - Bristol Railex Aylesbury - Saturday 25th June and Sunday 26th June Railwells - Saturday 13th August and Sunday 14th August This is not a full list, we may have missed some. We are swamped with paperwork and the show Elf is working through it all. There have been many disruption to the show calendar caused mostly by covid. Several venues have not and may never re-open to shows. Also the additional bank holiday next May has thrown a spanner in the works. We have, after much consideration, decided that we are unable to attend more than one show in a weekend. So regretably we will not be able to attend Perth this year (clash with Railex), hopefully returning in 2023. We are also unable to attend Gauge 0 event at Doncaster 11th June. We will endeavour to keep the website up to date on developments. EXPORTS Great news, we are continuing to send international shipments by santa (post including Northern Ireland). We are still struggling with courier requirements. At present we are only shipping items that can go by post. This means that there are limitations with a maximum of 610mm packed length, maximum of 2kg with no Royal Mail banned or dangerous items. After suffering a number of postal losses at the end of last year we are now tracking all international shipments for security which has increased the shipping costs. We don't want anything to fly off the back of Santa's sleigh! We continue to work on resuming international courier deliveries. Deliveries to Europe are currently being shipped without VAT being added, so shipments will be subject to Tax and Handling charges at your border and will need to be paid by you. We are close to implementing a Tax paid solution using IOSS which will slightly increase the shipping cost but should be a lot cheaper than the Post/Courier Tax handling charges. Progress is slow with other priorities, but it is coming. We will keep you informed of progress. STOCK INFORMATION We continue to maintain high stock levels, but are still seeing slow deliveries from some suppliers (maybe their sleighs arent as powerful!) We are also suffering from a growth in the Cancel Culture, whereby more and more customers are cancelling orders when we are not able to complete immediately. Please be assured we Elves do our best, but are limited in what we can achieve, we are only 'human' after all. All cancelled items or orders cost us time and money (payment handling charges). Please remember with Modelu figures, we stock several hundred Modelu figures, but as we have a choice of over 7500 on the site it is not possible to stock all of them, so they are are on a 2 to 3 week leadtime. See the next paragraph regarding displaying live stock levels. WEBSITE DEVELOPMENTS As mentioned before, our Elves have been working with our website pixies and believe we are close to being able to add real time stock levels online. There have been unforseen issues with complex products. They will appear, but we are unable to say when. Then you will be able to see if the item is in stock or can be pre-ordered awaiting delivery. If in doubt or you have any queries, please contact us. The Elves will be more than happy to help! Many of the products we sell are complex to put stock levels on the website. For example, we offer Parkside 00 kits in 3 different wheel options, but they need the same base product. So it has been hard to show the availability for all of them as only the 00 are physically held in stock. Similar issues apply where we sell the same metal sections in different lengths. We are also planning to change the way in which product options are displayed on the site, hopefully making things more obvious and simpler for you our loyal customers. Watch out for the changes. Right, better go, as Daughter Elf will no doubt be in trouble for elf-ing up the newletter once again! Thank you, keep safe and stay elfy! Derek, Anita, Matt and Judith (Also known as - Eileen's Elves)

Within 24 hours of posting the newsletter, Warley is now cancelled.

Eileen's Emporium Summer 2021 Newsletter We would like to thank all of our friends and customers for their support and patience during this pandemic and the challenges it has created for us all. We couldn’t have got through it by ourselves. We here at Eileen's hope this finds you fit and well and you are enjoying the summer. As the weather is nice (ish) we won't keep you long, but we would like to make a few announcements and keep you updated. HOLIDAY CLOSURE Now that the summer is here, we too would like to enjoy some time with our families as well as needing a break from working continuously through the pandemic. Therefore we will be closing the office for a few days for our summer break. We will be shut from end of day on Friday 13th August 2021 and will resume on Tuesday 24th August 2021. We recommend placing orders no later than Wednesday 11th August 2021 if you want them before we close, we will do our best to ensure as many orders as possible are sent before we close, but are unable to make any promises. The website will remain open for orders throughout, and will be processed in order of placement. TELEPHONE LINES We are sorry but we currently have an issue with our telephone lines and are unable to access voicemails. We are working with our supplier to get these issues resolved as soon as we can, meanwhile email is the best way to contact us. Thank you for your understanding with this. NEW PRODUCTS We are delighted that Peco have released the long awaited Parkside PC90 BR(E) 13T steel body hopper wagon in 4mm (our part KPC90). Supplies have been intermittent as Peco are struggling to keep up with demand. We have had several deliveries of these and currently are awaiting further deliveries from Peco. They were out of stock for our delivery a couple of days ago. We are also now stocking Dapol and Knightwing kits, these will only be available at shows if pre-ordered. Modelu have added many new products which have been added to our website. Why not take a look. EXHIBITIONS Exhibitions appear to be slowly returning to the circuit. Many will not return, or will be in a different location or format, mainly due to venue issues. Under the current circumstances all show bookings must be considered as subject to cancellation or change. We will take a very cautious attitude to shows. We want to do our best to protect our customers and ourselves. The economics of shows presents a variety of challenges, with high fixed costs (including much higher hotel costs) and potentially lower attendances. Therefore we will be taking a reduced size stand to shows for the foreseeable future and strongly advise pre-ordering via our website. The only confirmed bookings we currently have are the Great British Model Railway Show, Gaydon, 30/31 October 2021 and Warley National at the NEC 27/28 November 2021. EXPORTS Great news, we have now resumed international shipments, with a few changes. At present we are only shipping items that can go by post. This means that there are limitations with a maximum of 610mm packed length, maximum of 2kg with no Royal Mail banned or dangerous items. After suffering a number of postal losses at the end of last year we are now tracking all international shipment for security which has increased the shipping costs. We are working on resuming international courier deliveries over the next few weeks. Deliveries to Europe are currently being shipped without VAT being added, so shipments will be subject to Tax and Handling charges at your border and will need to be paid by you. We are close to implementing a Tax paid solution using IOSS which will slightly increase the shipping cost but should be a lot cheaper than the Post/Courier Tax handling charges. We will keep you informed of progress. STOCK INFORMATION We continue to maintain high stock levels, but are still seeing slow deliveries from some suppliers. We are also suffering from a growth in the Cancel Culture, whereby more and more customers are cancelling orders when we are not able to complete immediately. Please be assured we do our best, but are limited in what we can achieve. All cancelled items or orders cost us time and money (payment handling charges). The biggest issue is with Modelu figures, please note that we stock several hundred Modelu figures, but as we have a choice of over 7500 on the site it is not possible to stock all of them, so they are are on a 2 to 3 week leadtime. See the next item on displaying live stock levels. WEBSITE DEVELOPMENTS We have been working with our website designers and believe we are very close to being able to add real time stock levels. This should gradually appear over the next few weeks. So you will be able to see if the item is in stock or can be pre-ordered awaiting delivery. Many of the products we sell are complex to put stock levels on the website. For example, we offer Parkside 00 kits in 3 different wheel options, but they need the same base product. So it has been hard to show the availability for all of them so only the 00 are physically held in stock. Similar issues apply where we sell the same metal sections in different lengths. We are also planning to change the way in which product options are displayed on the site, hopefully making things more obvious and simpler for you our loyal customers. Watch out for the changes. Thank you, keep safe. Derek, Anita, Matt and Judith

European VAT is a big cause of problems, and not easy for small suppliers to resolve. If you trade on a major platfrom such as Amazon or Ebay thay provide mechanisms for dealing with it. If not then it causes issues. Anythig over 150Euro has to go with tax unpaid. Currently all imports to the EU below 150 Euro can either have taken prepaid by the sended (using the IOSS system) or not prepaid where the recieving country usually apply tax and the carrier will charge a service charge. I have seen some cases where they have not bothered. Gone is the old 20Euro no tax threshold. Larger suppliers can register direct for IOSS, but smaller ones are not able to do that. For starters you need to do it within the EU. Small suppliers can use IOSS but usually have to pay a third party for the privilage. I am still exploring oprions as I think it will benefit customers, but most agents want a significany up front/monthly charge plus a more reasonable per shipment charge. This per shipment will usually be passed on to the customer as part of the shipping cost, but hopefully will be less than the Post or Courier charges at the border. The VAT paid will then be at the VAT rate for the destination country. Also this system is for business to customer sales, so if you are VAT registered you cannot reclaim the VAT if IOSS is used. This is all for shipments to EU only. Imports to UK have a very different set of rules. You can see why this is causing suppliers headached.

Drilling that many holed is a real bind. I certainly recommend higher quality drill for NS, the DRHM series on Eileens lists, this will geive better life than the DRCM series. Breakage is a pain. I would strongly recommend having a smaller protrusion from the Minidrill. Less protrusion, less risk of lateral force, just enough for the job. Drill out the solder with the cheaper economy drills.

Late answer but all unequal T sections are always Wider than Tall. Same with U. Similarily I sections are the opposite, Taller than Width.

I am inpressed that your soldering skills reach to plastic kits. Seriously though, I consider regulators for irons a waste of time. A regulator is like putting a brick under a car accelerator. It limits the power, not the temperature (or for a car Speed). If the iron has any form or temperature regulation it can men an external regulator has to throtteled well down before becoming effective. The important thing is to think about how the heat (energy) will get to the materials being joined. Lots of factors, but mostly fairly obvious. A big lump of metal takes more energy to heat up. A big bit on an iron will hold more energy. A higher wattage will put energy into the bit faster. A large contact aree will transfer energy faster. Most importantly contact for a longer time will transfer more energy. Keep these in your mind as you are doing the work and things should go well.

Eileen's Emporium December Newsletter Ho Ho Ho everyone. Christmas is now well and truly on its way and preparations are being made. We are still here busily working away with the elves in our workshop for anyone who needs some last minute Christmas presents or holiday projects. So check your stock of essentials and make sure you have all the parts to begin or continue your favourite projects over the festive season. All of the elves down on the farm in Gloucestershire will be hoping for a sense of normality in 2021 so the usual elf-antics can get back underway. Boss Elf may regret asking Daughter Elf to review this newsletter before it was sent! Once again Eileens Elves would like to thank all of our friends and customers for their support and patience during these very hard times. We couldn’t have got through 2020 by our-elves. (Sorry, bad pun, we couldn’t elf ourselves). We hope you are keeping safe and well; thankfully the elves here are all fit and elfy (bar one too many mince pies). We are extremely grateful for all of your orders, please be patient with our elves as orders are often taking longer to process than usual due to sheer volume of orders and supply issues. Our elves are also hearing from some customers about random delivery delays by Royal Mail. (Their busy elves must be a little overworked at this time of year). This seems to be localised as mail is coming fast in some areas and not others. We are also seeing several delays to mail to Europe. Ok, so next up is the serious stuff! See you at the end of the newsletter for some more elf amusement! Meanwhile, I’m off to put another batch of reindeer cookies in the oven. The naughty elves around here keep finding my hidden stash! Brexit: If you know what is happening please tell us. We are as confused as anyone. Unless we have clarity we will be forced to stop exporting goods to Europe for a short time. The main reason is it looks likely that we will have to add Commodity Codes to all our invoices, and with 12500 items, most of which are not clear in the Government definitions, this will take some time. This is only a temporary measure and we will resume export as soon as possible. Service Status: We have completed the system upgrades and all is now in place. We are beginning to see the benefits and hopefully you will see them too. Stock Levels: We are still patiently waiting for deliveries from many suppliers, including Peco and Gibson. We appreciate the waits for some products have been substantial but are doing our best to work with all our suppliers to provide you with the goods you require. We have just had a delivery from HMRS, but they were unable to send everything needed. Deliveries from Modelu are imminent, always on a couple of weeks leadtime, but again the pressures of the time of year are slightly extending this. Due to recent demand, we have run out of a few metal sheets, strips and sections and are expecting deliveries before the end of the year. We apologise in advance for any inconvenience this may cause. Regarding Gaugemaster manufactured products, we are experiencing significant delays and delivery dates are unfortunately unknown. This also seems to affect Springside and some Smiths items. We have removed all Gaugemaster controllers from the website as a temporary measure, until stock issues are resolved. We are pleased to say that overall our stock levels are higher than usual and we are working hard with the suppliers and manufacturers to maintain and improve this further. Exhibitions: What exhibitions?? It’s certainly been a while since we were able to get out and about to travel the country. We doubt that there will be any viable exhibitions before the summer, but don’t fear our mail order will continue to remain open for you. We thank those who have used us by mail order for their support. We are really missing meeting our friends and customers at exhibitions. Hopefully we can meet up with everyone again soon and bring a bit of normality back, whatever that may be. The vast majority of planned exhibitions are cancelled for obvious reasons relating to Covid. Many will not be back in the same venue or indeed at all. We are hearing from a number of exhibition managers that venues will no longer be available, even after current restrictions are lifted. The economics of exhibitions will also be an interesting issue, as sufficient attendance numbers need to be maintained in order for many exhibitions to be financially viable. From our point of view, we have fixed costs for transport and accommodation that may not be justified if shows have reduced attendance figures. We will just have to wait and see what happens. As soon as we have positive news, we will be reporting it. We are keeping our fingers crossed. Right better go, as Daughter Elf is likely to be in trouble for elfing up this newletter! Thank you, Keep Safe and Stay Elfy! Derek, Anita, Matt and Judith (Also Known As - Eileen’s Elves) Visit eileensemporium.com Tel: 01531 828009

Once again we at Eileens Emporium would like to thank all our customers for their support and tolerance during these very hard times. We hope you are keeping safe and well, thankfully we are all fit and healthy here. We are very grateful for all of the incoming orders, please be patient with us as they are often taking longer to process than usual due to sheer volume of orders and supply issues. Changes at Eileens We have been working hard to improve our ability to deliver a better service to our customers. Recent times have caused an increase in demand as so many customers are isolating or are at home more. Also there have been shutdowns in many of our suppliers causing supply issues. The result is that the supply chain has been sucked dry of many items. Many specialist suppliers are taking far longer to deliver than normal causing a backlog of orders in our office. It takes far less time and effort to send an order than dealing with it if we are unable to complete the order. We are trying to keep all customers up to date on the status of their order within 3 to 4 days of placing the order, but there have been times when we have been so overloaded that this target has slipped. Most customers seem to be very understanding, and we are sorry if we have not met your expectations in this area. One of the changes we have made is to move the website to a more modern platform. You will see some minor improvements, including guest checkout, but the biggest change is behind the scenes where things are now much more manageable and maintainable. Please note that if you have previously registered you are not able to use the same email address for guest checkout. We are investigating what we can do about this. One question we are sometimes asked is why we do not show clearly what items are in stock and which are to order. We really would love to be able to do this and are still looking for solutions to this. Apart from a very heavy load that would be involved in maintaining this (we now have about 12000 items on the site) the first reason is that a lot of products are derived from other products, many packed items are available in different quantity packs. The website is not smart enough to show how many 10 and how many 100 packs we have when we only have a total of 200 of them in stock. Another reason is that in more normal times it is not possible to keep the stock level live when we sell items at Exhibitions. So rather than try to get the stock level live on the website, we are making changes to our systems to improve our stock control so as we are less likely to run out of items. This will never be perfect as we still see occasional orders for larger quantities than we normally hold, but it will make a difference long term. We have also changed our telephone system so we now have more lines available. This did cause a few teething issues but these are now resolved. It enables calls to be answered by more members of staff, and also voicemail messages can be accessed more quickly. You may also have noticed that we are now printing barcoded labels for Royal Mail shipments. This improves the speed and accuracy of shipping items. Further improvements are being made to make this process more directly linked to the website to reduce time and errors. All the pending changes are linked to a major change in the software package we use for stock control, order processing and accounting. This will be a traumatic step for us and we will try to introduce this as painlessly as possible. Website: The new website seems to have settled in, we are conscious that some customers have lost their passwords and we are sorry about that. The password reset feature seems to work well, except some customers (in particular, those with btinternet email addresses) are not getting the reset email. We have done all we can but for some reason some email providers do not like us. If you hit the issue of not getting the reset email please email us and we will make sure you can log in and then choose your own password later. If the manual email we send in response is blocked, we usually see a notification so will resend from a different address. We have also seen some instances of customers not being able to select a delivery method. We have made changes and believe this issue is now resolved. If you see a problem like this, please inform us. Interruption to normal service: The previous notification of interruption did not happen for a number of reasons and will now happen at the end of October. As mentioned above we will be making a major change to our systems. This will happen over the end of October and beginning of November. We are working out plans to minimise the impact this has on customers. We will have an all out effort to send as many orders as possible before the Courier and Royal Mail collections on Wednesday 28th October. We will continue to process orders after collections have happened and try to send as soon as possible. Then we will suspend order processing on Thursday 29th and Friday 30th October. We hope to be up and running again as normal on Monday 2nd November or very soon afterwards. With the new systems in place it will take some practice to get used to them, so please bear with us. Our website will not close for orders during this time. We will be very busy getting the new systems in place so will find it difficult to answer the telephone and take phone orders during these few days. Therefore, placing orders on the website is highly recommended. We will also remind you that there is a free shipping offer on web orders (order value over £30 to £50 depending on shipping cost) that do not apply on telephone orders. We apologise in advance for any inconvenience this may cause. Stock Issues We are still having some delivery issues. We did have a problem with Wheels, partly due to a massive increase in demand, which had a knock on effect to the manufacturer who also saw an increase in demand. We did have a large delivery recently that cleared the entire backlog, but demand remains high and some lines are already waiting for stock again. Peco have had severe disruptions and are beginning to get back to normal, but some lines are still in short supply. The spare transfers for Parkside kits are causing issues, and unless there is an improvement in supply we may have to stop supplying them soon. In that case we will list the quantities we have and let the stock run down. The majority of Gaugemaster manufactured products seem to have been unavailable since spring. This also seems to affect Springside and Smiths items. We had good stocks of all available 4mm items and many 7mm items from HMRS but these have sold rapidly. There are a number of items not in stock at the manufacturers. Exhibitions: What exhibitions!!! We are really missing meeting our friends and customers at exhibitions. We thank those who have used us by mail order for their support. The vast majority of planned exhibitions are cancelled for obvious reasons. Many will not be back in the same venue or indeed at all. We are hearing from a number of exhibition managers that venues will no longer be available, even after current restrictions are lifted. The economics of exhibitions will also be an interesting issue, as attendance numbers need to be maintained in order for many exhibitions to be financially viable. From our point of view we have fixed costs for transport and accommodation that may not be justified if shows have reduced attendance figures. We will just have to wait and see what happens. As soon as we have positive news, we will be reporting it. We are keeping our fingers crossed. Thank you and Stay Safe! Derek, Anita, Matt and Judith Visit eileensemporium.com Tel: 01531 828009 Postbox only: Unit 19.12 Highnam Business Centre Newent Road Gloucester GL2 8DN United Kingdom

Once again we at Eileens Emporium would like to thank all our customers for their support and tollerance during these very hard times. The launch of the new website seems to have happened without too many issues. We will still welcome any feedback you have. Meanwhile, we need to give as many customers as possible a heads up that we will closed for shipments for a day or two from 3rd August. This is because we are changing our internal invoicing systems and it could take us a little time to get everything in place and start operating normally. The website will remain open throughout for placing orders as normal. We will endeavour to get as many orders shipped as possible before close of business on Friday 31st July. We will continue to process orders even if it is after the Courier and Post has been, so some orders may not physically leave until Monday 3rd August. We will deal with all orders in strict sequence and hopefully this will not cause too many delays. We apologise in advance for any inconvenience this may cause. Thank you and Stay Safe!

New website now up and running. There is a special offer on the homepage, check it out. Any issues please let us know

Latest news from Eileens Emporium We at Eileens Emporium would like to thank all our customers for their support and tolerance during these very hard times. We are now please to announce the launch of our updated website. At some time during the day on Thursday 16th July the current website will be turned off, and a holding message put in place while we do all the necessary changes. This should only take a few hours. All orders will be transfered to the new site, as will user registrations. In fact the new site will look very familiar, but fresher, mobile and tablet friendly and a lot of the bugs will hopefully be fixed, such as problems with lost passwords. If you have any problems with the new website please email us. With the sudden cancellation of all shows and no return in the near future we have all been relying on mail order. We have continued to supply customers with their needs at an unprecendated level. So much so that the supply chain has been severely stretched and we are still suffering from delayed supplies. We appreciate our customers patience in these trying times. We will send another newsletter a few days after the new site is up and running. Visit Website To order by phone please call 01531 828009 (+44 1531 828009) between 10am and 5pm. Phonelines will be open while the website is offline. Calls may be answered outside these times and messages can be left at any time. Visitors are seen by appointment only. Please do not come unannounced.

Once again, thanks to all our customers for their support and tolerance during this crisis. We are open for business and trying as hard as we can to get as many orders out as possible. With staffing levels restored to normal we are presently running about a day or two behind. We have only been accepting orders placed through the website, but will resume taking telephone orders Thursday May 28th. It is much more efficient for us if you are able to place your orders on the website. Stock is now our main issue. We are getting lots of stock in, but some suppliers are not operating and many are taking much longer than usual to supply. Many of our suppliers are in the same situation as we are, so stock levels are a serious issue. If we have stock orders are quick to process, however where there are shortages it takes at least twice as long to deal with. Please do not chase us until at lease a week has elapsed as this also slows us down, and then by email please. Problem products include all Metal Sections and Strips. There have taken neasly 6 week to get through customs due to archaic and inefficient systems in use by Parcel Force. We are now expecting all shortages to be cleared with a delivery arriving on Tuesday 26th May, however there are so many orders awaiting this delivery it will take a couple of days to clear the backlog. We are also awaiting deliveries from Gibson Wheels, HMRS transfers (one order came in last week, but more awaited), Reamers, Some BA fasteners, Some Slaters Sheets, Vallorbe files and several other items. We are doing our best to resolve these issues. We will try to notify customers of problems as we process their orders. We are seeing orders for quantities way beyond our normal stock levels on many item, so we are unable to guarantee delivery from stock. Do not send orders by post, they will not be processed, we have not been in a position to accept cheque payments since all our local banks closed. We thank you all in advance for your understanding. Stay safe, keep well, keep modelling.

Limonene now back in stock.

As far as I can tell the do not exist now. There are at least 3 manufacturers of compatible blades. X-acto managed to get blacklisted by UK over contents of one of their glues so have not been coming into UK. I do not know if this is still the situation. Swann Morton and Excel both make them. None list what you are after. There is a half width blade for No. 1 handle, but we have never stocked it, I will try to get some.