Must read

[Yoxford]

This is a must read. What a great distillation of the problems facing our hobby….Well done Rob.
“Most Model Airplane Manufacturers Don't Own Their Own Factories”

http://www.talesofthecat.com/

[coreystinson]

This is a must read. What a great distillation of the problems facing our hobby….Well done Rob.
“Most Model Airplane Manufacturers Don't Own Their Own Factories”

http://www.talesofthecat.com/

Yes, interesting read. I think it reflects the overall disconnect between the high standards for quality that are expected of these models, and the absurdly low prices that the consumer have become accustomed to thanks to larger buyers such as Wal-mart and Toys R Us.

Even Blue Box, who own their own factories (so I am told) are not producing much right now.

I predict that the days of inexpensive, high-quality, high-detail 1:18 scale models are *over*.

It then falls to the economy to determine how many consumers are left to participate in this particular hobby, and if they are enough to meet the required economies of scale.

[dragon53]

COREYSTINSON:

Could you elaborate on why BBI isn't producing much now?...I have BBI's F-4J Phantom II and P-51 Donald Duck and plan on getting their F6F Cat Mouth and P-51 Cripes A Mighty (if I can find one)---I would buy more of their planes if they would release more.

[coreystinson]

COREYSTINSON:

Could you elaborate on why BBI isn't producing much now?...I have BBI's F-4J Phantom II and P-51 Donald Duck and plan on getting their F6F Cat Mouth and P-51 Cripes A Mighty (if I can find one)---I would buy more of their planes if they would release more.

I have no inside info, sorry. I suspect this market is just small potatoes for them (especially w/o major retail support) and like everyone else they're just waiting to see how things in the marketplace/economy shake out.

They've phased out their domestic distribution warehouses and will instead hand off wholesaling/distribution duties to third parties, as is currently happening with all new product they've announced thus far (1:18 scale BF-109, and the two upcoming 1:32 scale aircraft).

[forcerecon85]

Interesting article. I liked the analogy of applying lipstick to a dog.

I use to work in a factory that made plastic auto parts, mostly door handles and when dealing with 12 hours of doing the same thing over you can slowly watch the machine's quality kinda slide, from dirt, dust, being over heated, etc. Plus our part was trimming excess flash off the part, inspecting it and boxing it up.

After a few thousand parts you start to care less and less about quality, or floor supervisors tell you your being too picky and the ones you thought the quality wasn't great, well its good enough for them. Moral means the difference between quality products while being on schedule or poor quality being late. Normally that meant having the company ship a crate back to the factory and being fined or paying $80,000 to ship that crate of late parts half way around the world from your local airport and be in a finished car in 12 hours

As a side note, I collect 1/72 aircraft and Hobby Master's F-4 Phantom II's are $50 and beautiful. Converting 50 in any measurement from 1/72 to 1/18 means that $50 beautiful phantom in 1/18 scale would be $200. Bargain bin discount days are over. If you want something bad enough, start saving those pennies. This is a new era