Model Railroading > Athearn Prices

Anyone else shocked at the Prices for the next run of steamers WHOLY CRAP !

Genesis, DCC, Sound, all these items add up. And Challengers and Big Boys are huge locomotives.
Although $600+ bills is a little steep.

Paul Liddiard
Spanish Fork, UT

Well consider the price of a brass steam locomotive. You can buy a older model that doesn't run as well and lacks the DCC and Sound for about the same price, or spend many times more for a current brass model. The Genesis model starts to look like a good deal. If you want cheap, there is always old Rivarossi models.

Ted Curphey
Ontario, OR

You could always spend the next year of your life building one from scratch.....

Yeah but $530 for a non sound glad I got the first run models to play with

Prices will continue to climb as long as the bulk of the manufacturing stays in China. If industry follows others and moves their manufacturing to other countries like say Vietnam then you may see the prices stay more steady.

As been stated before right here T/O this is not 1975 or 1985 it's 2015. This is a hobby like golf, hunting or RC.

For what is available today for the current era modelers, including the major class ones, Amtrak and most commuter lines, in the quality, detail, operation, variety in road numbers and more, I will pay the current prices as to me it's more than a fair trade off.

Yes maybe not as many purchases but I am ok with the quality rather than quantity (although that too is there if your budget allows).

Northridge Switcher

I took the announced price of the Athearn Mt-4 "San Joaquin Daylight" engine, DC only for equivalency's sake, and plugged it into the dollartimes.com inflation calculator. Here's the result:

$319.98 in 2015 had the same buying power as $42.52 in 1965.

If I could have scrimped and saved $42.52 when I was 13, or made out like a bandit at Christmas from the folks, $42.52 would have been nearly the exact price that would have brought me a rudimentary brass Mt-4 with a Pittman motor, a reasonbly good-running chassis (with a lot of break-in time) and a dozen brass castings and some forged truck sideframes. I would have been over the moon with it -- but it couldn't hold a candle to 2015 Genesis detailing and authenticity.

Figuring the inflation index, the new steam model isn't any more expensive than it would have been 50 years ago, but it's features are worlds beyond anything even the finest modelers could create.

I'm pretty happy with that state, actually. A nice model was expensive and dear way back then. It's always been a premium product and premium always hurts a little, but the delight should compensate.

~ BZ

Even if the younger generation might not be interested in some of those models in the future, I still think that they will go up in value like pre-War Lionel. As somewhere along the line, I'll suspect that this merry-go-round will stop. So keep your models in good shape and save the boxes... <G> Don't weather them. LOL

In 198-something when I was 9 or 10 I remember thinking there would be no way I would ever be able to save up enough allowance to pay a whopping $21 for an end cab switcher for my trainset. $21 barely covered my lunch today...

Desmond Praetzel "4451 Puff"

Refer to this post if you want prices to remain constant.

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?3,2900692,2901673#msg-2901673

Everyone want's "more" but doesn't want higher prices.

Back in the 1960's, I invested in a bunch of PE, SN and New Haven electrics. All BRASS !!!
The PE & SN cars were imported by Ed SUYDAM ! I had at least fifteen + cars at $ 32.00 EACH.
If you find any on Ebay today, they are much more than THAT !

KRK

My dad likes to tell the story of how he took a girl on a date about 1938. They lived in a very small Oklahoma town, and he was going to take her to the "soda fountain" in the next town over, about 10 miles away. His dad said that he could use the car, as long as he replaced the fuel used. At the end of the date, Dad pulled into the FULL SERVICE Texaco station, and proudly told the attendant. "I'll have a dimes worth"!

Considering the quality of the product, it is a good investment.

Go went up, cars went up, houses went up....its economics 101. We expect more....gotta pay more to get it. Athearn is not Varney, we scrutinize and demand rivet counting accurate details and scream about it publicly when they are wrong (think about eh beating Bowser took recently)....to get that level of detail takes time,,,,and MONEY. Athearn is doing their part.

Why is no one complaining about BLI? Pricing is similar. Another quality vendor supporting our hobby.

Joel Brazy
Coatesville, PA

We, as a society are at fault.

Everyone wants the latest and greatest, but nobody wants to pay money for them.

Then they wonder why the products are garbage, and all the manufacturing jobs are done in some 3rd world country.

The industry as a whole seems so set on ready to run fully assembled and seems to be pricing itself into the ground. No way I could shell that out these days, and I love the Big-Boy! Just my two cents.....

> Why is no one complaining about BLI?


Cause I have 66 Genesis engines and no BLI engines. I like Athearn and not BLI and I think i've paid for the right to be upset that a Genesis F unit has doubled since they were released.

Perhaps hobby shops could turn up new profit centers by setting up payment plans with interest? <G>



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/05/15 12:45 by wabash2800.

ha ha ha, the "good old days"! I remember getting a blue box Athearn U33C for 19.99! The first time the price thing really got my attention was when Red Caboose bought out the beautiful coil steel cars for ...OMG... 34.99! That was HIGHWAY ROBBERY! But they were gorgeous cars, prebuilt (already had a lot of Walther's ones I had put together from kit form) so I forked out a bunch of cash on those! Same as always... if it is worth it to you, then that is how much you are going to pay for it! Then Auto Parts cars for 40.00 each and now, auto racks for.... 88.00!! PER CAR! I would NEVER pay that much for a car...have all those Walther's ones I built from kits....... hmmm.... but what nice detail.... wait, did they announce it painted for Missouri Pacific? ARGG!!

Have Fun!!
Chris