Western Railroad Discussion > Kalmbach Media...The End

As reported earlier,  Kalmbach Media sold their Tracks Brands (raiilroad related magazines + Astronomy) to Firecrown Media, effective June 30.

Kalmbach on May 1 also sent out a letter to their stockholders stating  that athe Board of Directors is actively seeking to sell the company's remaining media, marketing and other assets.    After completing the asset sales, the company will be dissolved.   After all bills are paid and accounts closed,  remaining funds will be distributed to stockholders.  Their hope is the sales will be completed by the end of 2024.

Thus the end of Kalmbach Media,  after 80 years.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 05/09/24 05:27 by masterphots.

Yup, cornerstone, one of those "things" that will always be there.

Out 

I recall buying Trains back in the '50s when I was in grade school, and I've subscribed to their publications off and on over the years. I have not subscribed for the past couple of years because I did not find the topics of interest to me. That is certainly a personal opinion and not meant as a global judgment on their publications. 

I presume Kalmbach publications suffered from dwindling subscriber rolls as many other fine  publications have. Also, much of what I am interested in can be found online, like here in Trainorders. 

In any case, I am sorry to see Kalmbach going out of business, but they had a good run and their products were important to many of us in our railfanning hobby. Their publications will continue to be an important resource for years to come. 

 

Al Kalmbach invented railroad hobby publications. This is truly the end of an era, and as a lifelong reader of Trains and Model Railroader (with the family subscribing since 1940), it marks a very sad situation. But it's been clear for some time that the business model (corporate campus, layers of management, huge staffs) was not competitive in today's environment. Its recent shift in focus to electronic media and video were unable to turn things around.

Mostly, I feel for the employees. Most Kalmbach staffers were there for their entire careers. I wonder what will happen to them, a number of whom I consider friends.

Art House

Sad news indeed. I am 61 years old and grew up with Model Railroader magazine. I consider Linn Wescott, Russ Larson, Andy Sperandeo, and many others associated with the magazine, to be the greats in our hobby. In the pre-internet days when a copy of MR arrived at my house, I scoured it from front to back. Many trips to my local hobby shop were inspired by MR. Truly the end of an era. I wonder what will become of the MR&T layout?  

Mike "Mikado" Anderson

aehouse wrote:

> Al Kalmbach inveted railroad hobby publications.

Arguably so; however, didn't the much older Railroad Magazine, while aimed more towards working railroaders, also begin to introduce certain features and columns that might attract the casual railroad enthusiast?

Hopefully 'Classic Trains' can continue under the new owners - perhaps in digital form.  That has been the jewel of their magazines in recent years, IMHO.

Rich

With the current attention span and slobber for immediate news, printed media doesn't have a chance unless it deals
with history. And as been said, those of us into historical topics will soon be history as well!

Out 

I hope someone will sell the Trains back issues in a useful digital format.

PasadenaSub Wrote:
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> Hopefully 'Classic Trains' can continue under the
> new owners - perhaps in digital form.  That has
> been the jewel of their magazines in recent years,
> IMHO.
>
> Rich

Problem is their reader demographic is fast ageing out.   Last I heard, CT was down to three staffers.

PasadenaSub Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Hopefully 'Classic Trains' can continue under the
> new owners - perhaps in digital form.  That has
> been the jewel of their magazines in recent years,
> IMHO.
>
> Rich

Ditto, I still subscribe to it and it is one of my favorite publications, along with my historical society magazines. I always enjoyed Fred Frailey's column, after he stepped aside, it was kind of downhill from there.

Tom

Kalmbach parking lot through the years:

1. 2011
2. 2022
3. 2023

They shed employees over the years as the business contracted until they reached the point that not a whole lot of people were working there anymore.
 

Todd Clark
Canyon Country, CA
Trainorders.com

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Then there is this street view from when they were trying to lease the building. Perhaps so the employees did not get worried they put that Kalmbach wasn't leaving.

Todd Clark
Canyon Country, CA
Trainorders.com

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Per another post, the new owner has no plans for the premises, so the layout will have to be dismantled. I've been through this kind of thing before which included a new owner. Sometimes the office politics get's nasty so people can save their jobs with a new owner. I'm sympathetic,  but it's time for the employees to find a plan B if they haven't already. A new owner can promise you anything and then renege.Thank God for 40(K)s.

I suspect that if the RR magazines stay, they will likely be digital only if not right away. And the staff will be dramatically reduced. They had already out-sourced some services. I have a digital subscription and like many of the features including reading current and back issues back to 1934.

I can't imagine that there were many shareholders unless some of the employees owned stock.

Victor Baird



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/09/24 12:40 by wabash2800.

Subscriptions were one revenue stream, but advertising was also a big chunk.  In 1996 a full page advertisement in Trains Magazine was around $5000.  Quarter page ad was around $1400.  Look through a magazine from that era and you can calculate how much money they were bringing in.  Most of the ads were video producers like myself and book/video resellers.  Once the Internet took hold that side of business dwindled away.  Magazine subscriptions also slid.  Trains had a circulation of around 130,000 issues a month at that time. In California alone they had 10,000 subscribers. I know because I rented their mailing list a few times in the late 1990s.   They use to publish their annual statement showing circulation in the December issue of the magazine in a tiny box. I would be curious to know what it is these days.

There isn't a large enough audience to justify selling digital only subscriptions. Some years back I looked into doing it here and my conclusion was there isn't enough hobbyists to cover the expense.  The hobby is too small.

Todd Clark
Canyon Country, CA
Trainorders.com

Todd:

Isn't that what you are doing right now with Trainorders?

Victor Baird

webmaster Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> There isn't a large enough audience to justify
> selling digital only subscriptions. Some years
> back I looked into doing it here and my conclusion
> was there isn't enough hobbyists to cover the
> expense.  The hobby is too small.

Englewood Wrote:
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> I hope someone will sell the Trains back issues in
> a useful digital format.

A few years ago one could buy a CD containing many years of Trains. I'm not sure that such CDs are still available.
 

colehour Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Englewood Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I hope someone will sell the Trains back issues
> in
> > a useful digital format.
>
> A few years ago one could buy a CD containing many
> years of Trains. I'm not sure that such CDs are
> still available.


Trains Mags are safe in print stuff n get in the mail every month?? 
>  

webmaster Wrote:
------------------------------------------------------
>
> There isn't a large enough audience to justify
> selling digital only subscriptions. Some years
> back I looked into doing it here and my conclusion
> was there isn't enough hobbyists to cover the
> expense.  The hobby is too small.

Todd...I might agree except for one thing.  The number of producers of railroad videos...good and hot-so-good and the length of the individual videos s increasing almost exponentially on YouTube.  In some cases the editorial content...the narration...is extremely ameterish, but , then again, in the beginning, so was Kalmbach.  These appear to be motivated people and given the right guidance, the output would develope into something akin to video magazine.  And that's where I believe the future of railfanning lies, again, given the right guidance.  Here's the question:  What's the difference between a good "you tuber" and a reporter writing an article?

I keep getting the 504 Gateway Time-out message when trying to access the Community>Forums>anything... Not the first time but I havent been able to get in for a few days. Any ideas if that will stay or is it finished?

Bruce