Another price increase?

[ColinB]

If there is another 10% hike later this year I seriously think Hornby should be wondering about its future. The retail market is not a bottomless pit, although some people on this site seem to think it is, a continental product is streets ahead of a Hornby product so a comparison on prices is not really fair. I bought a brand new Hornby Rebuilt Royal Scot last week, the reversing rod was in the box and the smoke box cover fell out. Read most of the posts on this forum, a lot about very old trains so not that many people are buying them new. Hornby needs to be shifting relatively large numbers to pay for its organisation, if it keeps increasing its prices there will be no market.

[VESPA]

I must admit, Colin, I am also very much with your thoughts. I would have liked the LMS Turbomotive but have settled for two books about it, due soon at £31 for both. Whether I will bite the bullet and buy the model is slim at the prices being asked. £266.49 !!!!!! That is 2 top make tyres for my car.

[ColinB]

@VESPA but if as someone suggested that there is another 10% price rise in August/September this year that would make it £293.14. I know it is desirable but would people pay that much? There will always be some but is there enough to justify making it. I watched a Sam's video review of the Rails/Bachmann class 812 loco. He criticised the price at nearly £200 but considering it was a special version implemented by Rails with a very small production run, I could see some justification for the price but Hornby are charging that for loco designs that are nearly 20 years old.

[Bulleidboy]

Whatever the price, there will always be customers. I would think that the members of this forum and others, make up a very small minority of Hornby's customers. I, like a number of others on this forum, put in my order for two or three loco's when the 2022 announcements were made, yes they are expensive, but they will not arrive until later in the year, if this year, so it's not a major expense right now. I will not be saving for these loco's, but am of course aware that later in the year the "card" will get a bigger hit than usual. No hobby is cheap nowadays, initially it can be, but as you progress you want better items for your collection, and it starts to get expensive. Many years ago, when my sons were in there teens (there now in their 40's), we started collecting model Ferrari cars, we started with the 1/18th Burago models, and then I discovered St. Martins models near Trafalgar Square, and the models started to get a little more expensive. That was years ago, and now there are about one hundred and thirty model Ferrari, all boxed and packed away in the loft, and have not seen the light of day for very many years. This was another hobby that started to get very expensive, but luckily the interest in that started to wain and stopped. Trains will always be of interest and there will always be customers.

[ColinB]

Of course there will always be customers, the trouble is, will there be enough to justify running a huge design team that Hornby has?

[Going Spare]

How many people are there in the "huge design team" dealing solely with Hornby railways?

[Bulleidboy]

Some years ago it was five. There is a post on RMWeb, where there was obviously a day out to meet "the team". The last count I saw said there were 191 employees at Hornby - that will probably include SK down to the cleaner. During the series on Hornby that was televised recently, the place did not appear to be a hive of industry.

[Tony57]

Hi

In view of how many years Hornby made an operating loss prices did need some increase but there are price increases and there are price increases

BB Looking at the number of companies in the Hornby Group 191 divided by 13 it is not that large a number of staff

Looking at the list of companies Corgi Premium looks an interesting development wonder if SK would open Hornby Railways up for the same type of product?

[ColinB]

191 employees is still a lot to pay, I get the opinion the smaller manufactures have nowhere near that. Ok, it is not like where I used to work but they still need paying. Then there is all the equipment, computers, sophisticated 3d printers and all the rest. £100 a loco profit if it is that, will still mean a reasonable amount of sales to support that. Admittedly you have all the other makes, but last I heard Hornby were up to their eyeballs in debt so you need to service that as well.

[Bulleidboy]

They did have a £48.5m turnover last year - and for the first time made a small profit £345K.

[DarkRedCape]

I think the Hornby name still has pulling power when it comes to demand for their product. How much longer before this weans is anyones guess.

I’ve seen so many stories lately about companies raising prices of their products, and blaming it on rising costs and inflation, then paying their CEO a record high bonus.

As mentioned in this thread already, I do think Hornby need to look at their future, because this constant increase in prices isn’t sustainable. But for the foreseeable future, I think they know that people want their products, and will pay the astronomical prices for them.

[TVR1707822112]

Yes - so true

[Will Hay]

One hundred and ninety-one employees doesn't sound a lot when you factor in scalextrix, airfix etc.

[AndyMac1707817969]

Unless you are in possession of the actual numbers as to what the outgoings and income of any company is, no one is in any position to make any judgement. If any company has made substantial losses then they may well be dancing to the bank’s tune. Just pulling figures out of thin air as to how much cheaper you would like a product to be is meaningless unless you know what the factory in China is charging Hornby compared to this time 12 months ago. Unless you know something as basic as this how can you say a price increase is not justifiable.

The most important thing for any company to do is make a profit else very soon they won’t be making anything. Looking at Hornby’s return on investment it is very, very low but then again they may be writing off old debt from previous years. There are a lot of very well off people out there with healthy retirement bank accounts which Hornby are finally tapping in to with new models instead of selling the same old ones which they have been doing for the last 50 years, that is good news.

 You also have to ask, how do the cost of models in the 1960s and 70s compare to now in relation to a week’s wages?

[Bulleidboy]

I have just received my new options for energy (Gas and Electricity) prices - my duel-fuel contract expires in March. Two of the three options are twice what I am paying now (per month). Martin Lewis's Money Saving Expert Energy Club have said what I have been quoted cannot be bettered by any other supplier - hey hojoy - the Hornby increases don't appear too bad in comparison.

[AndyMac1707817969]

Well we are meant to be using less fossil fuels and are certainly not going to do that is they are too cheap so as usual it might be bad for humans but good for the environment. I do like people’s reaction to this, my energy supplier went bust and I can’t get another deal as cheap as the one I had where the company supplying it went bust because they could not make any money. Live in the country so rely solely on oil and there is no price cap on that so gas consumers don’t know how lucky they are. Starting to miss coal and all that rail freight that went with it!

[The son of Triangman]

Prices aren't going down anytime soon, it's a worldwide issue, not just affecting Hornby. Hornby are an Small to medium sized company nowadays, once they employed over 2500 staff at Margate.

[Robert-1241802]

No wonder the younger generation would rather buy an Xbox, the train sets (mostly purchased by starters) are extortionate; to be honest, I don't see this company lasting the next decade at this rate.

[DBfan]

One hundred and ninety-one employees doesn't sound a lot when you factor in scalextrix, airfix etc.

 

 

As there is no production base in the UK the number seems reasonable, considering that equates too aprox 50 for each of the main brands held by the company. One could argue that 50 per brand is a slight case of overkill but we don`t know the breakdown or logistics, so it is no use speculating .

[DarkRedCape]

A little off subject here, but I noticed that Hattons have now added a list price next to their own price on all their items.

It’s a nice feature to see how much less you’re paying than buying direct from a retailer.

[Brew Man]

I can't see that which lists do you mean? If I click on an item it just shows Hatton's price.

EDIT: I get it on the Bargains page but nowhere else.

[DarkRedCape]

Brew Man, I was scrolling through my wish list and they all have a Hattons price and a list price.

Maybe is the feature is only implemented in certain parts of the website?

I’m a bit sad and I happen to check my wish list daily, and this feature has definitely been implemented in the last few days.

[37lover]

In the Azuma finally here thread on Sunday 16 Jan Chrissaf and I discussed whether Hornby honour Pre-Order prices. I sent an email to Hornby, received an acknowledgement, bumped it a couple of times, still no answer so eventually called [which I was reluctant to do as I am hard of hearing]. The lady who answered stated that she thought the promise was written in the T&C's, I said no it isn't, but she confirmed that Hornby would/do honour the pre-order price.

[DarkRedCape]

I have had the R3960 Terrier Train Pack on pre-order for 6 months direct from Hornby and the price on my order is still showing what it was when I placed the order.

However when I search for the pack on the website, it comes up for almost £20 more now. So it seems that Hornby are honouring pre-order prices, which is nice.

[CORKY.]

KERNOW do similar to Hattons, eg R 3542 £96.99 , RRP £194.99. !!