2015 Lionel Christmas Catalog

They are cool!

David:   As I can see, your question was answered INCORRECTLY.  There are TWO Polar Express add-on cars.  Whether they are new offerings, or not, I don't know.

Thanks RadioRon, I think the poster corrected himself from the earlier post after looking thru more of the catalog.  So he's forgiven.  

When I reviewed the online catalog very quickly this AM, I noticed two newly catalog'd PE scale freight cars:  an N5B Caboose, and a stock car.  The caboose seems to be from the tooling developed for the N5B offered in the Pennsylvania M1A coal set.  And the stock car closely resembles the Polar Railroad version from a few years ago... just in PE livery.  I'll likely pass on the latter, but the N5B will be a nice way to end a long string of PE GLa hoppers that I'm expecting from Charlie Ro in the next week or two From last years offerings.

I was hoping to see an RPO or Stationsounds diner in the scale PE passenger fleet, but no luck.    All we saw this year were a few recatalog'd items.  Not sure if Lionel is actually gonna produce more of those goodies or if they were just recataloging them to remind folks that dealers still have some in inventory.

Back to scale freight... no new scale North Pole Central or Polar RR liveries upon my first glance.  It's been a couple years now for the Polar RR, and Lionel just shipped the scale North Pole Central covered gondola out of last year's catalog.  Better late then never!

David

Charlie, are you going to do any set break ups?

I like the graphics on the boxcar in the Santa's Helper Christmas Set (the one with the docksider). I don't need the other items as I have the original NPC docksider, work caboose and gondola (also the original NPC crane).

I mainly collect Lionel Christmas trains, and from my initial view of the catalog, this is the least amount of items I'm going to get from a Lionel Christmas catalog.

The only definite is the 2015 Christmas boxcar.

In previous years, most of the Christmas items were new for that year. In this year's catalog, many of the items are repeats from previous catalogs.

I don't collect the Polar Express items, so that eliminates quite a bit of the catalog. I also have many of the earlier North Pole Central items, so that eliminates many of the North Pole Central rehashes such as the previously mentioned docksider, gondola, work caboose, and crane. I also don't like the graphics on some of the newer items such as the 6464 boxcar.

Looks like I'll be saving some money this year.

Couldn't help but notice a few items where Lionel continues to push MSRP price-points beyond the ridiculous.  

We can expect Polar Express and Coca Cola branded items to carry premiums associated with licensing/royalty arrangements, but $85 seems to be the new price-point for a plain old traditional-size Lionel boxcar.  We're not talking scale here -- just a 6464-style boxcar.  

Made me jump over to Atlas-O's website to check their MSRP for a nice Master Series 40' reefer, and sure enough it's $80.  But that IS scale, with the full complement of Master Series detail.

So I'm thinking Lionel has gotta be paying some hefty royalties to Warner Bros. and Coca Cola, right?  But then I saw what's gotta be this catalog's leading entree for a CNN / Anderson Cooper's Ridiculist nomination:  how about the two-pack of Silver-and-Gold ore cars for $130 MSRP?    Yes indeed... That's $65 each for a plain old traditional-size ORE CAR of all things.  No licensing/royalties to speak of -- just basic Lionel rolling stock.  Dealers will likely price 'em at $50/each, but still... I think I'll pass on those, thank you very much.

We were so spoiled FOREVER when Walter cleared out all his RMT ore cars for $10/each a couple of hears ago!!!  That had to be the bargain of this century!!!  

Nonetheless, it'll be tough to walk away without spending about $200 in this catalog when all is said and done.    A few Polar Express goodies (i.e., N5B caboose, aquarium car, Kinkade boxcar), along with the new Coca Cola boxcar... Perhaps a new wall tapestry.  It all adds up fast.  

David

Think you have a typo in one of your headings.

"American Flyer Christmas" actually shows 4 Polar Express decorative offerings (snow globe, tree skirt, Santa stocking and stocking hanger)

-Dave