Hallmark stores on tap to sell a Limited Edition "Toymaker Santa" series O gauge Lionel train set this holiday season!!!

I like it...a lot.  If I did not already have to many Christmas items, I'd be in for one of these.  Red trains are my weakness in this hobby.

Not a huge fan of Christmas themed sets though depends on the set. However, this is a nice looking set I love the metallic finish and the cars look great too.

Christmas bulb red! What a cool color for a toy train 

It would cool next to my double headed chrome Generals

I agree about the sell out. I don't think it will take long either. I live in a metro area of about 2.5 million people. It happens to be the metro area where Hallmark's headquarters are located. We have a total of 20 Gold Crown stores, that's 40 sets for 2.5 million people. There are also many very affluent areas here and $400 would be pocket change to those folks. I think the odds are extremely good that they won't last long around here, probably not past the first day they are offered. Unfortunately, $400 is a lot for me and I already have some things on order, I will have to see if it will fit in my train budget. If I can even get one.

Buy 10. Later on, sell them to fund your retirement.

Allan, thanks for the tip on LionChief for the set.   That makes it a winner for me.  -Ken

Thanks for the post Keith, this gives us a really good look at this train set.

Wonder if they have an 'Easy Pay' plan?

Hallmark and Lionel are a good mix and is a win win for the local Hobby stores. Some narrow minded business people would think this would drive sales away from their stores but Hallmark is not going to sell accessories. The profits are made when the customer buys accessories and track. We are already planning some joint promotions with our local Hallmark Stores. We will give the Hallmark Stores a coupon that will drive them to our store for additional items. In all the years of selling trains our profits on starter sets has been very low so we hope the customer will come back for the items needed to build their Christmas garden or Railroad Empire.

Thanks

Pat

PATRICK'S TRAINS

142 29TH STREET

WHEELING WV 26003

304-232-0714

WWW.PATSTRAINS.COM

E-MAIL PATSTRAINS@AOL.COM

Just a head's up for those who want one.  They are available for pre-order now.  Jump on it now if you want one.

http://shop.hallmark.com/ornam...in-set-1QHG5297.html

As far as in store availability, it's being marketed as a limited edition LionChief set with just two being made available per Hallmark Gold Crown stores (Gold Crown stores currently number 2,250).Will be dated 2015 with the Gold Crown insignia. With Hallmark collectors being an even more aggressive group than train collectors, I predict these will sell long before Christmas. Wonder what Santa's voice clips will be and how many there are.

Hopefully someone from Lionel will have these answers at York. Wonder whether they might even have the set there.  

If they are all snapped up by collectors as some are predicting then this effort will be a complete failure as a tool to introduce the hobby to newcomers.  If one is a collector of Hallmark ornaments it usually means they are really into Christmas and most likely already have a train set under the tree.  I doubt one more offering is going to get them to get into the hobby.

--Greg

Now THAT'S a great idea!

--Greg

I sort of doubt it.

I suspect the popularity may be regional.  When I was in one of my local Gold Crown stores the day they had ornament Premiere in July, some of the workers were discussing having 3 customers who wanted the set and trying to get another from another store.  In my part of PA that's not necessarily hard, as many of the Hallmark store owners have many locations (one has something like 20 stores, I believe).

The fact they are available on the website at all makes me believe the allocation was not scarfed up at a national level.

If any do remain, it will probably be either a web site discount, or maybe we would see them later on (April 2016 comes to mind) if Hallmark sells the whole batch of unsold units to a train dealer.

I'd probably suggest this may be comparable to the Disney Christmas sets (or even the boxcars) that have been offered on-line over the years.  A bit of a hit and miss.

Anybody want some Macy's Thanksgiving cars?  (oops, sorry, I thought for a minute I went back in time to 2006 )

All IMO.

They also didn't heavily advertise this set, so it's not like the masses will be knocking down Hallmark's doors to try to get one.  You basically are either a Hallmark fan or a Lionel fan already if you even know of the set's existence.  There may be a few people who randomly find it for the first time on the Hallmark website, but it's a minority of the people looking at it, I'm pretty sure.

-Dave

Speaking of Hallmark. stopped by on the way home to get some b-day cards. Saw this year's (old news to some I'm sure) Lionel ornament offerings. Chessie diesel loco, a Seaboard box car and a WM caboose.

Two Sets per store adds up to a lot of sets produced. they are also taking internet orders for it.  If you buy it do so because you like the set.  I might buy it, I like the looks of it, they do not mention what trucks the rolling stock will have... 

It should have had a diesel engine. Kids don't know what a steam engine is. $400. a little high. So if it has a problem, you take it back to your Hallmark store and what do they do? Another bomb.

You would think that at 2 per store should result in a sell out at least at the store level. With over 4,000 sets available I would not consider this a limited edition.

   Bill T.

My Nephew is 4 and LOVES "Steamy Trains" the best.

Thomas is a steam engine.

Kids love steam, too.  At least all the ones I know.

What do  they do, Eddie G., is fully refund the amount the customer paid for it. Unless, you're a regular customer, try getting your money back without a restocking fee for whatever reason you return an opened and run rtr train set to a local or internet train dealer. Good luck with that!!

And if it is faulty, you send it to Lionel who will repair it under warranty since Hallmark Gold Crown stores will be considered authorized resellers for this set which is made for and sold exclusively by HGC retail stores.

Oh, I don't know...  

Female-dominant market....QVC mindsets...limited edition...early disclosure in a "Dream Book" left lying around for kids to see....????

I see potential for some, as Martin puts it, 'Sturm und Drang' at the ol' Hallmark stores come November 6.... 

Followed by a few interesting ebay auctions.....rising to nose-bleed levels of bidding as the holiday(s) near and the offerings dry up....(remember first year's Polar Express set release???)

Coupled with frenzied calls/drives to ever-widening geographic circles of Hallmark Gold Crown establishments...

Complemented/puntuated with trips to the pharmacy and supermarket for...

and....

etc., etc., etc.....

It's the holidays, Bubba!  Shop-'til-ya-drop!  Be not outdone!   Seek, and ye shall find!  Must.....not.....let....(fill in the blank)....down!!!!  Etc., etc., blah, blah....

It's the female shopping modus operandi. 

Remember?

Very clever, Hallmark.    Verrrrrry clever! 

BTW....If you don't snag the original set this year, what'll you do with the subsequent add-on cars/accessories/etc. Hallmark will release every year thereafter to complement your 2015 ....'investment'??  Hmmmmm???

Just some added points to what you've said -- as for female-dominant, if you check the memberships for both national and international Hallmark Collectors Clubs, you'll likely be surprised with the ratio of female to male members. You'll see a respectably substantial number of male members in all clubs and with a much broader range of ages than for O gauge enthusiasts who are primarily male and in their middle fifties and older.

As for your point regarding Hallmark making add-on cars available in subsequent years, for me a more intriguing thought about offering additional cars in future years is that Lionel includes a puny 35 watt, 2 amp wallwart with their rtr LionChief starter sets -- a minimal power source woefully incapable of pulling many additional cars. And while many O gaugers might not care since they're likely to run such sets on layouts with a bigger power source anyway, Hallmark collectors won't have such an advantageous luxury, so what will be the fallout in future years when customers purchase additional cars and discover the set no longer works because it's now under-powered by that small 35 watt, 2 amp power source Lionel included with their set? I doubt they'll be as complacent and nonchalant about it as O gaugers generally would be! A most interesting can of worms for Hallmark's entry into the world of Lionel O gauge trains!!!

If this thing is a home run, I would suspect it might be more likely to find a new full set offered in future years, not just add on cars.  That solves that problem!

I'm curious about your other comment regarding continuous series.  I noticed Frosty Friends states it's #36 in the series this year.  Was there a known gap?

-Dave

Thanks, Dave, for calling to my attention the error in my earlier post. It should have said, and has been revised to read, "...ranks among the longest..."I also have include a brief blurb**

about the history of this series.

As what will happen if it is a home, and additional sets are produced in future years, hopefully Lionel will indeed improve the set. (Remember the very first Polar Express conventional rtr set loco, series 1, had a small motor which proved incapable of pulling additional cars so the series 2 loco with a much larger and powerful motor was in subsequent rtr sets. However, unlike the conventional PE sets where a loco with the smaller motor has no more collectible value than a series 2 loco with the larger motor -- the 2015 Hallmark set, being dated, will always hold a premium over subsequent sets if they're ever produced. 

I think about 7 or so years ago, Lionel released an It's a Wonderful Life set exclusively sold at Land's End.  It came with a certificate of authenticity that listed what number of the run the set was.  I think there were only a thousand made.   But they were marked down to $99 even before Christmas.  I don't know the specifics of how this all went down, but I ended up getting one for $99.

But I don't think that sort of thing is going to happen here because Hallmark receives so much more exposure than Land's End.  I think this will sell out with no problem between the train collectors like all of us and the non-train Hallmark buyers.  And don't forget, a lot of trains are bought around Christmas by women wanting to recreate the Christmas train experience for their children that they remember from their childhood.

I did find it on the Hallmark website by searching on "Toymaker Santa".  There's a short video posted showing the train on the 40x60 loop.  Minimal coverage but at least you can see what it looks like running.  Whoa, I turned up the volume to listen to the sounds. They would drive me NUTS after two loops around the track.

FYI, On April 30th, Hallmark's Digital Dream Book revealed this set will be reissued in 2016.

Our local store had a small flyer with this set advertised with the release date of November 6.

The flyer has since been taken down and when I asked recently in store they said they were pre-sold out with an extensive wait list and will not be able to get enough sets to meet demand.

Seems like it will be popular.

Price seems a bit high for what you get when you can get a LionChief Frosty the snow man set for $249 from leading OGR forum sponsor Lionel shops with same # of cars and same engine. You can add the Frosty animated gondola car for $51 and even more cars animated box car and a box car.

Other Lionel Christmas sets similarly much less cost then the Hallmark set.

I think the Hallmark set is very attractive nice colors but rather steep price when you can get something similar from Lion from regular train shops.

The problem with these sorts of things is that there is an additional profit margin built in. Lionel takes its share, but Hallmark also has their own markup, and there's also the profit that the individual store makes. So these items will usually be "overpriced" compared to regular production items. Special production planning and arrangements, separate product management and distribution, special packaging, lower production numbers, etc. also may be factors in driving up the prices on these kinds of items.

Of course, all Hallmark items are seriously overpriced; this is just another one of them.

Figured they would go fast, but thought they might at least make it to the stores before selling out. Sounds like they didn't make it. If the wait list is that long they may be sold out for next year as well.

As for price, I don't know about the Frosty set, but the Hallmark set has a die-cast engine.

As luck would have it, I had a hundred o scale elves made from a custom designed plastic injection mold for my Christmas layout this year.  I got a couple of hundred extra if anyone is interested.  I plan to sell them on ebay but will give first crack to O gauge forum members.  Here is the almost final version the graphic designer and I came up with.  The 3d mold should like similar to this but I want the yellow belt buckle changed and also want the belt to be brown all the way around.  Height should be around 1 to 1.125" but not to exceed 1.25".  I had 3 separate elves made, one with yellow hair, one with brown hair, one with black hair.  If there is any interest, I could also probably switch the red outfit for a green outfit. 

I know other threads have complained about the lack of o scale elves.  I know MTH sells one in a kit of 4 or 5 other items and scenic express has one (but it is sold out and I think this elf is a little more "Santa-ish").  It is nice to see an elf incorporated into a Christmas set such as this.  I wonder if they are fixed to the gondola or if they can move  around.

My custom made elves should be here by the end of October, if anyone is interested please feel free to email me for details.  The prices will be $4 each and below based on quantity. 

Well, the word is out, and Hallmark is promoting this train on Facebook.  There is a short video that does not show much, but it leads to their online store. http://shop.hallmark.com/ornam...K_HL_KP_lionel_text2

There is also a link to a short video of Ken Crow, who designed the train set's graphics.  I can't remember the last time I saw a grown man so enthusiastic about a train, but he is genuine in his interest. http://link.brightcove.com/ser...?bctid=4524788826001

In closing, the video answers my main question on the color.  It is a metallic red, like some of the Hot Wheels cars I got when I was younger.  I have requested one of the two that my local store is getting.  I may purchase it after all.

Chrome finish red paint makes sense with the move to Nascar products.  Chrome finish chase cars for Nascar are common.........  kind of an oxymoron with common chase car finishes, but what the heck,  it's true........

Mark

Is this set displayed, or mentioned at York?    

Has anyone asked about Lionel about it?

Wondering if it has the same Santa dialogue and sounds that other Lionel Christmas sets include, or is this Santa soundset made just for this set?

Checked in with my Hallmark store and I'm #1 on list to get this set. Definitely looking forward to it. Just hope it's not a dud or a bust when I finally get it. Do wish the stores would have one running, (but not mine!), so I could hear all the Santa announcements before buying it.