The Wabash is a Difficult Seller ?!?

I am in for any and all MTH Premier Wabash!  Have new Wabash trainmaster ordered in all 3 road numbers?

I am in for any and all MTH Premier Wabash!  Have new Wabash trainmaster ordered in all 3 road numbers

I'm guessing a couple of things...  First thing is that Mike knows what he is talking about if only from the standpoint of the stuff he has put out.  I know a bit more about the Ann Arbor than the Wabash and from what I have seen, the stuff he has offered has not appealed to me as much as the Atlas products.  I'm not slamming MTH, this is just my opinion.

I'm also guessing that since the potential fan base is smaller than many other roads, it is going to be a hard sell to do a run of cars when they can get more orders for those other roads.  It is also going to be tempting to be less than prototypical on the differences between the roads for a given car (or engine).  That would also decrease the potential market for the item.

According to the MTH Product Locator they have only made 6 Premier freight cars, and 3 diesel locomotives - a FM, Alco PA, and GP9.

Now from where I stand..the 6 freight cars are pathetic. Not even a Wabash box car?!?

I don't think it is as popular as some of the others. In order for it to be a desired road name a market will need to be created or expanded. First a starter set needs to be put out in the region where the railroad ran. The starter set needs to have one of the historical names of the railroad attached like the Cannonball or the Blue Bird or better yet are there Wabash survivor train that can be modeled.  Next in the ad/catalog provide a short history lesson about the railroad and the importance of the train you are selling. The idea is to capture the imagination of the potential customer so that they think it is a must have.

  That's the issue right now very few are made so the demand is down. The demand is down so there are even fewer made.

Scott Smith

There's more offerings in Railking..but not much.

Lionel, Atlas, Williams, and Weaver have all offered many Wabash and/or Ann Arbor items.  Lionel even offered a steam engine and a r-t-r passenger set.  I think it is a popular regional railroad.  Heck, it even has a song. 

John

Since there are three trains in the Wabash River at  Terre Haute I think that could be used to get more interest and sell a few Wabash trains. A story about each wreck in the catalog and call the series the three ghost trains of the Wabash.

Scott Smith

Wabash is a hard sell to the scale market for whatever reason.  There was supposed to be a Wabash 3rd Rail E7, but it couldn't generate enough orders to move forward.  Typically that means something like less than 10 orders.

Try finding MTH Premier Wabash Alco PA's,PB's or 70' passenger cars.I've been looking for over 10 years.Impossible to find.Wabash a poor seller,yeah right.

Ricky

Yeah.  Wabash was so popular MTH had a spare Wabash PA shell for my lost plastic experiment.

Later experiments were with undecorated shells.

I think that the reason that some Wabash items are difficult to find stems from their lack of popularity. Not many were produced due to the lack of demand.

For example, it has been quite a few years since Williams put out any passenger cars even though they have put out a few engines (Trainmaster, J Class and F3 that I know about). I bought a used set of 60' aluminum streamliners on here to run with my Railking E8 and paid the asking price because I didn't want another Wabash fanatic grabbing them. I see other roadnames cheaper because more were produced.

He said that the Wabash is a difficult item to sell, as its not as popular.

I wonder how he knows that unless he's tried?  What data did he use?  If he never produced one, how does he know it won't sell?

As an example (sorry all you PRR fans), if all he has to go by is what SPFs tell him, how does he know anything other than PRR will sell.

I'm sure MTH makes rolling stock that the Wabash owned, they just need to apply some proper lettering.

I'd buy a Wabash piece any day over a PRR, NYC, UP, or ATSF item.

You might want to email Buffalo Creek Graphics:

http://www.trainresource.com/Home.html

to see if they would be interested in doing a Wabash car.  They use Weaver rolling stock.

I feel for those that don't model one of the "Big Four" RRs, I'm in the same boat modeling Seaboard Air Line.  MTH can't even get their models correct on their website, they have some SAL items listed as Seaboard Coast Line:

http://www.mthtrains.com/content/30-2641-1

How do they expect it to sell if they can't even get the proper RR name correct???

I am sure MW  knows what he is talking about, that being said, The Lionel Legacy Wabash FM trainmaster was the first engine I bought when I started collecting O gauge about two years ago.  You can't beat the blue bird paint scheme, or at least not easily.  I like the Wabash, but I am from New York. Fred

Have MTH start with Wabash 19th Century RailKing offerings, then work their way forward until they eventually reach the 1960's. 

Andrew

I have suggested to Weaver to re-issue it along with those rare Central of Georgia boxcars they also made several years back.

Steve, take a look at the Buffalo Graphics link I posted above.  They have done CofG cars in the past.  Look under the "Newest Releases" tab then the "Alpha Index" tab.  I don't know what it would take to get them to redo or make new items but it can't hurt to ask.  I recently got a SAL 3-car set of Double-Door Boxcars from a fellow forumite that I thought I had forever missed out on.

There's a few pieces of rolling stock I see lettered for Seaboard in HO and even S, but the folks that make them won't touch O scale, I think because of the size more than anything.  Are the molds that are required to make an O scale boxcar that much more expensive to make?

I'd love the PAs.  I could get them repainted to Ann Arbor...

Have you ever taken a stab at printing your own decals?  With a decent color printer the come out pretty good.

I bought two K-Line Wabash Alco FAs. Changed one to Union Pacific and the other New Haven. They were $49 each and I have no big love for Wabash.

I have two of the Rail King Wabash grain cars http://www.mthtrains.com/content/30-75157  It is a nice looking hopper car and heralds the famous Cannonball brand!!  I run it regularly behind a Lionmaster Challenger.

It took me a long time before I found a set of the MTH RK Wabash "Cannonball" "60 foot" ABS plastic cars.  The cars are really beautiful, although MTH decided to use a non prototypical flat end observation..  They could just as easily have repainted one of their rounded observations,eg. the RK 60 foot ABS Texas Special but either didn't do their homework or didn't care. And, of course, the real Cannonball never was fully streamlined like the Bluebird or the City of Kansas City. However the name Cannonball is much better known than Bluebird, so it probably made sense to use it to market the train.  I grew up in St. Louis and took a batch of photos of the Wabash in the 1950s (see my photos at www.RRpicturearchives.net.  As to the marketability issue, I'm afraid that most of the old time Wabash fans are long gone.I hope I'm wrong.  Lew Schneider

Some of these 'problems' are not just from within the purple/yellow orange/blue domains.

Some time ago...several years, now...I asked Gary at Weaver if they'd be willing to do an Ann Arbor FA set (nee Wabash).  He said, 'Sure! Can you provide the artwork?'

Artwork wasn't available to me, but I have several customers (LHS) who belong to the 'Annie' Historical Society, the caretakers of this sort of information.  So, I passed Weaver's interest on to them...again, and again, and again, and again, and again....ad nauseum.  Finally, I gave up.

It's like pushing a car up a hill with a rope!

The (LHS) boss, well known in rail photography, preservation, history circles also 'pushed' from his vantage and contacts.

Nothing.

I am also a member of the "Annie" Historical Society (though I'd probably be shot for calling it that.   Some members are just a bit touchy.)  Anyway, this kills me.  I am not sure what info is required, but there is no excuse for it to fall into a black hole.  I would be willing to work with someone to ferret the info out or find out why we don't have it.  I know Life-Like had it.  I have the Proto-2000 HO models.  So I know it can be done.  Contact me off list if you want to work on this.

As another aside, we have a museum room in Durand, MI that is open almost every Saturday from 1-4.  Along with some artifacts, there are a number of reference materials that would be of use to people interested in The Ann Arbor and/or the Carferries.  Almost nobody comes.  Those that do are either just passing through or just want to chat.  (Sometimes even about trains! )  It isn't a bad place to start some research.  <end tangents>

How many times have you heard them say, oh, we did that one already?

 

If you missed the window of opportunity, chances are you will have almost a decade of waiting until that certain road appears again if ever.

That's the thing that gets me.  Do they think we're all born last century or that we all had Lionel trains growing up?  OK, so I was born last century, but I didn't have any trains of any kind until 1978 and they were HO.  I didn't get anything in O until maybe mid 1990s.

Then they do REPEATED runs of things like GG1s and Hudsons, I wish someone would hide those molds for the next 100 years.

I've said that a lot of folks would buy what Fido leaves behind on the front lawn, as long as it's got XXXXXX name on the side.  So make a car with Wabash on the side.  If it's the only car offered for 3-6 months I'll guarantee it'll sell, cause most of us can't go that long without our fix 

I really haven't heard them say oh we did that already  I do hear them say alot that its the second or third run of an item that they start making money.  As for the Wabash I love the paint scheme.  I just purchased a few of the Atlas Trainman 40 foot boxcars and also the Atlas MAster line 55 ton hoppers.  The blue and white on the engines is stunning.  I had the MTH PA's.  I had no problem selling them.  They actually went pretty fast.  The last MTH catalog shows a Wabash FM on the cover that is definitely on my buy list

>>>The last MTH catalog shows a Wabash FM on the cover that is definitely on my buy list<<

I had the Lionel Wabash FM from about two years ago. The engine sounded great and I loved the remote operating radiator fans. Sent it back for a refund because of a noticable paint flaw and ended up with the caboose.

Was very interested in the just released Lionel Wabash F-7's but passed again because Lionel screwed up its nose graphics.

Maybe someday I'll find a mate for this caboose..

Joe 

BTW, the Wabash Cannonball ain't no slouch....

Wabash is not the only roadname that seems forgotten.

Williams by Bachmann sells only certain styles of passenger cars and only one style of caboose. No Reading Company passenger cars offered at all by WBB!

I model the Reading railroad, from Reading PA, and I am surprised at the lack of rolling stock and sometimes engines that seem to be offered. Reading Lines was the fifth largest freight hauler during the 1950's and yet there is very little model selection, from any company, for the Reading. You go back to the 1870's, and Philadelphia & Reading Railways was the largest corporation in the USA, makes you stop and think.

I am just trying to bring out the unreasonableness of many companies today that produce whatever they want to sell. We all have our favorite railroad, as many of us grew up in differant places, so we all won't have the same favorite railroad.

I agree that we need to see some more stuff produced in differant railroads. How many Hudson's can you have??

Lee F.

BTW the, the Wabash Cannonball ain't no slouch

Except when compared to the Wabash Blue Bird.

BTW, I had my order in for the 3rd Rail Wabash E7, where was yours.

when I was up to weaver on 7-2, they only had 1 left.

To JC642, How and what did Lionel do to mess up the front end of the new Wabash F7. thanks

I'm trying to get my Cannonball photo into the text.  Let's see what happens.

Lew Schneider

I had the same problem in HO several years ago.  Found that if I wanted to model Wabash I had to paint and decal my own and ended up buying lots of undecorated kits and turned myself into a rivet counter of sorts.  I could do the same in O but I guess I am just too old for that stuff anymore.  It was fun while it lasted but it won't happen again.

>>>To JC642, How and what did Lionel do to mess up the front end of the new Wabash F7. thanks<<

Here's a front shot of a Wabash F-7.

Notice how the dark blue area slopes around the Mars light. 

Lionel changed the total look of the nose by painting the blue edge line straight across the face of the nose with a small "V" under the light.

Joe

MTH's RK E8 pulling the Wabash Cannonball painted the front correctly although the white seems very bright.  Lionel's old 2240 and 2367 F-3's didn't even attempt to put white paint on the front, but utilized the same color as the roof for the

"mound" surrounding the flag and one light.

Lew Schneider

Lew - What a great picture. 

BTW I loved Delmar Station.  I used to go as a little kid when Wabash was still running steam.  I tried to stand near that yellow line but those steam engines scared the heck out of me. 

This isn't the Wabash Cannonball, but it shows what the beautiful E-7s looked like on the City of St. Louis.

Lew Schneider

Of course between 1964 to 1976 Reading Railroad had a lot of new equipment delivered.

If you were a fan of Wabash during the years of 1964-1970, you have to use the new equipment of Norfolk and Western while they were leasing Wabash, before the official merger.

Wabash never got to paint their scheme on things like the SD35, SD45, U30C, Evans Double-Door Box Car, Ribbed 50' Box Cars, modern ACF Center Flow Covered Hoppers, PS-2-CD 3-Bay Covered Hoppers, Waffle Box Cars, Extended-Vision Cabooses, GP35, GP40, Covered Coil Cars, and other new equipment.

To be true to Wabash MTH will have to make all their Steam Era 1910-1945 period Locomotives and Cars in appropriate WABASH graphics to fill out the Wabash selection.

Andrew

Looking for Great Northern, a photo of a Wabash Auto Carrier in 1960 was found. Those Wabash and Trailer Train graphics are what MTH can put on their RailKing Auto Carrier.

http://collections.mnhs.org/visualresources/image.cfm?imageid=127639&Page=1&Keywords=Great%20Northern%20freight%20car&SearchType=Basic

Andrew