New packaging again..... (2 Viewers)

[jazzeum]

Pierre,

Agreed. Once he decides he wants an item, I don't even bother to think about bidding. You have to go so high it's not worth it.

 

[vandilay]

Very interesting question, Lionel trains have 3 basic catagories:

1. Pre-war Standard Gauge

2. Pre-war O Gauge

3. Post-war O Gauge.

Pre-war Standard Gauge were the trains of our fathers and grandfathers

fairly rare as many were melted down for the war effort. These were the

trains far to expense for the average collector with the Top of the line State

Set worth up to $25,000. We all tried to add a piece or two to our

collections.

Pre-war O Gauge was also rare but not as valuable, and you could find it on

occasion. We all had a fair amount of it on our shelves.

Post-war O Gauge was very popular the trains of our youth, fairly easy to

find even though back then we used catalogs obtained from buys to

determine how long a particular train had been made to determine if it was rare.

We all put together some beautiful collections, then you could upgrade at

the big York PA show and buy yourself some "Standard Gauge"

Now here is the answer to the second part of your question....current

values.

As the age of current collectors rose large "Standard Gauge" collections

became available.....but there was little interest because none of the

current younger collectors had ever seen them before. So now "Post War O

Gauge is popular and rising in value, a lot of newer collectors even buy the

"New Lionel Remakes" of Classic Pieces (in my opinion a total waste of

money) these sets cost thousands why not just buy the original classic

piece?

Smart money will always buy the truely rare original pieces, and right now

Standard Gauge is a good buy.....but it is fragile, and must be handled very

carefully.

Myself, I have had it all, many years of wonderful buys, great friends, and

wonderful memories. Here are just two of them!

One winter night about 7:30 pm the phone rings and a person asks me if

I'm the guy buying Lionel Trains? Seems he has a giant steam engine and

three cars in blue....would I be interested? The number on the engine is

400E and he is about 6 blocks from my home.

This is 1975 and the 400E in Blue is the Famous Standard Gauge Blue

Comet the second rarest set you could ever find. Worth in nice original

condition out of a private home manybe $5000 to $10,000. Now before you

get excited I have answered several calls like this one, directing me to

vacant lots and the cemetary on occasion from my competition!!

But I decide to take a chance, it is snowy and cold and I only had a couple

of hundred on me so I call my dad who lived a few blocks away and ask him

if he wants to tag along.....and bring his wallet!!

I pick up dad and go to the address, a man shows us to his basement and

there on his pool table sits an original Standard Gauge Blue Comet!.

Okay now the hard part, he tells me he is taking offers, and has written a

letter to Frank Sinatra (a big train colldector) and he will take my offer.

I tell him I don't make offers, I simply buy, if a person wants to sell. We

seem to be getting nowhere and Dad is getting annoyed he tells me "Lets

Go"

But I stop, and ask the fellow what prompted him to decide to sell the

trains? I want a color tv! Okay, I say, if I traded you the tv would we

have a deal? The fellow asks me where I'm going to get the tv he wants?

I ask him how much it costs? He tells me its $650. I tell him thats an awful

lot of money! "Well he says I want $650 and not a cent less" he states.....

to which I reply "Dad pay the man please"

And that was one of my best Standard Gauge Rescues!

Here is another story I hope you enjoy:

My partner John and I were sitting around our shop in N.J. one friday night

with a group of our regular customers, it was about 6pm and we were

getting ready to close. One of our customers Eddie Rowe a heavy

equiptment operator, rapid Lionel fan, and bitter rival to my partner John

was there busting balls as usual. The phone rings and I pick it up.....its a

fellow with two 4X8 tables of Lionel trains he wants to sell....tonight.

He starts reading me off numbers and over the conversation I'm calling

them out to my partner John to see if any of them mean a trip to this

fellows home. Back then there were no guides, but we kept lists of rare

pieces that our customers or we needed for our collections or the shop.

Now Eddie was sharp and quick and he was listening to every number I

called out......he new some of the items before John could find them.

2368....hey thats the B&O F3........2373......are you kidding me? Thats the

Canadian Pacific! 614.....the Alaskan switcher! A motorized unit 57...

......no, no thats the Great Northern Snow Rotary Snowplow.

Meanwhile I'm telling Edie to shut up cause I can't here John. I ask the

fellow if there is anything else and he says he has one set that he got

when he was older and never used it....but he would sell that also with the

layout the engine number was 2329 heck I knew that one myself. I calmly

called over to John he has a boxed set with a 2329 the Virginian Rectifier.

Edie about passed out.....he said to the other guys we must be doing

something wrong these two clowns have people calling them with this stuff

how is that possible????

Well of course it could be a hoax....as stated above I had my share of trips

to the cemetary. John and I closed up, were very careful to lose Edie who

tried to follow us and took John's beat up old truck to South Amboy N.J.

The fellow that answered the door was a little older then us maybe 28 or

29. He lead us to a beautiful garage with painted floors and an older corvette

sitting in the corner. We walked over to a room off the garage and there

were the trains on two 4 X 8 boards just as he stated. As usual John had

about $5 on him.....he was the master of the fundless buy....but I was

prepaired. We talked a bit, the fellow wanted everything removed tonight,

and he wanted a pool table this was to be his new pool room. He told me

the price of the pool table and I paid him and he and his wife went to get us

something to drink and some boxes to help carry everything. I was thrilled!

our best buy ever! Enough stuff to fill the store......but John was a wreck!

He couldn't believe it....he just wanted to go! "They are going to throw us

the hell out of here".....he keep repeating!......Look at that Vette........

"They are going to throw us out any minute" Relax John I said pointing out

the rare B&O F3 engine...look at this beauty!

"Just load it in the truck before they come to their senses" he replied!

I pointed out every rare piece, including many not mentioned earlier...it

was a beautiful collection......and I thought John was going to have a

stroke!

When I picked up the boxed Virginian Rectifer Set it was to much....he

had to go sit in the truck to calm down! It was really funny. The fellow

was very nice, he didn't know what to do with the trains, didn't want to

pack them up and was quite pleased with the prospect of buying his new

pool table in the morning.

John and I got everything in his old van (which now was more like a wells

fargo truck) and had lots of fun displaying the items in our shop.......John

finally got the best of Edie.........and I mean did he!

Njja

Thanks for posting that, its a great insight into the lifespan of collections,
what ever they may be,I have not been around collecting long enough
to see how these things play out.The only observation i can make is
regarding britains which i began collecting as a kid ,I have seen the value
of some of the old deetail line increase [kids toys] and the later collectors
figures going nowhere.I have often looked at some of the old lead sets
which reach large sums of money and wondered where they will head ,
when the kids who played with them [now men of course ]move on from collecting.I think your experience with Lionel trains gives an insight to that.
I think maybe their is going to be a clear line drawn between collectable companys and toy companys.Toys take a hammering so their is a high
degree of attrition,but baring the odd display cabinet mishap collectables
will rely on production rarity or increasing numbers of collectors to drive value.

 

[Louis Badolato]

I am no expert on the value of collectibles, I have never sold a K&C product and given away literally thousands of dollars of K&C stuff as gifts to fellow collectors, so I think I can safely say that I am definitely not in this for the money. That being said, here's my two cents:

When I look at prices of these collectibles, I think about economics 101, supply and demand. Why have K&C items gone crazy in the secondary market? Well for one thing, K&C really only got popular in around 2001 or 2002. Before that dealers had trouble getting sets limited to production runs of 500 off their shelves. Plus many sets authorized for runs of 500, far less were produced, and specialty items like the wood, metal and resin vehicles or wood warbirds, sometimes only 50 or less were produced. So on sets from 1984 to around 2000 or so supply is very limited.

Then you look at demand. When I started collecting back in 1993-1994 the number of serious K&C collectors was probebly measured in hundreds. Now I hear estimates in thousands. Plus, before e-bay, it was probably one or two people who walked into the local shop who might bid against each other on an item. Now its people from all over the world driving up prices. So with thousands of people from around the world having the opportunity to bid on extremely limited production items, prices on the pre-2000 "golden age" stuff
should stay high like they tend to with really old Britains or Marklins stuff.

Finally, with the more recent stuff, with much larger production runs and everybody and his brother holding onto them, supply will probably keep prices volitile, and there may someday be a crash of prices in this market (like the more recent Britains collectible figures). That's my read on the subject.

 

[Pierre]

I have the same feeling about the post-2000 releases.

Pierre.

 

[Njja]

I agree its always supply and demand but you must be realistic. Lionel trains

are a very very big collectible a visit to the twice yearly York PA show would

amaze you.........but in the entire world there are roughly 38,000 train

collectors in the Train Collectors Association. And membership is declining.

Most people collect the toys of their youth, or perhaps something they

shared with their fathers, once a generation is removed interest is drained.

My daughter for example having grown up with a den full of trains has only

the slightest interest in them. She decorates with a few pieces but has little

interest in their value and would certainly never be a canidate to purchase

any.

I have heard it said that King & Country Collectors number in the thousands

why its world wide..........sorry I just don't believe it. We know of a couple

of guys from France (thistar) a bigger presence in England.........a few

players (on the Forums) throughout Europe. It is said to be big in China....

well don't they have a Billion people?

If the K & C collectors were in the thousands a limited production run of

1250 would sell out in a day just like the 750 piece Grief did.......it did not.

Even Louis considered by many the "Top K & C Collector" is not a member of

their Collectors Club......I know he reciently said he tried to join.

I believe E-bay & the advances to the internet as much as anything helped

place King & Country in its current situation (taking nothing away from Andy

and his organization). The internet brought product availability to many

people not near a dealer, and E-bay brought products not usually available to

collectors. But even today the same names constantly pop up as the high

bidders as individuals build their collections. Remember France is a fairly large

country it could easily have 1,000 collectors bidding all by itself, it does not.

I think the secondary market created interest and has drawn collectors to

take a look at this product line, but look at this forum (certainly one of the

largest to date) we have 274 members from all over the world.....probably

100 to 150 activly participate where are the thousands?

We need a well thought out plan with a strong secondary market to

continue the interest created in the last 3 or 4 years. If not Louis will never

sell many tickets to his Museum.

Njja

 

[jazzeum]

Couldn't agree more with Louis post, which is further to my point that you need to distinguish between the older stuff which has its own market and the newer more recently retired stuff.

 

[Louis Badolato]

NJJA,

I think we agree for the most part in our analysis (accept for the number of collectors worldwide, which, frankly, I have no way of knowing, I only can take Andy's estimate), with one exception. You compare K&C to Lionel trains. I don't know if the comparison is realistic. I know nothing about Lionel Trains, but when I was a kid, I know there were Trains available for sale at every Department store and Toy Store, so I expect production runs were in the thousands, perhaps tens or hundreds of thousands.

I would estimate that an average production run of 50 of each wood armored vehicle, 10-20 of each resin vehicle, 10-20 (with perhaps 3-4 planes [ME109, Spitfire, Hurricane] being produced in about 150) of each wood warbird, and 300-500 of each early (pre-2000) set of K&C soldiers. With the exception of the Arnhem sets, which we know there were 1000 produced [500 original release, another 500 second release], you just don't see a lot of these sets change hands. Accordingly, when they do, even if there are only 1000 collectors worldwide, the prices at auction will be high. If you had any idea about the amounts I had been offered from some of my rare old wood & resin vehicles, you would underestand my belief that there will always be a collectors market for this early stuff.

Its the nature of collectors, we want the original products to be able to have everything made by the company we collect. So long as only 5 or 10 or 50 of a particular item was produced by a company with hundreds or thousands of collectors, there will be a high price for the item.

 

[nmrocks]

The K&C market will crash at exactly the same point the economy goes south, the further south the harder the crash.
K&C is a luxury item, during times of prosperity people accumulate luxury items, when things get tight there the first to go.
Economics 101 restated
Ray

 

[wellington]

I know this is not a nice subject and lord forbid it happen........ BUT.......if something happened to Andy I think any of the sets produced under the co-founder of K&C may become valuable....I also think it may or may not hurt future sales of K&C....depending on the quality, I think who ever would fill Andy's shoes would have large ones to fill given the fact that Andy is the co-founder and the care he puts into his company.


WELLINGTON

 

[Pierre]

The K&C market will crash at exactly the same point the economy goes south, the further south the harder the crash.
K&C is a luxury item, during times of prosperity people accumulate luxury items, when things get tight there the first to go.
Economics 101 restated
Ray

Can't go against that. Remember the two big auctions organized by Michtoys, I'll say 18 months ago. It was a collection sold by an individual who had money problems. Too bad... but Michtoys stated that he was very happy with the products of the auctions.

Pierre.

 

[vandilay]

I am no expert on the value of collectibles, I have never sold a K&C product and given away literally thousands of dollars of K&C stuff as gifts to fellow collectors, so I think I can safely say that I am definitely not in this for the money. That being said, here's my two cents:

When I look at prices of these collectibles, I think about economics 101, supply and demand. Why have K&C items gone crazy in the secondary market? Well for one thing, K&C really only got popular in around 2001 or 2002. Before that dealers had trouble getting sets limited to production runs of 500 off their shelves. Plus many sets authorized for runs of 500, far less were produced, and specialty items like the wood, metal and resin vehicles or wood warbirds, sometimes only 50 or less were produced. So on sets from 1984 to around 2000 or so supply is very limited.

Then you look at demand. When I started collecting back in 1993-1994 the number of serious K&C collectors was probebly measured in hundreds. Now I hear estimates in thousands. Plus, before e-bay, it was probably one or two people who walked into the local shop who might bid against each other on an item. Now its people from all over the world driving up prices. So with thousands of people from around the world having the opportunity to bid on extremely limited production items, prices on the pre-2000 "golden age" stuff
should stay high like they tend to with really old Britains or Marklins stuff.

Finally, with the more recent stuff, with much larger production runs and everybody and his brother holding onto them, supply will probably keep prices volitile, and there may someday be a crash of prices in this market (like the more recent Britains collectible figures). That's my read on the subject.

I agree ,i think thats a good read on the subject,with such low numbers
on the older stuff though I dont think they will play a major part in
the secoundary market as they are so rare the average collector who
has started in the last couple of years is unlikekly to come across them.
I think thats where ltd editions etc play a part [provided the production
numbers are right] As they are attainable to the average guy and come
on the market more regularly while still giving you the feeling your getting
a special piece.

 

[nmrocks]

I would be interested to hear the production numbers of HB so far and how that compares to K&C.
With limited funds, I have to make some hard choices,the "SL Meyer" @ 199 and 1250 produced makes the Winter panther look like a bargain @ 140. As a final note, does that HB quality play into this market value as they've declared open ended production should the market in general tank? (pardon the pun)
Ray

 

[Pierre]

I would be interested to hear the production numbers of HB so far and how that compares to K&C.
With limited funds, I have to make some hard choices,the "SL Meyer" @ 199 and 1250 produced makes the Winter panther look like a bargain @ 140. As a final note, does that HB quality play into this market value as they've declared open ended production should the market in general tank? (pardon the pun)
Ray

Better buy the "SL Meyer" now as the winter panther will be available for years.

Pierre.

 

[Njja]

NJJA,

I think we agree for the most part in our analysis (accept for the number of collectors worldwide, which, frankly, I have no way of knowing, I only can take Andy's estimate), with one exception. You compare K&C to Lionel trains. I don't know if the comparison is realistic. I know nothing about Lionel Trains, but when I was a kid, I know there were Trains available for sale at every Department store and Toy Store, so I expect production runs were in the thousands, perhaps tens or hundreds of thousands.

I would estimate that an average production run of 50 of each wood armored vehicle, 10-20 of each resin vehicle, 10-20 (with perhaps 3-4 planes [ME109, Spitfire, Hurricane] being produced in about 150) of each wood warbird, and 300-500 of each early (pre-2000) set of K&C soldiers. With the exception of the Arnhem sets, which we know there were 1000 produced [500 original release, another 500 second release], you just don't see a lot of these sets change hands. Accordingly, when they do, even if there are only 1000 collectors worldwide, the prices at auction will be high. If you had any idea about the amounts I had been offered from some of my rare old wood & resin vehicles, you would underestand my belief that there will always be a collectors market for this early stuff.

Its the nature of collectors, we want the original products to be able to have everything made by the company we collect. So long as only 5 or 10 or 50 of a particular item was produced by a company with hundreds or thousands of collectors, there will be a high price for the item.

You bring up very interesting points, in answer to your questions about

Lionel the most valuable sets are the least popular sellers, items only available

for say one year. So lets take the 38,000 TCA members most of them would

jump at the chance to pick up a rare piece. Since they were childrens toys

even though a few thousand of each may have been made most of them are

in fair to poor condition so a nice one has value. They may appear often

enough to change hands and have a price point value.

When you start speaking of an item made in quanities of 50 or less and take

into consideration items destroyed in shipping (as was the case of a early

aircraft I believe you purchased) and damaged in handling the number of items

is so small that they may almost never be made available for purchase by

collectors so their true value would be hard to determine. Also collectors like

the chance, no matter how remote to find an item for their collection. Not

many of us collect Van Goghs you go to a museum to see them...little or no

chance to ever find one.

Lionel was a wonderful time, you started out small with the $50 to $100

engines then as new collectors came along behind you they bought those

from you and you moved up to the $200 to $500 engines. As your experience

and expertise grew soon you had a $1000 engine or two. If you were lucky

and smart you could build yourself a beautiful collection.

I saw that King & Country had the same potential, I first bought it because I

liked the pieces. As interest grew and new collectors came along it gave us

the oportunity to pass along some of our older pieces and pick up other

retired pieces we might have missed. It was moving along quite nicely,

demand for products increased, sales took off and it looked like a wonderful

item with no phony "limited production" (not directed at Andy, speaking of

other manufacters limited editions). Andy retired items when sales got slow

so he had room to produce new items and store them prior to shipment.

It was a wonderful system, people in early could sell items they wanted to

and perhaps buy a wooden piece or an early warbird if they liked. New

collectors were eager to buy lower priced "retired" items which they might

have just missed.

Now with nothing being retired the entire process is stopped dead in its

tracks. The older collector has nothing to sell, the current items new

collectors are buying are in release for years. So aside from the limited items

now being made in quanities of over 1000, whats the plan?

I would like to see King & Country around for a long time, with a large

following, and giving Andy the opportunity to make every vehicle he has a

mind to. A little careful planning and no one will ever be able to catch him.

But over production, that is the real danger.

Njja

 

[red devil]

I agree, i would love to see K&C go back to the old days where a set was around for a year at most then be retired. It seems these days the releases go on for ever. I noticed they are still selling the Jagdpanther but I bought mine over 2 years ago, surely nobody still wants to buy one now?
As for the packaging issue, K&C do what they have to do to get the product to the customer in good condition and you can guarantee they thought long and hard before going down this route so they won't be changing their minds anytime soon. Therefore there is no point in moaning and surely we can come up with a better subject than this to talk about?
Can't believe I contributed to this thread either so please lets kill it now!!!

 

[nmrocks]

With Andy as prolific as he is I was always frustrated by my inability to keep up with the items I wanted.
While he's still as or more prolific now i have found the time to gather the sets I want, so I have very mixed emotions about cutting production.
Ray

 

[wadepat]

With Andy as prolific as he is I was always frustrated by my inability to keep up with the items I wanted.
While he's still as or more prolific now i have found the time to gather the sets I want, so I have very mixed emotions about cutting production.
Ray

Ray,

I share your emotional quandry. My budget is not as great as many and it takes me longer to secure the items I want. In that respect, I am glad that figures are not retired earlier.

On the other hand, the value of one's collection is something to be noted and a smaller supply of figures, combined with appropriate demand, enhances value. While I am not too concerned with value, it is always nice to feel that one's collection has some worth.

Warmest personal regards,

Pat

 

[nmrocks]

Better buy the "SL Meyer" now as the winter panther will be available for years.

Pierre.

Well thats the question now isn't it? @1250 units I'm not as certain as you that Meyer will not be around so long, even the Greif and Brit Sherman are readily available now well after a very much more limited run.
Ray

 

[Njja]

Yes Pat your points are well taken, and consider this, in the past when sets

had much shorter runs there value increased in the secondary market. So if

a collector decided to part with a few sets he could buy quite a few of the

new releases. If you sold 3 older sets for $250 each you could add 7 new

sets and take the wife to dinner!

It made you feel better about the money you spent.....gave Andy traffic and

profit in his new releases and gave a few newer collectors the chance to pick

up a set or two they might have missed.

Today all you are doing is spending money.....if you bought ten new sets

for $1000 next year they would be worth less since they would still most

likely be available with free shipping from dealers. I know, people say they

don't do it for the money but consider the fact that over time your collection could

represent a $25,000 or $50,000 cash outlay. It would certainly be nice if it

maintained its value. We are not talking about a casual collector with two

or three sets.

Njja

 

[nmrocks]

Ray,

I share your emotional quandry. My budget is not as great as many and it takes me longer to secure the items I want. In that respect, I am glad that figures are not retired earlier.

On the other hand, the value of one's collection is something to be noted and a smaller supply of figures, combined with appropriate demand, enhances value. While I am not too concerned with value, it is always nice to feel that one's collection has some worth.

Warmest personal regards,

Pat

I guess the question I have is what are the production numbers now?
Are they endlessly produced or is Andy deciding on larger initial runs and keeping them listed until there gone?
Either way, at this point, this debate is based on emotion and feelings rather than hard facts as I see it.
We're all agreed production has gone up, that's a given, it needed to with the growth in the market, but is there a true strategy change at K&C or is this a percieved issue as opposed to fact driven?
Ray