RMT by Aristo-Craft

G-gauge model railroad manufacturer Aristo-Craft Trains and O-gauge maker Ready Made Trains (RMT) have entered into a joint marketing agreement that gives the latter access to the former’s worldwide distribution channels.

Aristo-Craft president Lewis M. Polk and RMT president Walter M. Matuch signed the agreement March 9. The RMT trademark has also been licensed to Aristo-Craft and will be used to identify future products as “RMT by Aristo-Craft.”

According to Matuch, product availability, shipping and distribution will be streamlined to benefit the toy train hobbyist, retail stores and the distributor network in both the U.S. and Europe with the same terms for trade customers already purchasing Aristo-Craft products. He adds a new 2010 catalog will be produced “in the coming weeks.”

The deal also helps products for both companies to market faster. “Both Aristo-Craft and RMT products are made at the same factory complex in China, so efficiency of shipping will mean that goods can ship in a timely manner when manufactured, rather than when a container-load quantity has been reached for either company,” Polk said.

Polk and Matuch are well acquainted. Prior to starting RMT in 2003, Matuch was product manager at Aristo-Craft and later served as vice-president operations/licensing at Taylor Made Trucks.

As reported by Model Retailer on March 10, 2010

Lionel Expanding to Buy Marklin?

Well I heard about that a while ago back in Mid January, but I ran across this article from Model retailer magazine, which indicates that Marklin is on the rebound and it is reported that although a team from Lionel did visit the great toy and train maker, that they are not currently interested.

The new reorganized Marklin is making money and has apparently drawn interest from the biggest name in American model railroading, while Faller creditors have approved the company's reorganization plan.

Märklin administrator Michael Pluta has been quoted recently in the German press as saying the company generated 7 million Euro ($10.2 million) in earnings from April-December 2009.

An article in the Südwest Presse newspaper in Ulm said the earnings figures come on 110 million Euro ($160.2 million) in sales during FY 2009. The earnings figure is before interest and taxes.

Additionally, the publication says a delegation from U.S. toy train manufacturer Lionel has visited Märklin's production facilities in Göppingen in Germany and Györ in Hungary. However; a source inside Lionel says the company will not make a bid for Märklin.

Pluta, says he's under no pressure to get the company sold. In late 2009, he said a sale might be possible in 2010. He added Märklin is slated to release 400 new products this year.

Train Parts Temporarily Unavailable

We will be turning off our parts listings as we update our software. Unfortunately this will take some time to update. As we do this we will not be offering parts for sale either by phone or our website. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. We greatly appreciate your patience as we move forward to a bigger better system.

The Christmas Story Sets are here!

Just in time for Christmas, we have received Lionel's O Gauge Christmas Story train set. I just finshed adding them to our system, and they will show up on the website later today.

This is another addition to Lionel's recent run of 'themed' starter sets, along the same lines as the Polar Express and Harry Potter train sets. The Christmas Story set uses the standard 0-8-0 steam engine with smoke and whistle, and has four cars decorated for various scenes from the famed 1983 film. It also includes the standard CW80 transformer and loop of FasTrack.

It is definitely an eye-catcher and will gain attention circling around under tree. Even better, if any of your Christmas guests see the train and wonder what 'A Christmas Story' is, you can flip over to TBS while asking them what rock they've been living under for the last 15 years.

We have them for $264.99 with free shipping on our site. Hurry, quantities are limited and we only have a few left after filling preorders.

Also, the Lone Ranger Wild West set and the Amtrak HHP-8 sets are also now available. We have the Lone Ranger set for $354.99 and the Amtrak set for $424.99.

The Lone Ranger set has Trainsounds (I am curious how Lionel fit the Trainsounds speaker and circuit boards into that small Old West-style tender) and a lot of action. The Amtrak set has Trainmaster Command control, but does not have Trainsounds (the engine has a horn). The Amtrak set is one of the most up-to-date sets produced by Lionel and is a great choice for a fan of contemporary railroading.

Like the Christmas Story set, quantities of these top-of-the-line sets are limited.