New s/h champion supplier required. Reports please.

[Bigmet]

Early in the Hattons closing thread, I recall this question.

... Permit an odd question. The main British model rail magazines seem to have an unusually high number of adverts "we'll buy your trains." Has the hobby shifted significantly to circulating used stock? Too high costs for new stuff? Seems "previously owned" is the general trend. Comments?

There's always been a circulation of used stock, but the difference since 99% of our RTR OO is obtained from China, is that there is simply so much more superior product with 'eye candy' qualities in my opinion.

Basically every 'latest release' triggers the 'must have that' button of a significant proportion of the customer base ('collectors'*?). Who then a few mays/deeks/wonths later see the 'latest release' which triggers the 'must have that' button; and some now boring previous purchase(s) are chopped in to make space. I had realised this by about 2010, and began to make steady use of Hattons as the go to place for the recent releases now surfacing as s/h.
*Especially as many of these s/h fairly recent releases show little to no evidence of operation; suspect this is dominantly collectors.

A helpful adjunct group is 'Johnny Ninethumbs': bought it, broke it, can't fix it, chop it in. If I know the product and can see the problem and know it to be easily remedied, bingo.

Roughly two thirds of what I have been purchasing since 2010 has been s/h and most of that from Hattons, because their operation made it easy in all respects, and from within the UK was risk free due to their no quibble return policy. I'll take that saving, thank you; and over those fourteen years haven't had to return even one s/h purchase from our now sadly departed retailer!

Now to my question arising from all this. As experience builds let's have some feedback on which retailers are good at RTR OO s/h and why.

Elaine's Trains. Pro. Keen prices, clear advertising, prompt delivery. Con. Limited stock, mostly older product.

[centenary]

Bit surprised Rails wasnt mentioned in the above post. You can filter on in stock and pre owned stuff on their site which, imvho, is way better than hattons was. That looked like a 15 year old had used plain HTML to create it.

The Model Centre (TMC) also does loads of pre owned (some even their own). However, their filtering isnt as good and makes searching a little tedious when you go back to the main page after viewing an item.

Ellis Clarke also seems to have a good pre owned section.

[Bigmet]

Bit surprised Rails wasnt mentioned in the above post. You can filter on in stock and pre owned stuff on their site which, imvho, is way better than hattons was. That looked like a 15 year old had used plain HTML to create it...

Possibly I am not using the Rails site the way it was designed to be used? It's just a mess in my perception, won't let me focus solely on the items I am interested in, but shows all sorts of irrelevant items. Not solely restricted to this dealer, several others likewise: the system shows what the dealer wants to sell.
(By comparison Hattons second hand listings were a piece of cake to navigate: looking for <brand name> items X, Y, Z, and that's all I would be shown: the potential customer sees only what's of interest that they wish to buy, much better.)

[Peterm]

I agree with Bigmet. Hattons (as far as I'm concerned) was way better.

[centenary]

Bit surprised Rails wasnt mentioned in the above post. You can filter on in stock and pre owned stuff on their site which, imvho, is way better than hattons was. That looked like a 15 year old had used plain HTML to create it...

Possibly I am not using the Rails site the way it was designed to be used? It's just a mess in my perception, won't let me focus solely on the items I am interested in, but shows all sorts of irrelevant items. Not solely restricted to this dealer, several others likewise: the system shows what the dealer wants to sell.
(By comparison Hattons second hand listings were a piece of cake to navigate: looking for <brand name> items X, Y, Z, and that's all I would be shown: the potential customer sees only what's of interest that they wish to buy, much better.)

You can filter Rails site by all the above and more, primarily by scale ie OO scale from the main menu, exclusives, other hobby and brands etc.

Then beneath that, you can select Latest, Bargains, Locos, Rolling Stock, Scenic etc.

Selecting Locos, you can then select from OO Gauge Loco, Steam Locos and Diesel Locos etc. There's even a sliding price filter option so you can only see those items within the range of budget you set.

If you then select say Diesel Locos, you can then filter by any combination of In Stock, Pre Order, New, Pre owned, Brand, Era, Loco Class. By then using the 'Sort by' at the near top right of the screen, you can order the display by most expensive, cheapest, best seller and other reasons.

Im sorry but if you're seeing or focusing on other than what you want, then Id respectfully suggest people are not applying the search criteria and options properly.

The only downside of Rails website is that page display islimited to 20 items at a time.

BTW, Ive no affiliation to Rails but I did test websites from a User's perspective for a living.

[Peterm]

Thanks. I'll remember that if I look again, but as I can no longer afford to buy much...

[Bigmet]

I have now mastered the Rails site in terms of 'mechanism' and it remains clunky and tedious compared to what Hattons had developed.

I will continue trying the various online sites, and whichever retailer eventually matches what Hattons made so effortless gets all my business: it's never a mistake to make it easy for the customer to spend money.

[George Stein]

Thanks for reference to Eiaine's Trains. Had not seen that.

George
North Carolina

[Mountain]

I can vouch for Elaines Trains as is my favourite secondhand dealer.

[captrees]

I can't imagine this being of much interest to readers in the Northern Hemisphere, but for antipodeans, Maylands Model Railways in Perth Western Australia deserves an honourable mention.

Address: 201 Railway Parade, Maylands WA 6051
maymods@multiline.com.au
Phone: (08) 9370 2105
Website: https://maylandsmodelrailways.wordpress.com/

Peter the proprietor has a massive stock. English 00 predominantly. His prices are fair, and I've seen and bought some great bargains, particularly as new locos. Now he doesn't do internet. His website hasn't been updated for 12 years. No ebay sales. I'm not even sure if thats his current email address.

The shop is a real old school treasure trove. I have bought most of my stuff here. Most stock, I suspect, is deceased estates, etc. He will move a team in and dismantle layouts, box everything up, etc. Very little goes to waste. But its a bit like buying a used car, where you buy from the trade, and sell privately, because he offers very low money, and mostly gets it. I find that a bit sad, and have learnt not to exchange stuff.

Peter is very knowledgeable, and offers good advice. Google reviews are interesting. He can be bitingly sarcastic. It can be like dealing with Basil Fawlty.

He's about half an hours drive from me, and I need little excuse to go there. So if any antipodeans are looking for anything specific, let me know and I can have a look. He seems to have a high turnover of stock, which always surprises me. I have no experience of his mail order. Seems like he doesn't need to advertise.

[Bigmet]

...Peter the proprietor has a massive stock. English 00 predominantly. His prices are fair, and I've seen and bought some great bargains, particularly as new locos. Now he doesn't do internet. His website hasn't been updated for 12 years. No ebay sales. I'm not even sure if thats his current email address....He seems to have a high turnover of stock, which always surprises me....

Sounds good, something tells me that Peter's stock turnover is likely to accelerate.