RE: Another Local Hobby Shop Bites the Dust.
Mail-order may not be as much of a problem as many people think. As far as the shop owner is concerned, anyone could make up any reason why too few customers come through his door - so, mail-order works as well as any other reason.
Sure those in the sport, for several reasons will shop mail-order, be it convenience, price, availability of products, but fact is, there just isn't that big of an RC aeromodeling customer base in the first place. AMA only has 170,000 members on record, but even with the non AMA customer, a hobby shop may only have a couple of flying fields/clubs in his or her area. Then there is the fact that those clubs may only have 30 members of whom only 6or7 are active (read:buying) fliers.
As far as too many modeler/customers are concerned, price is king and if the shop owner can't essentially sell his stock at a loss, he's not competitive and doesn't deserve to survive. In the end, everyone loses.
My instructor and I are currently working on a marketing program so that hobby shop owners everywhere can effectively compete with mail-order. This program has already proven highly succcessful in several local hobby shops, including mine. So if there are any hobby shop owners interested in discussing this program with us, we will be glad to oblige. After all, we are all in this together.
Joe Bartholomew
Lighthouse Hobbies
1560 Lockport St.
Olcott, NY 14126
1-716-778-0471
1-716-434-7965