Originally Posted by
fliers1
That's a big factor in hobby shop owners keeping their stores in business in the digital age, said Rob Gherman, who publishes the Hobby Merchandiser trade publication.In the age of Amazon, retail brick-and-mortar stores are falling. The hobby industry is no exception: In the last 30 years, the number of hobby shops listed in Hobby Merchandiser has dropped from 20,000 stores to 5,000 stores.
And that doesn't surprise me at all. From my area to south of Seattle, there used to be several large and medium sized hobby shops. Now there's one medium sized independent, two or three Hobbytowns and two or three very small shops that are specialized in what they sell. None of them carry kit planes, other than Guillows and only one carries any real building supplies.