Tower Hobbies/Hobbico
 

I am active in the rc crawler niche of our hobby also, and am active on rccrawler.com , some of you may have heard that Tower Hobbies has been on a downward spiral the past few months. They have just recently filed for chapter 11. I know they don't supply a lot of "tank" stuff but this will be a blow to anyone involved in rc. Just look at all the hobby related supplies they offer, building materials etc. I own a few "Axial" brand products which is owned by Hobbico and to say I am shocked and disappointed is an understatement. Sucks for the employees also, they just closed one of their distribution centers in Nevada. I have been an avid customer since I have had my first paycheck. And it is a shame.

Cheers,
Wade

Wow, that's amazing and sad. 20 years ago when I was into RC airplanes Tower Hobbies was *the* place to go. They even had their own line of engines and things.

Steve

It will definitely be a sad day if Tower goes under. They've been around forever. I can't help but wonder how much the internet has to do with this. I said it many times, the internet has murdered the local hobby shop. Here in Detroit we had a chain of hobby shops called Riders and they had at least 15 different Outlets until the internet became popular and now there are none.

When I first started it was either Hobbyland in Mishawaka or Tower Hobbies.

Now I always check eBay first.

That's what they get for cloning Traxxas.... Is a shame, especially for all the employees. I haven't bought from Tower in years as other vendors seem to have better inventory and prices but still a shame to see it go down like this.
t

I'm guilty for shopping online more than locally. My issue with retail is that I usually do my research on the internet. I have to go through the same hoops when I shop locally. I usually go to the website, find what I want, locate the store, and check the availability before I go to a retail outlet. Half the time I get to the store and they don't actually have what I'm looking for so it's a wasted trip. The last time I went to a local hobby store that sold plastic models I asked the guy if they sold Milliput. He had no clue what it was. So since I couldn't get any multipart plastic filler there I thought I would pick up some paint. Half of the Tamiya acrylic paint was sold out. Couldn't even get flat black. So I grabbed a few other little items I wanted, but didn't need a the moment just so I could say the trip wasn't wasted.

Most of the time I shop online because I'm not in a huge hurry to get an item. The times that I am in a big hurry I will shop locally, but usually I end up disappointed because they don't have the item in stock or the price point really sucks. When I was a kid I used to love to go to the hobby stores in town just to look at all the cool stuff, but now I can do that without ever leaving my desk. I owned a pharmacy for a short bit so I know the pitfalls of retail. Sometimes you deal with items that have a short shelf life with minimum order stipulations.

Horsepucky. People said Sears catalogs and KMart stores were going to kill local businesses. Where are Sears and KMart today. I have been buying hobby stuff from catalogs for 60 years. The internet is just a faster catalog store.
What kills local stores is a LACK OF CUSTOMER SERVICE. The desire to increase profits and hire cheap, uneducated labor. Owners who have no concept of what they are selling and no desire to put the time into their store to keep their customers happy. Customers go to a local hobby store that has knowledgeable and friendly staff - that cute 18 year old dimwit blonde behind the counter doesn't do it. And also has products that they need NOW, not ones they have to order. If they have to order they might as well use the internet. That means get rid of the 3-D puzzles and stock up on balsa. And if I want a Revell plastic model car I'll go to WalMart.

Back to the OP, Horizon has the same problem. You can thank bleeding hearts with their push for increased minimum wages for this. American companies with ties to Japan and Europe cannot compete with Chinese companies any more. Companies need to be flexible to meet the changing demands. Hobbico's "flexibility" is sell the business to someone else who can be flexible. All they really needed to do was bring on a few of the Chinese manufacturer's like Hen Long

I don't know if it's a site problem or if I'm being blocked because of location but it seems and Avid RC is gone, too. Here's the link:

https://www.avidrc.com/

Hasn't come up since right before Christmas.

The Avid site came up.

With Tower and Chapter 11, at least there is a chance they are trying to keep the business going as opposed to just shutting it down.

Good. I'll have Daryl get me what I need. Never had problems with their site before.

If you really believe the internet hasn't hurt the local hobby shop you're either naive or blind. We have a couple of great shops right here that still survive, but go in there and ask for a 10 amp esc and see what happens. You'll either pay 4 times the price or they'll have to order it for you and it will still cost 4 times the price and take two weeks to arrive. I do a lot to support local hobby shops and I like the convenience of stock on the shelf, but now-a-days it's just things like paint I'm going for. And I don't know what walmart you shop at, but the model kit selection here is either extremely small or totally non-existent. When I need a model kit I go to squadron. Where are they? THE INTERNET!!!

^^^ I agree, a local hobbytown closed a few months ago near me. Now I tried to support that shop as much as I could. But driving 35 minutes to get there and them never having anything in stock that I want/need gets a little old. And this included olive drab paint I mean come on really. And if they by the slim chance had something in stock that I needed, it was 2x to 4x the price of online. I'm sorry but I'm not paying $70 for a lexan body for my crawler that i can order for $35 online with free shipping.

Cheers,
Wade

FYI, This guy talks about it in this short video,

A local Hobby Town here in Concord is closing after 16 years....

jerry

Hooky Town? Auto correct strikes again? ;)

Nope dumbthumbed it while chowing down on my Ravioli in a cool hole_in_the_wall Italian joint on Columbus in my old hometown of San Francisco.
Trying not to get sauce on my iPhone...

Jerry

Sauce on the phone? I hate it when that happens. ;)

It’s actually Hokey Town

Cheers,
Wade

Not to hijack, but Detroit is also known as Hockey Town. GO WINGS! :)

Detroit went belly up so did chrysler so did GM and some people still buy them

I've been a supporter of R/C and modeling for 30 years. I've also supported my local hobby shops and chains as Tower has always had great discounts as when they offered the HPI Crawler King RTR for $100, remember Hobby People before they created their own brand? I miss that place.
I've only bought Name Brand R/Cs, Losi, AE, Tamiya, HPI, Axial and Traxxas for the most part because I can get parts for them. I finally bought 2 monster trucks for the kids from a name ive never heard of Helion. I don't know if these were considered clones of anything but they were super cheap and pretty fast and durable as far as I can see. If this is the case, no wonder why people are starting to move towards cheaper clone brands. I think there is just too many options out there right now. I can look at all the offerings at Amain Hobbies and I haven't heard of half of those brands on their website. I can understand people not being able to afford name brands as my newest Losi SC truck build was just over $1,000 as was my last Axial build using Axial and Proline parts but I don't know where this hobby is going price wise but up. I feel like I'm priced out of name brand stuff right now. A new name brand vehicle with all the bells and whistles is $400-$500+ bucks as in my latest tank purchase. I don't know where Im going with this but its not like the old days when I worked a hobby counter and could buy and build an R/C for under $200. I'm just buying a lot less lately.

We had a Hobby Town close shop by us as well. They claimed to discount EVERYTHING, but even then, I found the Traxxas Stadium Trucks I was looking for cheaper at another hobby store. We used to have 4 of them in the Columbus area, now down to one. Sad really, but change comes to all.

I think people have just learned to do without customer service. Forums like this are my customer service.
The internet absolutely is killing brick and mortar. I buy nearly everything via Amazon now. I can research what I want online, read customer reviews, and get things delivered in 2-3 days.

The only advantage that local brick and mortar has is if I need something right now I can get it right now. But this is becoming less and less of an issue for me. I'll just place my Amazon order and in 2-3 days I have it. Brick and Mortar stores just can't keep enough inventory on hand to compete with the internet.

They are trying to diversify with things like 3D puzzles to attract a broader customer base than people who build model things. There might be 20 people in your town who will ever buy balsa wood but there are thousands who want a puzzle gift for some kid's birthday. But even that is a losing game as now you just go to Amazon and find the puzzle gift and it is delivered to your door.

The future of retail is online purchase with near-instant home delivery. Brick and mortars will become distribution centers with drones or self-driving cars that deliver what you ordered on the internet to your home in a few hours. It's already being piloted in big cities with services like Amazon Now.

Steve

I think the main reason my favorite local hobby shop has stayed in business all this time is because they are also the biggest Detroit dealer for all things Boy Scout and Cub Scout. I guess in the hobby business it's diversify or die.