Latest Marklin News

www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104149834 :unsure: Cheers, Jim CCRR

I seriously hope Marklin survives. I have bought thier Steel mill related equipment and 3 other Locomotives, and track and switches. But I have not bought their American equipment. Their tooling and run quality are excellent but I can't get past thier compromise in wheel sets and modifications to make their wheel sets fit. Their euro equipment looks great but I can't relate to it because I don't see it on US rails.

I don't think that Marklin has made a real effort to satisfy the American consumer. I hope they are listening to their customer base. I hope that this post doesn't start a firestorm or get me banned. Just posting my observations of the situation.bh

Oh I read in the German forum that one of the heirs just died too. Bad year for them.

Bobdocker wrote:

I don't think that Marklin has made a real effort to satisfy the American consumer. I hope they are listening to their customer base. I hope that this post doesn't start a firestorm or get me banned. Just posting my observations of the situation.bh

I think you're quite right in what you say, and that comes from a fairly committed Marklin fan (but one not blind to their faults). There seems to have been an attitude over the last couple of years that only the German-speaking market really mattered. However there are hopeful signs that with this crisis, and the recent changes in management, that attitude might be beginning to change.

Bob, No worries. When they sold out they sold it to a gang of corporate raiders who could care less about the Marklin name, history, or customer base. The new top executives where taking $8000 per day in pay. This is all a shame. Of course the Marklin owners, the family, helped bring all this on themselves. They did the first run of North American stuff 25 or more years ago and left it at that with very few questional releases since them. By keeping to the basic German customer base they failed to realize that German and Euro modelers were aging and the kids who grew up in the TV and electronic age, like kids in our country, for the most part could care less about model railroading. As the base age in the hobby grew older the money tended to dry up. This and general inflation made "toys" seem less a good investment. The Marklin family realized their errors to late. If and when Marklin begins producing again I believe their Z line may not make it. They can look inward to Europe and a saturated clientele and possibly try to market to NA in a big way. Somehow, I doubt it. Also remember that Marklin Z was only about 5% of the company's income. Not much. Not enough. Cheers, Jim CCRR:(

The demise of Marklin would be sad indeed

I keep thinking of the recent GM truck and SUV plant closures in the US and Canada and realize many companies worldwide will either go down the drain or be extensively restructured to serve perceived future needs during the current economic difficulties. None of us on this board has gone through any economic situation like this. Nobody knows how long it will last or how deeply it will cut. If it is anything like the Great Depression of the 1930s, we're in for a huge shock. The "green revolution", which will hopefully significantly address climate change from the corporate level downward, will be our eventual ticket out of the current economy. Or so I hope

Where Marklin will land in this mess is at the mercy of the gods. I tend to agree with Jim when he says that our children aren't very interested in trains, though my granddaughter's generation may have an interest due to Thomas the Train. Whether that translates into a future for Marklin or portions of Marklin is anyone's guess.

Beverly56 wrote:

The "green revolution", which will hopefully significantly address climate change from the corporate level downward, will be our eventual ticket out of the current economy. Or so I hope

I just hope that this "revolution" will help me to keep my job...

...currently the company where I work is barely hold up by making gear milling cutter for producing gear wheels for wind turbines. Our usual customers were the automobil industry...

Now we face a planned 25% reduction of the number of employees...

Uwe,

The auto industry is in shambles in N. America. I watch ads for cars from both US and Canadian television stations. Advertisers on both sides of the border are begging people to buy their cars. GM, one of the biggest manufacturers, is closing 300 of 700 car dealerships in Canada. I believe there are similar closures expected in the US. It's very scary. In your situation, a proposed reduction in workforce of 25% must be horrifying

We won't be buying a new car for years for a few reasons. First is that we seldom drive our N. American made Nissan. Chris takes the bus to work and I don't work outside our home. Our car is about five years old and has just less than 50,000 km on it - which is ridiculously low. Second, we're waiting for a good electric car to come onto the market, preferably a Nissan - a brand I've driven since I began driving over 30 years ago. Nissan barely has a good hybrid for sale, so I think it may be a long time before they have something we will want. Third, driving an electric car in our city isn't much of a green event. Electricity here is coal generated. Until there is greener electricity locally, we might as well continue to drive our gas-fueled car.

Chris works for an international oil and gas pipeline company in the IT department. There does not seem to be a problem with jobs in his company - yet. Maybe no matter what oil and gas prices are the product still has to get to customers. We can only hope.

I hope you are not affected by the job cuts. I'm sorry to hear about it

ULie wrote:

Beverly56 wrote:

The "green revolution", which will hopefully significantly address climate change from the corporate level downward, will be our eventual ticket out of the current economy. Or so I hope

I just hope that this "revolution" will help me to keep my job...

...currently the company where I work is barely hold up by making gear milling cutter for producing gear wheels for wind turbines. Our usual customers were the automobil industry...

Now we face a planned 25% reduction of the number of employees...

Uwe, I am curious. I didn't know auto industry is the biggesty user of wind turbines, or it is in Germany. I know there are wind power generator in planes, but maybe I am going on a wrong path.

I think what Uwe meant was that the company's usual business was with the car industry, but at the moment it has been staying afloat by making gear wheels for wind turbines. There are a lot of wind turbines in Germany.

shamoo737 wrote:

I didn't know auto industry is the biggesty user of wind turbines, or it is in Germany. I know there are wind power generator in planes, but maybe I am going on a wrong path.

No, I didn't mean that the auto industry uses wind turbines...

our company produces tools for both, the auto industry , and the wind power industry . For the wind power industry we produce big hobs, while in the auto industry mostly smaller hobs are used. But then there are exceptions...
Personally I'm working in the coating department.
It's an old company, last year we celebrated the 100th aniversary with a big party. I'm working there since 1975. If you have the time for a download, you can find a image movie of the company here . Unfortunately they used the long version for the download...

Wind power is a relativly big factor in Northern Germany. You will also find those wind mills all around the landscape. And they got bigger each time they set new ones up.

Sorry Uwe. I cant read in the morning. Come to think about it,I cant read in the afternoon either.