Lionel website got a facelift

That good, huh? 

Flavorless eye candy.

 

Pete

 

 

Marty,

My vote is with you. When anyone needs to resort to trickery to navigate a web site it is a complete failure.

I agree with MARTY E and others on the LIONEL site.  Just yesterday I wanted to look up something in the 2008 catalog and could not archive it.  I then tried the archive find on the product and the pic came up but when clicking on pic would NOT load.  Very frustrating.

I took some heat early on for stating I'd wait a while to see how it all came out before rendering an opinion.  I still believe that some of the initial reactions were unfair to the extent that it was early in the release and things could have been in flux.  A few months later and it really hasn't gotten better so it's now time to fix it.

Personally, I am very disappointed that they dropped virtually everything older than 8-10 years old from the product search, that was a valuable reference at times.  I also don't really understand the throwing away of the older information, it's really not a big deal to have a slightly larger database nowadays.

 

maybe we should ty this;

 

hhitchcock@lionel.com

Yes... and to save on wear-and-tear of one's fingertips, just send him a link to this thread.    It sizes up the situation quite accurately, albeit frankly and candidly.

 

David

I actually had to go to google and type in the Lionel information that I needed vice going to the Lionel Web.  Only way I could find it.  That was after spending 30 minutes navigating all the various Lionel links to see what was there, and what the best search methods were.  30 minutes of my life I will never get back!

 

At least the service web is still original, though they have reduced content in the service manual section.  Just does not function like it did 5 years ago.  Back when it gave you anything you wanted.  G

These screenshots below, will show you how easy it is to find information on the New Lionel Website. Click on screenshot to enlarge.

Gary • Cheers from The Detroit & Mackinac Railway, “ A Toy Train Layout” 

Step One

 

Step Two

 

https://www.lionelsupport.com/

+1,000 John, you nailed it.

 

I thought Lionel was making a bit of progress along these lines when I created my "Virtual Bandit Meet" for-sale thread a couple of weeks ago.  I was pleasantly surprised when I found new pages for things like the Santa Fe HiLevel Superliners from the early 2000 years or thereabouts.  So I included links to those pages in my for-sale ad.  Well when I checked those links today, those links now display a blank page... you don't get an error message, so the browser considers the links as valid...  but the links don't display any information anymore! 

 

So I'm back to how I felt about this disaster of a website the first day I tried using it. 

 

David

 

 

I also agree with the majority here that the new upgraded(?) Lionel website is mostly "all show and no go".  Fortunately,  they didn't screw with the parts section as it is still available and useable.

 

Nick

THIS!  (Or maybe a slightly modified version of this).

 

I had tons of bookmarks for the exploded diagrams and/or parts lists for various items in my collection.  Now all useless. 

 

Since every one of them brings me to the "looks like you took a wrong turn" page, it's not like they are re-using the URLs.  Leaving the old content there should have been pretty easy to do.

 

-Dave

 

I just used it to look something up and the simple fact of the matter is their website sucks. The page was blank

searched this loco and on my end page is blank.  how about anyone else

 

lionel union pacific

just sent my email

Great

 

Exactly.  That's what I'm getting with the links for the Santa Fe 18" Superliners that are in my for-sale thread.  I trust that eventually the content for these pages will get re-populated, but we shouldn't assume too much either.

 

David

I actually thinks it's a lot better but then again I do most of my searching from my mobile. The old site was almost impossible to use on a mobile device. Lionel almost certainly redesigned their site to be more responsive/mobile friendly. You're going to be seeing more and more of this now that Google has decided to skew search results to show mobile friendly sites ahead of older, desktop focused sites. Also the majority of searches these days are now done from mobile devices, not desktops. That people are all up in arms about these changes speaks volumes to the inability of this hobby to capture the interest of younger hobbyists ("younger" being anyone under say 40!) 

 

There is still plenty of older stuff. I just looked up 6-36784 Monsters Inc bobbing head boxcar which was from the 2004 catalog and also my 6-36703 Circus Horse Car and Corral from the 2002 catalog. 13 years is going pretty far back. 

 

"Looks like your heading the wrong way" MTH here we come?

 

This link used to work...

http://www.lionel.com/Products...ineID=&CatalogId=

 

 

 

And the fact that you're discounting the feedback us "older" folks are providing sends an interesting message too.

 

You found some old stuff.  Good.  I did too the other day, and now the page content is blank.  What does that say?  It says Lionel's site performs inconsistently at best.  I'm not trying to be a hard-a** here, or alienate our younger users.  I'm providing candid feedback on my experience using the site.  And if you listen to the feedback of others, it's pretty clear Lionel's new site is not ready-for-prime-time.  It wasn't at the end of August, nor is it much better 2+ months later.

 

Of course, some folks may view the site as "good enough" for their individual needs, and our world operates fundamentally on that philosophy nowadays.  Everything is OK as being "good enough"... not the best it can be. 

 

David

If I had a dollar for every time I've received that message on the new site, Lionel would have paid for the MTH Cancer Awareness ES44 locomotive I purchased the other day.  

 

David

Simply type 28063 in the search box and the info is there.

 

Not a fan of the new website myself either, quite a bit of the old products are still there

but not having the advanced product search is big letdown.

Harder and harder to be an adult in Amurrca. Zoom. Whee. Pretty colors.

 

But if I want to do some research on past items...sorry - that would be actual information.

 

Annoying - to the point that I don't go there as often, as there is less "point". Catalogs and data will sell me items, not nervous graphics.

They just haven't got too it yet....

Hey, I'm under 40

Probably because they can't find it.

Gary, While the service page is the same, less information is available.  The support page is contact.  The old product locator was much better.

 

Actually try to look stuff up you need, and those links won't help much.  G

Just received a reply from Howard Hitchcock, he thanked me for my concerns.  He stated he read through this thread and stated in part "Since you have sent your note, and I was able to read all of the comments in the thread, we have assembled the Web Development and Marketing Teams to discuss the nature of the concerns raised by you as well as other OGR members."

 

Thank you Mr. Hitchcock!!  

Excellent news!

 

 

I used the "advanced search" all the time at the old Lionel website. I don't understand why they removed it.

That is very good news, in more than one way. You can actually get through to the top and get a response. They listen to the customers and users of Lionel products. They have genuine interest in making things better. This is all very impressive, at least to me anyway.

 

Matt01,

See 2nd post above yours, very good news there.

It's still not all that easy to navigate this circus. It seems like the new website is mostly all about selling stuff.  I still haven't figured out how to access past catalogs. If there's a way, it's certainly buried.

FYI, the new update is not "what young people want to see." Source: I'm 21, so I guess that makes me young enough.

Being from my generation, I thought the old website was atrocious too, and I admit that it did need updating. However, the update they provided is orders of magnitude worse than the old site. It's ugly, it's not user-friendly, information is missing, there are typos everywhere. It's just awful.

Rant over for now.

Hover over the 'Products' label toward the upper left corner, a new screen will pop up, down at the bottom toward the lower right will be a 'Catalogs' label, click on that and you should get catalogs. Took me a while to find that one too.

Hi breezinup

     I have made you a link to the New Website Catalogs, this link will take you to all the Lionel Catalogs from 2010 to 2015

http://www.lionel.com/catalogs

     After you go to this link, just click on the catalog and they all work. Maybe Lionel has to fix the links. I found it with No Chaos.

Gary - Cheers from The Detroit and Mackinac Railway - "A Toy Train Layout"

This is a screenshot.

Yes, it has issues, yes it will get better. Try some of the other manufacturer's sites and they are not impressive. Links break, they don't get fixed. Bottom line, almost all manufacturers regardless of industry are trying to make the site more attractive. 60% of the purchasing power will be the Millennium's (those born in 1985 ~ 1993). They have grown up with all sorts of electronics like Sega, Play Station, Smart Phones, etc. items that blast their senses. They need that stimulation. 

 

Now for any Website, if I can get to what I want in 2~3 clicks I am gone. I won't waste my time searching for a product. Lionel needs to revisit the site on many levels, however, I do like the effort. All things being equal I am sure that their marketing teams and web development team are pulling statistics on performance. I would guess Howard and his team are looking at ways to amp up performance. My suggestion, if it is not hosted at an external data center that can scale with the times - Christmas is not far away, it will continue to perform poorly. Think UPS and FedEx two years ago. From a content perspective, I would have prefered, like Gun Runner John, the support section and previously released items remain on the site. 

 

Given the feedback from this forum I am sure Lionel will respond accordingly

hopefully the Lionel staff will continue to read this thread and see your post.

Thank you rtr12 and Gary for the information on the location of past catalogs. However, the archived catalogs only go back to 2010 with the new website. The old website had catalogs going back to 2000. Those older catalogs were invaluable for tracking things down and viewing items - I used that reference all the time. Deleting this information source is one of my biggest beefs with this new website.

My wife commented how the Real Housewives got facelifts and the results were not pretty.

 

Et tu Lionel?