Bachmann has abandoned O scale for years now. Do they still own the tooling or have they been selling it off? Just curious. Sorry if this has been covered before but I couldn't find much.
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The question of where tooling resides is one that is often challenging to truly know. In the case of Bachmann, which is wholly owned by Kader Holdings, the former Williams tooling more than likely resides at their main factory unused. Tooling isn't normally sold in Asia. Instead, the right to access that tooling at the factory it resides at is sold. Factories own a majority stake in tooling, so they have a high level of control over how that tooling is utilized. With Kader Holdings, there has been a policy since the late 2000's to only produce product for the companies they own which includes Bachmann and not produce for outside manufacturers. Most likely, Kader has determined that the profit margin on the Williams products doesn't justify its production due to a shrinking O gauge marketplace.
Will we see old Williams trains produced again? It's hard to tell. There is a lot of it out there in the secondary market at very reasonable prices and I'm sure that Bachmann is aware of that. The price to produce new "Williams" items would lead to all kinds of threads on this forum decrying the insanely high prices. In terms of where Bachmann sat in the O scale marketplace prior to cessation of O gauge production, the products were often praised for reliability and quality of the new locomotives they introduced, but at the same time criticized for lack of command control and features. Proof positive that this is a difficult industry to be successful in.
Here is a corporate history of Kader Holdings Company Limited from their website.
Wow, thanks for that detailed reply Jonathan. Very enlightening. I was just browsing the few Williams items left at Trainworld and it's a shame that Williams is essentially gone.
@GG1 4877 posted:...Will we see old Williams trains produced again? It's hard to tell. There is a lot of it out there in the secondary market at very reasonable prices and I'm sure that Bachmann is aware of that. The price to produce new "Williams" items would lead to all kinds of threads on this forum decrying the insanely high prices. In terms of where Bachmann sat in the O scale marketplace prior to cessation of O gauge production, the products were often praised for reliability and quality of the new locomotives they introduced, but at the same time criticized for lack of command control and features. Proof positive that this is a difficult industry to be successful in. ...
Thanks for the thorough summary.
I don't think that Williams needs new tooling to be successful. Menards has shown that there's a market for basic stuff if the price is right. Williams could compete by reissuing items in different liveries and perhaps by bringing back some of their steamers. The insane MSRPs hurt them - people saw those numbers and tuned them out - I never understood their pricing strategy.
Kader/Bachmann is in HO, N, and G scales and probably didn't feel the O gauge market was generating the returns to make it worth diverting the focus from their other scales to support it. However, I think they could have made it worthwhile if they had been willing to do some creative thinking as Menard's and RMT have done. As an example, with RMT I have bought multiples of a particular car because each car had a different road number. I have also bought other RMT products because the graphics included details like "return to" a particular railroad and location that resonated with me. No need for new dies or a different product, just doing details and graphical things that make the product compelling to buy.
I'm not expect Bachmann to give the Williams/WBB new life. Yes, Menards and RMT have carved out niches, and even MTH could be labeled a niche player now. Menards came out with a remote control system, and MTH already had PS3. Lionel has Lionchief for entry level and LC+2 and Legacy for hobbyists. I think most new buyers want some sort of remote control or smartphone control system. If I'm right, that leaves Bachmann with an R&D project or attempting a licensing deal to resuscitate the WBB locomotives for a market that's kind of crowded.
Yes, some still prefer conventional, but there's so much out there on the secondary market to compete with. Many like early RS and PS1 bring steam and diesel sounds.
Tough market segment to compete in with the WBB products despite their bullet-proof quality and pulling power.
