Friday I went to the annual O scale meet in Indianapolis. This year it is an O scale / S scale dual meet put on by a new sponsor, the O scale Resource and S scale Resource e-zines. I wasn’t expecting much as I have been dissappointed by this show when it was operated by others.
It was really pretty good. Saw a lot of old friends. I would recomment it. There were 5 operating layouts, 3 in On30, 1 in regular O and one in Proto 48.
Now for the rant part. Since getting older and trying to sell our products to a maturing customer base, one of the excuses that I would get from folks attending shows is “I’m not at the point of buying structures yet, I’m still working out my track plan.” I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard this from guys 10 years my senior and I’m 68. I saw a guy pushing a walker to the parking lot with a big box of brass locomotive. Wake up guys! It might just be a bit late to START that layout. Now, I’m not trying to kill anybody’s dream, but let’s be realistic. Y’all need to get some track down and run some trains.
The one thing I noticed, that I really didn’t like was all of the pre-built structures available. The stuff from Woodland Senics and Menards is unfortunately for Clever Models LLC, really nice. Yup, you pay a lot for it, but I saw a lot of it going out the door.
WHAT HAPPENED TO ALL THE MODELERS OUT THERE.
I do appreciate all you out there that buy our products. I Really, Really do! End of rant.