Hattons and Farish

[njee20]

Kernow were unbelievable on the price of stuff i bought of them last week. I was more then pleasantly surprised!!

Will they be under any obligation to price match? Basically if you haven't got an item in stock and can see no time soon as to when your going to receive (ie Hattons) you Can offer an item at 50p knowing you can't honour that because you have no stock. The same way the others can argue
We can't price match because their pricing doesn't reflect their current stock.

Obviously unknown until I ask but just thinking out loud.

Definitely no obligation to price match! Entirely at the discretion of the retailer, even if Hatton's (or a.n.other retailer) have stock they can sell for whatever they want to. I'd not be surprised if KMRC did though, and their prices are good. Collett's Models too, very good prices. Hatton's are often not cheapest IME.

Is this any different to Gaugemaster selling their own GM Collection range and also supplying this range to other model shops (class 73s, 66s, etc in N, Terriers in O, and various wagons in the three scales) albeit they are made by Dapol for GM?

Those are just commissions though, and although KMRC have also gone down the manufacturer route they've not done anything in direct competition with Bachmann.

[zopadooper]

The VAT rules on second-hand goods are such that Hattons are losing out if they are deducting 20% off pre-owned goods

Unless the vendor is operating under a VAT margin scheme, the same VAT rules apply to second hand goods as to new ones.

I agree but they would be foolish not to.

[nookfield]

Rails keep good numbers but I detest their website, type in the EXACT item you want and then spend 20mins trawling through stuff that is of no use to me. 

search using the catalogue number. It will come first in the list

[njee20]

Annoying if there's a range (different running numbers or whatever). The Rails search is disastrous, I'd buy far more from them if they could sort their indexing.

[Stuart Down Under]

So this issue drags on and on.... it is getting serious now! 

Just like "Leon", if it is a choice between Hattons and Farish, then Hattons wins for me. They have always provided me with great service, and that is important to me in far distant Australia. I check out their new and second hand stock every day. I have also used them to sell large quantities of surplus stock, and they are very fair with that, especially if you want to use it as credit against further purchases. 

I have used "Rails", but as someone else mentioned, their search is rubbish. Gaugemaster and Osbourns are OK for some special stuff, but you can't beat Hattons for stock and range.

Any new gossip around? 

[PLD]

Interesting conversation with AN Other retailer today on this.

If accurate, in effect what Bachman have taken exception to is Hattons wholesaling their products to other retailers.
I.e. you can now see Hattons' Branded products for sale on Rail's of Sheffield stand and several other big name retailers. That in Bachmann's eyes would seem to have crossed the line from a "commissioner" of models to a competing "manufacturer". You wouldn't expect Bachmann to supply stock to Dapol or Hornby and now Hattons have moved themselves into that category...

[RailGooner]

Interesting conversation with AN Other retailer today on this.

If accurate, in effect what Bachman have taken exception to is Hattons wholesaling their products to other retailers.
I.e. you can now see Hattons' Branded products for sale on Rail's of Sheffield stand and several other big name retailers. That in Bachmann's eyes would seem to have crossed the line from a "commissioner" of models to a competing "manufacturer". You wouldn't expect Bachmann to supply stock to Dapol or Hornby and now Hattons have moved themselves into that category...

I have a Gaugemaster branded product - Gaugemaster GM2210101 GBRf Class 66789 'British Rail 1948-1997' Large Logo Blue - on pre-order from another retailer. The same subject is available under the GF by Bachmann brand. From my unprivileged viewpoint that looks like the same scenario, and AFAIK Gaugemaster are still being supplied by Bachmann.

I just wish they'd crack on and come to some agreement.

[guest311]

am I understanding this correctly ?

Bachman is not so bothered about Hattons 'making' their own models to sell themselves but are unhappy at them selling to other retailers ?

[njee20]

We don't know the specifics of it, so not quite sure.

The GM commissions are just Dapol models. It's not Gaugemaster actually making their own models.

[Rabbitaway]

My view and only my opinion is that Hattons should stick to their guns on this.

Buchmann have a track record of including restrictions in their terms for supply, for example only allowing 15% discount on newer releases and dealing with bricks and mortar retailers only. Some of these restrictions are very borderline legally as discussed in other threads.

Their position as one of the two big suppliers is being eroded by lots of new competition. History has shown that if companies do not embrace competition through efficiency and good business they do come to grief in the end.

Although currently mostly 00 it is interesting to see that the new manufacturers are producing high quality models at a better price point than the excessive prices Buchmann are charging

[Kaput]

The longer this drags on the dodgier it gets having Hattons happily taking pre-orders for Bachmann products without even the slightest word to the unwary customer.

[Stuart Down Under]

If it's about Hattons being a manufacturer, then surely all they need to do is create an arms-length subsidiary, and call it "Super Models" or some such. I suspect that there is more to this dispute than meets the eye! The response I got from Hattons in January was that they were in talks with Bachmann, and expected a resolution "within the next couple of weeks". Clearly that didn't happen!

I wonder if one or more of their current projects is compromising something that Bachmann had in the pre-announcement planning stage, and they are using the fineprint in the retail agreement to try to get them to drop it.

Personally, I will continue to support English-owned Hattons (annual turnover £14m) over Chinese-owned Kader (annual turnover £113m). it is a pity that some of the models I would like to buy will soon be caught in the cross-fire! 

[Chris Morris]

I've heard that legal people are now involved in this dispute. This can only mean it will take a long time to resolve and cost both sides a small fortune.

As has been said above, surely Hattons could have chosen a different brand name for their own products.  Based on the fairly low level of new products from Farish and the prices they ask I have to say I wish Hattons all the best.

[Roy L S]

Personally I don't think a different brand or subsidiary would have been the answer, they have quite logically leveraged their well established Hatton's brand for their own products because it is known and trusted in the model railway world and has been for generations. Clearly they have the financial "muscle" to develop and wholesale their own products directly with factories and in doing so this makes them a direct competitor with Bachmann, but none of us are actually privy to the details of the "dispute" and for this reason it is impossible to speculate why Bachamnn is not supplying them.

I hope they can find a mutually acceptable solution quickly as I don't actually think it is likely to benefit either business if it continues indefinitely.


Roy

[Chris Morris]

The dispute and the cause of it are not speculation. Bachmann were not best pleased with Hattons having their own models manufactured and the dispute began then. When Hattons started distributing their own brand items to other retailers they became a fully fledged manufacturer and therefore competitor to Bachmann. Bachmann has what appears to be a perfectly reasonable policy of not supplying products to competitor manufacturers therefore they can no longer supply to Hattons without breaking their own policy. They might also be accused of being unfair by other manufacturers or retailers if they did continue to supply to Hattons.

The speculation is what happens next.  Bachmann probably think they won't be hurt too much because their products are all available elsewhere and will expect any loss of revenue from Hattons to be replaced with increased revenue elsewhere. Our purchases are largely about the items we want and not the shop we buy it from so this is a reasonable expectation. Short term Hattons will suffer from being without new product from Bachmann to sell. This will damage all important cash flow. If they have plans to create a range of their own items to sell and have the cash available to tool these items without the cash flow from selling new Bachmann products then they could do well in the longer term and could maybe become a real challenger to Bachmann. The rumour I heard is that neither side seem to be about to back down at the moment.

I wonder whether Hattons expected this to happen and have planned for it? If they know they can match Bachmann for quality and also undercut their prices they may have embarked on a high risk strategy that will provide great rewards if it succeeds. Certainly interesting times.