End Of a Era.

[Brakie]

Seems that Carstens Publishing has permanently closed its doors today.

I shall miss Railfan since I been faithfully reading it since the first issue in '74 and I feel like I lost a old friend.

I never cared much for RMC.

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[ezdays]

I found this announcement:

"It is with regret that Carstens Publicatons, Inc. will be closing permanently at close of business on Friday, August 22, 2014. Carstens Publications, Inc. has been a leading publisher of leading hobby magazines for over 50 years. Unfortunately the current economic climate has placed us in this position. Discussion is continuing with several parties who expressed desire to take on the continuance of the magazines. At this point there is still hope that all three titles will remain in existence. But I can offer no guarantees. We thank you for your patronage over the years, and wish you the best of luck in your endeavors.

--Henry R. Carstens, President
Carstens Publications, Inc."

I also found this for someone that worked there explaining in detail the reason for the shutdown. The only thing that keeps a business going is a positive cash flow. There still may be hope Larry, if someone buys the rights and continues publishing RMC & Railfan:

Guys,

A slight bit of additional information. Pretty much everything you've
read about the printer change etc is all true, but it doesn't draw the
complete picture. Allow me to fill in the blanks a little bit.

Any business owner will tell you, it is all about cash flow. You may
have all the sales you can handle, but if you don't get the money in
the door in a timely and steady manner, you are going to have issues.
And that has been the case at Carstens for some time. We have been on
a "pay to play" deal with our printer for years…We'd send the mag and
the money to print it…then we'd send the money for postage and they'd
mail it. And these were not insignificant dollar amounts.

From 2008 on, as the recession kept going, people kept losing their
jobs or taking work that paid less, our sales diminished also. We had
increases in the book line, primarily due to the On30 and then the
HOn3 Annuals, and our ad revenue stayed pretty steady. But over time,
the cash coming in, and the frequency of it inched downward. Our costs
(payroll, taxes, printing costs, mailing costs etc) kept going up, and
in the case of mailing, significantly so.

When Super Strom Sandy hit, we were out of power for 10 days (no
phones, no computers) and we counted ourselves lucky compared to some
on the east coast. But there was basically a half month that we could
not generate any revenue, and of course many folks on the east coast
couldn't buy from us if they wanted to because they didn't have power
or were dealing with flooding issues. Then we had the polar vortex and
the winter that would not end, and had many of the same issues. Those
hurt our cash to the point where we were missing print windows because
we didn't have enough cash to print, and we had to delay. That delay
hurt subscriber confidence and you can see the death spiral picking up
steam. There were any number of things that you could point to, but
Quad Graphics (our printer in St. Cloud for the last 15-16 years)
making the decision to shut the St. Cloud plant down and move us (and
they let all the people we'd worked with go) and put us with a new
plant and new people, that was basically the end. We had very little
money coming in, and with the delay, small prospects of any coming in.
We scrapped enough up to do the June and get it out, but the July will
never see the light of day as a Carstens product.

Now two companies are bidding to buy RMC & Railfan, and so they will
continue in the future in some form. What that looks like I don't
know. The Annuals future is somewhat more vague. It is my hope and
certainly my intent to continue to serve as the editor and bring those
out, but that decision is mostly out of my hands at this point. My
last official day with Carstens is Friday.

I don't want anyone to feel bad for me, I will be just fine and it was
my pleasure to serve the model railroad community and especially the
narrow gauge community as a member of Carstens. God willing, I will be
able to continue to do so in some other form, but I likely won't know
what that might look like for at least another week or so, and likely
longer.

All the best,

Chris Lane

[Brakie]

Don,You're da man..
Thanks for posting the additional information.

[ezdays]

Don,You're da man..
Thanks for posting the additional information.

Aww shucks, twern't nuttin' :oops: :oops:

I was just interested in seeing what I could find, I hope it works out, like a lot of industries, MRR just gets smaller and small with mergers, acquisitions and shutdowns. Manufacturers, dealers, websites and now publishers.

[e-paw]

Well at least I got myself in print before they closed their doors.... That letter from Mr. Lane did make me laugh a bit...

Our costs
(payroll, taxes, printing costs, mailing costs etc) kept going up,

They haven't been paying people for contributions for a few years now, at least at RMC, I can't speak for the other publications. Definitely a good way to save on payroll is not to pay authors for articles. I know this first hand from my own experience with them. After I did my camelback article I was contacted by a group of other contributors that had the same problem. After subscribing to RMC for about 15 consecutive years this caused me to cancel my subscription to them. If they had been up front with me and told me so from the beginning I still would have given them the article, I can't count how many times I heard "the check's in the mail" from the Editor himself, Tomustang was a witness to one of the more memorable ones.

I still have an email from him saved in my Inbox.

Apr 1, 2012
Steve,

The photos arrived—nice selection on the models and I think we have a cover. Will fit them on the template at work tomorrow.

The prototype shots are excellent/steam engines will be around in our “national modeling memory” for a long time. These sure look like work horses. The wheel arrangement does not appear to have been that common, though the Southern Pacific had some.

Again, thanks. Talk more in a bit. Nice looking RR!

Bill


HMMM.. April fools day, that should have been a hint.
I'm not trying to sound bitter, in fact I still have the magazine with my cover photo framed in my train room. I am very proud of it. I just wish it could have led to better things with RMC instead of how it had.

[nachoman]

The way model railroaders, and many other hobbies (and just about everyone, gets their information has completely changed since the 1980s. I wouldn't be surprised if most magazines and newspapers shut the presses within another decade. In 1985, the only way most modelers learned their techniques was from the book rack at the LHS. Now, I would guess that 95% of the information comes from online forums like this. I still like browsing through the magazines, but I'd take Big Blue any day . It's no different for other hobbies. How does one learn to restore a car? Magazine? More than likely, an online forum just like this one.

I do want to say one thing. I understand the economy isn't what it once was, but I hate when a business closes their doors and gives all kinds of excuses about the economy or the economics of their customers. Sorry, things change, and it's up to the business to adapt their product or go under. I really don't need to hear excuses out of them - the truth is their product wasn't what customers wanted, or their business model was not one that could deliver that product to their customers for a price that could keep them in business.

[faraway]

I will miss them. It was great improvement for me when they offered an online edition too. Reading the magazine on my iPad in time when the newest article discussed pop up in the US was great improvement.
I am afraid I am the proud owner of a three year online subscription but nothing to read anymore .....

[Brakie]

Kevin.When I am interested in buying a new locomotive I bypass forums, magazines and head for you tube for the review...


You Tube offers up hundreds if not thousands of how to videos from laying track to installing a DCC decoder and this may be the biggest competitor model railroad magazines have since there's nothing like watching how things are done instead of reading how its done.

[Sumpter250]

It's bad enough that they're shutting down, but I just sent them a renewal check for another year of RMC. Guess that's $40.00 ( +/_ ) that I'll never see again !! I got the June issue, and haven't seen one since.
Add to to that, as I was starting to read this thread, Commonwealth Edison dropped the power for the second time in a week !! Even with the laptop, without power I don't have an internet connection. The WiFi dropped out ! Fortunately, I got the power back, and everything came up correctly.

[ezdays]

It's bad enough that they're shutting down, but I just sent them a renewal check for another year of RMC. Guess that's $40.00 ( +/_ ) that I'll never see again !! I got the June issue, and haven't seen one since.
Add to to that, as I was starting to read this thread, Commonwealth Edison dropped the power for the second time in a week !! Even with the laptop, without power I don't have an internet connection. The WiFi dropped out ! Fortunately, I got the power back, and everything came up correctly.

Bummer, even if someone bought the publishing rights and kept printing the mag, they haven't bought the company and there's no obligation to continue your subscription, although they just might in order to keep a good relationship with their subscriber base. One thing, if you had paid by credit card, you can go to the credit card company and they will refund your money based on you not getting what you paid for. I did that once when I bought a shooting card for a trap range, and they shut the range down after I only had a chance to use it once. The credit card company refunded 100% of what I paid, even though I only asked for the difference.

[teejay]

Well I sure didn't help the situation ....used to buy numerous train mags for about 20 years and then stopped cold turkey with the economy ( and income ) in the toilet around 2007 . I haven't bought anything since then ....same with car mags . Most things I need for reference are on the internet .

T

[ngauger]

Well I sure didn't help the situation ....used to buy numerous train mags for about 20 years and then stopped cold turkey with the economy ( and income ) in the toilet around 2007 . I haven't bought anything since then ....same with car mags . Most things I need for reference are on the internet .

T

I'm in about the same situation TJ.....

[Mr Fixit]

In a somewhat strange co-incidence I have been reading through back issues of Model Railroader and TRAINS from @ 2001, pre and post 911 and then just last night, I happend to look up at my latest issue of MRR and noticed how much thinner is has become in just over a decade.
I then wondered just where magazines like MRR are headed given that during my recent house move I realised just how much space and weight my magazine collection involves. I seriously discussed with my father about getting both the TRAINS and MRR Dvd's to slim down my storage requirements.
Another thought is if we are getting rid of hard copies of books and magazines, where does this leave cabinetmakers and bookcases?
I think that there is a big difference between reading something On-line or on a personal tablet device versus reading a book or magazine and it does have something to do with what Sumpter250 experienced.
Who hasnt dropped a book or magazine or had the power go out or worse still the internet go down
You look at a book or mag. in your bookcase and you remember reading things in it.
You drop it you pick it up again, dust it off and start reading, drop your tablet device and see what happens.
Power goes out, grab a torch or a candle and you can still read a book, your tablet or computer will just sit there when the batteries die.
When the internet goes down you can still read a book or a magazine, plus they dont get spam, disruptive pop up ads or viruses. Nor do books have un supported software problems.
Welcome to progress.
Is this the end of the Guttenburg era in the same way steam was replaced by the diesel? hock:
Mark

[Brakie]

Mark,All my western novels and magazines are down loaded to my KindleFire 7" tablet and I can read them even if the 'net is down..

The good..No more piles of paperbacks and magazines on my coffee table.

The bad..The need to recharge the battery every 72-96 hours.

[ezdays]

Mark, I did a thing a while back on how MRR has changed over the years. I found one dating back to the 80's and compared it to one from the early 2000's to a recent one. The number of advertising pages had dropped appreciable over the years, as did the editorial content. However, the price of a subscription and the cover price had soared over that same period.

I agree with you, most of us old timers will. I remember "The Saturday Evening Post" and "Life", both stopped publication for a long time but are now resurrected, well, almost. They're not the same and I guess times change and as you note, things are going electronic now. MRR is bugging me to subscribe to the online content, and two of my computer magazines stopped their paper edition so I had to ask for my money back since I don't own a Kindle or even a smart phone and I thought it just about impossible to bring my computer in where I normally read my magazines. Just like cursive writing, paper prints will be a thing of the past. Can you see 20 years from now a teacher in grammar school saying, "OK kids, take out your electronic readers, go to 'www.blahblahblah.com', scroll to yadayadayada and select page 92"? Even worse, going to a museum where they have a magazine rack display behind glass as an oddity of the past.