Home Racing World

Gentlemen, I received both CAN AM cars and I give them two thumbs up. You can find them for as low as $85. Clover Leaf will have them Sept 18th.

Does anyone know why Thunderslot asks double prices? Who are these guys?

They manufacture one of the fastest out the box racing slot cars that I've purchased. With tire truing, ride height adjustment and loosing the pod screws.

Yes, they are nice. Have mine coming. But the significant price increase over the first release is simply not worth it to me. To others it might.

Aren't they a spin off, so to speak, of NSR? That would explain the price. Great looking cars though.

In my experience, once the price goes over $44.99 the sales go down........

A lot of manufacturers, in many industries, will have a "loss leader" to introduce new products. They give a discount price and entice potential customers to discover what a particular company can produce. They might lose a few dollars in the process, but the increased "word of mouth" advertising - at no cost to them will be re-couped with future sales and the name will be established without spending a lot of money. This is probably what is happening at Thunderslot. They certainly have received a lot of positive buzz with their lower priced offering. It will be interesting to see how successful this campaign is. But, their cars are apparently on a par, quality wise, with NSR cars that are also at that price point, and manufactured in Italy too. I'm not really interested in the T-Slot Lolas. I have nine Fly Lola coupes that are lovely little cars (as we all know), but the real deal breaker is "fastest slot car out of the box". Lolas can never compete with modern LMP machines, but now we have a car from the '70s that can beat them on our race tracks! Maybe we need to re-think the whole notion of what "scale racing" means and how toys like this fit into the bigger picture. It is not just a price point, or fast motor, that makes a car worth having.

I could not believe the price at first,(P.M. $102) but Electric Dreams $86 when I ordered the car. Now the price is over a $100. Clover Leaf is still at $85.

Prices are either cost determined or demand determined. That is, costs + desired profit margin or b) how much can I charge before no one wants it?

One sure way to ruin a sport or hobby is to increase the price until only a few will keep buying!! I hope the companies like Carrara and Scalectric and a few others keep making the cars the way they have been and at reasonable prices. They look nice ,run well, and have enough detail for me -- after all you can only see so much when it's going around the track. If I need the car to go faster I can tune it as much as I want to spend . I know I must sound like a cheap skate but that's the way it is. I'd rather buy a bunch of slower cheaper priced cars than one really fast one.

What he :text-goodpost: said. We have GREAT racing with $35 Carrera cars. Most home tracks are not big enough to take advantage of these cars.

Harry

Well, this all answers my question. Its hard to believe that people can go to the trouble of creating a manufacturing plant, market the product in today's insane business world, and a hundred other hurdles to hop over, then drop the ball completely by overestimating what consumers will pay, and disregarding completely the intrinsic worth of the object that is for sale. As long as there are scratchbuilders, the RTR cars can be ignored if price-gouging occurs. Ninco learned that the hard way, and they still haven't recovered. If you look back at the slot car era in the 1960s, there were outfits then who tried to drive prices up. They all failed of course, but more importantly, they damaged the hobby, and for decades it was anyone's guess as to whether the hobby would always be basement dwellers only. Home racing, eh?

And yes, Carrera, Scaley and some smaller outfits are holding the line, making money and doing well- because they do what they are good at and charge a fee that is reasonable for that product. Its that simple. And think of the world-wide customer loyalty these guys have because of it.

I have never enjoyed super-stupid-fast cars that I can barely see on the track at speed, nor the things that don't even look like cars that are usually with them, but they, even though rather expensive, are a hobby unto themselves and constitute no threat to our hobby, so good, I hope they have fun. Home Racing World. That's us.