Mini-rant: the slow painful death of the hobby shop

[REMJ666]

I am lucky because the Hobby Town near me has an indoor rc track so they have to keep other stuff in stock...There is a female racer/counter person there who is very knowledgeable about rc cars...Most of the counter people even thou they are young are also racers...The small hobby store right up the street is all about Traxxas and if you want anything else he can have it in 2 to 3 days...I rarely go in there because i don't own anything Traxxas...It is the complete opposite here where i am...Now if i drive another half hr in the other direction to The Track she has an indoor clay track and tons of parts...But she can be very moody and if you go there on certain days you will walk out of there pissed off because she acts like she does not want to help anyone...I do alot of online ordering because it is cheaper even with shipping...So that tells you about the prices in this area...

[85Edinger]

I know how you feel about Hobbytown. I went there looking for a Rustler A arm (don't judge me!). The guy behind the counter hunted for several minutes, only to tell me that they didn't have it. I had been looking at it the whole time. They also carry nothing but Traxxas and Helion, with a little ECX mixed in.

[knucklebuster]

Hobbytown is a joke. I feel sorry for the folks who buy into that franchise. There are two in my area and only one employee who works both locations that is of any help. The holiday temp staff is especially amusing. I made the mistake of paying $5.02 for a $4.97 sale and the clerk was utterly confused. LOOK AT IT, IT'S CASH, GIVE ME A SHINY NICKEL!

There is another LHS that survives repairing cars that were purchased from Hobbytown. The place looks like a bomb went off inside. Barely enough room to walk around tables filled with projects in various states of repair.

Tricked out Clods, hopped up Optimas, double deck 10ls, graphite RC10s, blah blah blah. The cars are poking out here and there. Until recently, the shop was lined with SCE and SCR packs. About 30 packs always on a cycle. He recently made the move to lipo.

The owner and I get along because I like all the old stuff. I don't ask to buy anything that I don't want for myself. In that shop, I choose to leave the part for the next enthusiast to find. After several visits over the course of two years, I walk in and see a NIB RC10 graphite chassis hanging on the wall. I know he pulled that out for me to buy, and I did. It's now one of a handful of dust collectors I own.

[vwjuice]

Four years ago my then wife went to the lhs to order me a Super Clodbuster for a christmas present knowing that I had always wanted one. The guy told her that she shouldn't get that because I didn't really want that. That I wanted a different truck, an Axial rock crawler. He started telling her about it and she said "it's slow isn't it?" he said yeah snd she knew that I didn't want that. She told him she was going to go home and order it online and then to save the sale he went ahead and ordered it. It was about a 20 minute conversation of him trying to convince her what I would want.


I hate rock crawlers!!!!!!

[CamplinP]

It is sad. When I was a kid Hobby Town was awesome. I remember looking at all the RC10s, Optimas, Ultimas and all the Tamiya stuff. They had every part and motor you could want. I remember in about 1987, getting my RC10 off the shelf along with my 1200 battery, Futaba stick radio, Monster stock motor, Novak speedo and my fancy charger that had a temperature pad I had to attach with a rubber band. Now the only reason I would go in there is if my daughter wanted to stuff a bear.

[knucklebuster]

and Pactra paint. Funny, last time I went for outlaw black they were out. I picked up metallic black. Come on, no outlaw black?