The Bad news is another hobby shop is closeing up

Bloch's Hobbyshop in Allentown Pa, on Union Blvd is going out of business. I personally tried to buy a little something there when I was in the area even though it wasn't on my A list. As the owner/operater seems to be mainly a railroad guy and only wants to talk with railroad people..and models were just a revenue item to them. But I must admit they did have a nice selection of Armor kits moderate selection of Aircraft and ships and a huge collection of Car kits. (although the kits I usely priced (armor) were a little bit more than the hobbytown usa prices.)

anyways everything in the store right now is 60% off. last day is this coming Saturday.

anyways the good news is that I got there before they closed up or sold out so here are a few things that I picked up today that i'll Call Bittersweet Deals.

Dragon's Sd.Kfz. 251/16 Ausf. C Flammpanzerwagen
Dragon's Sd.Kfz. 265 Kleine Panzerbefehlswagen
AFV Club Achilles Mk.IIc
Italeri Sd.Kfz 232 6 Rad
Academy M4A2 Sherman Russian Army
Dragon's Pz.Kpfw. I Ausf. B
Dragon's Sd.Kfz 250/11 le SPW w /anzerbuchse 41
Dragon's PzKpfw. IV Ausf. F2 Sd.Kfz 161/1
Dragon's U.S. Army Airborne Normandy 1944
Dragon's U.S. Army Anti-Tank Team Normandy

a couple of accessory kits... Some railroad Foilage and grass and snow and ect for my start into diarama's and about 20 bottles of paint mostly Model master... and some Tamiya..




but like i said my good news is bad news for the area.. this will leave only about 3 decent hobbyshops in the area.

Lucky you!

What's a Hobbyshop?...Jim :-)

It's always a pity to hear another LHS bites the dust...

Having said that, I always wonder whether the management did themselves in by screwing everyone else... my thought process is this... even when closing down, you always try to recover you initial cash outlay... therefore in order for the LHS to sell an item at less 60% and recover the initial cost, he would have needed to have put on a 250% markup originally! In other words something that cost him $4 he was selling for $10... you may think I'm talking bollocks, but having worked in a LHS I was witness to the owner simply multiplying his cost by anthing from 2 to 5, depending on what he thought he could sell it for...

Rudi

Delbert
That sucks another LHS is closing down In the Lancaster.Pa area we don't have much Basically Winky's in Lititz and I think Smitties in Lancaster is still open Smitties was more of a model railroad shop though

Coming from an area that only has Hobby Lobby, I wish we had "only" three hobby shops.

However, it is always sad to see another hobby shop go out of business, whether it is model, railroad, RC or whatever.

60+ mile drive E for one shop, 75+ mile drive west for second shop and thats it unless you want to drive 120 miles +. Definitely not a good are formodeling.

I'm with Frank here. All we have is a Hobby Lobby. The nearest real hobby store is Indianapolis - an hours drive from Muncie. Be thankful.

Jeff

This state appears to be losing all its hobby shops. Hopefully more open up.
At lest you guys still apear to have it better then me.
I have to make a half hr trip to get to my closest hobby shop and they don’t even carry military models.
Heck the local wallmart even stopped getting in modeling supplies.

how much did you get all of that for?

ice got a hobby shop like 20 minutes from my house. And the people are very nice and helpful. But like Delbert's guy, one of the many guys who work there like model railroads more and cant give me any advice on my models. I sure hope they dont go outta buisness! Hobby Lobbys armour kits cost way too much for me. I'd rather resort to online shopping. But it doesn't look as if Hobbytown USA is going outta buisness, the two (yes only 2) times I've been there, someone was buying a $1000 or over rc car.

i'm kinda embaressed to say


Dragon's Sd.Kfz. 251/16 Ausf. C Flammpanzerwagen $12
AFV Club Achilles Mk.IIc $11
Italeri Sd.Kfz 232 6 Rad $11
the rest of these were about $9.50 each....
Dragon's Sd.Kfz. 265 Kleine Panzerbefehlswagen
Academy M4A2 Sherman Russian Army
Dragon's Pz.Kpfw. I Ausf. B
Dragon's Sd.Kfz 250/11 le SPW w /anzerbuchse 41
Dragon's PzKpfw. IV Ausf. F2 Sd.Kfz 161/1

the 2 figure kits were about $3.50
Dragon's U.S. Army Airborne Normandy 1944
Dragon's U.S. Army Anti-Tank Team Normandy

got a lot of western Scenic's Railroad foilage and different turfs and ballast for about $3 a bag....

I got some good deals..... at least thats what i'm trying to explain to the wife...

The other problem is both of my "stash" areas are now full.. had to wedge a couple kits in to make em all fit.. lol big dragon boxes...

I also guess this is still a pretty good area for the hobby. there is still a hobby town USA near Reading and one over by Allentown both about 30 minutes away and both are fairly new stores and well stocked and clean and some of their staff actually builds models.... and there is a Trains and Lanes over near Easton...(bout an hours drive) and hard to find but a large stock of older models and some supplys that hobbytown don't stock..

and there is always e-bay..............America's yardsale 24/7

and yea I know what you mean about hobbytown.. the one thats my favorite over in allentown used to be in another location more outside of town but they moved because they needed a bigger store.. and got one in a strip outside a very large mall.. Lehigh valley mall and the back half of the store is for R/C as its their big money maker.. another large section is for Warhammer.. but I don't mind as long as they have fair prices and keep the model stock and supplies up... and a couple guys there are really into models also........

An hours drive? I drive 3-4 hours round trip, and that doesn't include the drooling and wallet busting time I do in the store.
I should say I'm lucky to have a great store in our state,
and that includes SprueBrothers and VLS.
Gotta give kudos to all the faithful modelers in-state who support these guys.