Athearn Cancels Ton of Projects

[Tad_T]

Another factor that may have played into the cancellation of, at least the Missouri Pacific bulkhead flatcars, is that Atlas recently released three numbers in their/old Walthers version of this car.

Depending on the car and the road, market saturation may play a factor in some of these decisions.

[lock4244]

Mostly this, with the exception that for those vendors that I have found to be reliable I'm still willing to preorder.    So far that's Lowell Smith, and Rapido.
Rapido gets points for being transparent - they tell you up front that they will or won't produce based on preorders up to some specific date.

This.

The other issue with preorders is that some vendors deliver something somewhat different than what was advertised for pre-order, and not in a good way.  I'm thinking of someone in Colorado right now.   Haven't preordered from them since.

Couldn't imagine who that might be... but also this 100% 

[nkalanaga]

The difference with Lowell Smith/Railsmith is that one pays up front, not just reserving the item.  He has to produce it, because it's paid for.  On the other hand, he also has the money, up-front, to pay for producing it.  Someone taking reservations has to do everything with their own money, or borrowed money, and hope they make that money back.