O GaugeWatch.com

JT’s Mega-Steam, the company that makes smoke fluid in a wide variety of scents, has been sold to Get Real Productions.  According to a post on the OGR Forum the new owner, Jeb Kriigel, has been transitioning the company from its previous owner and founder, Jeff Trenholm, over the past few months and doesn’t plan to make any changes.  Get Real Productions has sold Mega-Steam in the past along with other model railroad products and photos at train shows across the country.  Best of luck to both Jeb and Jeff.

Mega-Steam recently added a new scent to its lineup - Orange.

.

One of these years I’m going to make it up to the Amherst Railway Society Train Show in West Springfield, MA.  This year’s show is running from 1/24 to 1/25.  It’s a huge show that always gets good reviews on the O Gauge forums.  MassLive.com ran an article about the show that you can read here.  For more info and directions go to http://www.railroadhobbyshow.com/.

Today, MTH's email newsletter contains a picture of the new Lionel Corporation Tinplate catalog.  There is no real indication at all on the cover that the trains are made by MTH, which is probably to be expected.  After all it is a licensing deal to use the Lionel name.  Now that I've seen the catalog cover the idea that Lionel is turning the page to a new chapter in its history is really sinking in. It is also much easier to envision MTH eventually making more than just Tinplate products with the Lionel name on them. 

The news letter also announces that the web address of the site supporting the Lionel Tinplate products, thelionelcorporation.com, will launch the week of January 11th.  You can sign up to receive MTH's newsletter by clicking here.

UPDATE 1/8/09:  Joshua of Pre-War Times found the new site available at www.lionelcorporation.com.

I recently received an email from a loyal OGaugeWatch reader about my negative comments/rants about MTH and the poor job they’re doing managing their web presence.  Because of these comments the reader assumed I was bashing MTH because I’m not a fan of MTH.  The person also commented that it was unusual to read personal opinions on OGaugeWatch because I usually just post about the news leaving my opinions aside.    I feel compelled to clarify both comments to clear the air.

Click on the link below to read on

Continue to read It's nothing personal....

Well, it looks like MTH did it again….

Lionel Corporation Website Debuts

January 6, 2009 - M.T.H. is pleased to unveil its dedicated website to
our latest product line, The Lionel Corporation. The site will include
feature videos on Lionel Corporation products along with the latest
news from this exciting new member of the M.T.H. product line.

No links in the press release and none of the domain names I posted about yesterday are pointing to the site yet. To view the original press release click here.  Anyone want to guess who's administering the MTH site?  I hope they're not paying them much.

UPDATE 1/7/09:  A video link was added to the press release but it links to a generic landing page.  Thanks for the tip Lou.

UPDATE 1/5/09 8:58pm:  Joshua over at the Pre War Times blog caught this too.

A quick WHOIS search on the Network Solutions site revealed that MTH owns the domain name LionelCorporation.com and .net as of 12/29/08.  So, there is a very good chance that MTH will point  www.LionelCorporation.com to the home page of their site supporting their new Lionel branded Tinplate products.  The site is not up yet but given that it leaked out prematurely a few days ago, it should be up soon.  By the way, the domain name LionelCorp is owned by someone else but it expires in March of '09.

Obviously MTH is leaving room for product expansion by going with LionelCorporation but they also own LionelTinplate.com and .net and TheLionelCorporation.com and .net all of which should also point to the new site.