Can't find Salty anywhere

[MrNormalDraws]

So I got back into model trains a few months ago and I was kinda curious about getting Salty since he's one of my favorite characters. Unfortunately, I heard that Bachmann stopped him a few years ago and I can't seem to find him or the set he came with anywhere. There was one site called InternetHobbies that still has the set, but I heard some bad stuff about them and I don't know if I should risk spending money on them or not. (Update, I contacted them and they said they don't have the item anymore. At least people who have an issue with the site know they contacted me)

I personally don't know why they stopped making him considering he's still in the show. Now I wish I got him before they discontinued him. I felt like I came back into the hobby at the wrong time.

[Len]

Welcome to the club! I've been trying to find 'Salty', without buying a complete set, for almost a year.

Len

[MrNormalDraws]

Welcome to the club! I've been trying to find 'Salty', without buying a complete set, for almost a year.

Len

I wouldn't mind getting the set as I wanted to expand some of my tracks and rolling stock into my collection. Plus in case the controller I have doesn't work.

[Ronniethe14xxx]

Sadly since he's discontinued, your best bet now is sights that sell old items. Train shows may also be an option if you have any locally, however that would require a lot of luck to find him. Just, look at Ebay, Facebook marketplace, etc. and hope for the best. If you wanna get all thomas items, best look for Arry, Bert, and the signal box too, as they were discontinued this year. Hope you are able to find him!

[MrNormalDraws]

Thanks for the heads up! I wasn't planning to get the Ironwork twins at the moment, but after what you said, I'll try to save up on getting the twins before they go out.

[Rodimus Supreme]

I personally don't know why they stopped making him considering he's still in the show.

Because "being in the show" does not equal "sells well". The model stopped selling well, and they discontinued it. I think the set is on eBay frequently, but now that it's discontinued, it's super expensive.

[Ronniethe14xxx]

The better question would be, why didn't he sell well? I'm sure since he appears in the show a lot he would sell more then characters like Mavis, who is barely seen anymore, or Spencer who's price is a major turn off. Like, you'd think Mavis or Spencer would've been discontinued before Salty.

[Rodimus Supreme]

The better question would be, why didn't he sell well? I'm sure since he appears in the show a lot he would sell more then characters like Mavis, who is barely seen anymore, or Spencer who's price is a major turn off. Like, you'd think Mavis or Spencer would've been discontinued before Salty.

...Because anyone who wanted one, was able to purchase one, and was in the hobby at the time already bought one? It's not rocket science.

[Ronniethe14xxx]

That's the thing, that same argument could be applied nearly every character that isn't the steam team or Diesel. It just, feels like an odd choice? I mean, maybe it was uneconomical to make his model anymore, but then why was he still produced for three more years in a set? Maybe they were trying to sell excess stock I guess, and the fact it took that long kinda proves the point that he didn't sell well, but again, it's unclear. Salty clearly seems to be somewhat popular, he's made in all the current merch lines after all. Is there a really obvious explanation behind it like you said? Yeah, probably. But it still feels, off to me. I just, don't understand. Probably just being stupid again idk

[MrNormalDraws]

So sometime after I made this thread, I was able to find just Salty from a toy store in Canada that still had him. I snatched the two last (I'm gonna kept one and sell the other on Ebay) and hopefully have them in their warehouse. If not, oh well.

[Ronniethe14xxx]

Oh, that's great! Hopefully they do actually have him, Salty is a really nice model too.

[Chaz]

Glad to hear you were finally able to find Salty!  Salty seems to be getting a little harder to come by, but he does pop up every so often on eBay either alone or in his set.  The key with finding discontinued products just comes down to checking consistently on eBay or anywhere else that may have him turn up.

A few points I want to add with the first being that things get discontinued from Bachmann because they were not making enough sales when they were first out to warrant further production on them.  While the Salty model isn't a bad model by any means, I don't think too many people were as excited for him compared to some of Bachmann's previously announced models and especially what came after him.  'Arry and Bert are also famously known for not really being all that popular with Bachmann either and only lasted a couple of years after they came out like how Salty did.  

Another thing to think about too is that if Bachmann was continuing to make the products that weren't selling, it would hurt their production team and leave them with excess stock that no one would be buying (like their Chuggington range).  So in some ways, products getting discontinued is a blessing in disguise since it allows Bachmann to focus on making newer products that are more likely to sell better in the long run, rather than keep making ones that won't.  In the case of Salty, he got discontinued right as Oliver got announced and I feel like that was a  more than fair trade off production wise since Oliver sold miles better than Salty did and same can be said for 'Arry and Bert with Daisy's announcement this summer.  And hey, Daisy had a pretty positive response alone when she got announced, and that can be more than said for 'Arry and Bert even when those were released so that pretty much speaks for itself.

[MrNormalDraws]

Bad news, I emailed the site and they told me they didn't have Salty in the warehouse. At least they'll send me the refund on the orders I placed. 

I decide to go with the original plan I had that I'm gonna order the parts from the Bachmann parts site. Hopefully they have them in stock as at least I can built him.

[Len]

Now that's an idea! I'm smacking myself in the head for not thinking of it myself sooner. Just ordered the parts to put together a 'Salty' for the Brendam Docks area of the Sodor display I maintain.

Len

[MrNormalDraws]

Yeah, at least it looks like (hopefully) Bachmann still have the parts for him so at least building him will be easy as there's already the chassis build together.