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Post by kurthayek on Dec 16, 2020 7:09:20 GMT -8
Probably has been asked before, but does anyone have contact information for Athearn product development?
The newly announced Genesis Pullman-Standard 2893 CF covered hoppers include cars lettered for Chicago and North Western (long overdue!); unfortunately, the lettering leaves much to be desired (poor rendering of lettering, incorrect LD LMT and LW WT for car numbers selected, etc.).
The Chicago & North Western Historical Society has much information available, including a builder's photo, stenciling diagram, and car card data, that we can send; All we need is contact info. If Athearn will use the information is another matter given some of their screw-ups, but we have to start somewhere.
Thank you,
Kurt Hayek
Chicago & North Western Historical Society
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Post by stevewagner on Dec 16, 2020 7:26:37 GMT -8
Athearn's website has a built-in place for sending email that I've used with limited success in the past. Good luck!
I'm sorry I can search for past instances of contact with the firm this week. Still have things to do before Harvard University essentially shuts down after this Friday until January 4. My last day as an employee there since 1990, following 25 years of teaching high school students, is December 31, and I have an awful lot to get done in the before 4 pm Friday, and an approaching snowstorm may cause complications.
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Post by kurthayek on Dec 16, 2020 9:14:50 GMT -8
Steve,
Just got a contact tip from another member and am sending info to Athearn. Will see what happens
Kurt
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Post by sd40dash2 on Dec 16, 2020 9:32:22 GMT -8
Good luck. Athearn used to post here but my last PM went unanswered.
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Post by edwardsutorik on Dec 16, 2020 12:06:57 GMT -8
Mine too. And also e-mails to Athearn staff.
Ed
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Post by NS4122 on Dec 16, 2020 12:53:43 GMT -8
According to Janek Bringle on the latest Athearn Train Tuesday, they are very far behind on everything in the home office due to Covid 19. And if you follow the news you would know that LA is especially hard hit and on lock down to all but essential workers, so The Athearn staff is working remotely for the most part. You might want to keep that in mind before complaining about lack of responses.
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Post by Paul Cutler III on Dec 16, 2020 14:15:23 GMT -8
I think there's only three people left at Athearn these days. Horizon has really choked them off in the last couple years, and Athearn's slow response time shouldn't be a surprise, unfortunately.
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Post by edwardsutorik on Dec 16, 2020 15:15:25 GMT -8
According to Janek Bringle on the latest Athearn Train Tuesday, they are very far behind on everything in the home office due to Covid 19. And if you follow the news you would know that LA is especially hard hit and on lock down to all but essential workers, so The Athearn staff is working remotely for the most part. You might want to keep that in mind before complaining about lack of responses. You do realize that "working remotely" is closely tied in with being able to get and respond to e-mails, don't you. And also to check the mailbox at work. If nothing else, one can paste in a "we are layed low--we'll contact you as soon as we can" message. If you're working remotely. Now, if folks are worse off than working remotely, as in home sick, then they certainly should be taking care of themselves ahead of respond to our concerns. And I, for one, was not complaining. It was a statement of fact. And of concern. Ed |
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Post by NS4122 on Dec 16, 2020 16:38:22 GMT -8
I know exactly what it is like to work remotely and I know that just having a computer doesn't mean you have all the resources available to do your job like you had when you weren't virtual, especially if you are undermanned. Since you don't have a clue as to what is actually going on there, Why don't you just take them at their word. According to Janek Bringle on the latest Athearn Train Tuesday, they are very far behind on everything in the home office due to Covid 19. And if you follow the news you would know that LA is especially hard hit and on lock down to all but essential workers, so The Athearn staff is working remotely for the most part. You might want to keep that in mind before complaining about lack of responses. You do realize that "working remotely" is closely tied in with being able to get and respond to e-mails, don't you. And also to check the mailbox at work. If nothing else, one can paste in a "we are layed low--we'll contact you as soon as we can" message. If you're working remotely. Now, if folks are worse off than working remotely, as in home sick, then they certainly should be taking care of themselves ahead of respond to our concerns. And I, for one, was not complaining. It was a statement of fact. And of concern. Ed |
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Post by edwardsutorik on Dec 16, 2020 17:49:46 GMT -8
Could you repeat that, please?
Ed
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Post by GP40P-2 on Dec 16, 2020 17:53:41 GMT -8
Well Athearn had become quite unresponsive long before COVID. Just an observation shared by many here.
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Post by cemr5396 on Dec 16, 2020 21:08:42 GMT -8
I've contacted them several times over the last couple times over the last couple years, for various reasons. Each time they were fairly quick to get back to me.
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Post by dominicg on Dec 24, 2020 22:40:06 GMT -8
Well Athearn had become quite unresponsive long before COVID. Just an observation shared by many here. They've been without customer support for some time and backlogged filling warranty repairs, orders, exchanges, etc. I assume Athearn staff are working remotely which limits their parts delivery. DG |
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Post by delta767332er on Dec 25, 2020 11:06:18 GMT -8
Kurt,
Athearn has been fairly receptive recently to implementing *supplied* revisions to their products, both pre- and post-announcement. They should be commended for this, and I'm appreciative at their willingness to offer a greatly improved product with outside assistance. Of course there are a few caveats. 1.) This really shouldn't be necessary, at least beyond some minor tweaking or reference or research assistance. Their research is crowd-funded, but the prices we pay for them aren't. 2.) Without outside assistance, Athearn-produced artwork still tends to be well below average, and when compared to other company's research and products, and the overall quality of tooling the art is released on, it's REALLY unacceptably subpar.
Like the C&NW art, the B&O art was near laughable on a new-release car announcement in 2020. I complete redid it from the ground up from builder's photos and B&O lettering diagrams, including object tracing some of the art from some wonderful slides. While this unfortunately occurred post-announcement, I've been told the changes will be implemented for production, as others I have revised post-announcement have been. As far as providing them info for the art to be revised in-house post-announcement, I wouldn't be confident in this occurring - the announced art is obviously their threshold for acceptability vs. time spent; what did they use to produce the art to begin with? Hopefully I'm wrong and you'll have some success getting the C&NW cars revised. I have a friend who could use a few CNW 2893s, so I considered taking a stab at that car also, but a later repaint would be more useful to him as a 1980 modeler, so I picked my time battles and concentrated on the B&O. Athearn's art development, in the context of the tooling inventory they have, continues to be a major liability for the prototype modeler.
I've emailed you some email addresses vs. putting them here on a public forum without "permission," not that product development emails should be a state secret, but....... I believe Janek monitors this forum, so perhaps he will chime in publicly.
Brian Bennett
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Post by sknorcal on Dec 25, 2020 21:29:15 GMT -8
I have attempted to contact Athearn on multiple occasions with information that could improve their artwork and/or models. I have even gone so far as to offer my own fonts and artwork, much of which is derived from actual railroad lettering drawings. For all my attempts, I have never received a response from Athearn--not a even a "Thanks for your input. We'll see what we can do," or a "Thanks, but no thanks."
Sadly, I have pretty much given up on Athearn. Their tooling is top-notch, but their artwork is sub-par, they won't sell undecorated models, and I refuse to buy a decorated model that I need to strip and repaint--not when it could have been produced correctly to begin with (if they just accepted the help.)
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Post by dominicg on Dec 26, 2020 22:58:24 GMT -8
I have attempted to contact Athearn on multiple occasions with information that could improve their artwork and/or models. I have even gone so far as to offer my own fonts and artwork, much of which is derived from actual railroad lettering drawings. For all my attempts, I have never received a response from Athearn--not a even a "Thanks for your input. We'll see what we can do," or a "Thanks, but no thanks." Sadly, I have pretty much given up on Athearn. Their tooling is top-notch, but their artwork is sub-par, they won't sell undecorated models, and I refuse to buy a decorated model that I need to strip and repaint--not when it could have been produced correctly to begin with (if they just accepted the help.) Did it ever occur Athearn possibly gets a myriad of emails and information having to decipher what is useable and what is not? I am sure Janek is busy enough with assignments, tasks and deadlines they need to meet. That is a good enough excuse not to respond to every email they receive. Not every correspondence warrants a response. Cutting back our expectations a little will ease our anxiety. |
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Post by sknorcal on Dec 27, 2020 12:01:38 GMT -8
I have attempted to contact Athearn on multiple occasions with information that could improve their artwork and/or models. I have even gone so far as to offer my own fonts and artwork, much of which is derived from actual railroad lettering drawings. For all my attempts, I have never received a response from Athearn--not a even a "Thanks for your input. We'll see what we can do," or a "Thanks, but no thanks." Sadly, I have pretty much given up on Athearn. Their tooling is top-notch, but their artwork is sub-par, they won't sell undecorated models, and I refuse to buy a decorated model that I need to strip and repaint--not when it could have been produced correctly to begin with (if they just accepted the help.) Did it ever occur Athearn possibly gets a myriad of emails and information having to decipher what is useable and what is not? I am sure Janek is busy enough with assignments, tasks and deadlines they need to meet. That is a good enough excuse not to respond to every email they receive. Not every correspondence warrants a response. Cutting back our expectations a little will ease our anxiety. I have absolutely considered this. My opinions were not formulated overnight. As I stated, I have reached out to Athearn on several occasions, regarding a few different models. Each time the result was the same--nothing. Using the exact same logic you propose, I can only come to the conclusion that either Athearn product development is too busy to be bothered, or they have determined that my input is not worth a simple 30 second response to let me know that they received my info. For the record, I do believe that Athearn product development receives our input/suggestions and acts upon them where appropriate. I have seen many of my suggestions reflected in the final models when released. However, as a contributor of this information, I would have no way of knowing that my suggested improvements had been incorporated into the final production model until it is released. Consequently, I have passed, or otherwise missed out on models that I (may have) actually contributed to improving--Ironic. Using someone's input/suggestions absolutely warrants a response. That is not expecting too much. |
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Post by stevewagner on Dec 28, 2020 17:05:40 GMT -8
Thanks to movie for posting a very important piece of information on the "Athearn Train Tuesday" thread on this forum, concerning a special chat session this afternoon (December 28) with James and Janet of Athearn, of which I missed hearing the first part: Athearn has a new dedicated email address for product ideas and suggestions: athearn-productsuggestions@athearn.com
I certainly intend to try to make good use of it.
I hope I"ve managed to post a link to it -- I'm using an email application I haven't yet gotten properly used to using.
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Post by stevewagner on Dec 30, 2020 16:24:03 GMT -8
December 30, 2020, about 7:23 p.m., EDT
The following duplicates what I just now posted on the Athearn Train Tuesday thread. I do think it belongs on both.
Note: Easiest access to the new email address for 1) website questions and 2) ideas and suggestions for products is through Contact on the website, not from email from outside. Access through website allows the writer to choose proper recipient category for 1) or for 2). Use separate messages for each. Responses are not promised. I haven't yet had one to either message I sent, but at least they should get read!
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Post by edwardsutorik on Dec 31, 2020 16:02:38 GMT -8
In early November I sent a person at Athearn a pile of information concerning SP&S/NP/BN cabooses, and haven't heard anything. I just forwarded the whole thing to this New Improved e-mail address.
Can't hurt.
As far as responses: it's the polite thing to do. Just copy and paste a boilerplate comment stating that it was received and folks are looking at it and thank you. Two keys and a click. Easy. Of course, it perhaps hasn't been read yet.
Ed
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Post by stevef45 on Feb 25, 2024 12:53:33 GMT -8
Bringing this back up as Athearn had replied to a comment of mine on their recent facebook posting for new releases. They wanted me to provide them with the parts im looking for but I have no idea who to reach out too. I've done the emails from their site and i've gotten nothing from them but horizon instead stating they don't sell parts for trains.
/
Anyone have a good contact at Athearn to actually send a request too?
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Post by NS4122 on Mar 1, 2024 8:36:57 GMT -8
I recently sent a parts request to Athearn at parts@athearn,com and received a reply from them after about three days. They requested specific information including contact info, stock number from the box end, part number and description. I sent them the info, and about three days later I got a response stating they had the part and if I wanted it they would send a secure link for payment. I told them to go ahead and I received the secure link a day or two later, They sent the part FedEX ground. Bringing this back up as Athearn had replied to a comment of mine on their recent facebook posting for new releases. They wanted me to provide them with the parts im looking for but I have no idea who to reach out too. I've done the emails from their site and i've gotten nothing from them but horizon instead stating they don't sell parts for trains. / Anyone have a good contact at Athearn to actually send a request too? |
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Post by stevef45 on Mar 6, 2024 15:42:52 GMT -8
I recently sent a parts request to Athearn at parts@athearn,com and received a reply from them after about three days. They requested specific information including contact info, stock number from the box end, part number and description. I sent them the info, and about three days later I got a response stating they had the part and if I wanted it they would send a secure link for payment. I told them to go ahead and I received the secure link a day or two later, They sent the part FedEX ground. Bringing this back up as Athearn had replied to a comment of mine on their recent facebook posting for new releases. They wanted me to provide them with the parts im looking for but I have no idea who to reach out too. I've done the emails from their site and i've gotten nothing from them but horizon instead stating they don't sell parts for trains. / Anyone have a good contact at Athearn to actually send a request too? Someone from athearn sent me an email address. Out of everything I was looking for they had 1. Emd window set and surprisingly a set if handrails I needed. But no end cabs or cab pieces, no f45/FP45 parts even though they said they have stuff for models over the last 5 years. |
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