Randy, parts of what you wrote are correct. Other parts are not. Beverly was half the husband and wife team. The husband (I don't know his name) passed away a few years ago. Beverly continued the business, but she was getting on in years as well. They did, in fact, make products. They bought undecorated kits in very large case lots, and had them decorated. I believe that the decoration was done by other contractors, not Bev-Bel themselves, but I'm not 100% sure about that. I can find out. The kits were not decorated by the manufacturers to their specs. It is true that they made money, and from what I understand, they had a very comfortable living from the business, but no rational person will object to that. To say that they made nothing but money is also not correct. Example 1 is that there exists a Life-Like E8 model in EL paint. I don't think that L-L ever did this themselves, but if they did, it was only after Bev-Bel did it, with the assistance of several ELHS members to get it right. They did create models not made by the manufacturers, that is, not decorated in those paint schemes. To me, that is making something more than simply money. They did have almost no visible profile in terms of a physical business presence - they didn't need one. When you say "mail only," that makes it sound like they only dealt with retail customers by mail, which is not the case. Many dealers stocked Bev-Bel on a regular basis, and of course, they did business by mail; how else? The product was shipped to the dealers by, I believe, UPS. A contributing factor to the decision to close Bev-Bel is that Horizon Hobby, owner of Athearn, would not sell them undecorated kits, at any price. Since Athearn also incorporated Roundhouse/Model Die Casting, that virtually eliminated the basis for the business. My information for the foregoing is from a good friend of mine, a dealer, who "moved a lot of product" for Bev-Bel and visited them several times. He knew them both quite well. I'm not sure what made you get into a review of Bev-Bel in this thread about ERIE wood sheathed caboose kits, but whatever floats your boat, I suppose. SGL > Bev-Bel was simply a warehouse and distributor, run by Beverly Belkin. They made nothing -- but money. They > occupied a former garage facility on Union Avenue in Cresskill, NJ, about a block and a half from where I lived for 27 > years. They had no street presence or identity, but worked by mail only. They (she?) were pioneers and activators in the > field of custom decoration of standard products; they not only carved a niche, they created an industry within an industry > by selling the manufacturers on limited-run paint and lettering schemes on a semi-guaranteed basis. > > Randy Brown > -------------------------------------------------------------- > QC is out of business as such, the kit line was sold to Gloor Craft, as I wrote just a second ago. But QC was owned by > ?Bob? Weaver, who also owns Scalecoat Paint, and also owns Weaver, which makes O > scale plastic kits. > > Earlier tonight, someone wrote something about being surprised that Bev-Bel (also now defunct) having wood kits (but I > may have read that on a web page in a blog someplace after Googling "Quality Craft Gloor Craft"). Those kits were > made to order for Bev-Bel by QC and/or GC. > > > > SGL > > > > The Erie Lackawanna Mailing List > http://EL-List.railfan.net/ > To Unsubscribe: http://Lists.Railfan.net/erielackunsub.html The Erie Lackawanna Mailing List http://EL-List.railfan.net/ To Unsubscribe: http://Lists.Railfan.net/erielackunsub.html ------------------------------
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