Willis Hobbies owners Steve and Ken Ford vividly recall the first time they set up a large scale train set, with their father, Al, years ago in the hobby shop’s original location on Mineola Boulevard.
“It was a family project,” Ken said, smiling.
That memory naturally recurs when the Ford brothers survey their latest and largest installation, another family project in the basement of the popular Willis Avenue store. The sprawling train layout with four train sets that can be operated by four separate remote controls tells a story about the changing dynamics of the business. The trains dominate the landscape of a party room – also equipped with an eight-lane slot car track and model plane flight simulators – aimed to bring in additional revenue and promote the trains and cars by giving children a hands-on experience.
That was something that the Fords had plenty of growing up with a father in the business of hobbies – a tradition the brothers have continued under their direction at the store on 300 Willis Avenue in Mineola.
“We grew up in the business and had all these hobbies when we were kids,” said Steve.
Steve, 55, started working at his father’s store on Saturdays at age 14, followed closely by his younger sibling.
“It’s a fun business. It keeps evolving,” Steve said.
For kids unfamiliar with the latest technology, the party room is an eye opener. Model trains have crossed the digital divide carrying new bells and whistles – literally – as part of a digital soundtracks embedded in the trains on the physical tracks to add a fresh dimension of realism. Remote handsets can operate multiple trains, with industry giant Lionel leading the way.
The slot cars, larger and more realistic than the Aurora home slot-cars that dominated basements a few decades ago, come in two scales from two primary producers, Carrera and AFX.
As a classic hobby shop, Willis Hobbies carries the myriad accessory buildings and other features that model train enthusiasts still use to create their own paster of paris landscapes. Some of those elements are now be remotely animated by engineers who can also load or unload cargo cars on their trains.
“There’s a whole new dimension to trains now,” Ford said. “This is what gets the kids – the electronics.”
The digitization of model trains revived the pastime over the past decade – with some help from the movies. The hit animation “Polar Express” had a “huge” impact on model trains, according to Steve Ford, who noted that Lionel’s “Polar Express” train set has been its biggest seller over the past five years – partly due to the seasonality of the business.
“Trains are very big at this time of year,” Ford said, but he added that the increased popularity of hobbies that foster family interaction – particularly hobbies fathers and sons can share – has also fueled the resurgent popularity of both model trains and slot cars.
Ford points out that trains enjoy a longevity as one of the oldest American hobbies. And an imperceptible unbroken line of hobby traditions carry on through generations of customers who’ve continued to shop at Willis Hobbies.
“We have customers who are second and third generation,” Ford said. “You make friends. You’ve known people for so long, you build up relationships with them.”
But some hobbies, like building models of various vehicles from kits, have waned. So the Fords party room activities also include model-building sessions for cub scouts, to introduce them to that pastime. Model building, sparked by the imagination of the builder, has been supplanted by video games “so you have to get people to experience it,” Ken Ford said.
The basement space is large enough to enable demonstrations of new micro-helicopter models designed for indoor use. The video flight simulators mounted on one wall also give youngsters a sense of what it’s like to fly a model airplane by remote control.
Steve Ford said his father passed on the importance of promotion to his sons, both in displaying products and letting people have a tactile experience with them.
“When you put something into people’s hands, that’s what gets them excited,” Ford said.
As a past president of the Mineola Chamber of Commerce, Ford has sought to pass some of those lessons on to his business colleagues in the community.
“I always try to tell businesses you have to keep your store fresh, change displays and demonstrations,” he said.
Ford, who said he also follows his father’s advice about “staying active” in the community, is also a member of the Mineola Lions Club.
Of course, trends dictate what gets prime display space in any store. Display cases with Armour die cast models of realistically painted World War II fighters and bombers no longer being produced suggest another aspect of the hobby spectrum: adult collectibles.
Military veterans and World War II buffs come in seeking specific Armour models to complete a collection, according to Ford.
“We used to sell a lot of them,” Ford said. “Now they’ve become a collectible.”
Devotion to their respective hobbies motivates customers, but Willis Hobbies is also running seasonal sales specials of 20 percent off on all model kits and 30 percent off selected items in the store to give customers more incentive over the next two weekends.
Extending their own family tradition, Ken Ford’s wife, Robin, and daughter, Brittany, work in the store on weekends, along with Steve Ford’s daughters, Lisa and Stephanie.
The model trains and cars are certain to roll on with new features, and the Fords are keeping current with the trends to keep customers coming back.
