Another year is coming to an end. For us it was by far the most challenging year so far. Start-up difficulties with the H0 models, the need to take over the storage and shipping services ourselves at short notice, and the uncertain prospect of what rising prices might mean for us.
Not all the remnants of these challenges have been eliminated yet, but we have fought our way forward and look to 2023 with confidence. There will be new models, new moulds and painting and printing variants of existing models. The long-announced diesel locomotive in H0 will also be delivered in 2023, together with the reissue of the NOB’s Married-Pair wagons, the demand for which was pleasantly surprisingly much higher than we had assumed.
Before we say goodbye to the new year, we have some information for all customers from Austria. On 1 January 2023, an amendment to the Packaging Ordinance will come into effect, which stipulates that we, as an online retailer, must appoint a notarially authorised representative in Austria to monitor compliance with the Packaging Ordinance on our behalf when shipping to private customers in Austria. For us, this would be additional bureaucratic and financial effort (we already do this in Germany) and would be disproportionate to the revenue. Moreover, we are of the opinion that exactly this would be a nice task for an EU-wide regulation and not – to hinder the intra-European movement of goods – a national task. Therefore, until further notice, we will no longer ship to private customers in Austria until another possibility presents itself. We ask for your understanding and recommend that you talk to your respective member of the National Council.
2022 is going to the siding, for 2023 the train notification has already been sent. We are ready to leave.
Thank you all for your loyalty, patience and the many good discussions on these and possible further models.
A Happy New Year to all of you
Christian Arndt
and the ASM team