Probably the Most Popular Mailorder hobby store, Highy Recomended, but DO compare prices
Written: Jul 24 '02 (Updated Jul 24 '02)
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Having been an avid radio-controlled hobby enthusiart for many years (from buggies, to trucks to airplanes to boats) I have been shopping Tower hobbies and other mail-order hobby shops since before there were such things as websites and E-commerce...I don't mean to date myself, but yes, in a dark dark world, and long long time ago (oh so long, about 10 longggg years) we had to utilize magazines and telephones to order our kits and hop-up parts! Anyhow, that being said, Tower and I have a relationshop that goes way back, and it is certainly a fantastic shop with a tremendous selection and fairly competitive prices... Is it right for you? Quite possibly for sure, but DO NOT make the mistake of not shopping around, as the hobby market is quite competitive and believe it or not, it is one of the few market places where you would PROBABLY have an easier time finding a better deal by magazine add, rather than strict web search...Read on for more insight.
First, Tower hobbies has an excellent website, with tons of nicely segregated categories (buggies/trucks, airplanes, helicopters, boats, etc) and even has a seperate area for kites and boomerangs and such- though this is miscelaneous and truly, Tower is absolutely geared for the radio controlled hobbyist...(However they also have a section for stationery models, free-flight rubberband-powered aircraft and other non-RC items).
Along with the website, Tower offers an annual catalog with free quarterly publications called "Tower Talk." The catalog is wonderful -- Laid out very sensibly and with hundreds of thousands of items with decent descriptions, you can always utilize Tower's very helpful staff to answer questions (thoug of course some are helpful, some are very helpful and some are just not) Nevertheless I have usually had very good luck with the staff for questions -- Remember, regardless of the catalog and/or web page, you just can't fit every piece of relelvant information in either place, THUS the necessity of a sales staff. It is for exactly that reason that there are pros and cons to dealing with Tower: 1) The presence of a support staff makes Tower an excellent reasource for getting all the proper and correct information (usually) about a product before you make a decision to buy it - THIS is a big plus. However the down side to this is that unlike other "chop-shop" e-com/mailorder hobby shops who DO NOT have a supoprt staff, prices at Tower DO relfect the added cost of employing such people -- It is for this reason that probably 45-50% of the time, a better deal is out there, and sometimes significantly better.
The hobby market is indeed a strange place...Alot of people still like to support "the local guy" in this market, since THEY are the ones who provide track-resources for guys, they support flying fields for RC pilots and also provide the critical build-support information in person that nearly NO online/M.O. store can provide. I myself do value the local guy, however (and sadly so) you can only afford to shop there so much - since the difference in prices between online and local is absolutely night-and-day. Towers prices are basically ALWAYS going to be alot less than any mom-n-pop shop / local store. However because of the support staff cost typically you can find a better deal - just make sure you factor in Towers very fair shipping charges...Some store advertise ultra low prices but then try to whack you with unfair shipping, which essentailly makes their price the same or more than Tower. Lastly, I myself would rather pay a few more dollars (meaning 4 or 5 dollars more, NOT 15-20 or course) to Tower just to support the store that has always supported us hobbyists by providing such informative support and excellent reasources and reliability.
As for order reliabilty, I've completed well over 100 transactions in my history with Tower and almost all of them were correct. Of course, some orders are bound to get slightly botched, ESEPCIALLY when you take advantage of Tower's semi-annual clearance sale on small parts...I've had orders where I'll take 60-80 tiny little bags of random parts...naturally some thing are destined to get missed! In any of the very limited cased where this has happened Tower has been very helpful in clarifying what went on and replacing anything that was missing - usually nothing however. Shipping charges again, are absolutely fair and normal and this is in keeping with Towers excellent reputation in the hobby community as a key staple of hobby suppliers - I know many local shops that get their inventory FROM TOWER. Ordering is quick an easy, whether by website OR by phone - the only hitch is that they don't accept AmEX, but in all honesty who cares - I love my Discover card and keep my AmEX and Mastercard just for limited cases where I can't use Discover.
As for sales and clearance items, THIS is where it really pays to shop Tower...AND bear in mind, many times you WILL NOT see clearance items on the website in total - you need to receive TOWER TALK to find ALL the sale items. When you DO see the semi-annual clearance sales, THIS is where you'll really get to take advantage of some seriously great prices - and since Tower is such a huge supplier, their blowout prices are many times below wholesale cost!!!
The only thing that slighly puts me off about Tower is that they are aligned very strongly with Kyosho/Great Planes. This has good and bad points...FOr the pilot side of me, I do like to use Great Planes aircraft kits, since I find them very well cut and machines and easy to work with. However for buggies and trucks, you really can't compare Kyosho kits to Associated and Team Losi (The track records stand for themselves) And in accordance with the alignment with Kyosho, you'll more likely to get a cheaper price of a Kyosho kit than on an Associated Kit...this is just business. Nevertheless you CAN usually find some very compeititve prices on the Associated and Losi buggy/truck kits, but you'll notice that typically a kyosho kit gets a color page in the catalog while Associated (ae) gets a black and white. As for Losi - because of a deal for exclusivity, Losi is laregly not really handled with Tower anymore- so if you are a die-hard Losi fan, you'll have to shop elsewhere - however you CAN find some great deals on parts for their kits!
Fantastic selection *(among the best), excellent prices, incredible clearance sales and probably the best service around - I couldn't think of many more reasons why one wouldn't want to shop and to buy from Tower Hobbies - certainly check them out and see the difference. HIGHLY recomended for most of your hobby needs.
Recommended:
Yes
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nick1326
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Location: Long Island, NY
Reviews written: 232
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