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 Posted - February 01 2007 : 1:29:53 PM
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Hey Gang,
I've found another history of Tyco athttp://www.answers.com/topic/tyco-toys
which presents the past from a business perspective and names names.
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Posted - February 01 2007 : 1:56:51 PM
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Great Article! Sadly they don't even mention, unless I missed it, that TYCO ceases offering HO-trains in 1993.
Noticed that wikipedia's TYCO logo is mine scanned from the 1973-74 TYCO catalog cover and used on The TYCO Resource.
Tony Cook
HO-Scale Trains Resource
http://ho-scaletrains.net
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 Posted - February 07 2007 : 2:51:36 PM
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Great find!
Especially telling, was this paragraph:
quote:| Savoy Industries was a publicly owned investment group run by financier Benson Selzer when it acquired Tyco from Sara Lee in 1981. Savoy specialized in leveraged buyouts of troubled companies, which the firm would restructure and then take public. The two main figures at Tyco during the 1980s were Grey and Selzer, who eventually became chairman of the board. Although Selzer gave Grey free reign in the day-to-day management of Tyco, the two men had differing ideas on the long-term goals of the company. Selzer wanted to use Tyco's assets to build a diversified conglomerate, whereas Grey felt that Tyco could only be successful if it remained firmly rooted in the toy industry. As Grey stated to Business Week in 1992, "Not everything they [Selzer's board] did was terrible but a couple of things were absolutely self-serving." |
I think that finally answers the questions of why 1982 was the last banner year for Tyco's train line. I'm sure the project leads, production, and cataloging efforts for the 1982 line (with all its unique one-off paint schemes, etc) were well underway when the company was sold in 1981. So it in essence was locked to run.
But as soon as they get the chance - indeed, one surmises this was almost immediately - the new owners whack half the rolling stock, as well as many of the loco and kit models... and greatly reduce the roadnames (not to mention general quality control) on what's left behind.
Sad, really. [V]
Edited by - GoingInCirclez on February 07 2007 2:52:09 PM
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Posted - February 07 2007 : 3:07:25 PM
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Yes, it is sad to read this info regarding the direction desired for TYCO by owners Savoy in the early 1980s. When you look at the TYCO catalogs of say 1981 and 1982, as GIC mentioned, they include some truly choice items...New Haven GG1...GM&O GP20...Northern Pacific Shark...plus the cool US1 Trucking line arrives in 1981...then comes the mid '80s and bottom drops out of the TYCO line. Junk like Rambo and MASK sets with the puny Plymouth Switcher for power and the train line shrinks away to nothing by 1990.
Tony Cook
HO-Scale Trains Resource
http://ho-scaletrains.net
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