Some thirty years ago I managed Orange Empire's store for about three years. At that time, I followed the trend of the previous manager. Also I was into reading railroad history books -- and I still am.

At that time we were heavy with books and slight on children items. The child items amounted to post cards and child siz engineer hats and maybe a wooden whistle. For books I would order heavy the first time a book came out because I knew I could sill a bunch to museum members. After the initial surge (and maybe a reorder) I would reduce the number of copies on hand. As I recall there was not much out there for kids at that time.

Our current manager is much more into the children items and T-shirts. She relies on a salesman (middleman) to help her make the book purchases. I would closely study the magazines and notifications from the publishers to determine what to order. Our current manager has to rely on this salesman or on members asking her to stock a book.

A few comments about the world 30 years ago. At that time Orange Empire had a better selection than most of the area hobby shops; since then they have entered the book selling business. We would list the new books and similar items in a supplement to our newsletter and would sell by mail. At other times, members and non-member railfans would make the trip to the Museum to make their purchases.

The internet has affected the purchasing trends of hobbyists of all kinds; I have seen hobby stores go out of business undoubtedly because of internet competition.