Trainz Newsletter -- Volume 15 -- January 2008

Trainz.com Newsletter

Prices Reduced! Don’t miss out on these Lionel items at Trainz.com!
Lionel 30004 PRR Flyer Passenger Expansion Pack	Lionel 30016 New York Central Set	Lionel 30038 NYC Flyer Freight Expansion Pack
Lionel 30039 North Pole Central Passenger Expansion Pack	Lionel 30040 North Pole Central Freight Expansion Pack	Lionel 30045 Alaska Steam Work Set
Lionel 30047 Northwest Diesel Freight Set	Lionel 30048 Northwest Diesel Freight Expansion Pack	Lionel 30050 PRR Super Steam Set
Lionel 30056 Halloween Train Set	Lionel 30061 UPS Train Set	Lionel 30068 North Pole Train Set


			In This Issue:
			Trainz.com Daily Blog Trainz.com Christmas Charity Auction
	We’re excited to announce a new addition to our website – The Trainz.com Daily Blog. You can find the Blog in the upper right hand corner of our website right below “What’s New”. We’ll be adding posts daily, with the latest happenings at Trainz.com. If you subscribe to our Blog, you’ll receive alerts of new posts on your computers homepage! Just click here to Subscribe to the Trainz.com News Feed. What is a blog? Take a look at Wikipedia’s definition of blog. In December of 2007, Trainz launched its first charity auction on eBay to benefit the Salvation Army. Up for auction was the most popular train set of the year, the Lionel 11020 Harry Potter Hogwarts Express Train Set. eBay’s Giving Works Program allows sellers to donate a percentage of an auctions winning bid to a charity listed with Mission Fish, a non-profit organization helping non-profits raise money for their organization via eBay. Trainz donated 100% of the winning bid, $355.00. You can view the listing here. From all of us at Trainz, we would like to thank all of you who participated in this auction.

Our preorder program here at Trainz continues to be a success, thanks to all of our loyal customers!

Sometimes it may seem like a long time before your order arrives, be assured that we will send you an email when the item arrives and is ready to ship, so you’ll always know when we receive your item.

We just want to emphasize a few tips to remember while waiting for your preorders to come in

Check the Lionel or MTH shipping schedule often for release date updates
If your credit card on file changes, contact us as soon as possible
If your address on file changes, contact us as soon as possible
If your phone number changes, contact us as soon as possible

As long as all of your information is up to date and current, your preorder is secure with Trainz.com.

Evans Designs Customization Software
If you’ve got an inkjet printer, you’ve got to check this out! We’ve got the latest software to create your own custom buildings, railroad signs, decorative window inserts, nostalgic signs and much much more! You’ll be amazed what you can do, it’s so easy anyone can do this!

See the latest in pre-wired LED's for locomotive headlights, warning signs, street lights, signal lights, train running lights, building lights, and more!!

MI Trains Inventory Software
Looking for some great software to inventory all your trains? Check out MI Trains Software.

It works with all gauges and manufacturers of trains, but is especially useful with O Gauge trains by Lionel, MTH, and K-Line using their inventory modules that give you a wealth of additional detail after you simply enter the manufacturer and model number. These add-on data modules also include pricing information and photos of thousands of items.

For a limited time we will be offering a 30% additional savings to all of the artwork we have listed on our web site by artist Robert West. If you’re looking for the perfect train painting for your train room this is the time to shop!

Visit www.trainpaintings.com to view all of Robert's prints!


	January brought a flurry of winter birthdays! Happy Birthday to Milinda, Tommy, Lora, and Tracy! Best wishes & Happy Birthday to you all! During the holidays, all of the employees at Trainz were presented with a surprise gift from Scott & Milinda Griggs (owners of Trainz). The gift given to us was handcrafted, by Scott’s sister Shannon. She really out did herself with the “Trainz Santa Claus and his bag of toys”! It was a real treat for us to receive such a thoughtful gift! [click to enlarge] For information about ordering Shannon’s Sculptures, please email your inquiry to welchs@tds.net

If you haven’t caught this video floating around the net yet, take a look at a great interview at MTH with Mike Wolf:

Video 1

Video 2

Bob from the Metropolitan Division of the Train Collectors Association has kindly offered up 10 free tickets for METCA's February 9th train show to be held at the Broad Channel American Legion Hall, 209 Cross Bay Blvd., Queens NY. The show runs from 9:00 AM to 2:00 PM. If the pictures of past events posted on the METCA website are any indication, this could be a sizable show.

If you're interested in a free ticket, send an email to dave@ogaugewatch.com by 11:59 PM on Thursday, January 31st with your name and address. On Friday, February 1st, 10 winners will be picked at random from the emails received and tickets will be sent! This show is open to the public. More info...


		Spam Filters & Junk Mail Folders Folks, if you haven’t heard back from us via email, please check your Spam and Junk mail folders. More than likely, that is the cause of undelivered emails. If your email program is blocking us, please edit your options by accepting our emails from Trainz.


		Weird Emails From Trainz? No, we are not in Romania, we don’t use Western Union and we most certainly did not send you a second chance offer! If you have been receiving these “spoof” emails, we know how annoying they can be. The best and only defense we have to these types of emails is to report them to eBay and to block them in your email program. A “Second Chance Offer” or “Best Offer”, are terms and features used within eBay. We do not choose to use those features. Generally, if we do not receive payment for an item, our system will automatically cancel the sale and relist the item to our website or eBay. There have only been a few instances that we have contacted the 2nd bidder to inquire if they would like to purchase an item before relisting it due to non-payment. If we ever contact you concerning a Second Chance Offer, we will send you an email and ask that you call us. If ever in doubt, check with us first.


		What’s the best way to view Trainz.com? Did you know that if you set your computers resolution to 1024 x 768 or higher, you will view Trainz.com at its very best. Right-click on your Windows desktop and click Properties, then select the Settings tab and scroll the arrow to 1024 x 768 pixels or higher. Click “OK” and you are done! Or you can go to Start, Settings, Control Panel, and then Display. Everything will now fit conveniently on your screen, no more scrolling back and forth for those of you who were set at a lower resolution.


		Fraud on eBay - Second Chance Offers, etc. Just a quick reminder to let you all know that if you ever receive a second chance offer to purchase an item from us after an auction has closed, do not respond to it. In very rare cases, we may send a second chance offer depending on what the item is, but in most cases we just relist the item if we have a non-payment issue. If you receive one of these offers and you are unsure if it is us, contact us and we will validate the email. Do not click the reply button to the email you received, create a New email.


		News Flash ... Cash Back! If you use Paypal, you'll be interested in knowing that Trainz is participating in the My Store Rewards program. With this program our customers will receive cash back on their purchases, just by making your payment with PayPal, and agreeing to receive custom email notifications from MyStore rewards about other products you may be interested in you receive 1% cash back on all your purchases! To learn more about this great program please click on this link for more details http://www.mystorerewards.com/msr/rules.htm.


		If you haven't heard by now, Myspace.com is the leading site on the web for networking with all types of people and a place where you connect with friends with the same interests... Like Trains! If you have a Myspace account please stop by and add us to your friends list and check out our page.


		Visit our friends at O Gauge Watch for exciting news & updates on the latest happenings in the O gauge world of model trains!