Hornby on track to deliver for Christmas

HORNBY has pledged to deliver model trains to customers in time for Christmas after facing shipment delays and the threat of China’s zero-covid policy hitting production.

Lyndon Davies, the chief executive of Britain’s favourite model railway maker, said he could “guarantee availability” for shoppers this Christmas, having already filled warehouses with stock.

Hornby also produces Airfix and Scalextric as well as model railways. Figures showed its inventory levels jumped to £23m worth of goods by the end of September, compared with £18m worth last year.

Mr Davies said the increase in stock levels was “substantial, and that gives us plenty of security” in the run-up to Christmas. Turmoil from container shortages and a lack of delivery drivers held back sales growth last year.

This year, Hornby said the situation had “greatly eased”, but that it was still experiencing higher prices for containers. This caused its losses to swell to £2.9m in the first half of its financial year to the end of September, compared with £700,000 last year.

It said shipments were also being held up, as shipping lines were waiting until their boats were full and cancelling other orders, amid a wider global economic slowdown which was reducing demand for trade.

As well as the delays to shipments, Hornby pointed to a risk over the level of production in Chinese factories, after authorities introduced a series of lockdowns as part of China’s zerocovid policy, following outbreaks of the virus.

Covid cases this week hit their highest level since the pandemic began.

Mr Davies said: “The big question is how the Chinese government’s going to deal with this Covid outbreak, whether it’ll be the same as before, which is that everything shuts, or whether it’s different.”