And Mr. Bianco. and his son Ken Bianco Jr., house owners of TrainLand in Lynbrook, New York, are the nation’s largest retailers of Lionel trains.
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As kids have performed for generations, Landon Tennant seems longingly on the streamlined Lionel Santa Fe engine zooming round a small show of homes, mountains and bridges at Practice Land, a pastime store on Lengthy Island, New York.
“I believe I might prefer to get one other locomotive, as a result of it seems so good, like that one,” mentioned Tennant, barely concealing his pleasure.
Once you consider Christmas, you may consider mannequin trains round a Christmas tree. There is a good likelihood it is Lionel. The enduring American toy prepare firm is celebrating its a hundred and twenty fifth anniversary from this Christmas season by way of 2025.
“Everybody loves Lionel. It is nostalgic,” mentioned Ken Bianco Jr., the third-generation proprietor of TrainLand and TrainWorld, the nation’s largest Lionel Trains retailer. He factors towards the mannequin trains.
“This design right here has three totally different Lionel prepare units working and the children can function the distant controls over there. Do you see him urgent the horn?”
Caden Renna watches Lionel design at TrainLand. He got here to the shop to purchase his first Lionel prepare, a Christmas current from his grandmother.
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An worker shows a Lionel prepare hat custom-made in Trainland on Nationwide Lionel Practice Day.
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His father, Ken Bianco Sr., says Christmas has all the time been the most important and busiest time of the 12 months, whether or not in individual or by mail. Along with their traditional merchandise, Lionel manufactures “Christmas kits, Christmas engines, Christmas vehicles, and Christmas equipment,” he defined. “You are able to do a format of simply Christmas gadgets. It is wonderful.”
The corporate started manufacturing and promoting toy trains in 1900, at a time when residential electrical energy was new and never but widespread. A younger man noticed the potential in harnessing this new know-how, says Lionel CEO Howard Hitchcock.
“It began with Joshua Lionel Cowan, the founder and after whom the corporate is called,” Hitchcock says. “He was an inventor and a reasonably younger man, a really huge businessman, you recognize, who was actually into electrical motors. It was a reasonably quick toy. It wasn’t easy. It wasn’t inflatable. It was purely mechanical.”
Technological innovation continues to today. For a few years, the corporate’s prepare toys have supplied practical prepare sounds, smoke, and digital distant controls. Now, you’ll be able to function your individual Lionel prepare out of your smartphone.
Prospects at TrainLand on Lengthy Island have a particular Christmas theme.
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Lionel prepare mascot Lenny holds a particular version Lionel boxcar at Practice Land in Lynbrook, New York.
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“Little children at the moment are on their telephones 24/7,” says Ken Bianco, Sr. “So, Lionel mentioned if they will use their telephones, we would like them to play with trains on their telephones. So, now, with the Bluetooth setup that Lionel has, they’ll play with their trains.” And a number of prepare units within the format.
“And Lionel’s largest trains, referred to as O Gauge, attraction not solely to kids as toys but additionally to severe collectors as properly. Benjamin Larmont, an aerospace engineer within the Atlanta space, has greater than 100,000 followers on his Instagram account, Ben’s Trains. He is acquired an engine His first Lionel when he was 8 years outdated – and he nonetheless has it.
“My listing at present consists of about 47 engines,” he mentioned. “I do know there are individuals who have greater than that, however for me, that is the place I’m. That is topic to alter within the subsequent few weeks!”
Laremont invests in refined, extremely detailed fashions and makes movies of them working on the tracks within the basement of his home. But it surely’s nothing additional than a bit of whimsy. For instance, Lionel introduces a different-smelling liquid to steam locomotives, which makes steam spew out of smokestacks.
“I at present run a gingerbread smoke liquid and likewise a raspberry smoke liquid,” he defined. “However because it’s Christmas, I am an enormous fan of gingerbread this time of 12 months.”
The Lionel Thomas The Tank Engine prepare set enters a tunnel in Practice Land. It is likely one of the many manufacturers licensed by Lionel.
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4-year-old prepare collector Augie DiMartino watches trains go by in Trainland on Nationwide Lionel Practice Day.
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Laremont hopes to buy the Polar Specific prepare toy line this season – one in all a number of manufacturers that Lionel has licensed.
Ken Bianco, Sr. of TrainLand, notes that the mixture is the preferred with clients. “Polar Specific, Christmas yearly. Different Christmas units do very properly too, however Polar Specific is first – and has been for the final 20 years.”
Jacques Martinek has been gathering works for greater than fifty years, though his condominium in Queens, New York, is just too small to design completely. However the place there’s floor, he says, there’s room to run Lionel trains.
“I get them for Christmas, Fourth of July, Halloween, St. Patrick’s Day,” Martinek exclaimed, laughing. “I get bushes for each vacation!”
He plans to purchase extra trains, maybe one of many new units Lionel will introduce at his celebration – like some new Star Wars-themed fashions.
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