I got a message from MicroScale this evening that announced that Exxon/Mobil has terminated their license agreement which means by early June they must cease with any decals they have for that product. In fact the message stated that June 9, 2013 is the point at which they must stop and destroy all those products carrying either Exxon or Mobile on them. Basically the gist of the letter is that they are terminating all those licensing agreements which to me would also mean any tanker vehicles, railroad tank cars, etc. which are produced by other companies as well. I'll go back and copy the article from my mail and post it here for your edification.
Looks like someone used too many N scale Exxon/Mobil tank cars whilst committing crimes, or maybe in the background of a p**no movie. No wonder they're fed up with all that bad PR! I've seen hundreds of articles! Totally sensible for them to end such a large, glorious, world-reknown licensee relationship such as this! Glad that letter got typed and mailed to Microscale, I am sure Exxon will soon return to profitability and see people starting to use their gas pumps again. Bravo!!
This appears to be the right place to 'comment'... There's various media and press addresses too, but that's the only online link. http://www.exxonmobil.com/imports/contactus/contactus_contact.aspx I can only wish them as much success as Union Pacific had, and all the negative press that resulted from it. Remember 2004? http://www.ble-t.org/pr/news/headline.asp?id=10639 I remember the front-page story on the WSJ and the NBC news story, and that's when they finally gave up; wasn't worth the fight. I'd think that the scale vehicle manufacturers would be goin' nuts here. Do THEY have to destroy their inventory? Really? http://mrr.trains.com/news-and-revi...ates-new-union-pacific-licensing-deal-for-all Of all the vendors to pick on would be the one that does museum quality products for a customer base that is largely professionals, businessmen, and customers. Nice going Exxon. You'd think they'd want all the positive PR and nostalgia they could stand, given their typical day-to-day potential to make front-page news from operations.
I have never been a fan of Exxon anyhow, but that stems back from my former hazmat and environmental investigations days. They do have a propensity to shoot themselves in their collective feet regularly and it appears they are doing so again ala UP style. Maybe they hired the moron that worked for UP who came up with the same idea there. However in the spirit of compliance I shall do my part. As I slowly continue to inventory and sort out freight cars that don't fit my era I shall extract the few Exxon tank cars that are in my collection and set them aside for a coat of basic black that more appropriately fits my 1940s 50 era and match the fine tank cars that I expect we will soon see from TrainBoard's special run.
Don't know why this is in the N scale forum...... anyhow..... this is interesting, as more and more "brands" are moving this direction in "protecting their name" from us evil model railroaders who steal their profits and slander their good name! Doesn't affect me, but it is disappointing. Makes me wonder how far this will continue in the future? Will we eventually have to make our own decals for many more brands?
A company has the RIGHT to, by all means. The bigger question is whether they WANT to. Railroads, historically, have seen models and modelbuilding as relatively good PR, and have had only the loosest licensing agreements to make sure that their logo doesn't end up either completely bolloxed up or on something they'd be embarrased about. So it's more notification than profit center. Other Fortune 500's are notable for their immediate attack reaction on ANYTHING, I'd suggest UPS, Coca-Cola, Caterpillar, and John Deere as examples. They copyright everything up to and including the paint color and don't allow reproduction at all, period, no way no how. When those brands collide with modeling, modeling typically looses. There are a few licensed exceptions, but you can typically recoginize those by the price. And many of those deeply control license products all the way down the licensing chain. Those companies have been like that for decades, it's not news. And everyone kinda knows, too; I got turned down by MR for an article that showed how to make photographic sign reproductions at home, because my article include a "Coke" logo in the example. That scared Kalmbach to death and they said so. The costs and bureaucracy for licensing are such that most model companies don't want the hassle. You can't even use the phrase 'UPS truck" for a cast model description, it has to be "package delivery truck' or they'll be after you. Where it gets painful is in examples like this where the licensing WAS allowed, and now its retracted for unknown reasons, randomly picking on a small supplier that makes an excellent product that isn't exactly going to be used to put decals on pressure cookers, if you know what I mean. I used that PR link to send Exxon the video of Warren Buffet in front of his lionel layout with the message - you never know who the ultimate customer is for these products. I got a great deal of satisfaction finding out that the executive in UP that likely made that stupid decision in 2004 was forced into retirement, for that and other decisions. In that case the individual had no understanding of railroad or model history at all, it was no wonder that stupid decision was made.
This sounds like a lot more to me than just a few model railroad items. The automotive-petroliana market for Mobil stuff is huge. Think of all the repro tin signs, gas station items, die cast cars , etc. that have Mobil connections. That pegasus is probably one of the most popular items in the automotive collectible field. I haven't heard anything yet in the vintage auto market, my "other hobby", but the wording in that letter appears to allude to anything with the Mobil name that is not directly offered from Exxon/mobil. I guess we'll see. Bob
I never really understood these types of decisions. It's kind of annoying because I would like to model the Mobil facility my Dad retired from. It's in Frankfort, IL and they make styrofoam meat trays and egg cartons. It's big and switched by EJ&E (now CN) three times a day. Guess I'll just call it something else. Maybe Libom !!!
Because the decal is also in N scale, and it also affects every N scale vehicle and train car that carries either of the logos or the new combined logo, plus any model structure with their logos plastered on it.
Now I'm wondering how far they will go with this. What about the die-cast and plastic models of the race cars they sponsor ??? Or the shirts, hats, stickers, etc. sold at one NASCAR race ??? Unless this would be considered one of their "in-house" things, ALOT of Tony Stewart fans will be pretty disappointed !!! Many of the vintage race car kits have the logos, too. I wonder if the manufacturers will have to drop that from their decal sheets. Sorry for rambling, but this seems to be a very deep cut from a world-wide company. Maybe I'm just reading too much into this. I've been known to do that sometimes !!!
I think what this boils down to is all the stuff currently in production that they are not the sponsor of but only the holder of the license agreement to produce, or stuff that is being produced without license of any type. What folks bought in the past or fabricated on their workbench they can't touch. However just to try and enforce this world wide is going to cut into the old profit margin when the lawyers are done. That means a few of the wigs will just have to put off buying another Beamer this year for their Misters or Mistresses. And you probably won't be able to get that photo in the mag of the Exxon refinery you just built.
One of the shortfalls of the patent/trademark laws in this country is that you have to defend you trademark or risk losing it. This causes some pretty inane situations all in the name protecting a trademark, usually as defense against some syster who will go to court claiming that the trademark isn't being defended. I'm not saying this is the case with this exact situation with ExxonMobil but it is the reason why people and corporation sometimes make seemingly stupid decisions.
And as a result of this, I got rid of EVERY piece of UP/heritage locomotive and/or rolling stock I had in my roster. Sold the whole kit n caboodle for a song. In fact, because of that I still too this day REFUSE to even shoot a picture of Utterly Pathetic rolling stock. Ryan
I wonder whether this will extend to the VERO program on eBay, i.e. request to cancel all listings of Exxon/Mobil and heritage products. I further suspect that this is a prelude to some new exclusive big money licenses to a few suppliers a la John Deere et al. Or maybe someone played the 'liability' card: I choked on your Exxon tank car, you owe me.
HERE is a thought; their letter states that they are revoking MOST of these licenses. Why in the hell would they not leave the MR industry alone, when we all know they'll never take that stuff in-house anyway? In the 1940's they called a gaffe like this a "boner", I'd say the term still fits today.
Logtrain, now I don't feel so bad. During the UP thing, I took a photo of the UP cars I had and sent it to them with some stupid comment like, "You ain't gettin' these" !!! I also refused to change my friend's UP F7 wheels to run on my code 55 branch line. They were NOT to be on MY rails !!! I only recently started letting a few UP items sneak into my roster because I have a CRI&P presence on the future layout. The bitter after-taste is still there, though. EMD F7A, it's not fair to post something like that !!! If I respond to it, Administrators would be kickin' down my door !!! Ha,ha,ha !!!:teeth:
