It's unlikely I'll ever buy a NIB Traxxas product either-- but I'm not in their target demo, so it doesn't matter. I was having this discussion today with one of the guys at the LHS. He just got off the phone with a customer that had purchased a Sidewinder SV2 combo earlier in the day, and the guy on the phone said, "Where do I put it? How do I attach it? And what is the switch for?" That is the market Traxxas is aiming at. That take-it-out-of-the-box and drive it guy, that for whatever reason, doesn't know anything about R/Cs. To him, the pricing doesn't seem outrageous, because he's not going out to win races, he doesn't even know where the speed control goes.

I still assert that Traxxas' pricing model is fair-- you have to compare like for like-- you can't say "well, I could put together this with this and this and it will cost less." Put yourself in the mindset of that guy on the phone. Everybody starts somewhere.

I think the price would be fair IF they came with metal driveshafts not those crappy POS plastic driveshafts

My son's Stampede has gone through 1 set of driveshafts in two years. They're certainly not the worst things in the world.

+1 with Kawasaki, driveshafts upgrades are pretty much required on 3s lipo and pushes the price out of being reasonable due to those alone. why the new slash4x4 doesnt come with them blows my mind.

Dr you must be running a 2s or nimh?

There was a time those crappy plastic driveshafts were a upgrade to get away from metal dog bones and there problems. Few people realize we have Schumacher to thank for those then Team Losi started using them and then Traxxas included then in there models .

After reading this topic it is clear to me that the R/C market and Traxxas' position in it is just another market with it's specific properties.

Some things can be predicted where other things are surprising.

My last purchase of a Traxxas car was more than a year ago. The chance of buying one again is rather tiny. And that has less to do with Traxxas than with the fact that my garage is sufficiently filled to my taste.
I think the same will work for many others. At a certain moment the market (or at least parts of it) gets saturated.

The step to the flying part of the R/C market that Traxxas made is not that surprising to me. Only the way they did it was somewhat surprising. I have the idea that Traxxas didn't want to spend a lot on development costs. A wild guess is that they put an amount of money in development of products like the XO-1 and Funny car which doesn't get paid back as easy as they thought.
Development costs for the DR-1 and QR-1 are most likely a fraction of what they put in other products.

The well known Traxxas support is a smart and distinguishing marketing tool. Increase the price of a product to make it more easy to replace parts for free or relatively low costs. A replacement for a broken heli for only half the price sounds awesome, but of course that is a calculated risk. If it is a risk at all.

Ever thought about pricing of spare parts? Buy a complete car in separate parts and see what it would cost. Subtract the costs for the plastic bags and you will still have a huge difference.

In the end everything depends on your personal situation and the ability of manufacturers to adapt to that. Budget, personal taste, local prices (the cheapest 1/10 Rally from a Dutch LHS is still >$500 and that is without a battery), and local support.

Traxxas is to R/Cs as Bose is to home stereo. Bose doesn't make the best stuff and they surely don't offer the best sound quality for the money. What they have done is created dummy proof all in one "surround" systems and more importantly, built and marketed a brand name that is known by all and associated with "the best" in the minds of anyone who isn't an "expert". This allows them to charge a premium price for average or above average gear.

Traxxas is doing the same thing. Making a decent product, then using the brand they've built, marketing and superior business know how to out sell the superior products of competitors regardless of price point. Ask people on the street to name one company that makes Hobby grade R/Cs, besides "i don't know" Tamiya and Traxxas will be the only names random non hobbyists will know and that's why they win, regardless of their stuff bring over priced.


On a side note, I'll never buy another Traxxas, however they aren't over priced from an economics standpoint. The price for an item is determined by what the market will bear and obviously the market has no issue with Traxxas' prices.