All About Aurora Postage Stamp Trains
Company Profile: Faller
In 1946, Gebrüder Faller was founded in
Stuttgart, Germany, by brothers Edwin and Hermann Faller to make miniature wooden house kits. The company
later relocated to the brothers' home town of Gütenbach. Over time their product line
expanded considerably to include model railroad structures, amusement rides, figures and scenery-making supplies in HO, TT, N and Z Scales.
Introduced in 1963, Faller's
Auto Motor Sport (AMS) line grew to become quite extensive; by the mid-1960s,
they were purchasing cars from market-leader Aurora Plastics. Combination roadway/railroad sets were imported into the United States by Charles C. Merzbach
Company Inc. of New York (who also imported Arnold Rapido) under the brand name Western Star Road & Rail. In 1968, the
N Bus System was added to the AMS line; together with a select group of N Scale plastic
structure kits, they were imported into the US by Aurora Plastics and sold under their Postage Stamp Trains brand.
The market for AMS began tapering off in the early 1970s, and by 1985 production had ended; they've since become collector items.
Faller is distinguished among their peers as having survived over
seventy years intact; they also have an extremely broad product range, selling in excess of a million items each year. They've even published
their own modeling magazine for many years. Faller is also known for their
Car
System in both HO and N Scales. It consists of battery-powered vehicles with magnets attached to the
front wheels for steering; the magnets follow steel wires hidden under the road surface. The system is used extensively, and to great effect, by
Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg.
In 1997
Faller acquired
Pola, a former competitor in the structure kit market; the Pola
name was retained for their G Scale structures; the rest of the product line was fully absorbed into Faller's. For decades, many of Faller's older kits have been rebranded by
Model Power (now
owned by Model Rectifier Corporation),
Life-Like (now part of Walthers), Associated Hobby Manufacturers (AHM, now
IHC), Atlas,
Precision Miniatures, Parkway Industries and others.
Their kits were also imported into the US directly by Charles C. Merzbach; this ad features three kits that were
also branded for Postage Stamp: 4152-250, 4162-125 and 4111-250.
Additional details on the history of Faller can be found here.
See Also...
- Company Profile: Aurora
- Company Profile: Roco
- Company Profile: Trix
- Company Profile: American Tortoise