Draft:Schabak Model Aircraft

• Comment: See Your first article. S0091 (talk) 14:26, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

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Schabak is a German toy company based in Nürnberg, Germany known for producing die-cast model aircraft and cars. However, this article is only focusing on their line of die-cast aircraft models.

Schabak was one of the most successful model aircraft manufacturers, from 1982 to 2006, they had about 50 aircraft and more than a hundred airlines. They were also among the only manufacturers to make a Boeing 747 of Iraqi Airways.

History

Schuco

In the 1960s, Schuco was one of the leading German toy companies, making tin and die-cast models of all types. Four friends — Max Haselmann, Gerhard Hertlein, Horst Widmann and Wolfgang Stolpe — were employees at Schuco. Although all four were important, this story mainly focuses on Stolpe. Wolfgang worked in the advertising department from 1961 to 1967, and in the 1960s, Schuco had demand from automotive companies but did not want to pursue this line of business.

Therefore, on the 5th of September 1966, the four men went on to find "Schabak Modelle" to start selling miniature car models to German car dealers. However, two of the founders — Haselmann and Hertlein — left, leaving only Stolpe and Widmann.

In the late 1960s, Schuco began to make aircraft models in the 1:600, 1:250 and somewhat unusually, the 1:720 scale, Schuco only had a few airlines at the time and only had a few selections of aircraft.

Despite their success, Schuco had to be sold to the British DCM group in 1976, 1979, the factory went bankrupt. And in 1980, . Gama-Mangold acquired the rights to Schuco's designs and began producing replicas of Schuco models, with production focused exclusively on cars. This left a big gap in the aircraft division and there was still demand for such models. So, Schabak decided to continue the aircraft line.

Schabak

Schabak had an initial lease agreement with Schuco for the machines and moulds to produce the aircraft, and in 1982, Schabak was founded. Haselmann focused on the car division and Stolpe was assigned to the aircraft division. The moulds of the 747, A300, DC-10 and Concorde were taken from Schuco, the rest of the aircraft were later made by Schabak.

In 1982, Schabak released its first series of die-cast aircraft models, carrying over some features from the earlier Schuco designs. While a few airlines like Lufthansa, Condor, Air France, Swissair, and KLM continued into the new Schabak lineup with updated and more refined liveries, several other airlines from the Schuco era were no longer represented. (Iraqi Airways, Olympic, BOAC)

From then on, Schabak produced an aircraft every year and new airlines were being added to the list every month or so. By the mid-1980s, Schabak had 120 employees (or so-called "homeworkers") who worked from their homes helping to apply decals, fix wheels, etc, and this way, they produced up to 10,000 models every day.

A Schabak employee applying decals for a KLM 747

Schabak also introduced boxed sets, these were sets that usually came with 2, 3 or 4 aircraft and assigned to an airline. They were sold in flight and were perfect for children. About 30 - 40% of sales were from In-flight sales.

With barely any competition, Schabak became one of the biggest names in model aircraft. You could find their models in most airport shops and toy stores. But when the 1990s rolled around, things started going downhill with new scales coming out.

In 1992, German manufacturer Herpa released its first few aircraft models, these were in the 1:500 scale and were tampon-printed, unlike Schabak with hand-applied decals. As the models were bigger in size, the amount of details could be increased. As a result, many 1:600 scale collectors soon shifted to 1:500.

The increase in popularity of 1:500 led to Schabak also launching their series of 1:500 scale models. However, these models were still using decals and landing gear had to be assembled by yourself. Unsurprisingly, collectors still preferred Herpa and these models were not as popular.

Schabak was slowly declining during the 1990s, though more airlines and aircraft were being produced, their quality and sales were declining as collectors chose other brands and bigger scales.

An attempt to bring back Schabak was made in 1995 by the American division of Schabak, they had launched the series "Silver Wings". These models were limited to only a few thousand pieces and featured many aircraft from various American airlines. The detail on these models had increased but unfortunately were not tampon-printed.

On September 11, 2001, four planes were hijacked and crashed in what became known as the 9/11 attacks. The tragedy had a massive impact on the aviation industry, bringing much of it to a standstill. This meant that there were fewer orders for Schabak. Most of Schabak's collectors also shifted towards the 1:500, 1:400 and 1:200 scales.

In 2005, Herpa launched its own 1:600 scale series with better moulds and more importantly, tampon-printed models, Schabak obviously did not benefit from this and in February of 2006, Schabak closed after being purchased by Schuco. However, Schuco did continue to produce 1:600 models under the "Schuco Schabak" name and later "Schuco Aviation".