January 01, 2021

The Top Ten Products of 2020

January 01, 2021/ Brian

This is always my favorite article to put together at the end of the year. I love seeing which products made the cut this year — and which ones dropped off the list entirely. I hope it’s as much fun to read through as it is to put together. As always, this list is compiled by comparing our gross profit for each item in the store. The highest number earns the highest spot. It’s worth noting that because this is a cumulative total for the entire year, recent releases like the Hoss didn’t have had enough time to make the list. This isn’t a list of our favorite products, nor a list of the top products to release in 2020. These are simply the best performing products in our store this year. Now, without further ado, here is the Top Ten for 2020.

January 03, 2020

The Top Ten Products of the Decade

January 03, 2020/ Brian

Since 2012, we’ve been publishing a Top Ten list every year, looking at the most profitable products we carry here at Roger’s Hobby Center. It’s a list many in the industry read, especially manufacturers. Our contacts at places like Horizon Hobby, Great Planes, and Traxxas have, over the years, called us to discuss the list once published, asking about specific products and trends. It’s always a fun list to put together and discuss.

With the close of the decade, I thought it would be fun to look back at the last ten years and find the Top Ten Products of the Decade. We had to delve back into the records, and find data on sales from the years before we published the list, and even some of the data from the early years of the list had been lost. Through a long process of going through stacks of paper records, we’re able to bring to you the Top Ten Products of the Decade, based on gross margin profit.

December 31, 2019

The Top Ten Products of 2019

December 31, 2019/ Brian

This is always my favorite article to put together at the end of the year. I love seeing which products made the cut this year — and which ones dropped off the list entirely. I hope it’s as much fun to read through as it is to put together. As always, this list is compiled by comparing our gross profit for each item in the store. Highest number earns the highest spot. it’s worth noting that because this is a cumulative total for the entire year, recent releases like the Maxx probably won’t have had enough time to make the list. This isn’t a list of our favorite products, nor a list of the top products to release in 2019. These are simply the best performing products in our store for 2019. Now, without further ado, here is the Top Ten for 2019.

December 31, 2018

Top Ten Products of 2018

December 31, 2018/ Brian Schneider

Everyone loves lists, right? I'm pretty sure there are entire websites (cough cough Buzzfeed cough cough) built on that concept. Well, we love lists too, and so it's time to go over our Top Ten Products of 2018!

Like every year, the list is devised using margin (profit) dollars, so the list isn't all car parts, glue, and paint — and while the words accompanying the products are opinion, how they placed isn't something we change for editorial purposes or bias, so let’s dive into our top money-makers this year and see what our customers have been demanding throughout the year.

December 31, 2017

Top Ten Products of 2017

December 31, 2017/ Brian Schneider

Everyone loves lists, right? I'm pretty sure there are entire websites built on that concept. Well, we love lists too, and so it's time to go over our Top Ten Products of 2016! Like every year, the list is devised using margin dollars, so the list isn't all car parts, glue, and paint — and while the words accompanying the products are opinion, how they placed isn't something we change. What follows are the Top Ten Products we sold this year.

January 01, 2017

Top Ten Products of 2016

January 01, 2017/ Brian Schneider

December 31, 2015

Top 10 Products of 2015

December 31, 2015/ Brian Schneider

It's my favorite time of year! It's always fun to go back and look at the products in the store that out-performed everything else, and this year is no different, though there does seem to be a theme to this year's list...

As always, we devise this list by profit dollars, so it does skew the list toward more expensive items - this way, the list isn't all glue, glow plugs, and paint brushes. However, that doesn't mean we take liberties with the placement of the products on the list; the words are opinion, but the placing is stone-cold fact. This year, however, had so many iterations of previous products release, that we felt it was fair to combine some products together, so long as one was a direct replacement of the other on our shelf — meaning that you'll see a few items get dual-billing. That having been said, let's get to our Top 10 Products of 2015 countdown!

December 05, 2014

Top 10 Products of 2014

December 05, 2014/ Brian Schneider

Another year has come to a close. 2015 is a welcome sight for us weary of the past year. But 2015 can't come to pass without a look back at our top products of the year.

December 05, 2014

Top 10 Products of 2009

December 05, 2014/ Brian Schneider

Going through some old papers, I found our list of best sellers from 2009. Now, it wasn't formulated on the 31st of December, but it's the best picture of what that year was like, and what products did well that year. ANd while it's not really relevant data for today, I found it to be an interesting time capsule and look into the world before it was dominated by electric R/C trucks and quadcopters.

As always, we devise this list by profit dollars, so it does skew the list toward more expensive items - this way, the list isn't all CA glue, glow plugs, and shock fluid. However, that doesn't mean we take liberties with the placement of the products on the list; the words are opinion, but the placing is stone-cold fact. So let's get to our Top 10 Products of 2009 countdown.

December 31, 2013

Top 10 Products of 2013

December 31, 2013/ Brian Schneider

2013, for many, was a rocky year. There were many ups and downs. But for all the peaks and valleys, it's interesting to look back on the year and see what products remained popular while everything around them changed. As with every year, we look back on the previous 365 days and look at the most popular and profitable products in our store. For the second year now, we're sharing that information with our readers, along with some editorial on why we think that product made it on the list. As with last year's, this list isn't limited to products that came out in 2013. These are the top performing products in our store, by profit dollars, for this calendar year.

Because we devise this list by profit dollars, it does skew the list toward more expensive items - this way, the list isn't all CA glue, glow plugs, and shock fluid. This is about the marquee products in our line up. So let's get to our Top 10 Products of 2013 countdown!

The Unity: How I Explain Magic in D&D

One of the biggest issues I have with D&D is that they don’t really explain how magic items work—or magic, for that matter. I mean, what is magic in D&D? How does it function? Where does the energy come from? If these questions have kept you up at night, well, at least you’re in good company. Most GMs likely ignore the question, preferring to posit that magic just, well, is, but I can’t do that. I need to know—so I worked out my own explanation of what magic is and how it works for my homebrew world of Omira.

The Art of the Skill Check

When is the right time to call for a check and when should you let their actions alone determine the outcome? In this article, I discuss my approach to using skill checks as a longtime DM.

How I Used Zero Sessions Wrong

The zero session can be a powerful tool in a Game Master’s arsenal—this much I knew before I set out to helm a campaign myself. What I didn’t know is how to use a zero session properly, setting off a series of events that nearly derailed my campaign years later. In this article, I’ll detail how I used my zero sessions, why I used them the way I did, and how that use-case led to trouble down the pike.