25.06.2019 Press release and impressions of the 11th "Open House Day" on 22 June 2019

Last Saturday, PIKO invited model railway fans from worldwide to the 11th "Open House Day and PIKO fans from all over the world came to Sonneberg.

More than 16,000 visitors celebrated this special event together with the PIKO employees in bright sunshine and summer temperatures.

The guests were able to experience first-hand how PIKO model railways are made. In addition to experiencing the production process, the PIKO fans were also delighted that they were able to buy one or two bargains. There was a big crowd in the PIKO Oldie corner, where there were still model railway parts from GDR times but also parts from the latest production. Interesting was also the sales stand with attractive 2nd choice articles, which are only available at PIKO on the "Open House Day".

At the spare parts stand, the dedicated PIKO employees ensured that even the most unusual wishes of PIKO fans were satisfied and that even heavily used and older models were brought back to life.

The stands with PIKO innovations such as the H0 model of the ICE 4, which will appear in late summer, and the innovative digital products PIKO SmartTester and PIKO SmartProgrammer, which were presented on special demo layouts, met with great interest. The visitors could inform themselves about the development status and the functionality of these highly anticipated novelties for this year.

At the information stand of the development and construction department a crowd of people could be found until the afternoon hours. Here the PIKO fans discussed about current novelties and expressed wishes for future models.

The fact that model railways also offer a lot of emotions was shown to the visitors in the hall with the attractive layouts in the track sizes Gartenbahn, H0 and TT, which were presented by model railway clubs from Sonneberg, Suhl, Coburg and Bernburg.

The little PIKO fans had fun on the big bouncy castle and trained child carers made sure that the children didn't get bored with a lot of fun and games as long as dad, mum, grandma and grandpa looked around in the spacious factory halls. The children also had a lot of fun playing with the garden railway and painting their own G-scale or H0 carriages.

If you wanted, you could have a PIKO wagon or a locomotive printed with your picture or a design of your choice and thus had a very special memory of that day.

A special highlight was the PIKO "Kreisellok", the original of which has been decorating a roundabout near PIKO since the beginning of June 2017 and which visitors could buy as a H0 and TT model.

Thuringian bratwursts and other regional specialities as well as coffee and cake were served and visitors could talk shop and exchange their experiences both in the festival tent and in the open-air beer garden.

The 11th "Open House Day" at PIKO has once again impressively shown that the fascinating hobby of model railways can attract large numbers of visitors and inspire young and old alike. The media interest in the event was also immense. The MDR show "MDR vor Ort" was on the spot with a large team on the company grounds and reported live from the event. Anyone who missed the "Open House Day" or the report can take a look back at the events of June 22nd in the MDR media library.

Many visitors were pleased to find on their way home at the exit the reference to the next "Open House Day" at PIKO, which is to take place on 19 June 2021. UPDATE 23.09.2020: Corona does not pass PIKO and the model railway without a trace. Due to the still very indifferent situation and especially under the aspect of protecting the health of our customers as well as the employees at PIKO, the management has decided to postpone the "Open Day" planned for June next year by one year, to June 18, 2022.

Sonneberg, 25.06.2019

Videos of the "Open House Day" 2019

Pictures of the "Open House Day" 2019