Now I sort of wish I could take back what I wrote last November. =) The plan has changed slightly after some further research on my part and the feedback I received from the survey responses. If I haven't said so already, the survey input has helped immensely and I'm grateful for everybody that offered their opinions on this matter.

Here is the revised plan as it stands right now.

Northwest Timetable #8 will be released this summer. For the first time ever, Montana will be a part of the Northwest Timetable.

Once the Rocky Mountain #7 and Southwest #5 timetables sell out (probably another 2 years from now) these regions will be consolidated with the Mountain Plains timetable as follows:

Colorado-Wyoming-Nebraska-Kansas in one timetable to replace the Mountain Plains and part of the Rocky Mountain timetable. (Note: Kansas will be a new addition.) Arizona-Nevada-New Mexico-Utah will be in another timetable to replace the Southwest and the remaining parts of the Rocky Mountain timetable.

The Mountain Plains, Rocky Mountain, and Southwest Timetables range from poor to fair in terms of sales and inventory turnover. The reason Rob released new editions 3-4 years apart is because it took that long to deplenish the inventory of the existing release. Consolidating these three regions into two regions will speed up the inventory turnover and make for more frequent releases. In addition, it makes for less production work and reduced printing expenses on my end, which in turn will make buying the timetables less expensive overall.

I don't know yet how much the new CO-WY-NE-KS and AZ-NV-NM-UT timetables will sell for, but a safe guesstimate would be around $25 each. Under the current arrangement, these states would be split into three separate timetables costing about $20 each. If you bought all three, it would cost $60 as compared to $50 with the new regions that I have planned.

David Curlee