Originally Posted by Blue 
We have a local hobby shop that deals mainly in model planes but they do stock some railroad stuff including .027 and I do business with them for time to time. What gauge railroad stuff are you into? They are tied into the local model plane clubs and railroad clubs. Their prices are competitive. Staying in tune with the various groups and clubs helps. Even though they specialize in the planes and other rc stuff, they have always been willing to order Lionel stuff and are an authorized Lionel dealer which is where I get my annual Lionel catalogs.
Interesting you should compare to model railroading - I do that, too, and I buy exclusively from my local B&M shop.
But then when I go in the shop the owner knows me and my genre, knows my scale, knows where I am in the process toward completion, etc. When I ask a question about how to accomplish a representation of reality he has a prduct recommendation AND A CONSTRUCTION SUGGESTION.
He stocks EVERYTHING (models and operating elements, construction raw materials, paint, tools, books, just to start) to do with that hobby or can special order something and have it in a week or two (interesting that modelers don't worry about waiting - we know it is part of the deal).
His prices are 35% higher than the catalog / online companies, but that is OK.
There are literally a MILLION items available in the big catalog, not counting online specialty sources - his knowledge of the product area has value because I can NEVER equal it.
There isn't a single, one-time, major purchase such a camera body in the hobby - there are multiple, small purchases.
There isn't an Apple or Adobe whose major product is required for the hobby and
distributed away from the MR shop.
The message here is (unless you can convince me there are a million differentiated photography items in the B&H catalog),
now that film is gone there just isn't that much product differentiation and ongoing technical assistance a camera store owner can exploit, that can be tied to a series of regular purchases, to serve a customer and earn the higher cost.
My argument has been for years that the death of film is the death of the camera industry as we know it.