About The Western Depot

1650 Sierra Avenue Suite 203
Yuba City, California 95993-8986

phone: 530-673-6776
fax: 530-675-5590

store hours: Tuesday through Saturday 10:00 am to 5:20 pm

The Western Depot is a family business that was created in 1977 by Lieutenant Colonel Bob McBratney. Bob began The Western Depot shortly after retiring from the Air Force, where he started as an E1 level basic airman with a high school education and finished as a Lieutenant Colonel. Needless to say, being idle was not in the cards for Bob and retirement didn’t suit him. He turned his love of toy trains into a thriving business that has become one of the biggest toy train hobby shops west of the Mississippi.

Today, The Western Depot is operated by two generations of the McBratney family and two knowledgeable and talented associates who have been with the company since 1989 and 1998. The online store was created in-house, and is run on an in-house server so you are never interrupted while you shop. All of our merchandise is located on the premises and we maintain our warehouse ourselves. Because of this, our website is constantly updated and will only show you what we have in stock, right now.

When you speak to any one of us in our store or on the phone, we will be able to get you the answers to your questions and help you find what you’re looking for. We are here to serve our local customers and our customers around the world. We look forward to hearing from you!

The Western Depot Timeline:

1977 — The Western Depot is founded in Bob’s garage where he built and sold Williams passenger car kits.

1979 — The Western Depot gets its first public location, housed in a commercial office building Bob built with an Air Force buddy.

1986 — The Western Depot has grown too large and moves to its second location: a bigger unit in the same set of office buildings. Mail orders are becoming so prevalent and business is growing so fast that a warehouse down the street has to be rented to house the growing merchandise.

1991 — The Western Depot moves to its final and current location: a brand new commercial building with its own custom warehouse.

1997 — www.westerndepot.com is born.

2012 — Thousands of items are offered to Western Depot customers at our storefront in Yuba City and all over the world through our online store. Our founder dies and the store continues on under the leadership of his son and grandson.

2020 — The Covid pandemic temporarily closed down our retail store and changed our days of operation to Monday through Friday to match the days when UPS pickup is available to us.

2021 — Our retail store reopened to the general public in the fall but our days of operation remained Monday through Friday to match the days when UPS pickup is available to us.

2023 — At the end of April the boss changed our days of operation back to Tuesday through Saturday to allow people who work on weekdays to visit our retail store.


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