White Ensign Models is being purchased by Tom's Model Works, according to a notice on the White Ensign website.

The message on the White Ensign site main page reads:

WHITE ENSIGN MODELS WILL LIVE ON! WE ARE PLEASED TO ANNOUNCE THAT TOM'S MODELWORKS HAS PURCHASED THE ENTIRE STOCK OF WEM KITS, PHOTOETCH, AND RESIN PARTS, PLUS THE RIGHT TO CONTINUE PRODUCTION, AND THE WHITE ENSIGN MODELS NAME. WHITE ENSIGN KITS, PARTS, AND PHOTOETCH WILL BE AVAILABLE AGAIN SOON, SO WATCH THIS SPACE.

This supposedly is to also include the WEM line of paints.

Thank you, Tom!

Correction: The Colourcoats paints have been acquired by Sovereign Hobbies Ltd, NOT Tom's Model works.

From the Sovereign Hobbies LTD facebook post:

We are extremely pleased to see the level of enthusiasm shown by you all so far. We are anxious to demonstrate our commitment to this so I thought it time to share a status update.

1) This is a new company which was incorporated last week. We made an offer on Colourcoats as enthusiastic customers who happened to have the capital available in invest. Due to the holiday period the process of setting up a business takes a little longer. We are incorporated but other requirements such as business bank accounts etc are not yet in place.

2) The website. We have a domain name purchased. The original WEM website IP was sold as part of the PE brass and resin products to Tom's Modelworks. Whatever happened we would need to build a new website. We need to build a bit more, as well as establish a new stock control system which integrates with the new webstore. We have this working with samples, but there are over 400 colours to list and categorise. There are something of the order of 26,000 tins of paint to count to populate the system once built.

3) Shipping. We have been researching numerous options here both domestically and internationally. Due to the product being enamel, this is a challenge even domestically. It can be done of course, but we are trying to find something that is sensible commercially.

4) Stockists. We are very keen to continue to work with 3rd party stockists - both existing and new where opportunities exist.

5) Other business. We are extremely happy that John Snyder is happy to work with us. Dave Carter likewise has been most helpful, although he's also busy packing up the rest of WEM's stock for the other buyers which is the immediate priority to surrender the WEM premises.
In summary - we're modellers who run another completely unrelated business who were delighted at the opportunity to buy our favourite brand of model paints. We're getting everything organised as fast as we can but it's going to take us a little time. Once we have a bank account running and payment means established we should be able to process orders here and there, with the full webstore going live as soon as we can build it.

We are very grateful for the huge levels of support shown, and hope that we're not delaying too many modelling activities in the mean time!