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So when building my Ultramarine army I ordered some metal sholder pads and noticed that they came on a rather large tab, like sprue. I was curious to fine out how much waste they were putting in this...


Heres the results

70 Ultramarine Shoulder pads = 44.14 grams
70 Assault Marine pads = 44.05 grams

Shoulder pads total = 88.19 grams

Total amount of wasted pewter = 98.72 grams

I got more waste metal by volume then I did product I paid for. I feel that if they clipped this off after casting and reused it, they would get more milage out of the material, reduce amount needed, save the environment(since I dont need that much scrap pewter lying about) blah blah blah. Remember GW, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.

On the plus side I now have some pieces I can put in the Vallejo bottles to aid in shaking.

The issue is that if they reused the left over pewter it could cause defects in the product. Some types can be reused without problem but not all.

I'm all for ragging on GW, but this really isn't a problem that only GW suffers from. I got a stack of Gnome Battle Armour for BattleTech a while back, and they came 5 to a strip. I was cutting them into groups of 3 and the strip they came on was so thick that by the time I finished making 10 bases of the guys my wrist was cramping.

I'm sure this happens all over the place.

Its a cost thing isnt it?

If that excess is cheaper to have on than the cost/time of trimming recycling or even revamping production then GW is still onto a winner.

Is this even a problem?

I'd rather trim and clean them on my own than have some minimum-wage dude with absolutely no interest in the hobby use the big ol' clippers and screw it up at the factory.

Despite what GW might like people to believe, materials costs of metal and plastic are a small proportion of the cost of models.

Kilkrazy wrote:Despite what GW might like people to believe, materials costs of metal and plastic are a small proportion of the cost of models.

This is true for the most part, its the Sculpting & Molding costs that truely hurt.

The latest GW financial statement said the gross margin on their goods sold is 76.7%.

This means that a model which sells for £12 at retail costs them £2.33 to make and pack. (£2 is VAT.) That £2.33 includes the design, sculpting, moulds, metal or plastic, and the packaging.

Only 76.7%? We need to see that hit 80% by the end of next quarter! Time for another price rise!

I don't think it is pewter by the way. It is "white metal" which is a combination of metals. Not so sure I would throw them into my paints as they may stain the paint.

Fishboy wrote:I don't think it is pewter by the way. It is "white metal" which is a combination of metals. Not so sure I would throw them into my paints as they may stain the paint.

I doubt that as they don't stain currently painted models even recent ones.

and what do you think is in each Vallejo paint bottle? a tiny metal skull.

I agree, GW needs more Reading, 'Riting, and 'Rithmatic.

Onnotangu wrote:

Fishboy wrote:I don't think it is pewter by the way. It is "white metal" which is a combination of metals. Not so sure I would throw them into my paints as they may stain the paint.

I doubt that as they don't stain currently painted models even recent ones.

and what do you think is in each Vallejo paint bottle? a tiny metal skull.

Nitpick Reaper has the skulls, Vallejo has nothing but paint.

Kilkrazy wrote:The latest GW financial statement said the gross margin on their goods sold is 76.7%.

This means that a model which sells for £12 at retail costs them £2.33 to make and pack. (£2 is VAT.) That £2.33 includes the design, sculpting, moulds, metal or plastic, and the packaging.

Not quite. Any payroll costs are not included in Gross margin, so it doesn't include the design or sculpting cost, or indeed the labour involved in making the product..

Your point still stands, and probably even better as the labour costs involved in snipping simply wont cover the revenue from the recycling

Holdenstein wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:The latest GW financial statement said the gross margin on their goods sold is 76.7%.

This means that a model which sells for £12 at retail costs them £2.33 to make and pack. (£2 is VAT.) That £2.33 includes the design, sculpting, moulds, metal or plastic, and the packaging.

Not quite. Any payroll costs are not included in Gross margin, so it doesn't include the design or sculpting cost, or indeed the labour involved in making the product..

Your point still stands, and probably even better as the labour costs involved in snipping simply wont cover the revenue from the recycling

Standard accounting procedures call for all costs that can be identified as accruing to the production of goods to be accounted for.

Design, sculpting and manufacturing costs should be included in the COGS (Cost Of Goods Sold/Cost Of Sales), if they are significant enough to be tracked.

The big thing not included in their GP is the cost of retail.

So, if they're selling for £12 then it costs them £2.33 plus the cost of running the stores.
Or, they sell it at considerably less than £12 (to a retailer or distributor) and it only costs them £2.33.

Kilkrazy wrote:Despite what GW might like people to believe, materials costs of metal and plastic are a small proportion of the cost of models.

True, it might even cost more to have someone spend time cleaning the figures up than they would recover through recycling. When I was in Lenton years ago you could watch them doing the casting and when they opened the mould if there was a duff cast it would be slung whole back in the melting pot, but that's a different prospect to cleaning figures up.

Why do you put pewter in paint? Never heard of this practice.

UltraPrime wrote:Why do you put pewter in paint? Never heard of this practice.

To help stir the paint like the ball bearing in an aerosol can, actually you'd probably be better off with an actual ball bearing than dropping old clippings of pewter into your pots of paint.

Interesting observation about the metal sprue.

GW's massive markup doesn't make it such a big deal, but I'm still surprised they and other companies would waste so much do this. The GW margin numbers don't really take into account the fact that most of what GW makes now is plastic (rediculously lower cost raw material) and GW has a markup much greater than many smaller minatures companies.

The cost of metal figures massively into the budgets of companies who make only metal figures can't charge as much for figures as GW.

As to remelting of metal sprue, there's likely nothing other than possible labor costs standing in the way. I remember hearing that Reaper had taken a massive overstock of VOR figures just to melt down and recast into other figures, so if it's cost effective for them GW could likely do it too. Metal shoulder pads likely arent sold enough to make it worthwhile to clip and recast the tabs and most metal GW products don't have nearly that much sprue.

Howard A Treesong wrote:

UltraPrime wrote:Why do you put pewter in paint? Never heard of this practice.

To help stir the paint like the ball bearing in an aerosol can, actually you'd probably be better off with an actual ball bearing than dropping old clippings of pewter into your pots of paint.

I'm fairly sure theres a dakka article that does a study of this. The ball bearing actually rusts and stains the paint, if you stick it in your standard mini paint.

White metal wont stain the paint and its now readily available to me. I have been adding it to paint pots for years and never had an issue. Stainless steel ball bearings work well too, empty Vallejo pots even come with a tiny metal skull that goes inside.

I would imagine paying someone(s) to strip and clean the models to recycle left overs would cost more per hour than the wasted product. Probably 10x more.

Remember, GW production is in the country it was sold in, or at least in the US, and UK as opposed to other companies like Privateer Press, who had their plastic done in China. The Labor costs in US and UK are quite expensive even at minimum wage.

ALso note, the quality of materials in the US/UK compared to China in the two above companies. While PP was able to completely clean the plastic models of wasted materials, they were almost always badly done with divots and rips in the plastic.

If we're talking about 'waste of material', plastic sprues have far more excess than metal. Most metal models have very few tabs (being mostly one part). Plastic on the other hand, most of my plastic kits are at least 50% by weight sprue.
Obviously so little of their cost is materials that it doesnt matter.

Howard A Treesong wrote:

UltraPrime wrote:Why do you put pewter in paint? Never heard of this practice.

To help stir the paint like the ball bearing in an aerosol can, actually you'd probably be better off with an actual ball bearing than dropping old clippings of pewter into your pots of paint.

No they are glass beads or marbles not metal open up a can when empty and no air in them hold the can in a table vice and wrap a screw driver with a rag near the tip whack it with a hammer to let out the pressure and cut it open they have special devices to do this commercially so they don't explode when compacted.

I cut one open once but don't recall the bearing being glass.

What I do with exhausted spray cans is spray out as much as possible of the propellant, then stab the can with a garden fork, squash it, and put it in the metal recycle.

I've always assumed the rattle thingy is a ball bearing and I've never looked at it.

Steel only rusts by oxidation. It shouldn't rust inside a spray can pressurised with gas which is oxygenated.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Only 76.7%? We need to see that hit 80% by the end of next quarter! Time for another price rise!

Raising the price shouldn't change the GP Margin. The reason you do a price change is to keep the Gross Margin consistant (price change in cost of sales). They just need to control their G&A Costs.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Holdenstein wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:The latest GW financial statement said the gross margin on their goods sold is 76.7%.

This means that a model which sells for £12 at retail costs them £2.33 to make and pack. (£2 is VAT.) That £2.33 includes the design, sculpting, moulds, metal or plastic, and the packaging.

Not quite. Any payroll costs are not included in Gross margin, so it doesn't include the design or sculpting cost, or indeed the labour involved in making the product..

Your point still stands, and probably even better as the labour costs involved in snipping simply wont cover the revenue from the recycling

Only salaries that go directly into making the model will be put on this line item - R&D costs (mainly development costs) and the people who directly churn out the models. If they do not participate in production, they should not be there. GW is a miniatures and gaming company. If the employee is not directly making any of these items, then they do not go on that line item as it would be misleading to have your sales force included in the gross margin.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
[quote=Kilkrazy}
Steel only rusts by oxidation. It shouldn't rust inside a spray can pressurised with gas which is oxygenated.

boyd wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:
Steel only rusts by oxidation. It shouldn't rust inside a spray can pressurised with gas which is oxygenated.

Actually the bottle is an aerosol mixture in which they use hydrofluorocarbins (HFC) (now rather than chlorofluorocarbins (CFC) as they cause less damage to the ozone). If it was oxygenated, the oxygen would oxidize the metal causing rust as the spray is used.

Yes, I mistyped. Meant to say the non-oxygenated gas in the spray can would prevent oxidation of the ball bearing.

Kilkrazy wrote:

boyd wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:
Steel only rusts by oxidation. It shouldn't rust inside a spray can pressurised with gas which is oxygenated.

Actually the bottle is an aerosol mixture in which they use hydrofluorocarbins (HFC) (now rather than chlorofluorocarbins (CFC) as they cause less damage to the ozone). If it was oxygenated, the oxygen would oxidize the metal causing rust as the spray is used.

Yes, I mistyped. Meant to say the non-oxygenated gas in the spray can would prevent oxidation of the ball bearing.

Thats what I figured. Otherwise it would be much more flammable