Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 Adam LongWalker wrote:
@ Hulksmash

You got actual year to year store closures and openings?
I'm curious if GW's store foot print has increased/decreased in the US as well as globally.

It would take a little work but if someone wants to count the shops in WD for different years that would settle it.

 Peregrine wrote:

JWhex wrote:
I find it rather amusing that some people find portents of impending doom for GW because they discontinued a few products that were probably very poor sellers.

It's part of the whole picture. In isolation cutting poor-selling products wouldn't be a sign of impending doom, but in the context of stagnant sales/the Hobbit disaster/etc it looks like a case of throwing away long-term potential to claim immediate cost savings and put better numbers in the next financial report. A healthier company might have re-launched the specialist games (complete with proper marketing and support), but you have to wonder if GW is even capable of taking a risk like that, or if they had to drop them simply because they couldn't afford to do anything else.

+1

I actually understand the discontinuation of collectors models more than specialist games, as there were very few that I, personally, would want to own as many are from a time of less refined technique and production methods. Not to say there aren't a few gems in there, but this I can understand to an extent, and there wouldn't be much to do to promote them to increase sales, whereas the negligence shown to Spec Games and the apparent undervaluation of their potential to grow the business and the hobby is bordering on criminal IMO.

But like Peregrine says, take a step back and look at the big picture, you can certainly paint a pretty negative one with the information available.

JWhex wrote:
I find it rather amusing that some people find portents of impending doom for GW because they discontinued a few products that were probably very poor sellers.

I think it's more amusing that you're reading but not understanding the people saying such things. No one is looking at this event in a vacuum. It's looked at in the light of other changes and decisions that have been happening with GW as of late.

Please try to keep up.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:

 Adam LongWalker wrote:
@ Hulksmash

You got actual year to year store closures and openings?
I'm curious if GW's store foot print has increased/decreased in the US as well as globally.

It would take a little work but if someone wants to count the shops in WD for different years that would settle it.

The hard data that I have is at 2002 there was over 250 stores world wide. Current data for stores worldwide is over 400 stores. Approx a + 15 more stores per year globally per a 10 year basis (2002 - 2012). Actual year to year changes would be difficult at best as well as time consuming. I was curious to see if anyone did indeed some sort of research into that but in the scheme of things it is not that important to me.

I can remember the amount of stores told to me by a regional at 2002 and at 2006. Current stores open now in the US are double the amount since '06. To me it that Validates Hulksmash's comments and I am content with that

The current store model are 1 man stores at reduced hours and levels of quality service. From a business stand point I do see the savings via the costs of running one man stores.

I see it as a combination of a couple factors.

A: Get rid of more expensive (to them) metal.

B: Get rid of your Loss Leaders ahead of the sale so when it comes down to finding a third party to broker a deal the old stuff does not show on the books and they look smart for letting it go.

C: Cutting down on the fat makes it easier to sell to prospective buyers, instead of 3 Core ranges + 6 others, they can direct their attention to the profitability of the 3 Core.

The reasons above are why some of us also think LOTR is going the way of the dodo as soon as its legally possible for them.

Y'see, this is where I wish I had the capital to enquire about obtaining the design rights to produce the older stuff, such as the 2nd ed metal IG and the Dogs of War - I'm pretty sure they are all either over 15 years old, or due to hit 15 years old shortly...

 Adam LongWalker wrote:
The current store model are 1 man stores at reduced hours and levels of quality service. From a business stand point I do see the savings via the costs of running one man stores.

Personally, I think 1 man stores should only count as half of the store because they don't provide anything that games workshop's website doesn't provide. They provide a terrible experience with no value added.

 Warboss Gubbinz wrote:
I see it as a combination of a couple factors.

A: Get rid of more expensive (to them) metal.

B: Get rid of your Loss Leaders ahead of the sale so when it comes down to finding a third party to broker a deal the old stuff does not show on the books and they look smart for letting it go.

C: Cutting down on the fat makes it easier to sell to prospective buyers, instead of 3 Core ranges + 6 others, they can direct their attention to the profitability of the 3 Core.

The reasons above are why some of us also think LOTR is going the way of the dodo as soon as its legally possible for them.

One point to consider when making that argument.

Every game they just got rid of has something very similar to it that an entire company has formed around. That is, each line could be made profitable enough to run a small company. With the economies of scale and the market penetration GW has they could easily push these companies out of the market.

So while yes it is a smart decision to get rid of those lines, if they are not ready to invest in them, they could just as easily make them profitable rather than throwing good IP out the window. This is similar to the revamp of Dark Eldar and the rerelease of Space Hulk. These things are profitable when given half a chance. Its just a matter of someone having the corporate leadership to reform these lines rather than raising prices, and making cutbacks.

 Dysartes wrote:
Y'see, this is where I wish I had the capital to enquire about obtaining the design rights to produce the older stuff, such as the 2nd ed metal IG and the Dogs of War - I'm pretty sure they are all either over 15 years old, or due to hit 15 years old shortly...

Dunno if that applies.... The designs are trademarked, not patented (might be different in the UK though). Not to mention that GW would never license the old stuff anyways- that'd be competition.

I think the worst part is that they don't even have the decency to note that the old stuff is getting canned on their website.

GBL wrote:

 Warboss Gubbinz wrote:
I see it as a combination of a couple factors.

A: Get rid of more expensive (to them) metal.

B: Get rid of your Loss Leaders ahead of the sale so when it comes down to finding a third party to broker a deal the old stuff does not show on the books and they look smart for letting it go.

C: Cutting down on the fat makes it easier to sell to prospective buyers, instead of 3 Core ranges + 6 others, they can direct their attention to the profitability of the 3 Core.

The reasons above are why some of us also think LOTR is going the way of the dodo as soon as its legally possible for them.

One point to consider when making that argument.

Every game they just got rid of has something very similar to it that an entire company has formed around. That is, each line could be made profitable enough to run a small company. With the economies of scale and the market penetration GW has they could easily push these companies out of the market.

So while yes it is a smart decision to get rid of those lines, if they are not ready to invest in them, they could just as easily make them profitable rather than throwing good IP out the window. This is similar to the revamp of Dark Eldar and the rerelease of Space Hulk. These things are profitable when given half a chance. Its just a matter of someone having the corporate leadership to reform these lines rather than raising prices, and making cutbacks.

I totally agree with you, I am simply theorizing their decision making process having seen similar stuff from other companies in the past. The problem people are not seeing is GW have shoehorned themselves into a corner they cannot turn back from. Think of it this way, they've cut back on personnel, slashed their production capability in half and moved to the one man store setup.

If they had kept bunkers they could support the Core 3 + specialist, but from a business perspective, there's no way one man stores can grow the specialist line or even keep it stable. They are not hiring these people to be resource experts, they are hiring frontline people who they consider to have "limited shelf space" on what they can reasonably learn/sell/achieve in a year. That one person who if they kept specialist would need to know 9+ rule-sets and promote/support them. For GW, its a business decision, and its a simple one. ("But this is a good thing!")

I'm sure this looks great on paper for them. But for us, its another drop in an overflowing bucket. There's just no communication from them, no "Hey guys were going to be shelving this stuff for the near future we hope we can bring these product to you again some time. Thanks for your support."

I wish i had a window into what people internal to GWPLC are thinking right now. What worries me is after all the losses they took on dreadfleet our realistic chances of seeing one box games from these lines are slim to none.

I do hope they hand them off to FFG, now there's a group who knows what they are doing.

Well, I'm not pleased for some reason.



Fortunately, I already purchased most of my army over the last couple of years. However, it drives me nuts to know that if I ended up missing something I need, with say, a new codex change, I'll be out of luck.

I had a guess at buying a few heavy and special weapons... But I know I'm going to end up missing stuff.

I also went for the Gaunts Ghosts set and the Last Chancers.

I mean, seriously GW, for frikks sake, I have been actively collecting my Mordian Army, buying directly from them, for 15 years.

decker_cky wrote:

 Adam LongWalker wrote:
The current store model are 1 man stores at reduced hours and levels of quality service. From a business stand point I do see the savings via the costs of running one man stores.

Personally, I think 1 man stores should only count as half of the store because they don't provide anything that games workshop's website doesn't provide. They provide a terrible experience with no value added.

Of course they do, you clearly do not understand what the stores are there for.

GWs model is based around having one-stop-shops in as many locations as possible. This they believe acts as market presence and allows anyone who is of a wargaming bent to be inducted into wargaming but safely within the confines of the overall GW product base. This generates loyal GW customers who generally appreciate being shown how to play the game, model and paint armies.

When you look at the UK you see what they want to recreate elsewhere, a GW store in most major towns and multiple ones in cities. Everyone has heard of Warhammer/GW and has some appreciation of what goes on there so if you are of that bent you know where to go. So this market presence also doubles up as advertising (what's that gaudy shop? lets investigate!), where as G have stated that traditional advertising doesn't work for them.

So to GW it is not so much whether the store has one+ staff or a huge foot print it is more about actually having as many as possible. Increasing rents and rates mean smaller less mainstream locations true but a store off main street is as good as one on main street if you bear in mind the above desire to spam stores.

 Polonius wrote:

ianj253 wrote:
Thank you for understanding that time=money. Most of the people posting here don't factor that in. Like I said early making and accounting profit doesn't mean you're making an economic profit. They'd definitely be better of shifting their resources to other projects.

The funny thing is "the basement mba's" don't understand business. God forbid a company restructures and trims the fat to keep up with a changing market.

I understand that, I really do. It's possible that the whole operation is simple too "low cost/low gain" to be worth the hassle. That said, they're charging a premium retail price for old models. Spin casting isn't monkey work, but it's no more than semi-skilled. I simply think that it's a "very low cost/sort of low gain" thing.

Where things are different is if they are looking at a major capital expense to buy new casting equiptment, but even then...there's money to be had. I know this because I know what other companies make money at selling, at lower prices.

So while I would not be surprised that metal casting has the lowest profit margin and incidental revenues, I'm slightly surprised that they're turning their back on what revenues it is.

Hell, recreate Marauder miniatures (or, more likely, some clever name like "Longbeard's Forge") as a wholly owned subsidiary. give them some space, some equiptment, and the back catalog of master models. Let them run like FW does, and see how much cash they can bring in.

That's what I was thinking, people are able to sell spincast metal figures for far less than GW do and still make a decent profit, and I imagine all of the resin-casters and at least some of the other staff will be able to spincast metal if there is a machine for it, nor are moulds *that* expensive. So all they'd need to maintain to keep the line going is to keep a metal spincaster somewhere with a small amount of pewter, and only fire it up when something is bought and someone has the time. Or if they are cutting costs and staffing to the point they can't justify it, they could easily outsource it to any of the dozens of local metal casting operations (or one of the staff could get casting equipment for their garage and do it themselves at the weekend).

If no-one was buying the stuff, the cost to them beyond the rack of moulds would be negligable, and since I'm sure they own the buildings at WHW I'd be stunned if they didn't have enough space sitting idle.


I suspect, maybe, that they want to eradicate any evidence of them producing metal figures because 1. it makes finecast look bad and 2. If customers don't know they do metal it might hurt the 2nd hand market for old metal figures.

 Warboss Gubbinz wrote:

GBL wrote:

 Warboss Gubbinz wrote:
I see it as a combination of a couple factors.

A: Get rid of more expensive (to them) metal.

B: Get rid of your Loss Leaders ahead of the sale so when it comes down to finding a third party to broker a deal the old stuff does not show on the books and they look smart for letting it go.

C: Cutting down on the fat makes it easier to sell to prospective buyers, instead of 3 Core ranges + 6 others, they can direct their attention to the profitability of the 3 Core.

The reasons above are why some of us also think LOTR is going the way of the dodo as soon as its legally possible for them.

One point to consider when making that argument.

Every game they just got rid of has something very similar to it that an entire company has formed around. That is, each line could be made profitable enough to run a small company. With the economies of scale and the market penetration GW has they could easily push these companies out of the market.

So while yes it is a smart decision to get rid of those lines, if they are not ready to invest in them, they could just as easily make them profitable rather than throwing good IP out the window. This is similar to the revamp of Dark Eldar and the rerelease of Space Hulk. These things are profitable when given half a chance. Its just a matter of someone having the corporate leadership to reform these lines rather than raising prices, and making cutbacks.

I totally agree with you, I am simply theorizing their decision making process having seen similar stuff from other companies in the past. The problem people are not seeing is GW have shoehorned themselves into a corner they cannot turn back from. Think of it this way, they've cut back on personnel, slashed their production capability in half and moved to the one man store setup.

If they had kept bunkers they could support the Core 3 + specialist, but from a business perspective, there's no way one man stores can grow the specialist line or even keep it stable. They are not hiring these people to be resource experts, they are hiring frontline people who they consider to have "limited shelf space" on what they can reasonably learn/sell/achieve in a year. That one person who if they kept specialist would need to know 9+ rule-sets and promote/support them. For GW, its a business decision, and its a simple one. ("But this is a good thing!")

I'm sure this looks great on paper for them. But for us, its another drop in an overflowing bucket. There's just no communication from them, no "Hey guys were going to be shelving this stuff for the near future we hope we can bring these product to you again some time. Thanks for your support."

I wish i had a window into what people internal to GWPLC are thinking right now. What worries me is after all the losses they took on dreadfleet our realistic chances of seeing one box games from these lines are slim to none.

I do hope they hand them off to FFG, now there's a group who knows what they are doing.

This is going to draw jokes about "What is the internet lol" but I don't think that GW needs stores to sell the smaller games. If there was product support and a website on which they feature prominently, people would buy them. I have paid about $500 to companies like mantic, perry etc this year, never having stepped foot into a mantic store. Companies are making a mint on these products without any kind of physical presence. Heck with GW's pricing, they could afford to make a combined necromunda/penal legion plastic boxed set. They could sell extra minis to existing players very easily.

Mind Boggled.

Meh.

 Compel wrote:


I mean, seriously GW, for frikks sake, I have been actively collecting my Mordian Army, buying directly from them, for 15 years.

You never know this may just hail a move to plastic for the old guard, they have gone this way with special characters so maybe whole armies ? It would seem better for players overall.
They have done Cadians to death really, and jungle fighters I don't think were ever that popular. GW will be looking at maybe redoing one of the IG lines for the next codex. You only need a box of infantry, and box of heavy support weapons with all the options. So long as all the specialist weapons come on the sprue of the infantry and there are plenty of conversion ops then It is conceivable that maybe GW could redo their imperial guard in plastics?

Ugly miniatures decades olds being discontinued? I can live with that. Being honest, I would have done this earlier.

And I say this being the owner of several ugly miniatures decades old. But I live in 2013, and I want 2013 quality miniatures, not 1990 quality miniatures.

Those minis remind me of walkmans, Spectrum, Ghostbusters, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and things like that. And all of them are things I've replaced for better.

GBL wrote:
So while yes it is a smart decision to get rid of those lines, if they are not ready to invest in them, they could just as easily make them profitable rather than throwing good IP out the window.

No one is throwing good IPs out the window. GW can at any point revitalize any of it's back catalogue lines if they see a market that would warrant taking design and production capabilities away from their main lines.

garrapignado wrote:
Ugly miniatures decades olds being discontinued? I can live with that. Being honest, I would have done this earlier.

And I say this being the owner of several ugly miniatures decades old. But I live in 2013, and I want 2013 quality miniatures, not 1990 quality miniatures.

Those minis remind me of walkmans, Spectrum, Ghostbusters, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and things like that. And all of them are things I've replaced for better.

I still have my Atari ST to play old games from time to time...

 His Master's Voice wrote:
No one is throwing good IPs out the window.

To some degree they are. There's a good chance that they're throwing away the molds (shareholders don't like spending money storing molds you aren't even using), and dropping support is going to drive even more of the community to games from other companies. So it might be possible to bring them back in some form, but it's going to be harder than if they'd just kept everything in production. That suggests that they aren't concerned at all with the possibility of a future re-launch and are just dumping the whole line.

GW seem to be doing a lot to move out some excess stuff. GW may hopefully disappear but not out of business. It seems as if they are getting ready to sell up. With any luck a decent company will get it and do right by at least 40k, fantasy not really bothered about

 Peregrine wrote:
To some degree they are. There's a good chance that they're throwing away the molds

It's quite possible that they will throw the moulds away. The point is, I'm sure the moulds for Chaos Renegades are long gone but if GW would want to bring them back in their glorious 90's from, they could do that at any moment. They probably wouldn't sell much, because we're in 2013, but they could.

Those old models are, well, old. Outside of nostalgia factors, most wouldn't sell no matter how much marketing money you'd put behind them, or not sell enough to make it a viable alternative to marketing something else in the catalogue.

Just looked to see what what they still had listed, saw the Valhallans squad for £20 even though I could have sworn that they were £25 couple of years ago.

 His Master's Voice wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
To some degree they are. There's a good chance that they're throwing away the molds

It's quite possible that they will throw the moulds away. The point is, I'm sure the moulds for Chaos Renegades are long gone but if GW would want to bring them back in their glorious 90's from, they could do that at any moment. They probably wouldn't sell much, because we're in 2013, but they could.

Many of those molds were probably worn out anyway. Likely they'll be destroyed. However, I doubt they would destroy master models.

Backfire wrote:
Many of those molds were probably worn out anyway. Likely they'll be destroyed. However, I doubt they would destroy master models.

They could be stashing master moulds or perhaps resin masters, but at this point the sheer volume would start to be an issue if they wanted to keep each and every one of those. Some models are gone for good, it's just the nature of things.

 Adam LongWalker wrote:
@ Hulksmash

You got actual year to year store closures and openings?
I'm curious if GW's store foot print has increased/decreased in the US as well as globally.

GW has less sales staff that 5 or 10 years ago, whatever the footprint.
Only staff growing was bean counters

@Kroothawk

Certainly they do have less people. The standard staff when a store was in a mall in the US was 5 and normally they tried for 6. 1 Manager, 2 Full-Timers and 2-3 "Key Timers". This was mostly due to mandatory mall hours.

So it would take 5-6 stores to make one store staff level in 2003. And that's not including bunkers. But, they do have a larger overall footprint in the US than they did 10 years ago and it seems to only be growing with lots of new stores opening up in states they were never in before.

garrapignado wrote:


Those minis remind me of walkmans, Spectrum, Ghostbusters, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and things like that. And all of them are things I've replaced for better.

Heresy.

 Kroothawk wrote:

 Adam LongWalker wrote:
@ Hulksmash

You got actual year to year store closures and openings?
I'm curious if GW's store foot print has increased/decreased in the US as well as globally.

GW has less sales staff that 5 or 10 years ago, whatever the footprint.
Only staff growing was bean counters

Yea but to me that is referring to quality of services which I agree with you is on the decline.

What disturbs me is that going to their US official site they give the numbers world wide and in the US. I will have to say that these are "official" current numbers as the entire site has been updated to reflect the current year.

Now there will be people saying that those numbers are outdated. If that is so then we call into question the quality of services being rendered, productivity within the corporation, and the ability to keep themselves and their official online site correctly updated. Is this is how a so called " World's leading manufacturer, distributor, and retailer of toy soldiers, model kits, and table top strategy games", being ran at amateurish levels? This is not rocket science to update their web sites on a regular basis.

Current online numbers are 86 US stores. 375 world wide. By the way you should read the line about not encroaching 3rd party retailers. I am so not going to give GW money to see an rag mag for data that they should currently have correct online.


I call into question on the real reasons why all of the lower tier products being removed especially with current POD styles of concepts currently being employed within the New Now". Making molds are not that hard to do. keeping the product line alive would not be hard to do as well.

What is happening is that again short term profits are being generated as they sell out their products. Cheap marketing hysteria that works as people will impulse buy a product now than think about a few days later, Everything of late, the increase of product line in codexs, models, the C&D's being thrown out. The removal of the CEO ETC are all short term profit measures.

The sudden increase of licensing their IP's to video games again shows the need for short term cash. Ironically I also believe that this is the reason why specialist and collector ranges are gone. To be turned into Video Games and other licensing products. Now Marvel did the same thing, increasing their licensing IP's out to make video games, movies and other products. Where did this lead them? To be bought out by Disney for chump change back in '09.

http://www.comicbookmovie.com/comics/pictures/?i=1109


What GW is doing now is Vertical Integration, their continued effort of complete control of their revenue stream from manufacturing directly to consumers.
A simple Youtube video will tell you what this means.

Yea probably one of the signs of GWs deathknells, might be why they have been spitting out books in rapid succession, get stocks as high as possible before the inevitable cash out