tired of the Australia tax

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**jonolikespie**

The difference is GW is NOT a premium product.

They like to think and act as if they are the Ferrari of wargaming but they are the Ford of wargaming. I have never met anyone who's first car was a Ferrari, nor anyone who would question the quality of a Ferrari compared to a Ford.
GW is most peoples first experience with the hobby and comparing GWs products at Ozzie prices to other products they do NOT stand up in quality to equally priced products.

As well half the point of those luxury handbags and cloths is showing off that you are rich enough to afford them. You don't get that with GW because, as I said, everyone starts out with them.

**44Ronin**

jonolikespie wrote:
The difference is GW is NOT a premium product.

It's premium enough to be more premium than the others. The high prices they can still sell at reflects this.

GW is most peoples first experience with the hobby and comparing GWs products at Ozzie prices to other products they do NOT stand up in quality to equally priced products

Quality =/= premium product. Brand positioning = premium product eg., how much people are willing to pay for any given item. Many OEM producers will sell rebrands of THE VERY same product which sell upmarket, some sell lower. The key point is perception.

People will pay more for GW than other stuff, that much is pretty clear. The question is., how many and where the threshold lies.

To clarify, the extreme examples (as I told you they were) were a jest to get back at the charming way you told me my posts were load of excrement excuses.

GW brand positions through store experience. they aim for a premium that's higher than say... mantic (lol)

Now whether you believe it or not, they (GW) believe it (haha)

**jonolikespie**

I know GW believes it. That confuses and worries me.

Fact is GW are hemoraging sales in the Oz market so no, people are not willing to pay those prices.

Also the idea that GWs store experience adds value is laughable these days with the 1 man store model.

**44Ronin**

jonolikespie wrote:
I know GW believes it. That confuses and worries me.

Fact is GW are hemoraging sales in the Oz market so no, people are not willing to pay those prices.

....

Just because some people aren't willing to pay, doesn't mean others won't pay. The fact that they consistently applied price rises above inflation over and over again proves this over a long track record. There are still those who are willing to pay GW RRP.

Also the idea that GWs store experience adds value is laughable these days with the 1 man store model.

To discount their existence completely is naive and wrong.

**insaniak**

44Ronin wrote:
Just because some people aren't willing to pay, doesn't mean others won't pay.

Sure. But the fact that their sales volumes have been decreasing for a while now suggests that fewer people will.

To discount their existence completely is naive and wrong.

Completely? Sure.

I can not see any possible way though that GW stores have had any particularly great impact on GW sales in Australia in the time they have been around, though, given how few of them there are and how spread out our population is. The move to 1-man stores in worse locations can only make this more pronounced.

It goes even further south as more and more Australians turn to online shopping, which has been comparatively slow getting going down here. While GW's regional sales policy no doubt put a dent in that, it didn't take people long to find ways around it, so until prices finish equalising, they'll continue to lose sales to cheaper regions.

**jonolikespie**

You're saying they are increasing the price because people are willing to pay. They still have at least 1 sale a year so congrats, you are technically correct. Having said that compare current sales with 5 or 10 years ago. The MAJORITY of people aren't willing, and that is the important part.
If you don't understand how getting the same amount of money but losing 10% of your customer base year on year is going to lead to a total disaster then you're ignoring or ignorant of one of the most basic principles of retail and there isn't any further point discussing this.

And as for the stores name 1 thing they do now a properly manned FLGS can't.

**captain bloody fists**

jonolikespie wrote:
And as for the stores name 1 thing they do now a properly manned FLGS can't.

I can answer that for you. NOTHING! our games store (privately owned) does tournaments monthly (40K the first weekend of the month, fantasy the second then games like vanguard and x-wing take up the other two). hell even the club that I'm events manager of does learn to paint and learn to play on Thursday nights rotating weekly there as well. So yeah. the GW shops don't do anything more (and in most cases I imagine they do less) then a privately owned games store.

**insaniak**

Well, they can sell the new products that don't get supplied to independant stores due to 'supply issues'...

**Mij'aan**

insaniak wrote:
Well, they can sell the new products that don't get supplied to independant stores due to 'supply issues'...

Create a product. Sell the product through your own store, own website and multiple other retailers. The other retailers pay less for your product and charge less, but help create your customer base.
Choke the supply to these retailers and supply your own store, charging the full retail price. GW's Business Model.

**motyak**

Mij'aan wrote:
insaniak wrote:
Well, they can sell the new products that don't get supplied to independant stores due to 'supply issues'...

Create a product. Sell the product through your own store, own website and multiple other retailers. The other retailers pay less for your product and charge less, but help create your customer base.
Choke the supply to these retailers and supply your own store, charging the full retail price. GW's Business Model.

You missed a few steps. Local business closes/stops selling GW because of choked off business, GW store then goes for another year, moves across the road into a corner store as a one man store, makes less and less money because it's now out of the way, often closed, and has less space for gaming, right up until it closes.

**Yonan**

You missed another step too ; p Customers move purchases of many non-stocked GW products to China for easier, cheaper access and better customer relations.

**jonolikespie**

That hasn't been my experience. People don't stop buying from GW to buy from recasters, they stop buying GW to buy from PP, CB, Mantic, Spartan Games, ect.

**Yonan**

jonolikespie wrote:
That hasn't been my experience. People don't stop buying from GW to buy from recasters, they stop buying GW to buy from PP, CB, Mantic, Spartan Games, ect.

It's more both for people I know. Big shift to warmahordes and Dreadball, soon Deadzone too. But we *do* like our 40k, so we have a lot of "digital" rules and resin pieces now. GWs actions are just giving their competitors a much stronger foothold in Aus and making recasting very rewarding and therefore very common. That said I just oredered 3x SM Strike Force Ultras from Discoutn Games Store in the US. The models come out at about 40% of Aussie RRP, including shipping.

**Mij'aan**

jonolikespie wrote:
That hasn't been my experience. People don't stop buying from GW to buy from recasters, they stop buying GW to buy from PP, CB, Mantic, Spartan Games, ect.

Honestly, Many people I know have bought from people recasting GW stuff.
Whilst I wouldn't promote the blatant piracy and whatnot, I can see why people do it.
GW's product is expensive. Overly so. But - We all love it.
For lack of trying to derail the thread though, I'm sure other people here have done the same too. Please don't start noting sources of it... we all know where it's from.

Still, I hope AUS's situation get's better.

**Zagaboff**

How long till it's all web based purchases? Do away with GW stores and clamp down supply on flgs to make people buy online from GW direct.

**Mij'aan**

Zagaboff wrote:
How long till it's all web based purchases? Do away with GW stores and clamp down supply on flgs to make people buy online from GW direct.

It already went in that direction with the 1 man store option, 1 wage to 1 staff member running that 1 store in that particular area. Minimum cost to maximise profits. I think it's currently as far in that direction as it can go without making losses.
Whilst there's still people who go into stores and spend money, (whilst some of the sales reps are good at selling their products and pushing the sales every month to the same set of customers, and new ones) we will still see the stores.

**Yonan**

Zagaboff wrote:
How long till it's all web based purchases? Do away with GW stores and clamp down supply on flgs to make people buy online from GW direct.

If GW were the type of company to share the savings with the customers I'd be all for this. I much prefer to buy direct where possible. Imagine a GW where the basic price was 30% cheaper than it is now, with periodic sales at additional discounts. A man can dream.

**Pacific**

I remember a time when it was at 60-70% cheaper than it is now, and they had sales in store

jonolikespie wrote:

They like to think and act as if they are the Ferrari of wargaming but they are the Ford of wargaming.

It's not Ferrari, it's Porsche, as Pumbagore attests:

(Reason being, there was a senior person - I forget who - that described GW miniatures as the 'Porsche of miniature wargames')