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Scott-S6 wrote:

ArchaonSon wrote:What comradeship only comradeship I see nowadays (In the hobby sense) is between groups of friends and clubs if you expect comradeship in GW stores its like expecting a kick in the teeth that is after the bully took your dinner money...

Why would you expect comradeship in a retail store from someone that needs to sell you stuff in order to get paid?

Of course comradeship is between players, the quote didn't suggest that it was somehow between players and red-shirts.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

malfred wrote:Right, but soda or paint isn't really a profitable impulse buy. This
isn't the movie theater that charges you 3 dollars for a soda.

It's not uncommon for small game stores to make more from snacks than from games, especially places with a bias towards PnP games.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

malfred wrote:You never know. If the models played at tournaments are exactly what's
sold in any given period of time, then GW would have gone out of
business a long time ago. There are people out there who don't make
time to play the games. People who play the games seek each other
out, so maybe that's why we think there are more of them.

You do realise that many 40K players do not play in tournaments. At all.
That's a very american thing. In the UK the majority of play is in peoples' homes or in private clubs.

Right. I was trying to argue that you need the facts. A lot of the
time people enter these arguments saying that tournament play
is the hobby or that tournament players keep stores open.

I can't imagine the profit margins on food being good enough to
keep a store in the black. Is that a UK thing?

Scott-S6 wrote:

ArchaonSon wrote:What comradeship only comradeship I see nowadays (In the hobby sense) is between groups of friends and clubs if you expect comradeship in GW stores its like expecting a kick in the teeth that is after the bully took your dinner money...

Why would you expect comradeship in a retail store from someone that needs to sell you stuff in order to get paid?

Of course comradeship is between players, the quote didn't suggest that it was somehow between players and red-shirts.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

malfred wrote:Right, but soda or paint isn't really a profitable impulse buy. This
isn't the movie theater that charges you 3 dollars for a soda.

It's not uncommon for small game stores to make more from snacks than from games, especially places with a bias towards PnP games.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

malfred wrote:You never know. If the models played at tournaments are exactly what's
sold in any given period of time, then GW would have gone out of
business a long time ago. There are people out there who don't make
time to play the games. People who play the games seek each other
out, so maybe that's why we think there are more of them.

You do realise that many 40K players do not play in tournaments. At all.
That's a very american thing. In the UK the majority of play is in peoples' homes or in private clubs.

Agreed but the overall question is now that Games Workshop dont have a niche market in wargaming being that privateer and Malifaux Dust Tactics Infinity and Kings of War are slowly or in some cases quickly nudging their way into the market is the sky high prices rocketing Games Workshops way of saying they are ready to throw in the towel that the ideas arent orginal... But still GW is like Lazarus they keep finding a way to keep us all hooked..

I give it too the floor...

ArchaonSon wrote:

Scott-S6 wrote:

ArchaonSon wrote:What comradeship only comradeship I see nowadays (In the hobby sense) is between groups of friends and clubs if you expect comradeship in GW stores its like expecting a kick in the teeth that is after the bully took your dinner money...

Why would you expect comradeship in a retail store from someone that needs to sell you stuff in order to get paid?

Of course comradeship is between players, the quote didn't suggest that it was somehow between players and red-shirts.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

malfred wrote:Right, but soda or paint isn't really a profitable impulse buy. This
isn't the movie theater that charges you 3 dollars for a soda.

It's not uncommon for small game stores to make more from snacks than from games, especially places with a bias towards PnP games.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

malfred wrote:You never know. If the models played at tournaments are exactly what's
sold in any given period of time, then GW would have gone out of
business a long time ago. There are people out there who don't make
time to play the games. People who play the games seek each other
out, so maybe that's why we think there are more of them.

You do realise that many 40K players do not play in tournaments. At all.
That's a very american thing. In the UK the majority of play is in peoples' homes or in private clubs.

Agreed but the overall question is now that Games Workshop dont have a niche market in wargaming being that privateer and Malifaux Dust Tactics Infinity and Kings of War are slowly or in some cases quickly nudging their way into the market is the sky high prices rocketing Games Workshops way of saying they are ready to throw in the towel that the ideas arent orginal... But still GW is like Lazarus they keep finding a way to keep us all hooked..

I give it too the floor...

Maybe the mold releash GW uses gives on and invisisble but addictive smell?

Maybe

The CEO of Citadel mintatures has most likely (and I'll bet on this) said "Pffft what a bunch of geeks"-"as long as their playing their silly little games and I keep making money, Ill be a very happy panda"

This has come up before in another discussion about things GW have said. Here's what they have previously said about their customers:

filbert wrote:...GW call their customers things like "Geek, Gomer, Sheep, and Pleb"....

From the following threads:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/420/369325.page#2981277

http://www.infinitythegame.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=5052&pid=96428#pid96428

Hi folks...
Here is a quick over view of my GW experiance.(Interjected with fiscal comentary.)

In the beginning, GW was a collection of FLGS that sold a variety of products under one banner.
Then they sold just hier own games and minature ranges (Citadel &Marauder.)

The minature sales were driven by word of mouth , by good game play and good vibe from the relationship between the staff and the cuatomers.
There was a connection between the studio and the gamers, the message was, 'heres some ideas for fun games , see if you like them'.(and we did!)
And this leading by example inspired a lot of gamer to devlop thier ideas....
At this time people would write in to GW , and the best rules ideas- armies- senarios etc were published!

From 1988 to 1997 GW plc doubled turn over every 3 years.(Based on available infoirmation.)

This was the time where game play/social interaction was the main driving force and there was a wide variety of games avalable.
During this time GW said , ...'we are investing in plastic minature manufacturing , to lower the entry cost to new players..'

It may be nostalga , but this ws the golden period of GW IMO.

1998 signaled the start of the rot IMO.
They wanted to up minature sales, ands so upscaled 40k to a battle game from a skirmish game.
Which would have been great if they had written new rules for the new game play.
But they didnt , and so alot of gamers quit the new 40k.

Shortly after Mr Kirby decided to focus on the core buisness, which aparently was 40k and WHFB.(Specialist games were relagated to fan support.Which improved them no -end!)

And then said the famous words ...' we are in the buisness of selling toy soldiers to children...'
NOT because it was true, but because he could not explain to share holder how game play drives sales of minatures. But he could simply say we market toys to children, as every one understands this simple concept.

Oh dear..In the following years , so many well knowns and respected GW game developers staff leave.(And Chamber to Rick priestly.)
Only Jervis stays behind to be the 'official spokes person ',

What effect has the focus on ' selling toy soldiers to children had?

In 2005 GW has a turn over of £150M (appx)
Adjusting for inflation thats £170M(appx) in todays money.
Adjusting for price rises that £230M(appx) in todays money.

IF GW had performed as well as they did 1995 to 1997, that would have resulted in a turn over of £920M(appx)

What is thier current turn over?
£120M appx.
Appx 40%of what it should be if sales had been the same , and only 13% of what 1995 -1997 performance was....

They have lost at least 40% sales volume.And they lose more sales volume every year....

What have the offical GW spokes persons said during this time?
''The games are just the icing on the cake.'' (From Jervis.)
''....about 2/3rd of our customers dont even play the games ....''(Jervis)
'' ....the biggest amount of imballance in any game will only be 60/40...' '...obviously we dont play test every possible combination in every codex...'' (Jervis.)

(Jervis Is a nice bloke and has done some great game development . But his attempt to spin the corperate line make him sound detached at best, demented at worst.IMO)

''Our customers are price insensitive.They will buy what ever we sell them , at the price we set.''(Kirby)

...'Quality minatures are of equal worth irrespective of what material they are made from...)(Kirby)
Oddly enough , after increasing white metal minature prices , due to raw material cost increases.GW plc charged the same price for plastic minatures replacing them .

As the ROW embargo and finecrapexcuses of MR Wells are still fresh in people memory Ill not repeat them.

Leaving the 'Lala land of GW plc think'. behind.

Can any one name a game developer that openly declares ' my rules dont realy matter at all.'
And is ok about people not bothering to play the game they are developing?

And any company that switches to plastic manufacture, (which is set up for the economies of scale , high vloume low return per unit.)
And then restricts sales by charging the same price as the low cost low volume production?

GW plc IS a niche company in a niche market.

It is a company in the table top minatures game market.(Niche market)
But what sets it apart is its run to make its chairman as rich as possible before he retires.
And that truly is a niche in the table top games market GW has total monopoly over.

here, here

Lanrak wrote:Hi folks...
Here is a quick over view of my GW experiance.(Interjected with fiscal comentary.)

In the beginning, GW was a collection of FLGS that sold a variety of products under one banner.
Then they sold just hier own games and minature ranges (Citadel &Marauder.)

.....................

Sorry mate I think GW started slightly differantly.

GW begun as a couple of blokes playing rpgs in Hammersmith then wondering why they couldn't get these cool new D&D books easily in the UK. They then started a magazine (OWL & somthing? which then became White Dwarf) about rpgs and distributed it to their mates and others.

They then opened a shop selling and distributing games. They came into contact with the Chaps who started Citadel who had started making figures for use in D&D and started to sell and distribute them as well

They then went to Gencon, meet with the leading lights in the Games Industry and secured the rights to distrubuting D&D and others in Europe while simultainously getting deals with the Yanks to start selling Citadel minitures in the US (I know, horrible money grabbing business people right!).

Eventually they start Warhammer so that there is a battle game ruleset to use all those citadel miniture armies with rather than the clumsy D&D rules. So it would appear that GW have been trying to sell more toys since about 1981 with the use of rules.

Then I mostly agree but;

You suggest that if GW performed well they would have had a turnover of nearly a billion pounds? Curiously I heard on the news this morning that the British Toy industry is worth approximately £2.5Billion. I can invisage no reality where wargaming would represent over a third of the Brtish Toy market. None the less GW are a Toy manufacturer (I know it hurts doesn't it) and Toys are mostly sold to children.

Also to suggest that GW has a total monopoly is incorrect. They do not even have a virtual monopoly, its a global market baby!

Finally GW is run for the Benefit of its shareholders, the chairman/CEO are rightly shareholders. Who would invest in a company where the headman is not willing to invest his own money where his mouth is.

notprop wrote:

You suggest that if GW performed well they would have had a turnover of nearly a billion pounds? Curiously I heard on the news this morning that the British Toy industry is worth approximately £2.5Billion. I can invisage no reality where wargaming would represent over a third of the Brtish Toy market. None the less GW are a Toy manufacturer (I know it hurts doesn't it) and Toys are mostly sold to children.

Isn't a billion in the UK a million million, not a thousand million as the US term it? Or am I getting confused here?

There has traditionally been two "big" statements from GW that people have felt very strongly about;

1. "GW is a model making company first. The rules are there to get people to buy models"

and

2. "Warhammer is not a competitive game. It is an enjoyable way to spend a few hours, and the rules are balanced with that in mind"


These two always elicit a strong response from the gamers.
All yelling and complaining aside, those two have been part of the core values of GW for a loooong time.

filbert wrote:

notprop wrote:

You suggest that if GW performed well they would have had a turnover of nearly a billion pounds? Curiously I heard on the news this morning that the British Toy industry is worth approximately £2.5Billion. I can invisage no reality where wargaming would represent over a third of the Brtish Toy market. None the less GW are a Toy manufacturer (I know it hurts doesn't it) and Toys are mostly sold to children.

Isn't a billion in the UK a million million, not a thousand million as the US term it? Or am I getting confused here?

A bllion is a thousand million, no matter how many Americans get it wrong, though I suspect that they don't.

notprop wrote:

filbert wrote:

notprop wrote:

You suggest that if GW performed well they would have had a turnover of nearly a billion pounds? Curiously I heard on the news this morning that the British Toy industry is worth approximately £2.5Billion. I can invisage no reality where wargaming would represent over a third of the Brtish Toy market. None the less GW are a Toy manufacturer (I know it hurts doesn't it) and Toys are mostly sold to children.

Isn't a billion in the UK a million million, not a thousand million as the US term it? Or am I getting confused here?

A bllion is a thousand million, no matter how many Americans get it wrong, though I suspect that they don't.

I think you may be getting muddled here, notprop. In UK English, a billion is a million million. It is the Americans that call a billion a thousand million.

But it is a moot point anyway, because I think we have officially adopted the American 'version'...

filbert wrote:But it is a moot point anyway, because I think we have officially adopted the American 'version'...

Yes we have, the 'billion is a million million' is defunct, otherwise a billion pounds would be an absurd amount of money.

We should all agree on things like this and not have another cock up like the groups of scientists who crashed a Mars space probe because they didn't realise they separately working in metric and imperial...

Howard A Treesong wrote:

filbert wrote:But it is a moot point anyway, because I think we have officially adopted the American 'version'...

Yes we have, the 'billion is a million million' is defunct, otherwise a billion pounds would be an absurd amount of money.

We should all agree on things like this and not have another cock up like the groups of scientists who crashed a Mars space probe because they didn't realise they separately working in metric and imperial...

It would be much easier if people did things our way, ie the correct way, and not try to confuse things like spelling colour without a 'u' and so forth

Quite the colorful use of language there filbert

Why waste those vowels, haven't you ever played scrabble before?!

I feel sort of scammed by this thread and the thread of GW catchphrases. The nearest GW store is in Chicago (8 hour drive or so), so I've never been in one.

It could be worse, you could have been to a GW and been scammed by one of the Redshirts.

"More Stomper with that pot of paint sir?"

filbert wrote:

Howard A Treesong wrote:

filbert wrote:But it is a moot point anyway, because I think we have officially adopted the American 'version'...

Yes we have, the 'billion is a million million' is defunct, otherwise a billion pounds would be an absurd amount of money.

We should all agree on things like this and not have another cock up like the groups of scientists who crashed a Mars space probe because they didn't realise they separately working in metric and imperial...

It would be much easier if people did things our way, ie the correct way, and not try to confuse things like spelling colour without a 'u' and so forth

Agreeded, things like armour and colourful look and sound much better with the U in it. =o]

I also agree that GW “used to be a games company”. I remember when I started out in third they used to have wide variety of supported specialised games (like Mordheim and Inquisitor) that would also get White Dwarf bat reps as well. For core games, all faction rules would be maintained via White Dwarf errata and expansion books so generally all factions would be equal.

They ceased becoming a games company IMO around when 4th Edition started (which is when all the game devs left). Now they are just a miniatures company with some optional poorly maintained rules that you can purchase for tabletop games. Good thing that there are “games companies” out there like PP (who actually support their game).

Hi notprop.
If you read my post again, the first line IS quite important.

Here is a quick over view of MY GW EXPERIANCE.(Interjected with fiscal comentary.)
(Emphasis in capitals.)

As in when I started playing GW games 20 odd years ago , the company WAS a collection of FLGS .(I didnt have experiance of the company before that.I was writing about MY personal experiance of GW...)

I simply wanted to illustrate that , focusing on 'selling toy soldiers to children ' has had a negative effect on sales volumes.
And simply showed all the previous ratios in to days figures to illustrate how inaproprpiate this directive was.

When GW was at its most susessful it was doubling its turn over every 3 years.GW used to be this popular for a combinations of reasons.
ONLY one part of that was selling toy soldiers using strong asthetics.And taking that one part in isolation has been massivley detremental to the GW company and its customers.

I am aware GW may have hit a maximum market share at some point.(If we use 2005 as this value, GW should still be turning over in exess of £200m )

However, most companies work to maintain thier market lead.GW plc appears to be content with extracting more money from an ever shrinking customer base.

GW plc only has a 'monopoly' on running its buisness in this way:-
'.... its run to make its chairman as rich as possible before he retires.'
Sorry if that was not clear in my post.

Games Workshop should change its name to Citadel Minatures IMO, as this reflects its current focus more accuratley .

GW has always had a range of good quality minatures.
Its rules have always been more about narrative than competition.

However, GW used to spend far more time on game development and game support to deliver a better hobby experiance for gamers.

When you have a customer base mainly made up of gamers , its easier to interact with them in a meaninful way to improve the game.(Eg.Suggestions on a revised close combat resolution method.)

If your primary demoghraphic is mainly overstimulated, highly sugestible and fickel children. Meaningful dialouge with the customer base is a bit more difficult.(EG, Plazma Mareenz wiv laserbolt eys and plasma puke!!!!!!)

GW used to develop a wide range of games , to attract a wider range of gamers of all ages and levels of experiance.(Most sucessful period.)
Now GW plc appears content with just selling toy soldiers to children.(Least sucessful period.)

SilverMK2 wrote:

Flashman wrote:And yet strangely they feel compelled to charge vast sums of money for their rules and army books

Everything you know is a lie

Finecast is people.

DarkStarSabre wrote:

SilverMK2 wrote:

Flashman wrote:And yet strangely they feel compelled to charge vast sums of money for their rules and army books

Everything you know is a lie

Finecast is people.

Now is they actually said that it would actually increase fine cast sales. We all now how evil nerds are.

I'm reading this kinda chuckling. People.... GW is a COMPANY and companies are about making MONEY. They only sell you a new army book or rule book every 4-5 years so of course they don't make majority of their money from the game. Being that they sell more Models then anything else they can rightfully declare themselves a miniature company. Now that being said I understand that without WHFB, WH40K, and LOTRBSG they would have no reason to sell their product. I also agree that the GW hotline printed on the game books should have knowledge of game rules. However you should no be offended when a company that sells more models then game rules calls themselves a miniature company because it you look at their business plan that's what they are. Lets look at Video game companies.... most core video game companies make the majority of their money from console sales and they contract 3ed parties to produce software. However they still make games to make their console unique so people will buy it. They are still a console company before a developer company....they simply made the games to sell their hardware.

That's completely wrong. Modern video games consoles are sold at a massive loss. The money is made through licensing software out that plays on those consoles. Developers and/or their publishers (unless owned in part by the manufacturer (Sony / MS) pay a fortune for dev kits and licenses. Per project, the platform licensing is a significant chunk of a game's development cost.

Hi again.
GW plc is a minatures company and always has been.(A company set up to sell Citadel minatures.)
(This is the referning to the PLC not the old GW.)

I have had no problem with this fact EVER!

The most sucessful minatures companies , sell thier products at compatative prices in the open market.And /or add extra value to thie minatures by developing games to use them in.

The ones that drive minature sales through game development are generaly thought of as 'game companies.'
These companies focus on improving the game play and widening the appeal or thier game and customer base by doing so.

In this respect GW plc used to be a games company .

GW popularised the table top game hobby by improving the asthetic presentation of thier games.(Full colour artwork ,strong narative and themes.)
This COUPLED with focusing on improving game play in wide selection of games, resulted in the biggest period of growth for GW plc .(Doubling turn over every 3 years, up to 1997.)

Either aspect on its own would NOT have had such a positive effect on GW plc sucess.
(The talented studio staff drove the company from strenght to strenght.IMO.)

GW plc is a company and companies should be about making money now AND LONG TERM.
And you dont achive long term growth by simply targeting the easiest to please.As this shrinks the customer base , as opposed to growing it.

JUST focusing on the asthetic to hype the latest minature sales, only markets a small percentage of your product for a short period of time .
Imporving the game play , increases the value of ALL you products at the same time.