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The difference in price in eBooks is just silly. I wish GW would cut that gak out.

-Loki- wrote:... the only one in recent memory was the new Mortal Kombat, which I'm still stewing over...

Why? You can buy a copy almost any time you like. Pick your platform. I've had it since it came out. Great game.

If GW products are expensive in Australia, how expensive must they be in New Zealand O_o

In New Zealand they just play 40k on a macro scale using sheep as proxies.

inquisitorlewis wrote:Yet unemployment is at 8.3 percent in the USA, and at 5.2 in Aus. Maybe our design is slightly flawed.

Do not presume to understand the economy in simple ways. It's not simple at all.

ph34r wrote:

inquisitorlewis wrote:Yet unemployment is at 8.3 percent in the USA, and at 5.2 in Aus. Maybe our design is slightly flawed.

Do not presume to understand the economy in simple ways. It's not simple at all.

True enough. It is way over my head. I do tend to think that higher prices (in aus) are do to higher minimum wages though.

Probably because it's a death world that also hates anything attempts to excel.

There are various reasons why thing cost more in Australia including the amount of things you need to import, the distance to import it, and the size of the country, all of which increases distribution costs.

Some if it is simply due to inertia in the pricing as Mr. Gonads pointed out a few posts ago.

The way to bring prices down is to stop buying things.

inquisitorlewis wrote:

ph34r wrote:

inquisitorlewis wrote:Yet unemployment is at 8.3 percent in the USA, and at 5.2 in Aus. Maybe our design is slightly flawed.

Do not presume to understand the economy in simple ways. It's not simple at all.

True enough. It is way over my head. I do tend to think that higher prices (in aus) are do to higher minimum wages though.

I agree. It's an unpopular opinion but I believe the "suffering" of AUS 40k players is overblown. The minimum wage was higher than in the US before their currency increased in value, and it is double that of the US in equivalent currency now. The average wage follows similarly. General costs of living are also higher compared to the US. As someone that lives in a rather expensive area of California, I am in a similar situation of housing etc. being disproportionately expensive. Everyone in Australia makes more money, and everything costs more money. The fact that 40k is more expensive is in much more in line with every other aspect of costs in Australia, than Australians like to say. Australians seem upset because as their currency increased in value, 40k did not get relatively less expensive.

ph34r wrote: Everyone in Australia makes more money, and everything costs more money. The fact that 40k is more expensive is in much more in line with every other aspect of costs in Australia, than Australians like to say. Australians seem upset because as their currency increased in value, 40k did not get relatively less expensive.

Keep in mind that the focus in discussions here tends to be about 40K, because discussions here are generally about wargaming, and 40K more specifically.

It's not just 40K that has people here getting cranky, though... As the Oz dollar increased in value and prices stayed the same, more and more people have been turning to overseas alternatives. The afore-mentioned Borders example is a good one. The retail book market over here is struggling, because while we've always paid twice as much as the rest of the world for books and people accepted that while the dollar was low, people are finally realising that there are alternatives to paying full OZ retail price. Borders complained bitterly about being driven out of business by internet discounters... but really, it was just their chosen business model (keep increasing prices on imported product while the dollar continues to increase in value) that did them in. People aren't going to pay $80 to $100 for a hardcover when they can get it for $30 (around the same price as an average paperback these days) directly from the US.

To be fair to borders, the Australian book industry is restricted by legislation that requires overseas books to be reprinted in Australia, I assume to keep our publishing industry going, but has had the effect of artificially keeping prices high and putting retailers out of business.
There was a review of it, in which the govt decided to continue with the current laws only a few weeks before borders and their other bookstores in the RED group failed.
It should also be noted that borders in Oz was not owned by borders US that went bust at the same time. RED group had bought the name rights but worked on an almost identical model at the US.

I think your minimum wage needs to be sorted out or you australians need to stop complaining. In the UK a GW redcoat gets near minimum wage. Considering the Australian minimum wage is nearly double that of the UKs it's no wonder GW stores charge higher for their goods. Book shops would be a similar scenario.

our minimum wage maybe higher, but thats because our government wants us to pay more tax so they can say '' we are now the only western country that is not in debt!'' however wayne swan - minister of finance loves the fact that we will pay more as the shops are telling us to, since the shops usually have to be registered for gst as long as they make more then 75,000.00 a year - more gst means more money for the government and as long as they can do that the government won't change

yes we have an import tax it sucks - we are lead to believe that buying Australian made is better as it's going to cost more rather then have something made well from overseas.

In short we are having to pay more as shops want more money - cuz everyone wants more money even the government and no one will stop it as making money is great!

for more information about business tax pm me

If your minimum wage is only higher so you can pay more tax then it's effectively just a tax on employers and again it's no wonder you pay higher prices for things.

i give you 16.00 i tax you 30 cents to the dollar over the first 6 thousand you make then the rest you have you then need to pay rent ( which is very high) food ( which is also high) bills ect

kevlar'o wrote:i give you 16.00 i tax you 30 cents to the dollar over the first 6 thousand you make then the rest you have you then need to pay rent ( which is very high) food ( which is also high) bills ect

Right so if employers are being forced to pay employees at a high minimum just for that wage to be ridiculously taxed then it's effectively just a tax on employers isn't it.

Why is Australia despised by everything?

Because its full of Australians of course! (just kidding cobbers)

Please note, under New Zealand Law I am required to take cheap shots at Aussies whenever the opportunity presents itself. Anything less is considered treason.

(Don't mention the rugby...)

So given these responses by our Aussi members, is is reasonable to say that GW's prices in Australia are for at least a large part a symptom of a bad system, and not entirely based on GW money-grubbing maliciousness?

ph34r wrote:So given these responses by our Aussi members, is is reasonable to say that GW's prices in Australia are for at least a large part a symptom of a bad system, and not entirely based on GW money-grubbing maliciousness?

The system is partly to blame.

However, retailers using a falling dollar as an excuse to raise prices, but not subsequently lowering them when the dollar goes up are just as much to blame. And that's been GW's modus operandi for decades... it's just amplified now by the fact that the dollar has gone up so far this time around.

And none of it explains the Black Library charging more for eBooks downloaded from a UK website based on the customers location.

Gordy2000 wrote:
Please note, under New Zealand Law I am required to take cheap shots at Aussies whenever the opportunity presents itself. Anything less is considered treason.

From what I understand, even such Australian cultural icons like the Pavlova dessert were actually invented in New Zealand.

Despite all the import taxes and the cost of shipping around the world, something is wrong with your local prices if you can buy the product at full retail in the country of origin and ship them one at a time and come in under the wholesale price in Australia. GW's solution? Some sort of price parity? Nope. Embargo with trade policies.

I’m no economist but these are the general reasons I see causing it, I’m sure much more depth could be added to people in the know.

- We have nearly triple the average income of America (was roughly 70k to 25k last I checked, might be a bit outdated now) and a higher minimum wage, its good business sense to charge more if people earn more. As an Island consumers are willing to pay that cost because it's harder to find the products from a neighboring country which would be the case in Europe. Online shopping is starting to counter this, which is a hot topic among Australian retailers at the moment as it's putting them out of business (consumers don’t pay GST on purchases from overseas here, which is disgraceful).

- Shipping costs, Company will offload any costs to the consumer. Shipping and transporting the goods around Australia adds up. We live in a big country with little in the way of Rail Freight, everything goes long distance by Truck.

- The size of Australia, On average each individual shop serves a smaller portion of the population as we have quite a low population density (i.e. For each square KM there are less people). This doesn't exactly mean each store makes less money (although it probably is the case) it just means there are less potential customers for each store and are less likely to see the turnover of an overseas store.

I don’t purchase any of the digital content other people have mentioned but I could see the first point I made increasing prices slightly. Someone else might be able to enlighten us on the reasons behind those increases.

Anyway it’s a really interesting topic. I’d love to hear in depth from some people who know what the situation is and what causes it.

The "wages are higher!" argument is a dreadfully simplistic and fallacious way of looking at this. For it to be true - in relation to GW prices - it would also have to be true of all the other countries in the world that are paying twice that of US/UK prices (so everywhere from Japan to Brazil).

They had Ned Kelly and the rest of the world did not

insaniak wrote:And none of it explains the Black Library charging more for eBooks downloaded from a UK website based on the customers location.

I didn't believe this, had to go check it out for myself. Yikes. The bizzare price down the random cents was the giveaway. What a joke.

frozenwastes wrote:From what I understand, even such Australian cultural icons like the Pavlova dessert were actually invented in New Zealand.

We're more than happy to claim anythng good from New Zealand as Australian. Russel Crowe (when he's on the up), Cate Blanchett, Toi Toi sparkling win (found in the Australian section at Dan Murphys the other day)... all practically Australian.

Despite all the import taxes and the cost of shipping around the world, something is wrong with your local prices if you can buy the product at full retail in the country of origin and ship them one at a time and come in under the wholesale price in Australia.

To be fair, part of that is down to how the import tariffs are set up. We don't pay customs duties or taxes on imports under $1000... but when they do kick in, they're fairly hefty. So GW, for example, has to pay those duties on everything they import, where somebody buying a battleforce from the US on eBay does not.

vossyvo wrote:(consumers don’t pay GST on purchases from overseas here, which is disgraceful).

Walter Harvey threw that up as an argument as well (calling it 'un-Australian'... How many Australian-made TV's do you have in your stores, Mr Harvey?).... the thing is, I would have absolutely no problem with paying GST on imports. When you're getting the product for 50% of local retail, slapping a 10% GST on it isn't really that much of a deterrent...

insaniak wrote:
However, retailers using a falling dollar as an excuse to raise prices, but not subsequently lowering them when the dollar goes up are just as much to blame. And that's been GW's modus operandi for decades

And every other business since the dawn of time.

GW hates venomous spiders.

Australia is, comparatively to many other countries, really quite well off. Inflation has been a bit of an issue a few years back and despite it still being 'difficult' to get by for a lot of people - our wages are higher than a lot of other countries. This translates to higher prices for pretty much everything.

Our country's retail sector is going down the tube as of recent times as people are buying online and overseas where they can escape the jacked up prices where their dollar goes further.

This reminds me of when I lived in Florida. We had more Brit tourists than you could shake a stick at, because the strength of the GBPound vs the USDollar. Same thing with the Germans. They could vacation in the US for less than half of the cost of a comparable holiday in Europe. Ibiza suffered because the bang for the buck was better in Florida.

From what I understand a similar thing is happening with online international retailers in Oz. More bang for the buck as the brick and mortar retailer have to raise prices to compensate for the GST and the wages.

I see no easy solution, honestly, short of turning over the government next election.

Or the rest of the world is paying you back for Yahoo Serious.

treadhead1944 wrote:...as the brick and mortar retailer have to raise prices to compensate for the GST and the wages.

GST has been in place since 2000. At that point, the Oz dollar was tracking around 65c US. GST hasn't changed in that time... but the OZ dollar has risen to slightly more than a dollar US.

Wages most definitely haven't increased by anywhere near 80% in that time.

In a country that imports pretty much everything, but where retailers are screaming that they're struggling to break even, something doesn't add up.

And for all Mr. Havey's wind-blowing, he did eventually set up an overseas ordering system to get stuff from his stores in Ireland. In other words he did what so many have failed to do - he adapted to the market.