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That's assuming everyone paints their stuff...

Me, I'll buy kits I like the look of. But halving the price still isn't going to double my spending. I'm just as likely to spend the saved money elsewhere. Probably in the pub.

when customers say they don't buy GW minis because of the rules, you believe them. When they say they don't buy GW because of the prices, you don't? Let's not kid ourselves that the majority of purchases from GW are immediately assembled, painted, and then used in games. Customers with that kind of narrow focus and discipline were never going to keep GW profitable.

 Luciferian wrote:
People can only paint so many miniatures in any given amount of time. It can take months or years to finish an army, during which the player may not buy anything else at all. That in itself is a severe limiting factor in volume sales for a company like GW.

Yeah... about that... *looks at his grey pile of shame*

I think I missed that class in "Hobby 101"

I know, I do it too. At the moment I have about three armies worth of stuff and none of them are 100% finished. Still, unless you're really compulsive there's a point where you'll stop making purchases, or at least slow down to only buying a kit here and there when it really strikes you.

Yeah, the moment I droped 300€ in 5 minutes with the release of 8th, after buying two weeks before Deatwatch: Overkill, the Triunvirate of the Imperium and two Start Collectings, was the point I said "Ok, maybe this is enough for 2017"

 Bi'ios wrote:

Lanrak wrote:

Would GW plc sell more product to more people if the current retail prices were half what they are now?

Not likely, as everyone in the “hobby” is already aware of GW. But for the sake of arguement, let’s say they do sell more product to more people. Do you realistically think that they’ll OVER DOUBLE their sales? Because they’d have to do that to break even with where they are now.

Actually, they'd need to sell a lot more than double. Double would get their turnover back to the same but not their profit.

Lets say (just for easy maths) that they make 75% profit. If you reduce the price of something from $10 to $5 then you've gone from making $7.50 profit to $2.50 profit. You've got to sell three times as much.

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Bi'ios wrote:

Lanrak wrote:

Would GW plc sell more product to more people if the current retail prices were half what they are now?

Not likely, as everyone in the “hobby” is already aware of GW. But for the sake of arguement, let’s say they do sell more product to more people. Do you realistically think that they’ll OVER DOUBLE their sales? Because they’d have to do that to break even with where they are now.

Actually, they'd need to sell a lot more than double. Double would get their turnover back to the same but not their profit.

Lets say (just for easy maths) that they make 75% profit. If you reduce the price of something from $10 to $5 then you've gone from making $7.50 profit to $2.50 profit. You've got to sell three times as much.

Well you can't talk about profit without talking about expenses. The cost of actually producing their models is trivial in the grand scheme of things. Traditionally their biggest expense has always been their stores. Regardless of whether or not you lower prices, getting rid of their stores and trying to reestablish a good relationship with indies to carry their line and operate in their stead would go a long way to increasing profits.

 Torga_DW wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Bi'ios wrote:

Lanrak wrote:

Would GW plc sell more product to more people if the current retail prices were half what they are now?

Not likely, as everyone in the “hobby” is already aware of GW. But for the sake of arguement, let’s say they do sell more product to more people. Do you realistically think that they’ll OVER DOUBLE their sales? Because they’d have to do that to break even with where they are now.

Actually, they'd need to sell a lot more than double. Double would get their turnover back to the same but not their profit.

Lets say (just for easy maths) that they make 75% profit. If you reduce the price of something from $10 to $5 then you've gone from making $7.50 profit to $2.50 profit. You've got to sell three times as much.

Well you can't talk about profit without talking about expenses. The cost of actually producing their models is trivial in the grand scheme of things. Traditionally their biggest expense has always been their stores. Regardless of whether or not you lower prices, getting rid of their stores and trying to reestablish a good relationship with indies to carry their line and operate in their stead would go a long way to increasing profits.

It's not just the cost of making the sprues - machine time, operator costs, packaging, warehousing, transportation is all pretty substantial. Everyone always forgets machine time and that's not cheap at all.

Regardless - a fundamental point of economics is that halving the price for twice the sales will always result in reduced profits.

 Luciferian wrote:
People can only paint so many miniatures in any given amount of time. It can take months or years to finish an army, during which the player may not buy anything else at all. That in itself is a severe limiting factor in volume sales for a company like GW.

Not many people operate like that though. Just look at my sig and you can see my poor purchasing record, and I'm not nearly the worst I know.
"Minis painted since Jan 1st 2017: 39
Minis bought since Jan 1st 2017: 106"

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Torga_DW wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Bi'ios wrote:

Lanrak wrote:

Would GW plc sell more product to more people if the current retail prices were half what they are now?

Not likely, as everyone in the “hobby” is already aware of GW. But for the sake of arguement, let’s say they do sell more product to more people. Do you realistically think that they’ll OVER DOUBLE their sales? Because they’d have to do that to break even with where they are now.

Actually, they'd need to sell a lot more than double. Double would get their turnover back to the same but not their profit.

Lets say (just for easy maths) that they make 75% profit. If you reduce the price of something from $10 to $5 then you've gone from making $7.50 profit to $2.50 profit. You've got to sell three times as much.

Well you can't talk about profit without talking about expenses. The cost of actually producing their models is trivial in the grand scheme of things. Traditionally their biggest expense has always been their stores. Regardless of whether or not you lower prices, getting rid of their stores and trying to reestablish a good relationship with indies to carry their line and operate in their stead would go a long way to increasing profits.

It's not just the cost of making the sprues - machine time, operator costs, packaging, warehousing, transportation is all pretty substantial. Everyone always forgets machine time and that's not cheap at all.

Regardless - a fundamental point of economics is that halving the price for twice the sales will always result in reduced profits.

To save too much back and forth on this, their cost of sales (the cost of designing and producing their products) has hovered between 20-25% of their turnover for the last several years (since they included the cost of design in the figure.) So the cost of a kit is roughly 23% of the RRP ex sales tax.

The difference between their gross and net profit is significant, but that's not unusual, and the low cost of sprues is why I've often advocated for including more content in their kits over cutting prices, as the impact on profit is minimised but the value to their customer disproportionately increased.

That would be acceptable. The Getting Tsarted boxes operate on this principle, and they seem popular.

 Azreal13 wrote:

To save too much back and forth on this, their cost of sales (the cost of designing and producing their products) has hovered between 20-25% of their turnover for the last several years (since they included the cost of design in the figure.) So the cost of a kit is roughly 23% of the RRP ex sales tax.

The difference between their gross and net profit is significant, but that's not unusual, and the low cost of sprues is why I've often advocated for including more content in their kits over cutting prices, as the impact on profit is minimised but the value to their customer disproportionately increased.

Exactly so (I didn't pick the figure of 75% at random). Additionally, bumping content in the boxes or repacking into bigger sets avoids the perception of weakness on the part of investors/shareholders that would go with slashing prices.

 Azreal13 wrote:


To save too much back and forth on this, their cost of sales (the cost of designing and producing their products) has hovered between 20-25% of their turnover for the last several years (since they included the cost of design in the figure.) So the cost of a kit is roughly 23% of the RRP ex sales tax.

Anyone know how much they charge stockists, or what percentage of their sales are to independent retailers?

 Azreal13 wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Torga_DW wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Bi'ios wrote:

Lanrak wrote:

Would GW plc sell more product to more people if the current retail prices were half what they are now?

Not likely, as everyone in the “hobby” is already aware of GW. But for the sake of arguement, let’s say they do sell more product to more people. Do you realistically think that they’ll OVER DOUBLE their sales? Because they’d have to do that to break even with where they are now.

Actually, they'd need to sell a lot more than double. Double would get their turnover back to the same but not their profit.

Lets say (just for easy maths) that they make 75% profit. If you reduce the price of something from $10 to $5 then you've gone from making $7.50 profit to $2.50 profit. You've got to sell three times as much.

Well you can't talk about profit without talking about expenses. The cost of actually producing their models is trivial in the grand scheme of things. Traditionally their biggest expense has always been their stores. Regardless of whether or not you lower prices, getting rid of their stores and trying to reestablish a good relationship with indies to carry their line and operate in their stead would go a long way to increasing profits.

It's not just the cost of making the sprues - machine time, operator costs, packaging, warehousing, transportation is all pretty substantial. Everyone always forgets machine time and that's not cheap at all.

Regardless - a fundamental point of economics is that halving the price for twice the sales will always result in reduced profits.

To save too much back and forth on this, their cost of sales (the cost of designing and producing their products) has hovered between 20-25% of their turnover for the last several years (since they included the cost of design in the figure.) So the cost of a kit is roughly 23% of the RRP ex sales tax.

The difference between their gross and net profit is significant, but that's not unusual, and the low cost of sprues is why I've often advocated for including more content in their kits over cutting prices, as the impact on profit is minimised but the value to their customer disproportionately increased.

Talking about individual kits, yes. But when the Tactical boxs brings you 20 tacticals instead of 10, you are effectively halfing the purchases a player needs to do from you. One can talk about how the incrementation in sales and in players could help with that, but theres too things to have in account about puting more content in every box. (Obviously I'll love to see the number of models per box increased, I'm playing devil's avocado here)

 Luciferian wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:


To save too much back and forth on this, their cost of sales (the cost of designing and producing their products) has hovered between 20-25% of their turnover for the last several years (since they included the cost of design in the figure.) So the cost of a kit is roughly 23% of the RRP ex sales tax.

Anyone know how much they charge stockists, or what percentage of their sales are to independent retailers?

I think there may have been a small swing recently, but historically (i.e. the last 5 years or so) it's been roughly 40/40/20 GW stores/Indys/GW Online (incl FW and BL.) With slightly more cash coming from Indys than GW stores as a rule.

There's a couple of tiers of discount, I believe, but 60% of RRP is generally considered the norm (before VAT, so a £100 box would be £80 ex VAT, selling at wholesale at ~£48.

I'd love to see the market research that suggests GW customers buy exactly the number of marines they need for their forces, and not one box more.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I'd love to see the market research that suggests GW customers buy exactly the number of marines they need for their forces, and not one box more.

The reality is the same. If a player want 100 marines, he can buy 10 boxes of 10, or 5 of 20. One can discuss the fact that probably, if the boxes where 20-man boxes for the same price of 10-man boxes, he'll probably buy more than 100. But again isn't certain that doubling the content of you boxes will end with more profits.

But you are right, seeing the typical GW customer (Myself included ), that show no type of restrain, or keeps it at a minimun, probably that move would end with people having much biggers gray piles of shame, and more money for GW.

 Galas wrote:

Spoiler:

 Azreal13 wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Torga_DW wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Bi'ios wrote:

Lanrak wrote:

Would GW plc sell more product to more people if the current retail prices were half what they are now?

Not likely, as everyone in the “hobby” is already aware of GW. But for the sake of arguement, let’s say they do sell more product to more people. Do you realistically think that they’ll OVER DOUBLE their sales? Because they’d have to do that to break even with where they are now.

Actually, they'd need to sell a lot more than double. Double would get their turnover back to the same but not their profit.

Lets say (just for easy maths) that they make 75% profit. If you reduce the price of something from $10 to $5 then you've gone from making $7.50 profit to $2.50 profit. You've got to sell three times as much.

Well you can't talk about profit without talking about expenses. The cost of actually producing their models is trivial in the grand scheme of things. Traditionally their biggest expense has always been their stores. Regardless of whether or not you lower prices, getting rid of their stores and trying to reestablish a good relationship with indies to carry their line and operate in their stead would go a long way to increasing profits.

It's not just the cost of making the sprues - machine time, operator costs, packaging, warehousing, transportation is all pretty substantial. Everyone always forgets machine time and that's not cheap at all.

Regardless - a fundamental point of economics is that halving the price for twice the sales will always result in reduced profits.

To save too much back and forth on this, their cost of sales (the cost of designing and producing their products) has hovered between 20-25% of their turnover for the last several years (since they included the cost of design in the figure.) So the cost of a kit is roughly 23% of the RRP ex sales tax.

The difference between their gross and net profit is significant, but that's not unusual, and the low cost of sprues is why I've often advocated for including more content in their kits over cutting prices, as the impact on profit is minimised but the value to their customer disproportionately increased.

Talking about individual kits, yes. But when the Tactical boxs brings you 20 tacticals instead of 10, you are effectively halfing the purchases a player needs to do from you. One can talk about how the incrementation in sales and in players could help with that, but theres too things to have in account about puting more content in every box. (Obviously I'll love to see the number of models per box increased, I'm playing devil's avocado here)

If you're going to be literal about it, yes. But what about a box that still had 10 Marines but had a sprue of heavy and special weapons? Or Chapter icnonography? (In fact I think they've done that one?)

You'd probably have to go through each kit almost on a case by case basis, but I'm sure there's ways of offering the customer more while maintaining the prices and minimising the cost increase on most.

Oh yeah, that probably will work. And they have done that yes, like the limited run of boxes with a basic squad+Transport+Chapter Sprue for Dark Angels. GW should do more boxes like that, yeah, they make the separated boxes nearly obsolete. But just like SC!, they are great ways to increase volume of sales and make the game more accesible for new-comers.

 Galas wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I'd love to see the market research that suggests GW customers buy exactly the number of marines they need for their forces, and not one box more.

The reality is the same. If a player want 100 marines, he can buy 10 boxes of 10, or 5 of 20. One can discuss the fact that probably, if the boxes where 20-man boxes for the same price of 10-man boxes, he'll probably buy more than 100. But again isn't certain that doubling the content of you boxes will end with more profits.

But you are right, seeing the typical GW customer (Myself included ), that show no type of restrain, or keeps it at a minimun, probably that move would end with people having much biggers gray piles of shame, and more money for GW.

That doesn't address all of the former- and never-customers who would buy 100 marines instead of zero if they saw the value in the boxes. The prices are a barrier to entry--if you lower the barrier, you'd have more entrants.

I have never arguee about that point. I'm pretty convinced that you are right.

Besides, how many players would love to start another army (100 more minis!), but don't because the first 100 marines were so financially painful.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Galas wrote:
I have never arguee about that point. I'm pretty convinced that you are right.

Oh. Okay then.

The question is, exactly what difference lowering prices would make to potential customers. 50% prices means they have to sell over (over) twice the models to make the same profit. And we're assuming that won't happen. Okay. Somewhere in between (say a 25% reduction bringing in twice the customers) is the ideal sweet spot where they can maximize sales v profit. While it's a potential gamble (especially without any market research), the possibility still exists. Still, every new release is more expensive than the last.

edit: typo

@Torga_DW.
If GW had not retained the high cost of B&M stores ,but used more cost effective marketing.(Internet sales and better rules .)
They would not have to use over half their gross profits to pay for this old fashioned and inefficient sales option.
Which would have allowed for lower prices without loosing gross profits.

The only way to add perceived value without dropping retail prices now would be .
A) Increase the quantity of plastic sprues in the boxes.
B)Write well defined rules that deliver the expected game play in an elegant and efficient way.

@Azreal13.
My argument has been GW plc may have got better at selling stuff to 'GW collectors'.But they appear have done very little to appeal to potential customers outside this narrow demographic.
This is why I am using the 'old arguments', as I believe they are still valid.

What radical changes has GW plc made to appeal to potential customers out side this core demographic of GW collectors?
I genuinely may have missed somthing.

Can you offer anything at all to back up your assertion they only appeal to 'GW Collectors'?

You'll also need to define 'GW Collectors', as surely anyone who buys their stuff is a GW Collector?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Can you offer anything at all to back up your assertion they only appeal to 'GW Collectors'?

You'll also need to define 'GW Collectors', as surely anyone who buys their stuff is a GW Collector?

Compared to the wider wargaming community, or the even wider community as a whole? Let's be honest here - gw is a niche of a niche.

When he says GW collectors, i assume he means people who buy gw games and nothing else in regards to the greater ttmg hobby.

Well this is why I'm asking him.

He's made some assertions, but hasn't explained or defined them, and certainly hasn't offered any evidence to support.

Like more business minded posters have said across the board global prices cuts are a risky spin of the wheel but what if GW restarted limited time sales, maybe 20%/30% with Ltd Edition freebys for certain spends, maybe limited to GW stores, as Steam has proved people are suckers for the Anchor effect, and if it unduly messed with the money flow don't do it again

Steam is also a very different market.

GW only sell GW goods. Steam sells all sorts of computer games, but nothing that's an actual physical product.

It would be nice if GW did the occasional sale, but I for one will take permanently discounted boxed sets over splash sales. Missing a sale due to lack of cash is a pain in the arse. But stuff like Start Collecting remains a relative bargain, one I can plan to purchase and pick up when I've got the spare money.

Of course, GW do on occasion offer splash savings, particularly around Chrimbo. One that springs immediately to mind are the two Mechanicus ones. One gave Robots and Heavy Servitors for a discount, the other a bit of everything.

Now there, I count myself lucky as I get part of my annual bonus at the end of November, so I'm usually quite well placed to pick those up. But if I miss them? Not so good.

Only thing I'd like them to sort out is the contents of the Start Collecting. Some are the sort you want two or three of, others not so much. Some armies (Undead particularly stick in mind) have multiple boxes, all of which are useful building blocks.

Just even that out, and I'd be a happy camper.

it was more the point about the anchoring effect, Steam just sprung to mind due to my personal Steam library packed with Sale games that ive never even downloaded let alone played...(and like many gamers my mini backlog is equally bad)