Hobby Centre birthdays...

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**reds8n**

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/content/article.jsp?aId=15500017a

Starting this year, each Games Workshop Hobby Center in the UK will be hosting a Birthday Party to celebrate the founding of their location.

Each party will feature a host of exciting gaming and hobby activities, with a variety of special limited edition items such as water bottles, wallets with key chains, and posters, only available at these events.

And that's not all. Over the coming months we'll add more dates to the list below as they are confirmed. In the meantime, stop by your local Hobby Centre to see what they have planned for their Hobby Centre Birthday Party!

... seems this is Uk only then...

.... which must be news for GW Den Haag perhaps.

**SilverMK2**

I need a new wallet, but if I have to assemble and paint it I am not interested

**TBD**

reds8n wrote:... seems this is Uk only then...

.... which must be news for GW Den Haag perhaps.

GW Den Haag (my local one) has been doing this for years.

For every 9,- you spend you get a lottery ticket currently, and on the birth-day they hand out a lot of prizes, including expensive ones too. There was quite a big crowd last (accompanied by the usual smell, unfortunately).

**BrookM**

Amsterdam store does (did?) likewise with the tickets, but you don't get one until you spend €15,- however the prices given out were never anything less than a battle force or battalion boxed set.

**Da_Viking**

Have been to a few of these in the Toronto Area. Usually a special game is being played.

This year was bring 1 unit and everyone versus the Titan. Whoever killed the titan won a prized. There was also HeroHammer where you bring 1 fully kitted lord or hero choice and it was a free for all. Special rule no magic phase.

And from what I have seen these Birthday Parties have been going on in North Amerca for a few years now.

**Commander Endova**

Yeah. They do do them in the US, though unfortunately they only tend to have posters and pens for prizes.

**BrassScorpion**

... seems this is Uk only then...

Seems for once we had something cool in the US ahead of the UK instead of the usual other way around. They've been doing this for several years now already in the US. It's alternately called "store birthdays" and "Celebrate The Day" events. There has been all kinds of great special merchandise over the years, from dice with Chaos Stars to Warhammer logo water bottles and thermos cups, posters, Krak Grenade Keychains, dog tags, and Chaos and Inquisition logo pens. With so many hobby centers in Maryland we've been lucky enough to collect all the special items we wanted. My son and I both have dice collections full of the Chaos Star dice.

If you're on the US site go to this link for info on Hobby Center Birthdays: http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/content/article.jsp?aId=7800010a

Here's a picture of some of the special merchandise they are currently using in the US.

And here's the schedule of upcoming events through June. Check the website again after that for the next list of events to follow. I never miss the one at Jennifer Square since they started this a few years ago. This is the fourth annual store birthday event there coming up in May if I recall correctly.

Throughout the coming months, each Games Workshop Hobby Center and Battle Bunker will be hosting a Birthday Party to celebrate the founding of their location.

Each party will feature gaming, prizes and a variety of limited edition items available only at these events such as water bottles, key chains, pens, and posters. ITEMS MAY VARY, so stop by your event to see what's available!

DATES AND LOCATIONS

FEBRUARY 19th
White Oaks Mall - London, ON
Geneva Commons - Geneva, IL
Tacoma Place - Tacoma, WA

FEBRUARY 26th
Forest Plaza - Rockford, IL
Sunrise Village - Puyallup, WA

MARCH 5th
Victoria - Victoria, BC

MARCH 12th
Oakridge Mall - San Jose, CA
Kent Station - Kent, WA

MARCH 19th
Square One - Mississauga, ON

April 2nd
The Gateway at Mnt Village - Ontario, CA
Hampton Village - Rochester Hills, MI

April 9th
Morningside Plaza - Fullerton, CA
Bloomingdale - Bloomingdale, IL
Fair Oaks Mall - Fairfax, VA

April 16th
Empire Shopping Center - Antioch, CA
Ventura Village - Ventura, CA
Memphis Factory Store - Memphis, TN
Springfield Plaza - Springfield, VA

April 30th
Central Avenue - Glendale, CA
Deer Grove - Palatine, IL
Gig Harbor - Gig Harbor, WA

May 14th
Park Royal Shopping Centre - West Vancouver, BC
Coles Crossing - Cypress, TX

May 21st
Yonge and Lawrence - Toronto, ON
Royal Oaks - Houston, TX

May 28th
Jennifer Square - Annapolis, MD
Carkeek Plaza - Seattle, WA

June 4th
Park Plaza - San Pedro, CA
Lake Shore - Pasadena, MD
Halifax Shopping Centre - Halifax, NS
Copperwood Village - Houston, TX

June 11th
Larwin Square - Tustin, CA
Oak Park - Oak Park, IL
Echelon Village - Voorhees, NJ
Montreal-EC - Montreal, QC
Market at Towncenter - Sugar Land, TX

June 25th
Chinook Centre - Calgary, AB
Portola Plaza - Mission Viejo, CA
Naperville - Naperville, IL
Bayshore Shopping Centre - Nepean, ON
Preston Ridge - Frisco, TX

**Necros**

will they at least be serving punch & pie?

**BrassScorpion**

Necros wrote:will they at least be serving punch & pie?

Every store does there's a little differently. I have been to store events where there was cake or cookies. With the slimmer budget on events at GW stores these days I wouldn't go in expecting it, but you never know. I've been to many of these events over the years at several different stores and it's always been fun a fun day regardless of how much or how little prize support there was. In the early days of these things, before prize support was slashed, they used to sometimes raffle off a store army or some old boxed sets. At the first one I ever attended a few years ago, I won a huge pile of Chaos Warriors stuff, both built and painted and new in box. These days, giveaways, if there are any, are much more modest.

**Redemption**

Cool, seems there's a GW opening in Breda next month. Instant birthday and close by! Yay!

**Howard A Treesong**

Bottle openers for a customer base largely too young to drink.

I'm only interested in limited ed miniatures not the other guff unfortunately.

**sourclams**

What's frustrating is that it only costs GW about $3.00 to make a plastic kit.

They probably spent $5-$10 on the custom water bottles.

Which would you rather have as a special prize: An aquila Nalgene bottle, or 2-3 plastic kits?

GW probably thinks they'd lose sales if they did something like that. Blaugh.

**sonofruss**

Howard A Treesong wrote:Bottle openers for a customer base largely too young to drink.

I'm only interested in limited ed miniatures not the other guff unfortunately.

They still make glass bottle soda.

**Absolutionis**

I'm amused that they're selling both chained-wallets and bottle openers. One appeals only to middle-schoolers and the other appeals to college-age-people.

**BrookM**

Redemption wrote:Cool, seems there's a GW opening in Breda next month. Instant birthday and close by! Yay!

One-man store sadly.

**Hans Chung-Otterson**

sourclams wrote:

Which would you rather have as a special prize: An aquila Nalgene bottle, or 2-3 plastic kits?

GW probably thinks they'd lose sales if they did something like that. Blaugh.

Sure they do. And they may be right. On the other hand...they may be wrong. What if you had a big Space Marine force or whatever, but then you win an Ork plastic kit? Sure you might sell it, but then again you might feel like putting it together, and then you get interested, and then you start to buy more Orks.

Eh, but probably not. Still, if they really want to give out good prizes, they should give out some minis. It's why we're all here, right?

But, on the third hand: which is rarer: That Aquila Nalgene, or that Space Marine Tactical Squad you might win?

I'D certainly save some money if I won the tac squad, but the nalgene is cooler. Err, in this hobby, perhaps "cool" isn't the right word, but it's more exciting!

**Redemption**

BrookM wrote:
Redemption wrote:Cool, seems there's a GW opening in Breda next month. Instant birthday and close by! Yay!
One-man store sadly.

Ah, something along the size of GW Rotterdam then? The only official GW store I've visited. At least, not before walking past it half a dozen times, that place is smaller than my bathroom.

Ah well, Breda's close by so I'll check it out at least once, and perhaps grab some snag while I'm there.

**BrassScorpion**

What's frustrating is that it only costs GW about $3.00 to make a plastic kit. They probably spent $5-$10 on the custom water bottles. Which would you rather have as a special prize: An aquila Nalgene bottle, or 2-3 plastic kits?

Everything is incorrect there.

First, the water bottles only cost the customers about $10 US, GW is paying nowhere near that for them.

The point of the limited edition merchandise is that it attracts people to these Store Birthday events when they otherwise might not come. It's a chance to buy something that is only available at these events. The special merchandise is manufactured by third parties, there's no production resources used by GW other than marketing department people making the necessary arrangements to contract the manufacture of the stuff. Companies of all types contract these types of promotional items with their logo, advertising slogans, etc. on them and because of the size of that industry it's relatively cheap for companies to order that kind of promotional stuff, especially if they order it in quantity. The more you order, the cheaper the cost is per item. I used to order similar promotional items for a large company years ago. Water bottles, keychains, pens, etc., it's common practice for large companies to buy such promotional items as a form of advertising.

And the stuff sells fairly well to many enthusiasts who enjoy having it. GW orders large lots of the stuff all at once to keep their cost down, then apportions it out to each store for a year or so till it's gone. Then they come up with new items to keep the events fresh.

If these events and the merchandise is not for everyone, that's to be expected. But what is it with these forums that so many users think that if something is not of interest to them that they have to denigrate it and then file an angry wish list of what they'd rather see instead? That is neither realistic nor rational behavior. The world does not work that way and by extension, neither does GW.

**BrookM**

Redemption wrote:
BrookM wrote:
Redemption wrote:Cool, seems there's a GW opening in Breda next month. Instant birthday and close by! Yay!
One-man store sadly.

Ah, something along the size of GW Rotterdam then? The only official GW store I've visited. At least, not before walking past it half a dozen times, that place is smaller than my bathroom. Ah well, Breda's close by so I'll check it out at least once, and perhaps grab some snag while I'm there.

Something along those lines yes, but even smaller. I talked to the future Breda manager and it's all about pushing plastic kits and trying to get demos in. Two tables, maybe three if he's lucky enough. Though each table will be split in two so two games can be shown off and played at the same time. Also, the store will be open from Tuesday until Saturday, closed on Mondays and Sundays for obvious reasons.

**Grimstonefire**

I would find the irony of having a GW wallet too much to bear, considering mine is usually empty because of GW...

A GW Kool-aid bottle would be fun I guess.

**BrookM**

The Amsterdam store sold overpriced mugs and t-shirts to celebrate the release of Apocalypse back then. While they looked pretty nifty, paying €25 for a black t-shirt and €15 for a mug with "Apocalypse" was a bit too much.

**Chibi Bodge-Battle**

Necros wrote:will they at least be serving punch & pie?

More likely jelly and ice cream.
Will there be any bouncy castles/inflatable Imperium fortress?

Like the comment re the wallet Grimstone

**Mewiththeface**

If it looks cool, I would consider getting a GW wallet. To bad the American store birthdays are boring. "A 5 dollar pen? HELL YEAH"

**vitki**

I was talking to the manager of the Carkeek Plaza (Seattle, Washington) store and he said he is working on getting Jeremy Vetock and maybe some Black Library talent down to do signings on their birthday.

Could be worth checking out.

**BrassScorpion**

Mewiththeface wrote:If it looks cool, I would consider getting a GW wallet. To bad the American store birthdays are boring. "A 5 dollar pen? HELL YEAH"

Actually, we've had some pretty cool merchandise in the past. The first two years we had the Chaos Star dice in a huge variety of colors and there were eight different ceramic mugs with Warhammer designs, first four and then a completely different set of four the following year. The pens they currently have are not usually for sale, they are usually given out FREE with purchases of $50 or more. I've got several and I've never paid for one of them. The current round of merchandise is a bit stale in that they have been using the same items now for a couple years. However, there is a really nice set of folios and Terminator badge patches they are now using at the "Grand Opening" events. Hopefully, the birthday merchandise will get refreshed with something new again soon.