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I'm a regular visitor to Hobbycraft's Edinburgh shop, sometimes on a weekly basis. I was there again at the weekend and noticed some surprising things. First off, I buy a lot of paint there (mostly Tamiya and GW when I need colours in a hurry) but they don't seem to be restocking the racks for both types of paint(I'll point out that they also stock Revell and Humbrol as well). Also they stocked modelling products such as filler, thinners etc. These have all gone as well.
In GW's case they have not restocked for months(long before there was any hint of a new range), I can remember as far back as February many of the paints being missing. When I was there this weekend the actual rack was gone and the remaining paint were just stuck on a shelf in what seems an afterthought. I was expecting to see the new paint rack as Hobbycraft is probably one of GW's biggest stockists nationally and I'm sure GW would want them to be kept upto date, this doesn't seem to be the case.
The other surprising thing is as far as I can see, they have not raised the prices; the Stormraven is the same price as last year. Now you may say "so what?" Well consider that last year Hobbycraft raised their prices at the same time as GW did last year, why delay this time?
As I said I use this shop for getting Tamiya paint mostly, but at the moment they are not replenishing stock which is irritating.
So my fellow UK gamers, if you frequent Hobbycraft, have you noticed this in their model/wargames dept?

UPDATE:
I emailed Hobbycraft and have heard back from them. According to them they are currently waiting for the new paint racks to arrive and are running down the current stocks. On the other ranges such as Tamiya, Revell etc, they say that they are not running these down and have no plans to. If that's the case I wish they'd re-supply the damn shelves as they have been void of many colours for a long time now. On the GW front, it makes me wonder how long in advance they tell major stockists to run down the paint range. I'm not talking about a month or so; Hobbycraft have been devoid of many of the paints for quite a few months. They did say if I talked to a member of staff they could order it in for me, well considering I can order it from Wayland a lot cheaper I don't see the point.

My local HC has always had a pretty poor selection of GW stuff, although they did have a pretty mental sale on some items a while ago (things like the LoTR main rulebook for 3 quid for instance).

I'm not sure how the company is doing financially, or perhaps they are just going to stop selling GW stuff eventually?

Yeah, to be honest I was never convinced that they ever made too much ca$h money selling GW stuff. Whenever I go to my local HC the GW aisle is always conspicuously empty...

Still, worth keeping an eye on, though. If they do decide to stop stocking GW, then they'll likely be slashing prices of existing stock to clear the way for products that will sell better.

Not to derail the thread, but I've noticed Boyes in York has let a lot of it's Flames of War stuff run down to virtually nothing, while keeping a reasonable amount of GW, Plastic Soldier Company & other manufacturers.

They still keep plenty of Vallejo paint though, so all's good for me.

Jayce_The_Ace wrote:Not to derail the thread, but I've noticed Boyes in York has let a lot of it's Flames of War stuff run down to virtually nothing, while keeping a reasonable amount of GW, Plastic Soldier Company & other manufacturers.

They still keep plenty of Vallejo paint though, so all's good for me.

It always makes me smile when the old dears see the price of FoW stuff.

Yeah the 3 HCs near me have been like this for sometime, ie stocked but rarely seeming to sell anything. The paint racks are still there but stocks are dwindling (after I purged them of all their Devlin mud anyway! ) and they all have fairly extensive ranges that aren't shifting too quickly by the looks of things. It could just be HC giving themselves maximum time to shift the stock before they roll out the new paints and 6th?

I am led to believe that they have recently been taken over by a US hobby company, not sure who. That happened at the same time as he last round of 25% off that appeared in the papers and stopping the £5 off £20 that I royally rinsed for a few years!

I can see them waiting on 6th before changing things, or dropping the line. Keep em peeled for it appearing in the discount isle - that's usually a straight 30% off so if they don't price rise then it should produce some good deals.

I have not noticed this at my local Hobbycraft, but I don't go in there regularly.

They have a modest selection of kits, 40K and modelling supplies alongside their railway selection. It's not complete or awesome by any means, and maybe that is part of the problem.

Reading has a GW, a Modelzone and an independent model shop so there is plenty of competition. All of those are in the twon centre so you can pop in when wandering around shopping and stuff.

There's no point in stocking Tamiya paints unless you keep the rack filled up so that customers can be sure of finding what they need.

To be honest, I find online ordering and delivery so convenient that I only go to shops "for a look".

If I go for a specific thing -- WW2 Japanese navy paints, 3mm polystyrene sheet, etc -- they probably won't be in stock anyway.

The pity of it is that Hobbycraft is an enormous warehouse in an edge of town trading estate, and they easily have the space to keep more stock than they do.

To go back to the main point, I don't think Hobbycraft have been getting worse but they weren't that good in the first place. For serious wargame/model stuff.

Jayce_The_Ace wrote:Not to derail the thread, but I've noticed Boyes in York has let a lot of it's Flames of War stuff run down to virtually nothing, while keeping a reasonable amount of GW, Plastic Soldier Company & other manufacturers.

They still keep plenty of Vallejo paint though, so all's good for me.

Another York dakka user.

I was in Boyes Yesterday and noticed this, the flames of war stuff was very thin on the ground but the GW stuff was packed. Still got two copies of dreadfleet in also. They were supposed to have been taken off sale by now.

Yes, Southampton store is similar in that they appear to be running down their GW stock.

Paints were down to a few pots when I last went in a few weeks ago.

As an aside, whenever our Hobbycraft does a "sale" of GW stuff, it's always at RRP i.e. no actual discount.

Yeah I've never seen a sale of their that includes Wargaming or indeed models.

What you want to keep an eye on is the clearance isle/sections. It's usually 30% off and if you can find a voucher of some sort they happily stack discounts. 30% + 20% =

It's one of the only real reasons I stick my head in there.

I know the price increases still haven't hit at them. Got the Cadian battleforce for £65 t'other day.

I went in to my local HC today and all the GW was gone.

I went to my local HC today and I bought some tools and storage boxes. The GW stuff was still there.

It looks like a local thing depending on your area.

All the HC around me have completely dropped flames of war now. They had a small range about 4 years ago, a large range 2 years ago, and nothing now (or a year ago). One of them even briefly experimented with mantic as well but that only lasted a month or two.

legoburner wrote:All the HC around me have completely dropped flames of war now. They had a small range about 4 years ago, a large range 2 years ago, and nothing now (or a year ago). One of them even briefly experimented with mantic as well but that only lasted a month or two.

Yep, FoW gone from mine too. On an unrelated note, they also don't stock Hornby engines anymore, just tracks, trucks, scenery and accessories.

All of this suggests they are basically cutting down on stock with a high RRP.

deejaybainbridge wrote:

Jayce_The_Ace wrote:Not to derail the thread, but I've noticed Boyes in York has let a lot of it's Flames of War stuff run down to virtually nothing, while keeping a reasonable amount of GW, Plastic Soldier Company & other manufacturers.

They still keep plenty of Vallejo paint though, so all's good for me.

Another York dakka user.

I was in Boyes Yesterday and noticed this, the flames of war stuff was very thin on the ground but the GW stuff was packed. Still got two copies of dreadfleet in also. They were supposed to have been taken off sale by now.

I noticed the Dreadfleet in there as well, which is odd, as I was in there not long ago and it had gone from the shelves.

I assume some sort of stock rotation between stores maybe?

I would have have bought one as well if the price had been lower - but still £60 - no thanks.