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Of all the European nations it seems Poland stands out by the amount of miniatures companies created recently. Most famously perhaps, the ones producing bits or models compatible with the 40k universe. I know I have salivated over quite a few orc heads from Spellcrow, Puppetswar etc. Maxmini is in the spotlight recently with their new KS campain for WW2 orcs and certanly Kromlech needs no introduction.

There is enough Polish game companies too keep a blog regularly updated, such as the one managed by Dakka's own Inkub Pendragon
http://polskiefigurki.blogspot.se/

Of course these companies do not only produce conversion bitz or models suitable for GW games but have quite a few of their own products as well, but for many of us I presume that those products was what made us aware of the companies existence in the first place.

Now how come Poland in particular have all these companies?

I first considered that it could have legal reasons; that any legal actions (justified or not, I'm not claiming that the Polish companies are breaking any laws) by primarily GW was less effective in Poland, but on second thought; it's hardly like Poland is some post-apocalyptic wasteland to where the law can't reach. Poland is a member of the European Union and more or less share the same IP and marketing laws as the UK and due to the shared EU membership, any legal actions should not be that much more difficult than had they been UK companies.

One factor that I'm sure do influence things is that living expenses, material and labor in Poland are cheaper than in western Europe, which makes it more cost effective for businesses to operate there. However that is true for many other European countries such as Slovakia, Bulgaria etc. But there are not nearly as many miniature companies situated there.

Does Poland have some long standing tradition of miniature model making of which I'm unaware or are there some other factor that makes Poland such fertile grounds for miniature companies to spring up in?

I think it's probably 'all of the above. '

While I can't speak for Poland in particular, I've spent a fair amount of time in Hungary & Slovakia and knew some guys there who were really into their model building (plastic kits and the like), really going to town on the detail/modelling side of things. It seemed to be a fairly active scene as far as hobby niches go, and from stories I heard this extended even before the Iron Curtain fell.. a friend of mine's father was a lorry driver, and used to bring back lego, airfix and model railway bits from West Germany in his cab.

So it definitely seemed like there was a strong basis there for a connection to the wargaming side of things, and now that travel & communication is so simple it's perhaps only natural that there is such a strong connection.

Definitely agree though there is some awesome stuff coming out of Poland at the moment, I would say perhaps almost rivalling Spain in terms of creative content and high quality sculpts (for both the wargaming and modelling side of things).

Of course you would need a Polish people to comment on that (there are a number on the forum who post regularly!)

One of the guys that runs one of the companies said that the low cost for materials and whatnot is a big factor in all of this. This also allowed them to invest early into stuff like laser cutters, laser printers and those other things with lasers in them.

It makes me really jealous all those Polish mini companies with their tanks of sharks with eye lasers......

sorry I'll get my coat

more seriously Poland was the eastern block countries where the soviet influence started collapsing earlier than in the others, add that to a strong domestic modelling scene (planes/tanks etc) and GW (and other) wargaming took hold but people really struggled to get the official stuff so a lot of people started to make their own

this gives a good pool of talent now with people able to set up their own companies, and plenty of talent to hire which is often the major problem for expanding mini companies

(a major reason why Nottingham UK has so many, there is local talent available who have either worked for, or hoped to work for GW or the competition. People are much more likely to take lowish paying jobs if they don't have to move to do so)

 BrookM wrote:
One of the guys that runs one of the companies said that the low cost for materials and whatnot is a big factor in all of this. This also allowed them to invest early into stuff like laser cutters, laser printers and those other things with lasers in them.

And the US Missile Defense System! When it isn't shooting down Iranian ballistic missiles, it can cut MDF terrain at 300 miles.

Yes talented People living their Dreams.....

Pacific wrote:I think it's probably 'all of the above. '

While I can't speak for Poland in particular, I've spent a fair amount of time in Hungary & Slovakia and knew some guys there who were really into their model building (plastic kits and the like), really going to town on the detail/modelling side of things. It seemed to be a fairly active scene as far as hobby niches go, and from stories I heard this extended even before the Iron Curtain fell.. a friend of mine's father was a lorry driver, and used to bring back lego, airfix and model railway bits from West Germany in his cab.

So it definitely seemed like there was a strong basis there for a connection to the wargaming side of things, and now that travel & communication is so simple it's perhaps only natural that there is such a strong connection.

Definitely agree though there is some awesome stuff coming out of Poland at the moment, I would say perhaps almost rivalling Spain in terms of creative content and high quality sculpts (for both the wargaming and modelling side of things).

Of course you would need a Polish people to comment on that (there are a number on the forum who post regularly!)

OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:It makes me really jealous all those Polish mini companies with their tanks of sharks with eye lasers......

sorry I'll get my coat

more s
eriously Poland was the eastern block countries where the soviet influence started collapsing earlier than in the others, add that to a strong domestic modelling scene (planes/tanks etc) and GW (and other) wargaming took hold but people really struggled to get the official stuff so a lot of people started to make their own

this gives a good pool of talent now with people able to set up their own companies, and plenty of talent to hire which is often the major problem for expanding mini companies

(a major reason why Nottingham UK has so many, there is local talent available who have either worked for, or hoped to work for GW or the competition. People are much more likely to take lowish paying jobs if they don't have to move to do so)

So there seems to be something in the theory that Poland is particularly fertile ground for modelling then, although there might be similarities in other countries formerly behing the Iron curtain as per Pacific's example.

Low cost of living and materials etc should be similar to other former eastern bloc countries so it wouldn't explain why Poland in particular is such a powerhouse when it comes to miniatures production. I guess Poland might represent a good compromise. Due to an earlier break with the Sovjet union the contry has better infrastructure and western relations than many other post eastern bloc nations, while the expences is still low? (i'm kinda guessing here though since I don't really know if there are any significant difference in infrastructure between Poland and say Hungary or Slovakia).

It would be interesting to hear from the Polish contingent of the Forum. Hopefully they will find this thread.

You have a large number of companies based in Poland and the Czech Republic who are producers of comparable items for scale modeling as well.

There is a rather large number of companies and individuals within Russia proper as well - though they tend to be less broadly distributed outside of Russia (partly due to language, partly due to people being cautious of Russian companies...).

One thing that you will notice if you go looking is that in a lot of Eastern countries (sort of hard to pin down...Eastern European as well as Asia proper) there are a ton of small companies. Many of them are able to do sufficient business within their own regions that they don't bother to tread out into the broader Western based forums and mess around with translations. I know there are several Chinese, Korean, Japanese and Russian companies that I order from now and then who I have never seen mentioned, linked to or otherwise discussed outside of sites and forums that are in their home countries language.

To make it more difficult to find - generally they don't even bother with any sort of English language meta tags or other indexing tools...so you won't find them in normal searches.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
You have a large number of companies based in Poland and the Czech Republic who are producers of comparable items for scale modeling as well.

There is a rather large number of companies and individuals within Russia proper as well - though they tend to be less broadly distributed outside of Russia (partly due to language, partly due to people being cautious of Russian companies...).

One thing that you will notice if you go looking is that in a lot of Eastern countries (sort of hard to pin down...Eastern European as well as Asia proper) there are a ton of small companies. Many of them are able to do sufficient business within their own regions that they don't bother to tread out into the broader Western based forums and mess around with translations. I know there are several Chinese, Korean, Japanese and Russian companies that I order from now and then who I have never seen mentioned, linked to or otherwise discussed outside of sites and forums that are in their home countries language.

To make it more difficult to find - generally they don't even bother with any sort of English language meta tags or other indexing tools...so you won't find them in normal searches.

That's a good point.
I guess it is possible that the appearance of Polish companies as proportionally more numerous than other countries has much to do with them being more visible.
Although that begs the question of why Polish companies in particular among the eastern/central European nations would market themselves more towards the outer world.

Russia and Asia has larger internal markets (at least in regards to population) and might have much more of a hassle with customs, tolls and the like so I understand that miniatures from those countries are not as available for Europe/US. Although that would not explain why Poland seems like such a powerhouse in the bitz/miniature market while I don't think I have heard of a single comparable company from the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia etc.

Zywus wrote:

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
You have a large number of companies based in Poland and the Czech Republic who are producers of comparable items for scale modeling as well.

There is a rather large number of companies and individuals within Russia proper as well - though they tend to be less broadly distributed outside of Russia (partly due to language, partly due to people being cautious of Russian companies...).

One thing that you will notice if you go looking is that in a lot of Eastern countries (sort of hard to pin down...Eastern European as well as Asia proper) there are a ton of small companies. Many of them are able to do sufficient business within their own regions that they don't bother to tread out into the broader Western based forums and mess around with translations. I know there are several Chinese, Korean, Japanese and Russian companies that I order from now and then who I have never seen mentioned, linked to or otherwise discussed outside of sites and forums that are in their home countries language.

To make it more difficult to find - generally they don't even bother with any sort of English language meta tags or other indexing tools...so you won't find them in normal searches.

That's a good point.
I guess it is possible that the appearance of Polish companies as proportionally more numerous than other countries has much to do with them being more visible.
Although that begs the question of why Polish companies in particular among the eastern/central European nations would market themselves more towards the outer world.

Russia and Asia has larger internal markets (at least in regards to population) and might have much more of a hassle with customs, tolls and the like so I understand that miniatures from those countries are not as available for Europe/US. Although that would not explain why Poland seems like such a powerhouse in the bitz/miniature market while I don't think I have heard of a single comparable company from the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia etc.

Could it have something to do with there being a reasonably sized Polish community in the UK? Around half a million Poles moved here after Poland joined the EU and we already had a Polish-speaking/descended community of around 200K as a result of resettlement during/after WW2 - given the apparently higher incidence of involvement with model making/wargaming suggested above, it's possible they served as a bridge for Polish companies into the English-speaking wargaming world in a way that other countries lacked.

 Yodhrin wrote:

Zywus wrote:

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
You have a large number of companies based in Poland and the Czech Republic who are producers of comparable items for scale modeling as well.

There is a rather large number of companies and individuals within Russia proper as well - though they tend to be less broadly distributed outside of Russia (partly due to language, partly due to people being cautious of Russian companies...).

One thing that you will notice if you go looking is that in a lot of Eastern countries (sort of hard to pin down...Eastern European as well as Asia proper) there are a ton of small companies. Many of them are able to do sufficient business within their own regions that they don't bother to tread out into the broader Western based forums and mess around with translations. I know there are several Chinese, Korean, Japanese and Russian companies that I order from now and then who I have never seen mentioned, linked to or otherwise discussed outside of sites and forums that are in their home countries language.

To make it more difficult to find - generally they don't even bother with any sort of English language meta tags or other indexing tools...so you won't find them in normal searches.

That's a good point.
I guess it is possible that the appearance of Polish companies as proportionally more numerous than other countries has much to do with them being more visible.
Although that begs the question of why Polish companies in particular among the eastern/central European nations would market themselves more towards the outer world.

Russia and Asia has larger internal markets (at least in regards to population) and might have much more of a hassle with customs, tolls and the like so I understand that miniatures from those countries are not as available for Europe/US. Although that would not explain why Poland seems like such a powerhouse in the bitz/miniature market while I don't think I have heard of a single comparable company from the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia etc.

Could it have something to do with there being a reasonably sized Polish community in the UK? Around half a million Poles moved here after Poland joined the EU and we already had a Polish-speaking/descended community of around 200K as a result of resettlement during/after WW2 - given the apparently higher incidence of involvement with model making/wargaming suggested above, it's possible they served as a bridge for Polish companies into the English-speaking wargaming world in a way that other countries lacked.

Also a stronger connection to the West even before then. Thanks in large part to JPII, I know that in the US there has been much more back and forth communication with Poland than with other former Eastern Bloc countries. Many of those who were still in Poland had close family ties in the West - and they often had more contact with those family members. As a result - they were quick to realign themselves after the end of the Cold War with the West, while other countries were slower.