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I cannot believe people are siding with GW's profit line over the health of their hobby and local communities.

GW releasing products that are only sold online makes people use their online store more. Buying more products from them, than their LGS. This is the exact same thing as online discounters, but MUCH WORSE, because your own damn business partner is trying to take your business, instead of a compeditor.

Banning the use of the book 'hurting' players is overblown. GW's done this by experimenting with a distribution method that in the end, if carried out at a larger scale, will hurt your store and local community.

Kudos to the LGS's for standing up to this utter nonsense and short-sided cashgrab.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
Considering this is what happens when GW advertises, do we want that?

GW should actually make that advert. Complete with a snarky looking guy at the end, who simply remarks "Now do you see why we don't advertise?"

Also, these calls of "WE MUST MAKE A STAND!" like GW is some terrifying tyrannical entity keeping the population under it's iron heel through the means of drooling cybernetic monsters that prowl the streets and disembowel anyone who complains really annoy me.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:

 warboss wrote:

While I wouldn't support a store in stopping casual players who came for a pickup game from using the rules, I would say making a store rule that keeps the older rules as completely legal in all games including casual is reasonable as is not allowing the new rules in tournies and other official events (with the proper notice of course in the posted tourney rules). As for sushi, plenty of stores do ban outside food if they sell food inside. Continuing your rather ridiculous analogy, do you think McDonalds would be ok if you sat down with a Papa John's pizza in their restaurant just because they dont' sell pizza?

Actually, many resturants allow you to come in with other food aslong as either you, or someone else in your party buys something from them.
This is just them being upset because they dont get so sell something, its like the stores that ban KS products because someone else got it from them before.

Many restaurants? I've never seen or been in one. The most I've seen is allowing people to bring in food for babies or kids with special dietary needs. You may be surprised to know that many local regulations don't allow it either and it's not to protect the business interests of the restaurants but rather to make sure there are no additional contaminents to consider if there is a food-borne illness. Either way, your ridiculous example is starting to derail the thread so I'll leave you to your eating in Wonderland.

My 2 cents..Overall… While I agree it is perfectly acceptable for GW to offer an “ online only “ product item. After all they own the IP and the rights to the product. The independent retailer also has the freedom to make the rules for any event he wants to run. Don’t like it, don’t play there. I’ve been buying GW models since RT came out and have purposely avoided partaking of some 40K versions as I have disliked the way the game played, the cost of some models or the poor quality of some of their product. You have the right to “ vote” with your feet ( or in this case your wallet as well).

I also work in Logistics for a fortune 500 American company ( 25 years) and am totally baffled by most of GW business practices. Whether initiative launches, product availability or marketing, communication and selling strategy for them it all seems chaotic ( I’m not familiar with GW’s business model or goals).

In our company we can afford to short sell, We have the inventory, multiple business categories and pricing options to compete ( and in many markets). The local businessman does not, In fact they most often are bound to their local economy and market. There often isn’t multiple revenue streams that they can play with. To assume they are protesting for nothing is absurd! I also know Pat at Gnomes Games personally. I like the man and understand. He is always fighting to get stuff from GW. I prefer to buy locally. I like to have something in my hand when I pay and walk out the door.. MY choice! If I order something from him, I know ( I could order it on line ) he will do everything to get it for me. I like to support my local businesses when I can. My local game store provides me with access to the gaming community. I don’t attend a school or know too many people in my professional circle who game; so for me it is in my benefit to support my local shop.

In the company I work for we fight for shelf space at every location we deal with. We don’t tell our retailers what to stock and how much they get. They tell us !. we spend massive amounts of money promoting our initiatives, benefits and value. We rely on repeat customers and will fight to get every new customer we can or market share from our competitors. We do that by helping and insuring our retailers get the product they want, in the amount they want and when they want it. The only way to make money is to sell something! Sell something that the consumer wants. If they don’t want it then innovate and create something they do want. You don’t make money if you don’t have stuff to sell. If GW thinks it can survive ( meaning make profits / provide shareholder returns) by pricing alone they are in denial. They should be selling all they can! The other game systems have shown that there are others willing to take market share from GW. The FLGS usually is a place to get folks started. Working together they could both benefit.

While I understand the arguments, I’m hoping someone at GW upper management trys to understand the market they are in ( maybe the UK is different ) and the potential for profit if they work with their retailers. In the mean time I can decide on my own to play in a tourney at gnome games or not. It will not prevent me from being a customer.

EDIT: whoops, wrong thread. I'm on a roll lately.


But, to make this post relevant, RE: that ad hotsauceman posted:

If companies didn't advertise because someone might take their ad and make a stupid pisstake parody of it, then pretty much no company ever would advertise. Certainly, it never stopped Billy Mays or that Shamwow guy, not that I think that type of advert would be appropriate for GW.

 warboss wrote:

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
To me this just smacks of "Spoiled brat Syndrome" in which, because they cant get it, neither can you. How exactly is this "Taking a stand" againts GW, they are not loosing revenue from this, its direct only remember? its like banning sushi from your store, because you can sell it, but you dont have thee kitchen to make it.
I think the fact that so many stores backed out to show how poorly planned and thought out this was.

I'm sorry that this is a simple inconvience to you as a gamer but the it's a matter of protecting the livelihood of the store owners that are affected by this. With that in mind, who is the "spoiled brat" in that situation? This is likely the first step of many in cutting out the store from necessary products to play the game with existing models and is IMO a totally justified stand for stores to take in regards to official events. GW was the first gaming company (I believe they beat TSR/WOTC to the punch IIRC) to cut out the distributor from most of their dealings to save 5-10% and the stores are the next logical hurdle in GW's mind between them and the consumer.

While I wouldn't support a store in stopping casual players who came for a pickup game from using the rules, I would say making a store rule that keeps the older rules as completely legal in all games including casual is reasonable as is not allowing the new rules in tournies and other official events (with the proper notice of course in the posted tourney rules). As for sushi, plenty of stores do ban outside food if they sell food inside. Continuing your rather ridiculous analogy, do you think McDonalds would be ok if you sat down with a Papa John's pizza in their restaurant just because they dont' sell pizza?

Lol. You put it rather well I think.
The more they can bully their way around, the more bullying we will have to tolerate.
I understand that there are no mom-n-pop hobby stores in the UK? If that's true it's a sad state of affairs. I'm glad I live in America and can give my support to small businesses that truly value me as a customer.

 StormK wrote:

 warboss wrote:

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
To me this just smacks of "Spoiled brat Syndrome" in which, because they cant get it, neither can you. How exactly is this "Taking a stand" againts GW, they are not loosing revenue from this, its direct only remember? its like banning sushi from your store, because you can sell it, but you dont have thee kitchen to make it.
I think the fact that so many stores backed out to show how poorly planned and thought out this was.

I'm sorry that this is a simple inconvience to you as a gamer but the it's a matter of protecting the livelihood of the store owners that are affected by this. With that in mind, who is the "spoiled brat" in that situation? This is likely the first step of many in cutting out the store from necessary products to play the game with existing models and is IMO a totally justified stand for stores to take in regards to official events. GW was the first gaming company (I believe they beat TSR/WOTC to the punch IIRC) to cut out the distributor from most of their dealings to save 5-10% and the stores are the next logical hurdle in GW's mind between them and the consumer.

While I wouldn't support a store in stopping casual players who came for a pickup game from using the rules, I would say making a store rule that keeps the older rules as completely legal in all games including casual is reasonable as is not allowing the new rules in tournies and other official events (with the proper notice of course in the posted tourney rules). As for sushi, plenty of stores do ban outside food if they sell food inside. Continuing your rather ridiculous analogy, do you think McDonalds would be ok if you sat down with a Papa John's pizza in their restaurant just because they dont' sell pizza?

Lol. You put it rather well I think.
The more they can bully their way around, the more bullying we will have to tolerate.
I understand that there are no mom-n-pop hobby stores in the UK? That's truly a sad state of affairs. I'm glad I live in America and can give my support to small businesses that truly value me as a customer.

There are plenty of independent stockists and retailers in the UK. My FLGS, Battlequest Games, is ran by one guy, with the occasional friend of his standing in when he's on holiday.

Edited by Manchu

 gunslingerpro wrote:


And did it cross your mind that perhaps these stores are defending their livelyhood? Being upset about one direct only sales item may prevent them from cutting them out of the GW sales strategy entirely.

Exactly! I think that these stores are trying to send a message to GW. None of these stores are going to go out of business because "Death from the Skies" is direct only.

However, if GW can continue to release new, profitable product, and restrict it to their website only, while still getting local stores to host events for their games, it may be the first of many such releases. I think these stores are trying to make it clear to GW that providing gaming and hobby space for GW games is contingent on being able to actually sell GW merchandise in the store.

It's bad enough when GW makes a lot of 'niche' products direct only. Every 'limited release' or 'collectors' model that your local store can't sell you is lost revenue for them, and GW can take that revenue without having to use any of it to support local gaming (given that GW stores are thin on the ground in the US).

Taking mainstream, core products and making them direct only? I'm sure the local stores can see where that is headed. No one is claiming that the sky is falling just because of this one product. However, if this product becomes a trend, it's a portent of nothing good for local stores with GW. Imagine if all of the rulebooks, army books, codexes, and battalion boxes were direct only.

If, however, local gaming stores make it unequivocally clear that they aren't going to continue to support the "GW Hobby" (with tables, tournaments, and campaigns) while GW cuts them out of the profit stream, maybe GW will pay attention before the situation becomes dire. They have improved relations with their distributors before, so maybe there is some hope.

So to sum up 21 pages of stuff

GW released a "death from the sky's" codex that is required for some armies flyers. This codex is direct order only from GW. Many retailers are very angry about this and some are dropping GW models and games all together because of this. I just went on the GW website and it looks like they are sold out now as well.

My two cents... I believe GW is stepping all over what we call in the states a "monopoly". Unfortunately here they do not pass go or collect $200.

I think technically it would only be a monopoly if there were zero alternatives to GW products (IE, no other war games out there). So it's not a monopoly. It's still a gakky thing to do.

 StormK wrote:

That's ridiculous. A stand must be made. Imagine Ford Motors telling a used car dealership that the new model car could not be sold at their dealership.

You mean like Tesla Motors is doing? They are opening stores in high end malls selling directly to consumers. They just won a suit brought against them by auto dealerships in the New England area? The dealers sued Tesla saying it hurt their sales and that Tesla cars should only be sold through dealerships.

Though sympathetic to you plight and don't agree with what GW is doing. Your letter is far better stated and straightforward. Far more professional then the previous "Hey gaiz! Buy WMH!" ones.

The Deamon codex is releasing special edition codex and army books that focus on a specific god theme. It's almost twice the cost of the standard book too for some reason.

They sent an email out to retailers telling them to not accept preorders or payments for the special edition books and to instead order them directly from the site.

Economics: How does it work?

Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

 Savageconvoy wrote:
The Deamon codex is releasing special edition codex and army books that focus on a specific god theme. It's almost twice the cost of the standard book too for some reason.

They sent an email out to retailers telling them to not accept preorders or payments for the special edition books and to instead order them directly from the site.

It's the same thing they did with the Dark Angels and CSM Limited Edition (xept that those only had 1 version of the LE, not 4). There's nothing different to the "Khorne-Limited-Edition" to the "Slaanesh-Limited-Edition" except the outer design.

-Shrike- wrote:
Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

Yep and they were roundly shouted down.

That theory also explains part of why it sold out so fast.

 Savageconvoy wrote:
The Deamon codex is releasing special edition codex and army books that focus on a specific god theme. It's almost twice the cost of the standard book too for some reason.

They sent an email out to retailers telling them to not accept preorders or payments for the special edition books and to instead order them directly from the site.

The email also said that it was because they were extremely limited and GW fully expected them to sell out completely on the website over the weekend.

 pretre wrote:

-Shrike- wrote:
Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

Yep and they were roundly shouted down.

That theory also explains part of why it sold out so fast.

The only fault I find with this is that the last offering (Blood in the Badlands? Whatever that campaign book was) sold out equally quickly. This isn't some side project or standalone game they were working on. It was a book for their core, #1 selling system.

I have trouble giving them the benefit of the doubt on this one.

-Shrike- wrote:
Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

The difference between this, and dreadfleet, is that GW is marketing this as something that is -essential- if you play those models. If it was just a spin off book, that gave you fun missions to use flyers with, that would be different. But it's basically an extra few pages for the core rulebook/codex's, and without it, you can't play those thing's properly anymore.

If GW honestly thought that DftS wouldn't sell then...I don't know. I don't know how you could be that obtuse. Lots of people bought flyers. Lots of people are going to need the rules. Don't they have a rough estimate of flyers sales? Shouldn't they be able to gauge the demand fairly well?

Don't they realize that this kind of crap leads to pirating? What is the customer supposed to do if they can't find the rules for their product?

Edited by Manchu

Wow. Just wow. We are well on our way to a well-deserved 'Ol Yeller of this thread.

Well, that escalated quickly.

Both of them need to be reprimanded for cultural insults. Its no different than racism.

Ladies, Gentlemen, Children, and forumgoers, can we get this back on topic?

-Shrike- wrote:
Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

The question would be then.. why is the company producing stuff that won't sell! If Management thought that then they should have done their research on what the market wants.( like up to date codex's (2 years+?.. I can completly change my product line in less time!) and pulled the plug early on for such a low demand non revenue product!

-Shrike- wrote:
Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

That's no reason to prevent FLGS' stocking it.

 Baragash wrote:

-Shrike- wrote:
Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

That's no reason to prevent FLGS' stocking it.

You've missed quite a bit as this is not really in contention.

FLGS aren't prevented from stocking it once they refill the stock. They can order direct-only items as normal for less of a discount. The problem in this case was that they had no opportunity to order it before it sold out because of the secrecy policy and once they could order it, it was sold out. It put them at a disadvantage that they had no way to overcome.

 Baragash wrote:

-Shrike- wrote:
Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

That's no reason to prevent FLGS' stocking it.

Yep... then the responcibility is the FLGS to promote it, sell it, grow customer base for it. sell more ... and so forth. Can't do that when you don't have that!

 pretre wrote:

-Shrike- wrote:
Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

Yep and they were roundly shouted down.

That theory also explains part of why it sold out so fast.

I'm not sure why they could have thought that. They're adding a model (which they have already released) to their most popular range, for their most popular game. Just a basic understanding of what they sell should have told them that it would be a big seller to all the Space Marine players that have been wanting an excuse to buy a Stormraven/use the one they already bought.

 Baragash wrote:

-Shrike- wrote:
Has anyone considered that GW thought it wouldn't sell well, or that nobody would buy it, (like Dreadfleet) and they decided to make it Direct Only to save on the cost of having stores stock it? Dreadfleet is a brilliant example of something that stores carried, and failed quite incredibly to sell. Maybe they thought it would save face if the same happened here?

That's no reason to prevent FLGS' stocking it.

Right, but by having it as Available to Order, it's GW telling the FLGS, "You probably shouldn't keep this in stock because we don't think it'll sell well enough for you."

I'd rather it be ATO and have to special order it for my customers (Which, when it is reprinted, my sales rep says I can...) than have it on my shelf when the new Ork and Space Marine codexes come out.

Here are the *if's* that make me alright with GW making this ATO only:
- *If* the customer plays Space Marines, Black Templars or Orks.
- *If* they didn't already get the White Dwarf with the rules in it.
- *If* they don't have the iPad codex with that information in it already.
- *If* they actually plan on using the Talon/ Raven or Ork Flyer.
- *If* someone else in their gaming group hasn't already got a copy of the rules.

That's enough *ifs* for me to say, "I'll special order it for the customer."
My only gripes about it as a retailer:
1.) It should have had a larger print run.
2.) It should have been announce a week before release.
3.) It should have been available to us to order (Even if at the lower ATO margin) before release.