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 IdentifyZero wrote:
This is some kind of major conspiracy to screw the FLGS owner among other things is what I am getting out of this topic.

Maybe it's a conspiracy or maybe, just maybe? A massive company made a mistake.

Certainly. I've said as much in all of my posts on this topic. I've never said that they did it on purpose. But the people paying the price for this mistake are the FLGS, NOT GW.

As mikhaila posted,
US manufacturing is gone several months ago, machines were sold off, molds returned to the UK, plant manager given his walking papers. Memphis is currently a giant warehouse for shipping and receiving.

I dunno..I don't think it's JUST the LGSs that are affected. My local GW has said they'll be getting much less than expected and some of the pieces online now have 1-2 week shipping times, as opposed to the usual 2-3 days....

 Captain Vyper wrote:
As mikhaila posted,
US manufacturing is gone several months ago, machines were sold off, molds returned to the UK, plant manager given his walking papers. Memphis is currently a giant warehouse for shipping and receiving.

LMAO. So they sold off all their manufacturing capability where the dollar is weak and moved it to England, where the GBP is strong....I guess the Chairman really doesn't want GW to continue on after his retirment next year....

 Salacious Greed wrote:

 Captain Vyper wrote:
As mikhaila posted,
US manufacturing is gone several months ago, machines were sold off, molds returned to the UK, plant manager given his walking papers. Memphis is currently a giant warehouse for shipping and receiving.

LMAO. So they sold off all their manufacturing capability where the dollar is weak and moved it to England, where the GBP is strong....I guess the Chairman really doesn't want GW to continue on after his retirment next year....

what you makes you think he is going to retire next year?

Fenrir Kitsune wrote:

 Salacious Greed wrote:

 Captain Vyper wrote:
As mikhaila posted,
US manufacturing is gone several months ago, machines were sold off, molds returned to the UK, plant manager given his walking papers. Memphis is currently a giant warehouse for shipping and receiving.

LMAO. So they sold off all their manufacturing capability where the dollar is weak and moved it to England, where the GBP is strong....I guess the Chairman really doesn't want GW to continue on after his retirment next year....

what you makes you think he is going to retire next year?

Pretty sure if he hasn't stated he is looking to retire soon then it's just been heavily implied in the past.

Either way it's a pretty common theory that he is going to retire soon and is just pumping the stock short term at the cost of long term viability.

Salacious Greed wrote:
LMAO. So they sold off all their manufacturing capability where the dollar is weak and moved it to England, where the GBP is strong....I guess the Chairman really doesn't want GW to continue on after his retirment next year....

So they reduced their production capability? Is there any word on if they added production capacity in the UK? If that isn't the sign of a company on the decline, I don't know what is.

jonolikespie wrote:

Fenrir Kitsune wrote:

what you makes you think he is going to retire next year?

Pretty sure if he hasn't stated he is looking to retire soon then it's just been heavily implied in the past.

Either way it's a pretty common theory that he is going to retire soon and is just pumping the stock short term at the cost of long term viability.

Even if it is a common theory, it is unsubstantiated. I believe he is 62 - 63 years old. Unless the UK has an automatic retirement law, I don't see him retiring just because he hits retirement age. There are plenty of examples of CEOs who work past retirement age. I just think the policies are more to line his pockets and those of the investment houses in general.

I think the retirement comments are probably based on
a ) his age
b ) the fact that so many of the policies seem to be aimed at short-term gains without much thought to longer-term future sustainability. He is a significant share-holder, and apparently gets close to half a million GBP which each dividend payment. Obviously, if profits and therefore share prices (which many have commented have been propped up by a series of unsustainable cost-cutting measures) begin to drop, then the longer he leaves it the less he will have to collect when he does finally retire.

Re. the main topic, I don't think it's too hard to imagine that this might have been done deliberately. The fact that GW have done it many times in the past, and are on record from numerous sources (including my own experience for that matter) as withholding new releases for a short delay so the GW stores can get the lion share of sales was used to crush FLGS as far back as the 90's, and it wouldn't surprise me if they tried to do the same thing again now.

Wasn't his retirement mentioned in relation to Mark Well's once-position, or something?

I heard about this from my FLGS. Oh dear. Ironically, I had gone there to get the Chaos Space Marine Codex, which was also out of stock.

Either GW massively understocked or there was an absolutely gargantuan demand that GW just couldn't meet. Or both.

 Pacific wrote:
I think the retirement comments are probably based on
a ) his age
b ) the fact that so many of the policies seem to be aimed at short-term gains without much thought to longer-term future sustainability. He is a significant share-holder, and apparently gets close to half a million GBP which each dividend payment. Obviously, if profits and therefore share prices (which many have commented have been propped up by a series of unsustainable cost-cutting measures) begin to drop, then the longer he leaves it the less he will have to collect when he does finally retire.

Except that many of these "short term gains" have been going on for several years. They haven't had any "long-term stability plans" according to the internet for the last 10 years. People were throwing out the whole "retirement" theory long before. A pump and dump is done over a short period of a couple years at most. You hype up the stock with great returns and then jump ship right before everything starts to go sour.

If Kirby were looking to retire, he would have jumped ship before the Hobbit came out. The stock was at a high before the movie came out. It is clear GW sees it as a lost cause and has only put minimal effort into it. They knew it wouldn't help them and now their stock has started to decline and is trending downward because people see there isn't going to be a repeat of the LotR bubble. Waiting a year or two can easily mean the loss of millions. The amount of money tied up in Kirby's shares is significant and if the stock were to drop 25%, that would be the loss of millions. Far more than any dividend payment is worth. Just based on the current price vs. the 52 week high, Kirby has lost 1.6 million GBP in value.

As I said, this is just a continuation of policies to maximize dividends to share holders and not some retirement conspiracy.

And just got another call from GW.

I had inquired as to why they were charging me for all the models they weren't able to ship. The answer is that even though they called Wednesday to tell me I wasn't getting them, I really am, and they are in transit.

I'm hoping this is the case for my stores and customers, as well as another other FLGS that was affected.

Wait, so there isn't a shortage now?

Salacious Greed wrote:

 Captain Vyper wrote:
As mikhaila posted,
US manufacturing is gone several months ago, machines were sold off, molds returned to the UK, plant manager given his walking papers. Memphis is currently a giant warehouse for shipping and receiving.

LMAO. So they sold off all their manufacturing capability where the dollar is weak and moved it to England, where the GBP is strong....I guess the Chairman really doesn't want GW to continue on after his retirment next year....

Maybe they sold off their manufacturing capability because they've been moving fewer and fewer units each year, while raising prices. If units sold continues to decline, they don't need the capacity. Unless of course something is very popular, possibly what we're seeing here, and then they can't keep up with demand.

@Pretre
The sky is falling, right?

 pretre wrote:
Wait, so there isn't a shortage now?

Who knows? It all seems to be a bit of an unknown quantity at the moment. Wayland's update:

As a quick Tau update, we are pleased to report that some of the stock we require has now been allocated to us by GW, and that as soon as it arrives stock will be allocated to orders in the order in which we received them. We should have further updates each day on more stock arriving.

So your guess is as good as mine

Sounds to me like either a shipping container was held up in customs that has now been released or one of their suppliers resolved an issue preventing shipment.

Guess we'll all know shortly.

But, But, But, GW is trying to kill FLGS's still right?

 Hulksmash wrote:
But, But, But, GW is trying to kill FLGS's still right?

With extreme prejudice! It's even rumored GW sent Marbo after them...

 mikhaila wrote:
And just got another call from GW.

I had inquired as to why they were charging me for all the models they weren't able to ship. The answer is that even though they called Wednesday to tell me I wasn't getting them, I really am, and they are in transit.

I'm hoping this is the case for my stores and customers, as well as another other FLGS that was affected.

Someone must be lurking Dakka and wants to silence you... I'll now remove this silly tinfoil hat that somehow appeared on my head...

 Hulksmash wrote:
But, But, But, GW is trying to kill FLGS's still right?

Of course! This is just further evidence that GW planned this all along. But then Dakka found out and they had to drop their plans.

Great work DakkaDakka, you solved the mystery of the missing miniatures. Now let's all head back to the clubhouse for hot coco.

Please note I'm not making light of the bad situation it would have put FLGS in (and still might since we're not totally sure yet). Just making light of the tin foil hat brigade.

I noticed that X-wing is in short supply here as well.

Those bastards at FFG are at it now too....and they somehow got fooled into doing it (probably by GW) before GW did it!

Bastards!

[adjusts tinfoil hat to a more jaunty angle]

haha Ok.. take the piss all you like, but it's something I've seen happen first-hand many years ago, and have heard the same thing from others.

The moment a GW store opened in the town, suddenly the new releases started coming weeks (and sometimes even longer) late. By the time they were in stock, everyone had already got them from the GW, and the store I worked at stopped dealing with GW altogether because of this and because of the amount of BS he got on the phone from the rep.

You could say (as could well have happened here with the Tau) there is an entirely innocent reason - GW didn't produce enough to fill demand, but the end result is the same, that the FLGS loses out on the sizeable chunk of money from those first week sales, and GW makes a lot more money from it than they would the FLGS sales.

@Pacific

For every one of those stories I have stories from the same period where FLGS's grew when a GW moved in near them assuming they took advantage of the opportunity. Heck, I worked hand in hand with a FLGS when I ran a GW Store, it was good for both of us. Granted that was here in the US, not the UK.

Ah...so the merchandise is just fashionably late, then.

 mikhaila wrote:
And just got another call from GW.

I had inquired as to why they were charging me for all the models they weren't able to ship. The answer is that even though they called Wednesday to tell me I wasn't getting them, I really am, and they are in transit.

I'm hoping this is the case for my stores and customers, as well as another other FLGS that was affected.

So,

This begs the question to ask if they put out this propaganda to infuse the situation, increase demand, and increase the market demans for tau.

Sounds like they did this on purpose.

 Grot 6 wrote:

 mikhaila wrote:
And just got another call from GW.

I had inquired as to why they were charging me for all the models they weren't able to ship. The answer is that even though they called Wednesday to tell me I wasn't getting them, I really am, and they are in transit.

I'm hoping this is the case for my stores and customers, as well as another other FLGS that was affected.

So,

This begs the question to ask if they put out this propaganda to infuse the situation, increase demand, and increase the market demans for tau.

Sounds like they did this on purpose.

Or if they've shifted product from their own shops/web orders to independents instead.

 Grot 6 wrote:

 mikhaila wrote:
And just got another call from GW.

I had inquired as to why they were charging me for all the models they weren't able to ship. The answer is that even though they called Wednesday to tell me I wasn't getting them, I really am, and they are in transit.

I'm hoping this is the case for my stores and customers, as well as another other FLGS that was affected.

So,

This begs the question to ask if they put out this propaganda to infuse the situation, increase demand, and increase the market demans for tau.

Sounds like they did this on purpose.

Tinfoil hat much?

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Grot 6 wrote:

 mikhaila wrote:
And just got another call from GW.

I had inquired as to why they were charging me for all the models they weren't able to ship. The answer is that even though they called Wednesday to tell me I wasn't getting them, I really am, and they are in transit.

I'm hoping this is the case for my stores and customers, as well as another other FLGS that was affected.

So,

This begs the question to ask if they put out this propaganda to infuse the situation, increase demand, and increase the market demans for tau.

Sounds like they did this on purpose.

Or if they've shifted product from their own shops/web orders to independents instead.

What I'm hoping for as well. It's what they should be doing. They might not remember it always, but selling to stores, hell, selling to distributors, is selling. That makes them customers, that means you provide them with customer service, you go the extra mile for them.

And the availability 1-2 weeks has gone from the UK GW webstore

They've clearly looked behind the sofa and found the missing kits