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 Kirasu wrote:
How has this affected the Warstore is the main question.

Three page thread on that here.

I'm waiting for GW to disallow selling below MSRP for holders of a trade account. I'm actually curious why they haven't done this yet, to the point I'm actually reading about the legality of if (I guess it's called Resale Price Maintenance.)

Edit: Actually, I think I may have used the word actually a few too many times.

 filbert wrote:

...no bits sales, you cant break down the sprues or components and sell individually, ok so bye bye modelbits.co.uk, letthedicedecide.co.uk and any other UK bits seller..

How can they regulate this? I mean, presumably once you buy something from GW, whether as a distributor or an individual, surely you are free to do whatever the hell you want with it?

I am not a lawyer, but I think the way this kind of thing works is that retailers can do whatever they want... if they buy at normal prices (I.E. the same prices regular customers would pay from the online store). However, retailers that jump through hoops (At a basic level, often accepting a minimum order, but with free/cheap shipping. More complex terms might include carrying the whole line, options to return unsold product, or other benefits to both sides) get massive discounts... Which they really need to make it worth it.

So, basically, a store can do what they want, but if GW catches them, the store will not be offered the reduced prices.

Some stores have, in some areas, worked around these terms by buying through a distributor (like Alliance) who generally are easier to deal with and don't mess with terms.

 Steve steveson wrote:
It's pretty standard in a allot of industries to not deal with Internet only sellers. Far to many fly by night operations out there and having a B&M store is one of the signs of a company that is putting real investment in to it rather than just some guy with a £50 web site, a load of trade credit and a spare bedroom. Many publishers will only sell to companies with a B&M store, unless the buyer is large enough to enter negotiation for its own bespoke contract.

I wonder if they have been stung by a few small companies just disappearing or paying very, very late. The "one order a week" makes me think it could be this too. To many companies ordering as they get orders rather than holding stock. Transfers all the risk to GW, whilst they take the sales because they have 0 risk or overheads they can pass on 20%+ of the trade discount.

The B&M stores have also probably been complaining about how they provide a load of services, hold stock and are being undercut by web stores (Just the same as I have seen in publishing).

I wouldn't say "standard in a lot of industries" is entirely accurate today. 10 or 15 years ago? sure. But not today. Amazon, eBay and the explosion of eCommerce changed that quite a bit. It's not even "standard" in this industry as no other company has those restrictions.

As far as small retailers disappearing or paying late, this isn't limited to just online retailers. Hobby / Comic Stores come and go with a lot of regularity and have done so for a very long time. The way to deal with that issue is to not extend credit at all but rather make them pay as they go until the relationship is firmly established. If they have the funds to pay the light bill, then they should have the funds to stock whatever it is they want to sell.

Regarding complaints a B&M might make: they have an entirely different value proposition which can justify their prices. One of the local stores here has an on going escalation league system that draws people. It runs for about 3 months with a tournament at the end. Once the tournament is over a new league period starts up. They do this for multiple game systems and people are always in their store. This isn't something you can get from an online retailer and people do spend money while there.

Point is, every retailer that attempts to sell a high priced item at full MSRP is going to have issues if all they are offering is the product. If they offer discounts, then it eats into their potential profit margin. However, if they offer other items to continuously draw people in then they will make sales for no other reason than it is much easier to buy something when you are staring at it than to wait a week or so for it to ship. Bonus points to those B&M's that do both: some discount in combination with a friendly environment that encourages use your purchases. Wargaming is an interesting field: by nature it is a social game. Therefore providing an environment for people to socialize in is a must.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Of course if you're a bits seller that doesn't have a contract with GW, then it really makes no difference.

Which is why the ridiculous tantrum thrown by businesses such as Spikey Bits was so... umm... ridiculous. Ordering from ACD or Alliance is a ~2% difference in wholesale costs.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 scarletsquig wrote:
My LGS has already given up on stocking GW.

Mantic is now on the shelves where the GW stuff used to be.

You have my pity. Mantic is God-awful......

DeathGod wrote:
Which is why the ridiculous tantrum thrown by businesses such as Spikey Bits was so... umm... ridiculous. Ordering from ACD or Alliance is a ~2% difference in wholesale costs.

Distributors are also forbidden from selling to businesses that don't follow GW's trade terms.

So the end result for bits sellers is that they have to buy their sets at retail (or whatever discount they can get from retailers) rather than on a trade account. FOr some, that makes no difference since it's what they were doing anyway... But for those who built their business around having a trade account, it does have an impact.

At the end of the day, GW will seek to maximize its own profits. Even a bits seller who buys at full GW retail is still costing GW a customer who only wanted select bits rather than be forced to buy a whole kit.

I would not be surprised if GW further down the line looks to add even more restrictions in some way or form. But at that point, they might as well stop selling to independent retailers altogether.

And I’d hardly call it a “ridiculous tantrum”. It’s not as if Spiky Bitz were doing anything wrong. Why shouldn’t they be annoyed that a part of their business is being shut down because of short-sighted morons who think that the Internet is something that must be controlled and curtailed?

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Why shouldn’t they be annoyed that a part of their business is being shut down because of short-sighted morons who think that the Internet is something that must be controlled and curtailed?

It is a business however that relies on short-sighted morons who think that the internet is something that must be controlled and curtailed. They need them in order to run their business model.

Of course, they could make their own bitz, but then would have the short-sighted morons who think that the internet is something that must be controlled and curtailed on leashes handing them cease and desist orders.

 WarOne wrote:
At the end of the day, GW will seek to maximize its own profits. Even a bits seller who buys at full GW retail is still costing GW a customer who only wanted select bits rather than be forced to buy a whole kit.

Only if that person would have wanted those bits enough to go and buy the whole box.

And only in the same way that peope trading bits at a gaming club is 'costing GW sales'...


If anything, bits sellers are resulting in more sales, since as well as the bits that people are buying, those bits sellers are all sitting on extra inventory that came from GW... and are giving people access to bits that they wouldn't have had access to otherwise, due to small gaming groups having limited trade possibilities.

Stopping bits sales from trade account holders is incredibly shortsighted. It doesn't stop the bits trade. It just stops trade accounts from participating in it... which is going to cost them sales.

Me thinks that GW's lawyers are writing checks that they can't pay once again.

AFAIK, under EU trade laws as long as GW has an online presence themselves they can under no circumstance forbid others from selling their product online. This type of policy seems to be a direct breach of Chapter I, Article 101 of the EU Anti-competitive agreements, and if GW tries to enforce it and they called to the courts for it, they'll pay a very heavy fine for it!

DeathGod wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
My LGS has already given up on stocking GW.

Mantic is now on the shelves where the GW stuff used to be.

You have my pity. Mantic is God-awful......

You obviously don't know much about scarletsquig

Deathgod is writing from 2009, he hasn't seen the later releases..

It only mandates that you need a store. So no completely exclusive online sales. Hmmmm. Can't fathom how that might benefit GW. Unless adding a big(ish) cost to a lot of online retailers is the point of this I don't see how that changes anything.

Also no GW supported bitz sales, that has been discussed before. Someone has to stop GW in this. But I suppose if they are allowed by law then I can't see how really.

 Pacific wrote:
Deathgod is writing from 2009, he hasn't seen the later releases..

the later ones have some steaming turds too. Shilling for mantic in the face of reality is a hard sell.

I hardly believe any store has actually gone 100% mantic and dumped GW.that sounds like anonymous Internet plausible deniability to me. They can hardly give mantic models away due to the way the kick starters starve the market in many places.

This policy doesn't shut down bitz vendors, just bitz vendors which use A 45% retail discount to not sell the products at retail. They would have to maintain their bitz profit using the retailer 20% off Internet discounter. If you want the 45% discount, you follow the rules of the agreement. This is like distributors saying don't break apart for individual sale. If you bought it retail, you can do what you want but trade partners didn't buy the products retail and have limited rights to what they can do with their product.

PhantomViper wrote:
Me thinks that GW's lawyers are writing checks that they can't pay once again.

AFAIK, under EU trade laws as long as GW has an online presence themselves they can under no circumstance forbid others from selling their product online. This type of policy seems to be a direct breach of Chapter I, Article 101 of the EU Anti-competitive agreements, and if GW tries to enforce it and they called to the courts for it, they'll pay a very heavy fine for it!

This, I think they can block sales via third-party websites (eg Amazon and eBay), providing they don't sell directly there themselves (again EU competition laws). In order for them to be a sole presence on Amazon, they'd have to set up a trade account with them, and then get Amazon to police it, and also make sure Amazon only sell at full RRP - Bose and Bowers & Wilkins for example manage this.

I think they also can't make retailers sell stuff at full RRP, as they have their own stores (which by law, DO have to sell at full RRP, and, if online, have to charge for shipping).

This policy makes sense frankly, and it ought to be supported, but as its a GW policy it wont be by many.

This is coming from someone who repeatedly harshly critiques GW, rather than a fanboi.

We need to look at the isue not who is making it.

GW forks out for brick and mortar and lose out to third party retailers who only sell online. Online only sellers do not support the hobby, only those with a physical sales location do.

If GW tries to ban online sales they will break EU laws, however the current rerstrictions are no more than 'do as we do' and reamin fair so long as GW itself has a retail division.

GW has many many faults, but this policy is not one of them.

Funny they come up with this right after they lost CHS case. Leaving an even bigger door open to independent conversion bits.

It really does not make much of a difference to me personally, to think they will be able to eradicate bits sellers is ridiculous, but this will not be the first windmill GW tries to tilt.

In all honestly they are making every effort they can to push people out of the hobby, I was starting to cast legs and torsos for personal use and buy arms and weapons (those bits have to come from somewhere right)? well, seems that instead of me buying bits they would rather i buy nothing at all.

Those Chinese recasters are looking better by the minute.

Its so funny, lest assume for a second that we live in an alternate reality and they some how manage to destroy bit sellers, what is the next logical step you will see pop out and get massified? USED ARMIES AND UNITS, even painted, they are around today, but bar a heavy discount, you rather just get the bits, i would like to see how GW plans to fight that when it happens.



The US army already had a policy for something like this in place "Dont ask dont tell".

 Orlanth wrote:
Online only sellers do not support the hobby, only those with a physical sales location do..

Nah, private gaming clubs "support the hobby" far better than any store can. Or do you really enjoy playing on dingy boards in some cramped bit of cut-price retail space while unsupervised kids rifle through your stuff when your back is turned?

 insaniak wrote:

DeathGod wrote:
Which is why the ridiculous tantrum thrown by businesses such as Spikey Bits was so... umm... ridiculous. Ordering from ACD or Alliance is a ~2% difference in wholesale costs.

Distributors are also forbidden from selling to businesses that don't follow GW's trade terms.

That says interesting things about how big GW is. To my understanding, most companies love sales to distributors as it's good up-front cash flow and generally have to agree to the distributor terms moreso than the other way around.

 Orlanth wrote:
Online only sellers do not support the hobby, only those with a physical sales location do.

This is the party line from GW but, I'm sorry, it's nonsense. Quite a few online businesses do support the hobby. I've seen more than one tournament sponsored by online stores, and several gaming clubs that had purchase agreements with online businesses. They also keep people in the hobby who would otherwise not be thanks to the prices, or just not having a nearby store.

It's an even more nonsensical statement when you consider that GW's idea of 'supporting the hobby', as stated by their CEO, requires stores to provide gaming space. Something that GW stores have been progressively eliminating for the past several years.

What annoys me about this is I can't even order off the GW website. Their system is set up in such a way from what I understand that my card will not work when ordering from them. It protects me ( ) from making purchases. Something to do with shipping to a different address then the one you live at is a no no with the GW website. Sucks because I live on a military base but keep a residency in my home state for tax purposes.

Additionally when I go in store an make a purchase my bank calls me to inform me that an irregular purchase has been made on my card. (my bank might be trying to tell me something)

DeathGod wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Of course if you're a bits seller that doesn't have a contract with GW, then it really makes no difference.

Which is why the ridiculous tantrum thrown by businesses such as Spikey Bits was so... umm... ridiculous. Ordering from ACD or Alliance is a ~2% difference in wholesale costs.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 scarletsquig wrote:
My LGS has already given up on stocking GW.

Mantic is now on the shelves where the GW stuff used to be.

You have my pity. Mantic is God-awful......

A bit more actually. Alliance and ACD sell GW at a basic 35% off, E-Figs at 40%. Direct from GW is 45%.

Also, as of June, if GW's terms with distributors also have a way to enforce no bitz selling. supposedly, GW will be looking at bitz sellers, and instructing the Distributors to not sell to them. I'm curious to see how the enforcement works on that, but there are many other companies who have rules to stop distributors from selling to stores that violate trade terms.

 Agamemnon2 wrote:

 Orlanth wrote:
Online only sellers do not support the hobby, only those with a physical sales location do..

Nah, private gaming clubs "support the hobby" far better than any store can. Or do you really enjoy playing on dingy boards in some cramped bit of cut-price retail space while unsupervised kids rifle through your stuff when your back is turned?

Depends on what country you live in. Gaming clubs that rent out a space are exceedingly rare in the US. In fact nonexistant, in most places. Our social points of contact outside the home are gaming stores. Many of them are very nice and do not fit your description at all.

No kids looking through my stuff, ever. The whole world is not like your backyard.

Bits sellers have a large untapped source of bits..............


......Modelers. afaik, no bits sellers buy from the public, but if it became economical to do so, there could be a flood of product.

filbert wrote:

How can they regulate this? I mean, presumably once you buy something from GW, whether as a distributor or an individual, surely you are free to do whatever the hell you want with it?

Not if you sign a trade agreement with GW. Seeing as how GW is profiting well right now, and growing, it would be pretty foolish of a retailer to stop selling their stuff and/or breach said agreement.

A retailer could be stupid and try to rely solely on PP or Mantic, but that's begging for failure.

insaniak wrote:

 WarOne wrote:
At the end of the day, GW will seek to maximize its own profits. Even a bits seller who buys at full GW retail is still costing GW a customer who only wanted select bits rather than be forced to buy a whole kit.

Only if that person would have wanted those bits enough to go and buy the whole box.

And only in the same way that peope trading bits at a gaming club is 'costing GW sales'...


If anything, bits sellers are resulting in more sales, since as well as the bits that people are buying, those bits sellers are all sitting on extra inventory that came from GW... and are giving people access to bits that they wouldn't have had access to otherwise, due to small gaming groups having limited trade possibilities.

Stopping bits sales from trade account holders is incredibly shortsighted. It doesn't stop the bits trade. It just stops trade accounts from participating in it... which is going to cost them sales.

It's not short-sighted. They pay lots of people to research this stuff, and it happens in business everywhere. The people on internet forums are far more short-sighted than GW on this matter. We only see that we may have to find another way to get bits. Having to think hurts our brains, so we cry foul. They see a way to streamline the process, maximize their profits (which means growth, more jobs created, better benefits for said employees, and a better product), and help the FLGS make more money as well.

Bits ordering isn't exactly a booming industry anyway, and the sellers are just trying to maximize their profits off of someone else's product. Shouldn't you be screaming at them too then? This really won't hurt any entity relevant to the hobby. On the whole, it will be a healthy move, and most everyone griping in here won't even be affected by it.

PhantomViper wrote:Me thinks that GW's lawyers are writing checks that they can't pay once again.

AFAIK, under EU trade laws as long as GW has an online presence themselves they can under no circumstance forbid others from selling their product online. This type of policy seems to be a direct breach of Chapter I, Article 101 of the EU Anti-competitive agreements, and if GW tries to enforce it and they called to the courts for it, they'll pay a very heavy fine for it!

They aren't forbidding people from selling their product online. They are just regulating in which form(s) it can be sold.

nkelsch wrote:

 Pacific wrote:
Deathgod is writing from 2009, he hasn't seen the later releases..

the later ones have some steaming turds too. Shilling for mantic in the face of reality is a hard sell.

I hardly believe any store has actually gone 100% mantic and dumped GW.that sounds like anonymous Internet plausible deniability to me. They can hardly give mantic models away due to the way the kick starters starve the market in many places.

This policy doesn't shut down bitz vendors, just bitz vendors which use A 45% retail discount to not sell the products at retail. They would have to maintain their bitz profit using the retailer 20% off Internet discounter. If you want the 45% discount, you follow the rules of the agreement. This is like distributors saying don't break apart for individual sale. If you bought it retail, you can do what you want but trade partners didn't buy the products retail and have limited rights to what they can do with their product.

Smartest post of the thread.

JWhex wrote:

 Agamemnon2 wrote:

 Orlanth wrote:
Online only sellers do not support the hobby, only those with a physical sales location do..

Nah, private gaming clubs "support the hobby" far better than any store can. Or do you really enjoy playing on dingy boards in some cramped bit of cut-price retail space while unsupervised kids rifle through your stuff when your back is turned?

Depends on what country you live in. Gaming clubs that rent out a space are exceedingly rare in the US. In fact nonexistant, in most places. Our social points of contact outside the home are gaming stores. Many of them are very nice and do not fit your description at all.

No kids looking through my stuff, ever. The whole world is not like your backyard.

Well said. I have 4 stores in driving distance with room for playing table top games. Most of them are perpetually crowded, and no one who plays at those locations is a part of a gaming club. 3 online gaming clubs in my area have started and disappeared in the last 10 years, because there just isn't support for that sort of thing.

This is a hobby where the bread and butter is still the B&M store.

GW is simply trying to avoid getting burned by fly-by-night online entities that are really just gamers looking to get stuff for cheap. Sure, a few online retailers may suffer for it, but that's why they are businessmen and women: it's their job to adapt or die. If GW continues to grow, while certain online sellers are dying, who's business model was the failed one?

People need to stop thinking "GW = evul becuz the interwebs sez so!!!" and think about what's really happening. Every industry has policies like this in place. Just look for the words "Not for individual sale" on a product that comes out of a case or a box. It's everywhere.

There's also the rumor hovering around that GW plans on opening up their own bits packages down the road for direct sale, but we will see. They've done a lot of good since the release of 40k 6th, and their sales numbers reflect that.

 brassangel wrote:
Not if you sign a trade agreement with GW. Seeing as how GW is profiting well right now, and growing, it would be pretty foolish of a retailer to stop selling their stuff and/or breach said agreement.

GW are making money but they are growing slower than the industry as a whole is growing. In business terms that isn't growing, their market share is shrinking.

Moves like this restrict the sale of GW products which is stupid plain and simple. GW need to be getting more people playing their games if they want to be the market leader in 5 years, not forcing people to buy from them direct and expecting the higher profit to cover the loss of sales.



I'd love to see someone properly question if this sort of thing is legal in the UK since after the chapterhouse lawsuit we should all know not to take GWs word for anything legal wise. They can probably implement this with no issues, doesn't mean it isn't stupid though.

 brassangel wrote:

It's not short-sighted. They pay lots of people to research this stuff, and it happens in business everywhere. The people on internet forums are far more short-sighted than GW on this matter. We only see that we may have to find another way to get bits. Having to think hurts our brains, so we cry foul. They see a way to streamline the process, maximize their profits (which means growth, more jobs created, better benefits for said employees, and a better product), and help the FLGS make more money as well.

Sorry, which process is streamlined by GW forbidding bits sales?

And how does forbidding FLGS owners from competing with non-trade account bits Sellers make them more money, exactly?

Bits ordering isn't exactly a booming industry anyway, and the sellers are just trying to maximize their profits off of someone else's product. Shouldn't you be screaming at them too then?

Screaming about what? I don't object to this because GW shouldn't make a profit. I object to it because it is a stupid policy that only hurts those trade account holders who were trying to compete with other bits Sellers. It won't make the bits trade go away... Just limits who can do it.

And if the bits trade is as insignificant as you seem to think, why bother regulating against it?

You know what they say about arguing with a wall, insaniak. right?

GW gave sufficient reason for disallowing their retailers to sell bits, the problem is that many of you are ignorant of the reason because you didnt read the trade agreement that was posted or you simply disagree with their decision and the reason that they gave.

I feel bad for one of my favorite local retailers because he sold lots of used models on ebay for his customers, took a cut and gave store credit for the remainder. It was conveinent for him and us.

However, GW explained why they were enforcing the new agreement and from the perspective of a marketing professional they gave a valid reason.