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I believe him that it became a corporate mantra inside GW during the final years of 2nd edition though, because both 3rd edition 40k and 5th edition WFB were definitely "sell more fish" editions.

THAT I have no trouble believing!

Or he could have ripped it off.

It's not like GW hasn't...um....borrowed heavily from other IPs.

I look forward to coming back to this thread a couple years from now and quoting it for the newest GW is going out of business thread.

 pretre wrote:
I look forward to coming back to this thread a couple years from now and quoting it for the newest GW is going out of business thread.

Keep your words short and sweet little dinosaur, as you may just have to eat them.

Biggest threat IMO comes from FFG's XWING taking customers. Could work both ways as a starter to the more flashy 40k. However, when I look at the 40k players vs XWing players, en balance, more mutants on our side of the fence. Plus the fluff is much more accessible.

3d printers pose a serious threat in the coming decade.

IP only goes so far, if the fluff doesn't expand for GW. you can only make so any video games... Plus movies (thus far) have not been compelling at all.

Chapterhouse lawsuit was minor IMO. GW did a greedy and seemingly poorly conceived strategic tack by changing rules to hurt a small but much more nimble company. Becoming a major sponsor a la "Red Bull" athletics would've been a much bolder market play. Twitch coverage and major events would've been my suggestion. Engage country by country competition wholly sanctioned by YOUR corp. There's money right there. Not now. But later. And... Acquisitions. Why not buy chapterhouse rather than fight? Crazy. Merchantilis vs Entreprneurialism.

I'm drunk.

 pretre wrote:
I look forward to coming back to this thread a couple years from now and quoting it for the newest GW is going out of business thread.

What, you're going to prove people like me who think they'll stick around right?

I swear people just remember posts they disagree with or extrapolate the most extreme criticisms into "the opinion of everyone."

If anything, I'd say this thread has largely been about how GW is not going under. Other than Wayshuba, is anyone actually predicting a demise of GW any time soon?

I think they'll just dig themselves into a hole and won't know how to dig themselves out.

It looks like the wargaming industry is actually growing, while GW isn't really growing if not losing it's fan base. After releasing a mainstream console game, two editions, 9 army updates, 6 supplements, dataslates, and 2 expansions it doesn't seem like the company is growing as much as one would expect.

You don't need to sink. You just need to be stuck in a leaky raft and bailing out water while others are turning coconuts into jet skis.

https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=GAW.L#symbol=GAW.L;range=1y

it seems like they split there shares in half and have gone up a ton since. thats insane. they've made so much money this year its not even funny. no way its going under. seems like they're spending tho, could be eternal crusade

Grimtuff wrote:

 pretre wrote:
I look forward to coming back to this thread a couple years from now and quoting it for the newest GW is going out of business thread.

Keep your words short and sweet little dinosaur, as you may just have to eat them.

I already bet someone on it and will certainly eat my words if I'm wrong. Of course, I won't be wrong.

doktor_g wrote:Biggest threat IMO comes from FFG's XWING taking customers.

Not sure if serious...

I'm drunk.

Oh, nevermind.

frozenwastes wrote:What, you're going to prove people like me who think they'll stick around right?

Yep.

I swear people just remember posts they disagree with or extrapolate the most extreme criticisms into "the opinion of everyone."

If it wasn't clear from my post and previous posts on the topic, I think the 'GW is going under' thing is hogwash. Just as it was with the last thread and the thread before that, going back for the last 20 years.

If anything, I'd say this thread has largely been about how GW is not going under. Other than Wayshuba, is anyone actually predicting a demise of GW any time soon?

Is Wayshuba the one who keeps posting the death spiral graphic or the other guy who keeps hawking that one blog?

 poolatka wrote:
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=GAW.L#symbol=GAW.L;range=1y

it seems like they split there shares in half and have gone up a ton since. thats insane. they've made so much money this year its not even funny. no way its going under. seems like they're spending tho, could be eternal crusade

Errr....

What?

 frozenwastes wrote:
I believe him that it became a corporate mantra inside GW during the final years of 2nd edition though, because both 3rd edition 40k and 5th edition WFB were definitely "sell more fish" editions.

The shift towards bigger games from 2nd to 3rd ed 40K wasn't entirely corporate driven.

While 2nd ed started out as a small skirmish game, what happened as it aged and people got more comfortable with it is that they wanted to play bigger and bigger games... but the 2nd ed rules got fairly clunky fairly quickly when you went large. So GW stripped back the rules and made it a game that scaled up more easily.

It's easy to be cynical and assume that these decisions are all based on pure sales ... although from a certain perspective, giving people the games system that they want is all about sales. Which is ultimately where GW appear to have lost their way. Somewhere between 3rd edition and 6th edition (I would say right about the time Codex: Grey Knights was published, personally), they stopped writing the game that their players wanted, and started writing the game that the studio wanted.

 poolatka wrote:
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=GAW.L#symbol=GAW.L;range=1y

it seems like they split there shares in half and have gone up a ton since. thats insane. they've made so much money this year its not even funny. no way its going under. seems like they're spending tho, could be eternal crusade

It was no split. It was a gap down upon a bad interim report. Then they posted an update that sales were around what was expected and then they announced a dividend and it's climbed back up. It bounced off 650 and now it's on it's way back down, who knows how far.

 insaniak wrote:
Somewhere between 3rd edition and 6th edition (I would say right about the time Codex: Grey Knights was published, personally), they stopped writing the game that their players wanted, and started writing the game that the studio wanted.

I lol'd at this. I know you were probably being serious, but still...

From my limited understanding of economics, it doesn't seem that their practices are sustanable for the long term.

I don't know enough about business to make any sort of definitive judgement on the future of GW, but I also can't see them sticking around for another 10 years with their current business plan.

I wouldn't shed a tear if they went under, but I'd also be quite happy if they turned it all around and made a game worth the price they're asking, at half the cost.

Part of me is hoping this financial report is poor, as maybe that'll be enough of a wake up call to change some of their business policies/shake up the studio. I'm not sure how the sales of 7th will help, but I guess time will tell.

 pretre wrote:
I lol'd at this. I know you were probably being serious, but still...

Yup, totally serious.

I've been playing since the early days of 2nd edition. For much of that time, while they didn't always get it right, the studio at least put some effort into listening to what the players wanted. 3rd edition saw a shift towards bigger games. 4th edition added back some of the detail that was lost when the game was 'streamlined' and improved the close combat and vehicle rules. 5th edition saw an even bigger emphasis on vehicles and big games. All of this was driven at least as much by the players as by the studio - while obviously not universal, it was the game that many players wanted.

Then came 6th edition. By this point, GW isn't listening any more. They've closed off communication with their customers, they've stopped talking about upcoming releases and mingling with players over actual games, and are just pumping out releases that try to cram as much of 2nd edition as they can into the current game.

Anybody who has been around for more than a decade is fairly inured to the price complaints by now. GW's stuff has always been expensive. So it's hard to pin the current exponential exodus on pricing. But I'm seeing an awful lot of people walking out on the basis that the game has turned into something that they're just not interested in... far more so than any previous edition change.

The logical conclusion then is that these latest changes aren't what the players wanted.

 pretre wrote:

Is Wayshuba the one who keeps posting the death spiral graphic or the other guy who keeps hawking that one blog?

So there are two people who think GW is on the verge? Well, that's twice as many as I thought.

I think GW is on a path they'll eventually need to find their way off of, but I'm not sure they're being forced to change yet. Kirby just paid himself another 400K in dividends and they might have figured out they can sell people the game over again every two years. And that they can split up codex sales so people will have to pay way, way more if they want all the rules for their army. And the move of elites to 5 miniature boxes shows that people really will keep buying GW plastics at Forgeworld prices.

I think the reason I take exception to these posts like "I'm just going to show this thread in a couple years to show you all how wrong you were!" or the posting of an image of homer predicting the end of the world or the "GW go under? pshaw!" posts is that they don't actually engage in the material being discussed or deal with the topic except to dismiss or belittle those participating in the discussion.

There will come a point though, where GW can't cut costs any further. Where if they dismiss one more employee, they'll be lacking in the ability to function as a business. And there's a point where a new release is priced so high not enough people will buy it. They're not there yet. But Wayshuba's point does stand: companies very rarely realize they have passed that point until after they've done it.

GW will eventually have to adjust their business model. In a way, they're trying to do that right now by getting enough single employee stores and enough margin from direct only to make it all work. They're shifting to a hard sales and direct sales model rather than a community building model and are part way through implementing that transition. We will see if it even works over the next two financial reports. Either the stores stick and the admin staff they've dismissed bolters sales and keeps costs down enough or they don't.

 frozenwastes wrote:
they might have figured out they can sell people the game over again every two years. And that they can split up codex sales so people will have to pay way, way more if they want all the rules for their army. And the move of elites to 5 miniature boxes shows that people really will keep buying GW plastics at Forgeworld prices.

Have they figured out how many customers they lost implementing these? It seems to be substantial.

 frozenwastes wrote:
There will come a point though, where GW can't cut costs any further. Where if they dismiss one more employee, they'll be lacking in the ability to function as a business.

They're arguably already there.

At least on the retail front... In this day and age of retail convenience, they have a whole bunch of stores worldwide that are closed two days a week, and that can't open for business if their single employee is ill.

And then they wonder why people are buying stuff on the internet instead.

 Yonan wrote:

 frozenwastes wrote:
they might have figured out they can sell people the game over again every two years. And that they can split up codex sales so people will have to pay way, way more if they want all the rules for their army. And the move of elites to 5 miniature boxes shows that people really will keep buying GW plastics at Forgeworld prices.

Have they figured out how many customers they lost implementing these? It seems to be substantial.

In the half-year, Kirby alludes to it but discounts it as transitional adjustment issues that will be/have been worked out.

I know this was talked about in another thread but...my god, they really tanked in the half-year. Earnings per share in the previous year was 51.5p and this half-year is just 17.7p and includes the heaviest sale period of the year (holiday season) no wonder they pulled out all the stops and have just been flooding product through the system since. In a direct comparison it was 25.6p the previous year's half-year report.

 Yonan wrote:

Have they figured out how many players they lost implementing these? It seems to be substantial.

It may be substantial, but with sufficient price hikes on new releases, they can make up the revenue. There are also a few ideas that have been floating around the net which might explain their seeing of "players" as being lesser importance.

1) Most of their customers don't actually play their game. Jervis said this in an interview over 5 years ago now at UK Games Day (2009, I think). He said their core customer was a craft hobbyist who rarely, if ever, put their models on the table to play.

2) Ex-GW employees from the post-LotR era said that GW believes their typical customer only sticks around for a couple of years. So then they should be releasing new editions more regularly so that everyone can have the opportunity to buy the game again before they quit at least once in their time as GW customers. At first you might think this contradicts 1), but remember it's not about having them buy the game to play it, but to buy the game with the idea that they might play it and thus need models.

3) GW really does view the hobby as the purchasing of GW products. They said it at Games Day, they said it in the CHS lawsuit, on the stand, under oath. What do they care about the number of players as long as enough people are still involved in the real hobby, buying their stuff.

4) New releases sell great. And Space Marines. That's it. This is from the CHS lawsuit sales spreadsheet. New products sell great and then drop off. Space Marine releases don't drop off as fast, but they still do. And now with Unbound they can sell everyone on every release as you can just use it in every army. No more awkard "what army do you play?" sales barrier. Now it's a sales feature. Play Dark Angels? Imagine how awesome these new orks will work with your army!"

Most people judge GW's health by the health of the local gaming scene. I think the "Games" in Games Workshop hasn't really been present in a long, long while and their whole complete package isn't about good game play or developing a community of gamers, but of selling people on an idea that keeps them buying. I think Dakka's population might be very representative of gamers as a whole but very unrepresentative of GW's customers as a whole.

---

While I don't think GW is in imminent danger of going down, they are in a new exciting, challenging environment, from a competitive standpoint. The industry has never had it so good. Stuff like plastics and digital design tools are accessible to just about anyone. Start-ups and new product development are more readily funded with stuff like crowd-sourcing. And GW itself is partly responsible for the amazing state of the industry, thanks to the small legion of alumni starting up or joining other companies. Then there's the amazing exciting new players that pop up now and then, such as Warmachine, Flames of War, and X-Wing. But these are all fairly different games. So while they are still competitors vying for the same wallet in the same kinds of target market, GW's core games can differentiate fairly well, not to mention the world-leading fan base they already have. I think there are enough threats facing GW, and the challenge for them is a strategy for sustainable growth. But going down? Don't think so.

He also asked if anyone remembered pokemon like less than a month after X and Y made more money in their opening week than GW does in a good year.



*edit* Bah, I should just stop trying to keep up with conversasion on my phone.

 jonolikespie wrote:
He also asked if anyone remembered pokemon like less than a month after X and Y made more money in their opening week than GW does in a good year.

That was funny.

One thing he is right about though, is that Pokemon is no longer a direct threat to GW. GW is doing what they can to isolate and segment their sales away from being directly competing with pokemon cards at your local shop. By moving more and more direct only and relying on GW's customer base's penchant for buying new releases, GW has been able to capture more margins and segment themselves from the larger market.

The end result has been giving away a massive amount of market share, while using higher prices and the pumping of new releases to keep revenue up.

Notice that GW no longer publishes sales number by channel. Hopefully they do in the next report, but it's no likely. If they did, it might show a rather nasty drop in trade sales as GW goes more and more direct only.

The way I see it, since I sold off/out, is two things:

1) GW doesn't tank. I'm actively playing better games, painting awesome models, and enjoying hucking dice with far less disputes per game. Most of my disputes arise from learning 3 games at once because I'm crazy, not because the rules are bad. I'm usually wrong, I apologize, they laugh, we keep going at it.

2) GW does tank. See #1, but add that I probably made way more money selling off my 40k/Fantasy stuff now than before they tanked. If another company buys the IP and remakes the game into something awesome, then I will gladly reward that company with new sales of an army.

So it's win-win for me. I think they're on a dark course of obscurity or failure. If they can somehow buyout and go private, they'll drift into obscurity as a model company who maybe rises from the ashes if they remove the offending parties and come with hat-in-hand. Or they stay public, try to stick to their guns, and go out of business.

 frozenwastes wrote:
GW is doing what they can to isolate and segment their sales away from being directly competing with pokemon cards at your local shop. By moving more and more direct only and relying on GW's customer base's penchant for buying new releases, GW has been able to capture more margins and segment themselves from the larger market.

The problem is that, outside of the UK, this is an incredibly stupid plan. The US market can't support enough GW stores for them to bring all GW customers out of independent stores and into GW's own stores, so they're never going to eliminate the competition. The absolute best they can hope for is that certain geographical areas (centered around the lowest rent in town) are somewhat isolated, but even then those customers are likely to interact with GW customers from the independent stores, friends that play non-GW games, etc.

The end result has been giving away a massive amount of market share, while using higher prices and the pumping of new releases to keep revenue up.

Which is just suicide in a social hobby like 40k. Sure, those price increases make up for the lost sales volume in the immediate future, but the lost market share makes it a lot harder to recruit new players to replace the ones they lose (and yes, they will lose players). And as the number of players continues to drop it makes it even harder to recruit replacements, driving the death spiral faster and faster.

doktor_g wrote:Biggest threat IMO comes from FFG's XWING taking customers.

Not sure if serious...

Peregrine wrote:The problem is that, outside of the UK, this is an incredibly stupid plan.

GW has just full-on failed to achieve anything like the market penetration they had in the UK anywhere else. Even when they worked closely and fairly with trade partners in the US, they still never got anywhere close to the sales levels per population they did in the UK. They must, by now, realize it's just not going to happen for them.

The US market can't support enough GW stores for them to bring all GW customers out of independent stores and into GW's own stores, so they're never going to eliminate the competition.

They don't need to. And they certainly don't need to blanket the country with them. They just need to identify good locations for their stores so they get enough profitable locations rather than dominate the market. if population centres without enough going on to justify a GW store want to be serviced through independant trade accounts, GW will supply those guys, insist on draconian trade terms and then use their direct only approach to steal as many customers as possible.

The absolute best they can hope for is that certain geographical areas (centered around the lowest rent in town) are somewhat isolated, but even then those customers are likely to interact with GW customers from the independent stores, friends that play non-GW games, etc.

And the question is, can GW develop enough of these sort of locations and have them be profitable to keep their revenue up in this new segmented market + direct sales approach? I think they can.

Which is just suicide in a social hobby like 40k. Sure, those price increases make up for the lost sales volume in the immediate future, but the lost market share makes it a lot harder to recruit new players to replace the ones they lose (and yes, they will lose players). And as the number of players continues to drop it makes it even harder to recruit replacements, driving the death spiral faster and faster.

GW is in a managed decline. They are shrinking their player base in exchange for qualified sales prospects. And they are ahead of the game on cutting costs.

This obviously can't continue forever and they will reach a point where shedding more customers will lead to too many lost customers, but is that point really here yet? Their new campaign box set is selling out in preorder. And while you or I may instinctively think "then make more," I think their response will be that the next similar product will be priced higher. If they sell out in preorder, they made it too good of a deal.

To bring this back to the social issue, let's say Warmachine/Hordes has 100 players. And GW has 500. These numbers are obviously made up. GW shrinking to 250 or PP growing to 250 doesn't actually mean suicide or success for either company. Many companies don't manage expansion correctly and hit cash flow issues and have huge problems. Others can manage declines properly and stay profitable. if X players is enough for PP to have a vibrant community and a profitable business, why can't it be that way for GW, but with GW's added advantage of capturing more of the margin (PP rarely sells direct) and their completely paid for, in house, plastic production?

GW is on a path to irrelevancy to the wider hobby. But what if they may be finding a way to make the wider industry completely irrelevant to them? Do I think it's the right path? No way. Do I think it means they can't make it work? Again no. I think there are enough people to sell out their new box sets in preorder. I think enough people will pay Forgeworld prices for GW plastics.

Would I rather be wrong? Absolutely. I would love it if financial hardship forced GW to change, but we're not there yet. And the question is are we even close? I think the time to call it as being close is after GW has fully rolled out their new plan and had their only result be failure. They're still mid stream on their restructuring but from now on will have an even lower overhead as they trimmed entire national offices worth of admin staff.

---

 frozenwastes wrote:
Their new campaign box set is selling out in preorder. And while you or I may instinctively think "then make more," I think their response will be that the next similar product will be priced higher. If they sell out in preorder, they made it too good of a deal.

A product selling out on pre-order doesn't actually tell us anything useful without knowing how many were available on pre-order.