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I was looking around on their site and it occurred to me that I don't actually know what the business model is. I know they're a subsidiary to GW, but I don't actually know why it's more feasible to sell models and rules under a different company name.

I guess I'm just curious why GW doesn't just make those models and rules themselves? It may be a stupid question, or one everyone already knows the answer to, I just personally don't, so I wondered if anyone could tell me more about it.

Why does General Motors bother selling their cars and trucks under the different brands of Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, etc.? Because of brand recognition. Each of those brands has a certain reputation attached to them that is marketed and capitalized on. It's the same with GW and Forgeworld. Forgeworld is the specialist producer of the high end goodies, much like Ferrari is for Fiat.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
Why does General Motors bother selling their cars and trucks under the different brands of Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, etc.? Because of brand recognition. Each of those brands has a certain reputation attached to them that is marketed and capitalized on. It's the same with GW and Forgeworld. Forgeworld is the specialist producer of the high end goodies, much like Ferrari is for Fiat.

This.
But, their relationship is probably more similar to that between Abarth and Fiat.

Forgeworld caters to a niche whereas Games-Workshop is more general in its target audience.

Different models, different staff, better models, better rules.

There's a reason why many people who really dislike a lot of stuff GW does mentally ring fence FW and remove it from that criticism, if you aren't a grognard and want a glimpse of what the whole of GW used to be, look at modern FW in comparison.

Huh. Well I guess that answers that. I kinda thought the reason would be something more complicated I guess.

In any case, appreciate it.

Back when GW was making a huge push to open tons of retail stores, they had a pretty huge obsession with trying to sell their products to the mass market (before they realized their products will always be niche because of the painting/modeling aspect).

So they were constantly trying to make it easier for new players to get int the game by releasing more and more plastic kits (which they still do to this day for good reason).

Resin models (especially the old school stuff), on the other hand, can be fairly difficult to work with from a modeling perspective, and most importantly, when you do handle resin it can produce some toxic byproducts. Therefore, selling these old school resin models to kids just getting into 40K/WHFB was not something I think GW wanted to do.

So Forgeworld was a way for GW to still cater to the hobby veterans who like obscure models…especially as they could produce them in the much smaller runs that these veterans were asking for them (and charge an even higher price that these veterans were willing to pay), while at the same time keeping a visible division between the standard 'GW' models that could easily be sold to new players.

 Squidmanlolz wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
Why does General Motors bother selling their cars and trucks under the different brands of Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, etc.? Because of brand recognition. Each of those brands has a certain reputation attached to them that is marketed and capitalized on. It's the same with GW and Forgeworld. Forgeworld is the specialist producer of the high end goodies, much like Ferrari is for Fiat.

This.
But, their relationship is probably more similar to that between Abarth and Fiat.

Forgeworld caters to a niche whereas Games-Workshop is more general in its target audience.

If we are going to use motoring analogies, let's make them good ones! FW are to GW what Lexus are to Toyota, or Infinity are to Honda for you colonials (we don't have the Infinity badge over here.)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 yakface wrote:

Back when GW was making a huge push to open tons of retail stores, they had a pretty huge obsession with trying to sell their products to the mass market (before they realized their products will always be niche because of the painting/modeling aspect).

So they were constantly trying to make it easier for new players to get int the game by releasing more and more plastic kits (which they still do to this day for good reason).

Resin models (especially the old school stuff), on the other hand, can be fairly difficult to work with from a modeling perspective, and most importantly, when you do handle resin it can produce some toxic byproducts. Therefore, selling these old school resin models to kids just getting into 40K/WHFB was not something I think GW wanted to do.

So Forgeworld was a way for GW to still cater to the hobby veterans who like obscure models…especially as they could produce them in the much smaller runs that these veterans were asking for them (and charge an even higher price that these veterans were willing to pay), while at the same time keeping a visible division between the standard 'GW' models that could easily be sold to new players.

You can probably throw in a line about them licensing them initially and then stealing the idea back when it took off, and that's a pretty decent summary.

 yakface wrote:

Back when GW was making a huge push to open tons of retail stores, they had a pretty huge obsession with trying to sell their products to the mass market (before they realized their products will always be niche because of the painting/modeling aspect).

So they were constantly trying to make it easier for new players to get int the game by releasing more and more plastic kits (which they still do to this day for good reason).

Resin models (especially the old school stuff), on the other hand, can be fairly difficult to work with from a modeling perspective, and most importantly, when you do handle resin it can produce some toxic byproducts. Therefore, selling these old school resin models to kids just getting into 40K/WHFB was not something I think GW wanted to do.

So Forgeworld was a way for GW to still cater to the hobby veterans who like obscure models…especially as they could produce them in the much smaller runs that these veterans were asking for them (and charge an even higher price that these veterans were willing to pay), while at the same time keeping a visible division between the standard 'GW' models that could easily be sold to new players.

Ahhhh, okay, that makes alot more sense too me especially if smaller runs were involved. Very cool. Thank you!

 Phyrekzhogos wrote:
I was looking around on their site and it occurred to me that I don't actually know what the business model is. I know they're a subsidiary to GW, but I don't actually know why it's more feasible to sell models and rules under a different company name.

I guess I'm just curious why GW doesn't just make those models and rules themselves? It may be a stupid question, or one everyone already knows the answer to, I just personally don't, so I wondered if anyone could tell me more about it.

GW's core business does primarily plastics and sells through retail outlets. The main GW design studio is subordinate to marketing and sales direction.

Forgeworld basically does the niche stuff. Stuff that they can't produce in the volumes necessary for plastics to be cost effective, and stuff that the main studio can't or doesn't want to do, or that simply can't be done adequately in plastic, but that still has a place within the 40k universe.

Now, this can all be done through the FW sub-studio, in resin, and at a higher price point, and be done without having to encumber the primary design studio or manufacturing process.

As a great example, forgeworld's Death Korps of Krieg line wasn't really a "main" studio project, they're a sub-faction and have a slightly controversial visual aspect, but generated a huge ton of interest. So FW picks them up, fleshes them out, and makes a boatload of money for GW from doing it

The only part that confuses me is that since recently, computers in UK GW stores specifically block the Forgeworld website. You used to be able to walk into a GW and order some nice grey goodies to the store.
You can check your email, but you absolutely can't look at Forgeworld's products.

Riddle me that.

I think part of it is that armorcast back in the day proved that there was a market for niche resin minis (back when gw was doing metal & plastic only).

 Buttery Commissar wrote:
The only part that confuses me is that since recently, computers in UK GW stores specifically block the Forgeworld website. You used to be able to walk into a GW and order some nice grey goodies to the store.
You can check your email, but you absolutely can't look at Forgeworld's products.

Riddle me that.

GW is weird. This is the same company that actively squashes anything that could be considered marketing activity even when it's to their benefit, and has *borrowed* money to pay dividends to shareholders (the only possible reason for which was to effectively *double* Mr.Kirby's salary, as he's one of the largest shareholders).

 Buttery Commissar wrote:
The only part that confuses me is that since recently, computers in UK GW stores specifically block the Forgeworld website. You used to be able to walk into a GW and order some nice grey goodies to the store.
You can check your email, but you absolutely can't look at Forgeworld's products.

Riddle me that.

Simple: buying a model from the FW website doesn't count as a sale for that particular store*, so it doesn't help the employee meet their sales quota. A GW store is not a place that exists to serve the customer, it's an assembly line that takes a new customer from their first starter set to a complete army without ever leaving GW's "core" product lines (and certainly without ever mentioning the possibility of non-GW products existing). It's the same kind of mindset that makes GW sell overpriced re-branded knives and tools instead of saying "just use a knife", your entire Hobby™ Experience™ is supposed to go through that one store and if the employee doesn't move you through the process efficiently enough they'll be fired and replaced with someone who will.

*Yes, this is really stupid, and it results in things like employees posting on facebook begging for people to come in and buy stuff instead of buying online direct from GW so that they "help the store". Essentially GW has set it up so that all of their various stores are competing with each other.

Azrael- we do have infinity over here. Still terrible cars though

Peregrine - some changes are coming where stuff delivered to store will count towards their targets. And the block is at the corp level currently - they don't want to support resin de jure in store.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Buttery Commissar wrote:
The only part that confuses me is that since recently, computers in UK GW stores specifically block the Forgeworld website. You used to be able to walk into a GW and order some nice grey goodies to the store.
You can check your email, but you absolutely can't look at Forgeworld's products.

Riddle me that.

Simple: buying a model from the FW website doesn't count as a sale for that particular store*, so it doesn't help the employee meet their sales quota. A GW store is not a place that exists to serve the customer, it's an assembly line that takes a new customer from their first starter set to a complete army without ever leaving GW's "core" product lines (and certainly without ever mentioning the possibility of non-GW products existing). It's the same kind of mindset that makes GW sell overpriced re-branded knives and tools instead of saying "just use a knife", your entire Hobby™ Experience™ is supposed to go through that one store and if the employee doesn't move you through the process efficiently enough they'll be fired and replaced with someone who will.

*Yes, this is really stupid, and it results in things like employees posting on facebook begging for people to come in and buy stuff instead of buying online direct from GW so that they "help the store". Essentially GW has set it up so that all of their various stores are competing with each other.

Not that I agree with it, but that's very common corporate thought in neo-liberal economies; competition at all levels within the company and without. I worked at a few American-owned electronics stores in high-school, and directing customers to the website for product unavailable at the store was grounds for termination, and competition between stores took far higher priority than with actual competing enterprises. They even had such a system in place between departments; if someone walked in the door, the objective was to have them walk out with a laptop, car stereo, refrigerator, LCD tv, camera, cell phone and several DVDs, and helping other departments was strongly disincentive.

Go into a big box store and can't find any assistance in your particular area? That probably has something to do with it.

It's the one "modern" business practice GW has adopted wholesale.

It's also great if FW goes belly up. IF FW bankrupts it won't pull GW down with it. Loads of companies, like airlines and others, do this. Hell, if GW knew what they were doing they'd turn their staff into a separate subsidiary company whom GW would hire from, giving them way for flexibility and avoiding higher costs and legal issues.

 Peregrine wrote:
*Yes, this is really stupid, and it results in things like employees posting on facebook begging for people to come in and buy stuff instead of buying online direct from GW so that they "help the store". Essentially GW has set it up so that all of their various stores are competing with each other.

This is actually pretty standard in retail. In your typical US shopping mall only a few companies own all of the brands in the mall and each directly competes with itself regularly in the expectation that through the various options they will get maximum dollars out of the mall venue. Each of those individual brands of stores have their own required sales figures and levels and whether the parent company gets all the money anyway or not they are each still responsible within their own business line and held accountable for sales levels and failing to meet quotas and sales expectations. GW stores actually tend to have less direct competion within their areas given that you don't often see more than a single GW store in any specific shopping district. In that case their main direct competition is the website and not other stores themselves. Sure if two towns each have a store no one from town A needs to go to town B to shop at a GW store, but it isn't usually like there are two GW's so close that they are consistently drawing customers away from each other all the time.

Skriker

I think everyone else pretty much hit the nail on the head. What I did find ironic is that when paying for a recent FW order through PayPal, my payment went directly to Games Workshop.... Not even the illusion of a separate company. Not that I care, so long as I get my Fire Raptor.

 Skriker wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
*Yes, this is really stupid, and it results in things like employees posting on facebook begging for people to come in and buy stuff instead of buying online direct from GW so that they "help the store". Essentially GW has set it up so that all of their various stores are competing with each other.

This is actually pretty standard in retail.

What you've described (different brands owned by the same company competing for different market segments and demographics) is not the same as what Peregrine described (different divisions within the same company competing for the same sale).

 Kajaki War Pig wrote:
I think everyone else pretty much hit the nail on the head. What I did find ironic is that when paying for a recent FW order through PayPal, my payment went directly to Games Workshop.... Not even the illusion of a separate company. Not that I care, so long as I get my Fire Raptor.

Forgeworld are not, to the best of my search skills on Companies' House (and supported by the lack of any of the mandatory info on the FW website itself), a separate company, merely a separate internal division with it's own external branding.

In this day and age, you really have to wonder if the separation is actually doing more harm than good. When the main design studio is rushing through so much work that they don't even put out useful FAQs at a reasonable rate anymore, having the FW design studio out chasing shinies seems a bit daft. It also leads to situations where SOME of the units FW puts out are just flat out superior to their GW equivalents.

 Kajaki War Pig wrote:
I think everyone else pretty much hit the nail on the head. What I did find ironic is that when paying for a recent FW order through PayPal, my payment went directly to Games Workshop.... Not even the illusion of a separate company. Not that I care, so long as I get my Fire Raptor.

Would you buy that ugly model if it didn't cost about 75 points under what it should cost? This is the question I must ask GW...why not make the model and the broken rules youself and make 100% of the profits instead of 20% or 30% which is likely the arrangement.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

Deschenus Maximus wrote:
In this day and age, you really have to wonder if the separation is actually doing more harm than good. When the main design studio is rushing through so much work that they don't even put out useful FAQs at a reasonable rate anymore, having the FW design studio out chasing shinies seems a bit daft. It also leads to situations where SOME of the units FW puts out are just flat out superior to their GW equivalents.

Really? like the fireraptor and sicarian? OFC they are superior...they write the rules to sell the models. GW is daft for allowing it. I wouldn't care where my money is going but it really heats me that in order to be competitive FW models are basically required...and they cost 2x as much a GW equivalents.

 Xenomancers wrote:
This is the question I must ask GW...why not make the model and the broken rules youself and make 100% of the profits instead of 20% or 30% which is likely the arrangement.

GW does make 100% of the profits, because "Forge World" is just another brand name (like "Citadel" or "White Dwarf") that GW sells products under.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

nosferatu1001 wrote:
Peregrine - some changes are coming where stuff delivered to store will count towards their targets.

If this is true it would be a good change, but that was just one example of the problem.

And the block is at the corp level currently - they don't want to support resin de jure in store.

Sure, but I suspect the reasoning is still exactly what I said: higher management wants local store employees to focus on filling their quota of starter sets, and buying FW products in the store doesn't fill that quota.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
This is the question I must ask GW...why not make the model and the broken rules youself and make 100% of the profits instead of 20% or 30% which is likely the arrangement.

GW does make 100% of the profits, because "Forge World" is just another brand name (like "Citadel" or "White Dwarf") that GW sells products under.

Okay - if that's the case why can't I buy FW models in a GW store? Cause resin? GW stores aren't climate controlled? Why does the GW store have no links to forgeworld? Give me a break. I can buy citadel products directly from GW website and in GW stores...They even push their products - clearly it's not the same arrangement with forge world. There is more going on behind the scenes here than meets the eye because it just doesn't make sense.

A lot of people claim FW is niche as well...How niche do you really think FW would be if it sold on GW shelves? They make 100% of the profits as you said - so what kind of idiot management would turn down potential sales?

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
This is the question I must ask GW...why not make the model and the broken rules youself and make 100% of the profits instead of 20% or 30% which is likely the arrangement.

GW does make 100% of the profits, because "Forge World" is just another brand name (like "Citadel" or "White Dwarf") that GW sells products under.

Okay - if that's the case why can't I buy FW models in a GW store? Cause resin? GW stores aren't climate controlled? Why does the GW store have no links to forgeworld? Give me a break. I can buy citadel products directly from GW website and in GW stores...They even push their products - clearly it's not the same arrangement with forge world. There is more going on behind the scenes here than meets the eye because it just doesn't make sense.

A lot of people claim FW is niche as well...How niche do you really think FW would be if it sold on GW shelves? They make 100% of the profits as you said - so what kind of idiot management would turn down potential sales?

You can't buy it at a store because GW doesn't want to sell it there. Just like many if not most Toyota dealerships don't sell Lexus vehicles, despite Lexus being part of Toyota. Easiest answer? FW doesn't; produce the volume necessary to sell at retail locations, and retail managers don't like it because it doesn't count towards their sales quotas so they don't make it available.

FW isn't a separate company. They're not even a subsidiary. They're a separate sales channel for niche products.

GW is an odd company. They force every sales avenue to compete with and cannibalize each other, they *borrow* money to pay dividends, they routinely put retail locations in absolutely stupid places, etc.

Weird things happen when your CEO has also been Chairman for many years and one of the largest Stockholders.

 Xenomancers wrote:
Okay - if that's the case why can't I buy FW models in a GW store?

I already explained that. Because GW wants their stores to focus on a specific process from starter set to completed army, all done with "core products" found in their retail stores. Buying FW in a GW store doesn't fill the employees quota of starter sets they have to sell.

Also, aside from GW's stupidity of competing with itself, there's a supply issue. Most FW kits are low-volume products and maintaining an inventory of them in every store doesn't make sense. But fortunately "I can't buy it in a GW store" doesn't really matter. It's 2015, buying stuff online is just part of life, and going into a GW store isn't very appealing anyway.

There is more going on behind the scenes here than meets the eye because it just doesn't make sense.

Too bad, it doesn't have to make sense to be true. We know how FW is treated because GW is required to publish financial information where they include sales of FW (and BL) in their general sales total. And we know that all of the copyrights on FW products are owned by GW, the FW website is hosted on GW's servers, the billing information for FW purchases says "Games Workshop", the shipping address for FW products is GW, etc. Meanwhile the only argument for FW having financial independence is your belief that it "doesn't make sense".

They make 100% of the profits as you said - so what kind of idiot management would turn down potential sales?

1) It's not free to sell FW products. You have to spend shelf space on them (which means higher rent to have a bigger store), you have to cast lots of copies of them so that each store has a full inventory just in case someone comes in to buy it, etc. And then you have to deal with angry parents who buy their kid a FW kit without realizing that it takes way more work to build one compared to the plastic kit next to it on the shelf. I don't have the numbers obviously, but I find it entirely plausible that the extra sales from putting FW kits on the shelf in GW stores would not be enough to justify the costs.

2) It doesn't fit GW's business model for their stores. The stores are focused on selling starter sets to kids, adult customers are a much smaller priority and the kind of older veteran customer that is most likely to buy FW kits is even lower. By the time you're ready to buy FW kits you're not spending much time in a GW store, so why waste shelf space?

2) We know that GW is run by idiots and their retail chain is some of their worst idiocy, so "they would have to be stupid" isn't a very convincing argument.

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
This is the question I must ask GW...why not make the model and the broken rules youself and make 100% of the profits instead of 20% or 30% which is likely the arrangement.

GW does make 100% of the profits, because "Forge World" is just another brand name (like "Citadel" or "White Dwarf") that GW sells products under.

Okay - if that's the case why can't I buy FW models in a GW store? Cause resin? GW stores aren't climate controlled? Why does the GW store have no links to forgeworld? Give me a break. I can buy citadel products directly from GW website and in GW stores...They even push their products - clearly it's not the same arrangement with forge world. There is more going on behind the scenes here than meets the eye because it just doesn't make sense.

A lot of people claim FW is niche as well...How niche do you really think FW would be if it sold on GW shelves? They make 100% of the profits as you said - so what kind of idiot management would turn down potential sales?

Forge World used to be sold in store...
i've never made an order direct to Forge World, and i have a ton of their models...
everything i have was either bought at the Amsterdam GW, the L.A. Battle Bunker, or at Games Day...
now that they don't sell in shops anymore, i'll just get it when i am attending a convention that FW is at too...

as Peregrine pointed out, the sales of FW in shops took away from the starter box quota sales...
take away the temptation of buying Red Scorpions in store, and people will go for Dark Vengeance instead...
not to say that i support this logic, but who ever claimed that GW management is known for sensible decision making these days???

cheers
jah

 Azreal13 wrote:


If we are going to use motoring analogies, let's make them good ones! FW are to GW what Lexus are to Toyota, or Infinity are to Honda for you colonials

Not real relevant, but Acura is Honda, Infinity is Nissan

But yes, it's a matter of prestige and name to go along with the price tag. "Oh, that's a forge world model" and so on, more exclusive of "upscale"

Peregrine - I know its one example of the problem, but one that is at least having some attention paid to it.