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 RiTides wrote:
It doesn't say they'll stop all online sales, just be very selective about who can sell online, right? Terms look really harsh but people should still be able to order product from home by some means...

I might suddenly get selective on where I spend my money. It's a two way street, and something that FFG should consider.

If you live in the countryside or far away from an FLGS, can't you still just order direct from FFG? You just can't get a discount now, right?

Considering Netrunner was the only thing I was buying. As my lgs tends to add about 5 percent on those for some reason, ill see basically.

Someone mentioned GW had a hand in this on reddit but I think the Star wars, people don't want people to see their brand as cheap.

 Da Boss wrote:
If you live in the countryside or far away from an FLGS, can't you still just order direct from FFG? You just can't get a discount now, right?

you'll certainly be able to order direct, but FFG's postage is really expensive so not only will you miss out on discount, you'll also be paying a heavy extra shipping toll

Honestly, it really just sounds like people are butt-hurt about this because they wont be able to buy board games and other games at cost.
I know for a fact that if a FLGS were to sell all of their board games at Amazon's prices, they would actually lose money.
Keep this up, and then they would go out of buisness.

Amazon stays in business by running a deficit (losing money on every sale) but then generates a collosal amount of revenue from investors, keeping them in business.
In short, Amazon makes money by losing money. How do you expect any other store to compete?

People come into our store all the time, look at what we have, then buy it online cheaper. We do price matching, but some people just prefer to buy online, after coming into our store, taking up our time, and then leaving us with nothing. It makes you just want to dump the entire gaming aisle.
You know what doesn't have that problem? Games Workshop.
Makes me wonder.

 Peregrine wrote:

No, I'm supporting the notion that physical game stores do not need to exist in order for me to support my hobby.

And you're wrong, at least in the US. Stores are incredibly important in recruiting new players, and filling the need for a "you will always have a place to play this" safety net that makes people willing to invest a ton of money into a game that requires 2+ people. You personally might not need a physical store because you only play kitchen table games with one friend, but without the stores you probably wouldn't have started playing in the first place and you won't have a company to buy from very much longer.

You either have real issues seeing things from a perspective that is not yours, or you seriously have no concept of how spread out the population in the US is. Many (I'd even say most) gamers have no LGS, or one that doesn't give the kind of support that happens in your gaming wonderland. BGG does more to support the hobby than any brick and mortar store I've ever been to (at least a dozen over the years).

But again, it seems like more "I got mine, feth you".

~Eric

Neronoxx wrote:
Honestly, it really just sounds like people are butt-hurt about this because they wont be able to buy board games and other games at cost.
I know for a fact that if a FLGS were to sell all of their board games at Amazon's prices, they would actually lose money.
Keep this up, and then they would go out of buisness.

Amazon stays in business by running a deficit (losing money on every sale) but then generates a collosal amount of revenue from investors, keeping them in business.
In short, Amazon makes money by losing money. How do you expect any other store to compete?

People come into our store all the time, look at what we have, then buy it online cheaper. We do price matching, but some people just prefer to buy online, after coming into our store, taking up our time, and then leaving us with nothing. It makes you just want to dump the entire gaming aisle.
You know what doesn't have that problem? Games Workshop.
Makes me wonder.

I'm all in favour of helping FLGS, but I live hours away from a store.

Why not directly order from FFG?

A reasonable question, but I live in a remote part of Britain and because of that, postal couriers slap an extra delivery charge on top of things.

I need to save money where I can, hence the reason I like ordering from online discounters. Their 20% discount helps a lot in that regard.

Neronoxx wrote:
Honestly, it really just sounds like people are butt-hurt about this because they wont be able to buy board games and other games at cost.
I know for a fact that if a FLGS were to sell all of their board games at Amazon's prices, they would actually lose money.
Keep this up, and then they would go out of buisness.

The only people who are supportive of the move seem to be located in the US, and near an LGS at that. Otherwise they'd understand that it's not just about the money - it's about not necessarily having an LGS at which to buy from. It's like you didn't really read the thread at all and simply decided to put your own opinion in writing.

And yes, I get it, the answer to not having an LGS is "buy from FFG" - at which point it might become about money. But it certainly is no longer about supporting your LGS because if you don't fething have one and need to order from FFG the point is entirely moot.

Limiting how, where and when customer's can buy your product will only ever hurt you in the long term.

GW have tried this already, how are the sales doing, oh that's right there in decline.

FFG make the same amount of money selling at trade to an online discounter as they do to a brick and mortar store. If they stop selling product to online stores, they will only hurt their own sales.

Many customers many only buy product at the discounted rates available online, trying to get everyone to sell at RRP will just reduce your sales.

A bad decision no matter how you look at it.

Supporting FLGS is a very good thing, certainly in the US where clubs are the exception.

Even if you are a long way from one they are still a good thing, otherwise you would be that much further from the next oasis in your gaming desert.

A corporate entity has to look after those FLGS as they, along with distributors) are the majority of their customers. That's who hands them their money and makes their sales that's who this is designed to aide.

 Tamereth wrote:
Limiting how, where and when customer's can buy your product will only ever hurt you in the long term.

GW have tried this already, how are the sales doing, oh that's right there in decline.

FFG make the same amount of money selling at trade to an online discounter as they do to a brick and mortar store. If they stop selling product to online stores, they will only hurt their own sales.

Many customers many only buy product at the discounted rates available online, trying to get everyone to sell at RRP will just reduce your sales.

A bad decision no matter how you look at it.

I actually don't think GW limiting online sales mattered at all. Lets be realistic here and admit that GW screwed up so much other stuff that it's hard to compare a single decision.

Very good move.

Other businesses have been killed by discount-battles. No need to repeat this with TT and boardgames. And after the battles were over the customer never profited from any of these battles in the long run.

The big problem a few here are having with perspective is rooted in their being tabletop wargamers.

My group of friends that play boardgames and X-Wing do not do so in stores. There are some lgs, but we do not play there.

For support we look to Boardgame Geek, the Dice Tower, and Geek & Sundry Tabletop. The store offers nothing but full retail price and spotty inventory.
Why would we need to give them our custom when they don't carry a good stock of the product, or offer to "order it for me".
If that is all the service a lgs can give me, I'll order online and have it many days faster at a much lower price.

I don't owe them my business just because they are local to me.

A common complaint seems to be, "I live in a remote area with no FLGS, so why should I bother supporting them when I can get it cheaper?"
Sorry, but to be honest, how is that anyone else's problem but your own? Why do FLGS have to suffer online discounters because you live in the middle of nowhere? It's not a customer service issue if you restrict yourself to not being a customer.
So in short, you say "It's YOUR problem I live in the boonies, so i'm going to buy it from someone else." That is what i'm hearing, correct?
Supporting the hobby should be a gaming companies ultimate goal. Encouraging price wars between online stores and physical retailers IS NOT how you support the hobby OR the industry. People say FLGS have to change how they do business in order to survive, but those people don't know what it takes to run one, or even how they should change. It's all just baseless opinions founded on greed and selfishness.

Are cheap games easier to get into? Yeah, absolutely. Starting MTG costs roughly $15, and X-wing and other board games are anywhere from $30-60. But don't defend undercutters by claiming that these already inexpensive games should be cheaper because that's the only way you can afford it. That's called entitlement.
And just to be clear, I'm not saying discounters are bad. 10-20% off is fine, and stores make good enough money they could do that all year round. It's the 40-50% discounters that kill FLGS. And it only takes one of these discounters to ruin it for a huge portion of stores. I would gladly pay full price, plus shipping for any game I wanted to play. If I can't afford it, that's no one else's problem but mine.

Actually, price-wars are quite often the reason there are no stores near you.

I guess it's just a case that FFG are so big now due to their recent successes that they get to call the shots, and have decided to support traditional retailers and their own direct sales over online discounters.

The postage thing sucks, for sure. I didn't know they charged above the market rate for postage. I wonder how much the free postage eats into the profits of the other discounters.

 Peregrine wrote:

NoggintheNog wrote:
The problem actually doing this is that you cannot put the genie back in the bottle, the internet is not going away so whatever they do is really never going to be effective long term, it mainly ends up annoying customers.

How can it not be effective long term? The publisher has full control of who they sell to and at what prices, if they want to remove internet discount sales they can easily do it. And honestly, they might lose a few sales from people who are outraged about losing their discount sellers but I suspect it's a tiny price to pay for keeping their physical store networks intact.

I assume this is about reigning in the discounts (think FoW where the max discount if typically 10%) rather than distribution because there are a lot of customers who buy exclusively through online. They will lose a lot of customers if this is intended to push brick-in-mortar.

 skrulnik wrote:
The big problem a few here are having with perspective is rooted in their being tabletop wargamers.

My group of friends that play boardgames and X-Wing do not do so in stores. There are some lgs, but we do not play there.

For support we look to Boardgame Geek, the Dice Tower, and Geek & Sundry Tabletop. The store offers nothing but full retail price and spotty inventory.
Why would we need to give them our custom when they don't carry a good stock of the product, or offer to "order it for me".
If that is all the service a lgs can give me, I'll order online and have it many days faster at a much lower price.

I don't owe them my business just because they are local to me.

Yeah, if your LGS sucks, speak with your wallet. But just to be clear, let me present the other half of your story.

Customer enters the store, peruses the board game section with friends/ while looking at phone.
Customer doesn't find what they are looking for, and orders it online.
Customer leaves store.
If you doubt any part of this, ask yourself how much patience the average person has, then leverage that against the impulse of instant gratification and you'll understand how often this occurs. Many times, customers don't even enter the store, they just call in, and are price matching while on the phone.

Many gaming stores stock what they can. What they can stock is what they sell.
Many gaming stores can order product in. This takes maybe 2-5 days.
If you want a gaming store to carry a product, order it from them. They will not/ can not suddenly generate revenue out of nowhere to stock something they don't usually.

If you order it online, chances are that store will never carry it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Duncan_Idaho wrote:
Actually, price-wars are quite often the reason there are no stores near you.

Can we post this on the entire internet? Because this is kind of the point.

Neronoxx wrote:
A common complaint seems to be, "I live in a remote area with no FLGS, so why should I bother supporting them when I can get it cheaper?"
Sorry, but to be honest, how is that anyone else's problem but your own? Why do FLGS have to suffer online discounters because you live in the middle of nowhere? It's not a customer service issue if you restrict yourself to not being a customer.
So in short, you say "It's YOUR problem I live in the boonies, so i'm going to buy it from someone else." That is what i'm hearing, correct?
Supporting the hobby should be a gaming companies ultimate goal. Encouraging price wars between online stores and physical retailers IS NOT how you support the hobby OR the industry. People say FLGS have to change how they do business in order to survive, but those people don't know what it takes to run one, or even how they should change. It's all just baseless opinions founded on greed and selfishness.

Are cheap games easier to get into? Yeah, absolutely. Starting MTG costs roughly $15, and X-wing and other board games are anywhere from $30-60. But don't defend undercutters by claiming that these already inexpensive games should be cheaper because that's the only way you can afford it. That's called entitlement.
And just to be clear, I'm not saying discounters are bad. 10-20% off is fine, and stores make good enough money they could do that all year round. It's the 40-50% discounters that kill FLGS. And it only takes one of these discounters to ruin it for a huge portion of stores. I would gladly pay full price, plus shipping for any game I wanted to play. If I can't afford it, that's no one else's problem but mine.

And the flipside is that it is not the consumer's problem if a retailer can't fulfil their desires. Why should I as a consumer limit myself and spend more of my hard-earned money than I need to? If a product can be bought cheaper at X establishment, why should I shop at Y establishment? It is not an FLGS' problem that somone might live in a Rural area and it is not the consumer's problem if an FLGS is incapable of competing with other businesses

Neronoxx wrote:

You know what doesn't have that problem? Games Workshop.
Makes me wonder.

Depends on perspective. GW does control their pricing, but now they have created new competitors who seem to be thriving when GW is surviving. They have lost customers...someone who stops buying is worse than someone who buys at a deep discount.

And let's be fair, the issue is the higher priced items where you can find them at 30% to 50% of retail not the $30 or less items.

Have you considered whether the issue is pricing not discounting? If a store has to discount by 30% to 50% to sell the product than it might be priced too high based on what the actual demand is at that price level.

Neronoxx wrote:
And it only takes one of these discounters to ruin it for a huge portion of stores. I would gladly pay full price, plus shipping for any game I wanted to play. If I can't afford it, that's no one else's problem but mine.

A bold claim regarding the perhaps only larger gaming company even more expensive than GW for what you usually get in the box (e.g. Armada, Imperial Assault), seeing most people consider GW's high prices as a big reason for the companies slow decline, or at least a big reason for the shrinking (not growing) of the gaming community for their games.

Neronoxx wrote:

Yeah, if your LGS sucks, speak with your wallet. But just to be clear, let me present the other half of your story.

Customer enters the store, peruses the board game section with friends/ while looking at phone.
Customer doesn't find what they are looking for, and orders it online.
Customer leaves store.
If you doubt any part of this, ask yourself how much patience the average person has, then leverage that against the impulse of instant gratification and you'll understand how often this occurs. Many times, customers don't even enter the store, they just call in, and are price matching while on the phone.

Many gaming stores stock what they can. What they can stock is what they sell.
Many gaming stores can order product in. This takes maybe 2-5 days.
If you want a gaming store to carry a product, order it from them. They will not/ can not suddenly generate revenue out of nowhere to stock something they don't usually.

If you order it online, chances are that store will never carry it.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Duncan_Idaho wrote:
Actually, price-wars are quite often the reason there are no stores near you.

Can we post this on the entire internet? Because this is kind of the point.

So....speak with your wallet as long as your message is, "Here crummy LGS, keep taking my money even though you can't provide me the goods or services I want?"

 Da Boss wrote:
I guess it's just a case that FFG are so big now due to their recent successes that they get to call the shots, and have decided to support traditional retailers and their own direct sales over online discounters.

The postage thing sucks, for sure. I didn't know they charged above the market rate for postage. I wonder how much the free postage eats into the profits of the other discounters.

I think that's more likely down to them being acquired with the Asmodee Group (a rather large French company) who are also a big distributor in their own right. A change of culture perhaps?

Can't explain the postage thing though, even having had the rather painful experience of buying 3 Collectors Editions books all at once a few years ago (Ninety fething quid!!!!). I just write it off the same as the equally odd FW P&P, or more precisely find a way around it....

Even if I could order from FFG, I probably wouldn't because all I would be able to get are FFG goods. Whenever I buy online from MM or other online stores, I tend to buy a bit from different systems. Being forced to just buy FFG products and then ship them to singapore at the current postage rates would be prohibitive.

 Prune wrote:

Neronoxx wrote:
And it only takes one of these discounters to ruin it for a huge portion of stores. I would gladly pay full price, plus shipping for any game I wanted to play. If I can't afford it, that's no one else's problem but mine.

A bold claim regarding the perhaps only larger gaming company even more expensive than GW for what you usually get in the box (e.g. Armada, Imperial Assault), seeing most people consider GW's high prices as a big reason for the companies slow decline, or at least a big reason for the shrinking (not growing) of the gaming community for their games.

I am a bit surprised that it's even effecting their business model right now. From what I've seen, FFG can't keep product in stock. Which makes sense, with Armada and X-wing being 'gotta catch em all' affairs. Their prices definitely do present a barrier, which will only intensify with reduced discounts. I don't mind paying retail for ships I desire- as an Imperial player I buy most of them near release. But I'm fine waiting for the sets I'm less enthused about to go on discount. I probably wouldn't have purchased Rebel Aces if it hadn't hit the 50% mark. With how large the catalog is now, I suspect many sales for secondary figures is only happening because of discounts.

 whitedragon wrote:


So....speak with your wallet as long as your message is, "Here crummy LGS, keep taking my money even though you can't provide me the goods or services I want?"

That is the opposite of what i wrote, but i'll clarify with you since it seems to be needed.

"If your local game store's service sucks, do not buy from them. Buy it somewhere else, preferably local because they (should) want your business, and accommodate you as the customer. It is unreasonable to expect a game store to carry every game in print, so inevitably they wont have something you want. Order it from them (if their service pleases you) and you will become a valued customer."

I'm not telling you to only buy from FLGS. I'm saying if you are at all concerned about where the industry is going, you should. If everyone bought their games off Amazon, do you think anyone would want to start a game store? Would they be able to?
The consensus seems to be if you don't use a FLGS, it's not your problem.That's an acceptable viewpoint. You aren't getting anything from them, so why should you spend money with them?


Please fully read this whitedragon, then read it again before responding.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

MacMuckles wrote:
....it is not the consumer's problem if an FLGS is incapable of competing with other businesses

Except it is, but it's not your problem if you lack the foresight to understand this.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Sheck2 wrote:

Neronoxx wrote:

You know what doesn't have that problem? Games Workshop.
Makes me wonder.

Depends on perspective. GW does control their pricing, but now they have created new competitors who seem to be thriving when GW is surviving. They have lost customers...someone who stops buying is worse than someone who buys at a deep discount.

And let's be fair, the issue is the higher priced items where you can find them at 30% to 50% of retail not the $30 or less items.

Have you considered whether the issue is pricing not discounting? If a store has to discount by 30% to 50% to sell the product than it might be priced too high based on what the actual demand is at that price level.

You must not have any experience with this.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1633440729?keywords=TIE%20PUNISHER&qid=1450708490&ref_=sr_1_1&sr=8-1

That is a $19.99 item, listed for $10.78 (at time of posting.)
The issue is not pricing. The issue is extreme discounting. No store has to discount by 30% to 50% to sell a product. They do it to enact a 'price' war, and consolidate sales into their pocket, making little but hoping everyone will buy from them. It kills brick and mortar stores.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

Simply selling games does not = support for the hobby

By that logic, a car dealership who only sells cars, is not supporting the car industry because he doesn't organise a Grand Prix or other races?

That's a horrible comparison. Driving is not by it's very nature and purpose a "social" activity. I don't believe stores are obligated to provide that social support but it's a horrible comparison nonetheless.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Red Harvest wrote:

Board Games, and even this X-wing game also sell in the Big Box stores-- Target, Walmart etc-- in the USA. I wonder if those places had any influence on the decision?

I'm guessing the decision was made without their direct involvement. FFG isn't big enough to push a big box store around so they'll likely qualify for their super special double rainbow exception without ever knowing about the change in policy. They'll keep selling the box during sales/clearances oblivious to the restrictions being forced upon smaller stores who want to maintain their retailer discounts. Even if the small online seller organizes local demos, sponsors a league in store, and are the bestest B&M FLGS eVAR!, they're likely not going to qualify for an exemption and FFG is taking money out of their pockets by disallowing online sales.

I live 40 minutes (without traffic which is rare) from the FFG event center. I don't drive over there to purchase product. I'm not willing to eat 1.5-2 hours of my free time to go pick stuff up.

However, I've purchased massive quantities of Armada from MM. Because shipping is free, I get a solid discount, it enables me to have enough stuff to ensure I can provide for other people locally who might want to play, and I don't have to waste precious personal time to get it.

If I can't get it at a reasonable discount the actual cost of the game is silly high. I'm not willing to pay $40 for single mediocre painted figure and some cardboard. I bite the bullet at $25-$30. The problem is FFG's method of card distribution as well. It's not like buying a model and simply having one copy of the cards is enough for FFG. Nope, card for everytime you use it.

Meh, we'll see how it all shakes out. But if they cut MM, Warstore, and Coolstuff out then I'm probably out. And that's with a relatively thriving community locally for Armada.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
That is one of my LGS. The owner is a donkey cave who has numerous times accused online retailers of stealing food from his kids mouths. Anything he says should be taken with some salt.

He posted this in the comments that I found odd. It's clearly possible but I'm surprised that there is such a huge walk in local board game scene that makes the category bigger than what is usually touted as the top seller for most stores. It's the internet and store owners aren't immune to the online phenomenon of significantly exaggerating to "prove" a potentially heated point that affects them personally which is why I ask.

This year my store sold 20,000 board games, generating more revenue than Magic: The Gathering. We hold board game night every week. We put board games in the front of the store and hand sell them to people who have never played them. It's nice to see publishers like Christian Petersen acknowledge our relevance, even if Internet customers don't see it.

Wow, well, I guess it was good while it lasted.

I always used MM as my last resort if none of my FLGS had what I wanted. Sadly, a lot of times, they didn't.
This could be because of there is no community for a game FFG, or any other company, produces.
It could also be because of online retailers like MM.

I know from my own experience, when I started WM/H (yes I know not a FFG game but bare with me), there was no community here for it. One of the LGS wouldn't even let us play there because all they dealt in was 40k/WHFB. After a while though, said store gave in once I helped get a community of people together and they saw an increased interest.

There has to be a community for the stores to want to stock this stuff. I guess as well as it being something they don't compete with discount online retailers for.
If there isn't the online retailers to compete with then what will convince FLGS that there is a community when there doesn't appear to be? I know there are actions they can take to create interest. But if there isn't the interest, then there isn't the interest.