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Kilkrazy wrote: Most companies do some spinning when they have to announce bad results.
Yesterday M&S, a major UK clothes retail chain, announced bad Christmas results and blamed it on weather, discounting by rivals, and lack of stock. M&S had a 30% off sale in December.
Weather certainly is a factor, but it's not hard to see that everyone can't be suffering from rivals discounting if they are discounting themselves, and it's hard to understand why you would run out of stock if your problem is you aren't getting enough customers into your shops.
In other words, the spin is obvious bs and I think most people are intelligent enough to see this sort of malarkey in any company report, including the GW one.
This has been one of the mildest winters, we've had for years.
Spin doesn't always work.
Marks and Spencer chief executive Marc Bolland to quit http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-35249317 Marks and Spencer chief executive Marc Bolland is to step down in April, the company said as it announced its Christmas results.
Mr Bolland will be succeeded by Steve Rowe, executive director of general merchandise.
Third-quarter sales of general merchandise were down by 5.8% for the thirteen weeks to 26 December.
Actually, the mild winter is what M+S were blaming, nobody bought new warm winter clothes.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/01/08 12:10:28
We find comfort among those who agree with us - growth among those who don't. - Frank Howard Clark
The wise man doubts often, and changes his mind; the fool is obstinate, and doubts not; he knows all things but his own ignorance.
The correct statement of individual rights is that everyone has the right to an opinion, but crucially, that opinion can be roundly ignored and even made fun of, particularly if it is demonstrably nonsense!” Professor Brian Cox
"The greatest risk is the same one that we repeat each year, namely, management. So long as we have great people we will be fine. Problems will arise if the board allows egos and private agendas to rule. I will do my utmost to ensure that this does not happen."
Kilkrazy wrote: Most companies do some spinning when they have to announce bad results.
At first glance the results don't seem that bad to me? Perhaps we can get an analysis from someone who is more familiar with reading financial reports?
To me it looks like overall revenue is fine, 2.2% decrease but 0.7% increase at constant currency. It's hard to grow when you have a strong currency and rely heavily on international sales.
Slight increase in trade, decrease in retail and increase in mail order.
The increase in royalties propped them up a bit, $800k increase in royalties accounts for ~1.5% of their revenue, so without that revenue would have dropped by 3.5% (or a 0.7% drop at constant currency).
It's not bad, but it's not exactly great, either. The half year report includes the release of both AoS (where new editions of games usually bump up sales) and the Calth game - i.e., plastic Heresy, which in the past has been alluded to as GW's panic button.
Reasons it's not great
-revenue has remained flat, despite the average price per SKU almost certainly increasing
-profit is down significantly on the same income, the licensing revenue from all that shovelware has really dug them out of a hole.
-dividend is almost half what it was last year.
- Rountree has already effectively issued a profits warning, and declared December sales (not included in these figures) were below expectations.
Reasons it's ok
- They're not sliding anywhere near as quick as they were
- They're still making a profit, even if it isn't so much from minis and games
- Rountree is making some good noises, for the second report in a row. He mentions a focus value, admits disappointment over performance, and, possibly, tacitly implies Kirby was a douchebag.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/01/08 13:44:05
We find comfort among those who agree with us - growth among those who don't. - Frank Howard Clark
The wise man doubts often, and changes his mind; the fool is obstinate, and doubts not; he knows all things but his own ignorance.
The correct statement of individual rights is that everyone has the right to an opinion, but crucially, that opinion can be roundly ignored and even made fun of, particularly if it is demonstrably nonsense!” Professor Brian Cox
Kilkrazy wrote: Most companies do some spinning when they have to announce bad results.
At first glance the results don't seem that bad to me? Perhaps we can get an analysis from someone who is more familiar with reading financial reports?
To me it looks like overall revenue is fine, 2.2% decrease but 0.7% increase at constant currency. It's hard to grow when you have a strong currency and rely heavily on international sales.
Slight increase in trade, decrease in retail and increase in mail order.
The increase in royalties propped them up a bit, $800k increase in royalties accounts for ~1.5% of their revenue, so without that revenue would have dropped by 3.5% (or a 0.7% drop at constant currency).
The problem I have at first glance is the difference between Retail and Trade. Sales in retail are sales to customers, sales in trades are sales to independent stores, meaning that for Trade whatever happen to a product afterward (whether it sales immediately or spend a year on the shelves) is irrelevant to GW.
Now if you release a new product and see independent stores massively investing in it. Trade will go up. But, if the product ends up not selling well to the final customers, that won't change anything for Trade but Retail will not see a similar increase or even see a decrease.
So if big releases like BoC or AoS were to underperform in a visible way, it would appear on the report in the same way we are currently seeing. But it would be worse for the following 6 months. As if the products underperformed then Trade accounts will stop investing in it and you will start to see Trade following the same pattern as Retail unless you release another new Product to force stores to invest (and even so chances are they'll be wary and no longer order as massively as they could, whatever you release).
So yeah I'm just theorycrafting from behind my screen but I think the next 6 months will be quite telling. And considering GW is unhappy with their December numbers, it doesn't start well.
Talys wrote: @agnosto - as I'm certain you're aware, a company doesn't have to be sunshine and roses to be an amazing investment -- it just has to be priced at less than what you think it's worth. Conversely, a lot of companies that are doing great are terrible investments, because they're overpriced.
Spoiler:
@Baragash - Sounds like academia In the real world, professional CEOs and CFOs of public companies are hired and paid disproportionately humongous salaries because of their ability to increase the value of the stock, with any ability or understanding of the company's core business being a plus, rather than a requirement. For little public companies (or private companies aspiring to become public), often, NOTHING matters other than the CEO's ability to raise capital (ie their ability to dog and pony shows). The company could be in the business of selling eggs, and the CEO could be incapable of distinguishing a male from a female chicken, and it wouldn't matter as long as they could raise the next $10 million.
Sure, we can argue about how this is not how things should work, how it contributes to bubbles that burst, yadda yadda yadda... but hey... it's the way the world goes round and round and how trillions of dollars change hands. GW is just a little, mostly insignificant piece of that cog
Anyways, I've rarely read preambles in annual reports from profitable public companies that were doom and gloom. I don't believe that GW is in imminent peril of anything, and we'll see in a week or so, but I figure they sold hundreds of millions more dollars of little toy soldiers and pocketed a nifty sum that they'll just pay out to their shareholders. Considering that half of the period was a grand experiment that, in my opinion was risky, if they're profitable at all, I think management and shareholders will be satisfied.
Talys, I don't know if you're elaborately trolling people or genuinely serious in this pants on head posts.
This is what a statement from a company should look like when addressing negative financial results:
Kevin Rountree
We have made some good progress on our strategic initiatives all focused on delivering long term growth. Whilst we are disappointed with the decline in return on capital reported in the period, we are all confident that we are focused on delivering the necessary changes to address this decline.
In the period we launched some great new products and our new visitor centre has performed well.
December sales were below expectations across the Group. At this stage in the Company’s financial year, the Company’s internal projections indicate that pre-tax profit for the year to 29 May 2016 is unlikely to exceed £16 million. A further update will be made when appropriate.
That's spin and anyone who a) invests and/or b) is in the business world knows what this means.
This, however, is insane and has no place in financial reports:
Kirby
As I write the world is tumbling in chaos around us. Pundits discover they cannot predict elections, the Americans ride to the rescue of world football (thank you, Uncle Sam), Sunderland escape relegation, again, the UK will split up into its consistent parts, it will leave Europe; and yet we struggle on. Babies get born, the rain falls the sun shines and the plants grow, our chickens keep laying, and Games Workshop still employs over 1,500 people, supporting 1,500 families all over the globe, making the best miniatures money can buy, providing one of the best investments in our owners' portfolios, and having a great deal of fun doing it.
I have never said that they should run around with their hair on fire but at least talk about the finances of the company.
Six mistakes mankind keeps making century after century: Believing that personal gain is made by crushing others; Worrying about things that cannot be changed or corrected; Insisting that a thing is impossible because we cannot accomplish it; Refusing to set aside trivial preferences; Neglecting development and refinement of the mind; Attempting to compel others to believe and live as we do
infinite_array wrote: It's not bad, but it's not exactly great, either. The half year report includes the release of both AoS (where new editions of games usually bump up sales) and the Calth game - i.e., plastic Heresy, which in the past has been alluded to as GW's panic button.
But in order to release AoS they didn't have 40k releases for a while, so in that sense it's not terrible.
Calth was only out for 2 weeks of that reporting period. I don't know how well it sold but I always tend to think it takes more than a single product to make a significant bump (or drop) on revenue. If Calth is successful it'll probably show up in the next report more as people who didn't buy it in the first 2 week buy it and then proceed to expand the forces with other purchases.
I think GW purposefully released AoS and Calth in the same reporting period so that mugs like us couldn't do a decent analysis of what is going on
Kilkrazy wrote: Most companies do some spinning when they have to announce bad results.
At first glance the results don't seem that bad to me? Perhaps we can get an analysis from someone who is more familiar with reading financial reports?
To me it looks like overall revenue is fine, 2.2% decrease but 0.7% increase at constant currency. It's hard to grow when you have a strong currency and rely heavily on international sales.
Slight increase in trade, decrease in retail and increase in mail order.
The increase in royalties propped them up a bit, $800k increase in royalties accounts for ~1.5% of their revenue, so without that revenue would have dropped by 3.5% (or a 0.7% drop at constant currency).
The problem I have at first glance is the difference between Retail and Trade. Sales in retail are sales to customers, sales in trades are sales to independent stores, meaning that for Trade whatever happen to a product afterward (whether it sales immediately or spend a year on the shelves) is irrelevant to GW.
Now if you release a new product and see independent stores massively investing in it. Trade will go up. But, if the product ends up not selling well to the final customers, that won't change anything for Trade but Retail will not see a similar increase or even see a decrease.
So if big releases like BoC or AoS were to underperform in a visible way, it would appear on the report in the same way we are currently seeing. But it would be worse for the following 6 months. As if the products underperformed then Trade accounts will stop investing in it and you will start to see Trade following the same pattern as Retail unless you release another new Product to force stores to invest (and even so chances are they'll be wary and no longer order as massively as they could, whatever you release).
So yeah I'm just theorycrafting from behind my screen but I think the next 6 months will be quite telling. And considering GW is unhappy with their December numbers, it doesn't start well.
But "retail" doesn't include mail order, when you add "mail order" and "retail" together, it was flat (or very slight increase).
I'm not sure GW would be unhappy with AoS "only" doing as well as 40k as from reports we have WHFB was doing significantly worse than 40k. So they managed to release AoS, diversifying their sales beyond 40k without losing out massively.
If AoS maintains popularity it'll mean GW has more than just the 40k channel making money, which is a good thing. I tend to think it won't maintain popularity, but that's all just speculation, this report in and of itself doesn't seem all that terrible.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/01/08 13:58:25
Quick look and a couple of thoughts before I have to run to some meetings:
-The odd thing here is that their tactic with webstore exclusives seems to be working. 5.3% growth is respectable.
-Retail sales continue to be an issue. They opened 22 new stores and sales were flat. I think that we've all beat that particular horse to death but they apparently haven't learned why sales are down in that stream. Hmmmm. Seriously, operating expenses, driven by their retail activities, went up .3m but were flat. I hope someone's asking some hard questions there but somehow I doubt it.
- They've doubled licensing revenue so people must be buying all that shovelware that's been coming out.
-Inventory increased by .6m. By itself this doesn't necessarily mean much unless it's all boxes of AoS models.
-Cash is king and their net cash fell by .6m. Something I never thought about before is that we can know how much they spend on product development (6.3m) for next time people assume making model molds costs 100s of thousands of pounds...not so much.
Edit:
Overall, some negatives but the financial picture remains healthy; no doom and gloom here. Good news is that the sales slide has slowed so that means their potential market has bottomed out (or nearly) or we might see them turn things around in the 2nd half for positive growth. I'm happy that I was wrong on my dire prediction earlier in the thread of 6-8% loss.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/01/08 14:07:02
Six mistakes mankind keeps making century after century: Believing that personal gain is made by crushing others; Worrying about things that cannot be changed or corrected; Insisting that a thing is impossible because we cannot accomplish it; Refusing to set aside trivial preferences; Neglecting development and refinement of the mind; Attempting to compel others to believe and live as we do
December sales were below expectations across the Group. At this stage in the Company’s financial year, the Company’s internal projections indicate that pre-tax profit for the year to 29 May 2016 is unlikely to exceed £16 million. A further update will be made when appropriate.
I missed that bit. That doesn't sound great, so they're expecting 2015/16 to be slightly worse profit-wise than 2014/15, though still not as bad as 2013/2014 which I think was their worst year in recent times.
infinite_array wrote: It's not bad, but it's not exactly great, either. The half year report includes the release of both AoS (where new editions of games usually bump up sales) and the Calth game - i.e., plastic Heresy, which in the past has been alluded to as GW's panic button.
But in order to release AoS they didn't have 40k releases for a while, so in that sense it's not terrible.
Calth was only out for 2 weeks of that reporting period. I don't know how well it sold but I always tend to think it takes more than a single product to make a significant bump (or drop) on revenue. If Calth is successful it'll probably show up in the next report more as people who didn't buy it in the first 2 week buy it and then proceed to expand the forces with other purchases.
I think GW purposefully released AoS and Calth in the same reporting period so that mugs like us couldn't do a decent analysis of what is going on
It doesn't really matter when customers bought BaC. It gets added to the accounts as they're ordered from trade/GW shops. So, if BaC had an initial run of 10k units at a trade price of £50 per unit, that's £500k straight to the accounts as soon as it gets ordered, regardless of whenever Timmy buys his. Same goes for AOS. If they made 25k copies that went to trade accounts (i.e., independent shops) that's still 25k copies worth of money in for GW, regardless of how many actual people buy the sets. If it's a flop, it won't show up until indies stop ordering (or send them back, if they have deals like that).
"The Emporer is a rouge trader."
- Charlie Chaplain.
infinite_array wrote: It's not bad, but it's not exactly great, either. The half year report includes the release of both AoS (where new editions of games usually bump up sales) and the Calth game - i.e., plastic Heresy, which in the past has been alluded to as GW's panic button.
But in order to release AoS they didn't have 40k releases for a while, so in that sense it's not terrible.
Calth was only out for 2 weeks of that reporting period. I don't know how well it sold but I always tend to think it takes more than a single product to make a significant bump (or drop) on revenue. If Calth is successful it'll probably show up in the next report more as people who didn't buy it in the first 2 week buy it and then proceed to expand the forces with other purchases.
I think GW purposefully released AoS and Calth in the same reporting period so that mugs like us couldn't do a decent analysis of what is going on
It doesn't really matter when customers bought BaC. It gets added to the accounts as they're ordered from trade/GW shops. So, if BaC had an initial run of 10k units at a trade price of £50 per unit, that's £500k straight to the accounts as soon as it gets ordered, regardless of whenever Timmy buys his. Same goes for AOS. If they made 25k copies that went to trade accounts (i.e., independent shops) that's still 25k copies worth of money in for GW, regardless of how many actual people buy the sets. If it's a flop, it won't show up until indies stop ordering (or send them back, if they have deals like that).
It depends how much independents bought. Sales from retail and mail order don't get added until a customer actually buys them, sales from trade get added when store buy it.
The previous year Space Hulk came out as well which was also a big seller. As far as independents buying boxes is concerned I almost would have though Space Hulk would have had more copies ordered than Calth. I know my local FLGS bought a giant stack of Space Hulk but a much smaller stack of Calth That said I didn't really follow the release of Calth because it doesn't interest me, maybe I underestimate it.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2016/01/08 14:15:15
AllSeeingSkink wrote: But "retail" doesn't include mail order, when you add "mail order" and "retail" together, it was flat (or very slight increase).
From what I see Retail+Mail Order went from 34,536 to 32,841 so still quite a fall. I am amazed by how much they do via Mail Order thought, it's more than half Retail and I never realized that until today.
infinite_array wrote: It's not bad, but it's not exactly great, either. The half year report includes the release of both AoS (where new editions of games usually bump up sales) and the Calth game - i.e., plastic Heresy, which in the past has been alluded to as GW's panic button.
Nah, the plastic thunderhawk gunship is the break glass in emergency only.
When GW start selling that, run for the hills, because the end times are upon us
"Our crops will wither, our children will die piteous
deaths and the sun will be swept from the sky. But is it true?" - Tom Kirby, CEO, Games Workshop Ltd
AllSeeingSkink wrote: But "retail" doesn't include mail order, when you add "mail order" and "retail" together, it was flat (or very slight increase).
From what I see Retail+Mail Order went from 34,536 to 32,841 so still quite a fall. I am amazed by how much they do via Mail Order thought, it's more than half Retail and I never realized that until today.
If you visit a modern GW shop it will be clear why web store sales are so high. The shops only stock part of the range for each army. This forces people to order any other items needed. These orders can only be done through the web store. Whether it's for actual postal delivery, or delivery to store for collection, the result is the same. The web store is a channel for a lot of orders because it's the only way.
This isn't a bad thing in itself, but it isn't a reflection of the web store as a major success in online retail design so much as a consequence of people being forced to do business there.
One might say that GW are doing a good job in the Clicks And Bricks line.
Funny to see GW in this afternoons Evening Standard on the way home. Unfortunately it's a profits warning, sales are up but profit will fall short of £17M expected.
In a less anachronistic fashion from the previous incumbent Roundtree has released comments to the press too
Seems to be in line with true general downturn this winter but we will see I guess in 6months.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/01/08 14:55:04
How do you promote your Hobby? - Legoburner "I run some crappy wargaming website "
I will wait for the full report, but personally (although I am not an investor) I am not worried about a small decline in profits. The important thing is that the decline in sales is slowing down.
Overall, some negatives but the financial picture remains healthy; no doom and gloom here.
This seems to be it.
It looks like a half-year of almost-flat numbers, with (another) slight fall in revenue but the royalties from videogames have managed to compensate for that.
In a wider timescale it's hard to judge, overall I believe it's another step in their slow decline trend (the biggest fish is stagnant in a growing pond), but for now at least it seems they've managed to slow the rate at which they were falling. Also, at least there seems to be someone competent in charge now (however I'm skeptical about to what degree he has the means to fix GW's main issues).
Considering Rountree's words about the dissappointing December, I guess they'll try to put out some eye-catchy releases in the following monts (could the new bundles have already been a result of that?). We'll see.
Progress is like a herd of pigs: everybody is interested in the produced benefits, but nobody wants to deal with all the resulting gak.
GW customers deserve every bit of outrageous princing they get.
Bundles are something you can put together very quickly. You just need to design and print new boxes, and have the content kits on hand. It's much easier than designing a new kit from scratch.
Kilkrazy wrote: Most companies do some spinning when they have to announce bad results.
At first glance the results don't seem that bad to me? Perhaps we can get an analysis from someone who is more familiar with reading financial reports?
To me it looks like overall revenue is fine, 2.2% decrease but 0.7% increase at constant currency. It's hard to grow when you have a strong currency and rely heavily on international sales.
Slight increase in trade, decrease in retail and increase in mail order.
The increase in royalties propped them up a bit, $800k increase in royalties accounts for ~1.5% of their revenue, so without that revenue would have dropped by 3.5% (or a 0.7% drop at constant currency).
The problem I have at first glance is the difference between Retail and Trade. Sales in retail are sales to customers, sales in trades are sales to independent stores, meaning that for Trade whatever happen to a product afterward (whether it sales immediately or spend a year on the shelves) is irrelevant to GW.
Now if you release a new product and see independent stores massively investing in it. Trade will go up. But, if the product ends up not selling well to the final customers, that won't change anything for Trade but Retail will not see a similar increase or even see a decrease.
So if big releases like BoC or AoS were to underperform in a visible way, it would appear on the report in the same way we are currently seeing. But it would be worse for the following 6 months. As if the products underperformed then Trade accounts will stop investing in it and you will start to see Trade following the same pattern as Retail unless you release another new Product to force stores to invest (and even so chances are they'll be wary and no longer order as massively as they could, whatever you release).
So yeah I'm just theorycrafting from behind my screen but I think the next 6 months will be quite telling. And considering GW is unhappy with their December numbers, it doesn't start well.
Add to this that the terms for returns of Age of Sigmar were very generous - which means that stores were willing to take a chance on the game, but will be returning unsold stock rather than holding on to it.
Which can bite a company in the butt. (One of the many things leading to the demise of TSR was large amounts of returns on generous terms. (Hmmh... I typed 'lager terms'.... The Drunken Kings game is tonight....))
*EDIT* It also hurt that TSR warehoused the returns - which left them with a vast amount of inventory of zero value. Reading Dancey's report on the demise of TSR is painful. TSR would have been better served by destroying the returned product, or by allowing retailers to strip the paperbound adventures and supplements.
Two of the local stores have just returned most of their stock of AoS. The third store did not go as deep, and is holding on to them... if they do not sell then the models will be used by the store owner for his 40K armies. (He plays Blood Angels and Khorne... must like the color red....)
The Auld Grump
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/01/08 15:18:25
Kilkrazy wrote:When I was a young boy all my wargames were narratively based because I played with my toy soldiers and vehicles without the use of any rules.
The reason I bought rules and became a real wargamer was because I wanted a properly thought out structure to govern the action instead of just making things up as I went along.
People with better economic knowledge than me are saying that this is not that bad, which is fair enough, but what's the next rabbit that GW are going to pull out of the hat?
We've had the knight, anecdotal evidence says that AOS has done a Titanic impression, HH has been tried, and I doubt if 40k players will be happy at a new version...
What now for GW?
"Our crops will wither, our children will die piteous
deaths and the sun will be swept from the sky. But is it true?" - Tom Kirby, CEO, Games Workshop Ltd
infinite_array wrote: It's not bad, but it's not exactly great, either. The half year report includes the release of both AoS (where new editions of games usually bump up sales) and the Calth game - i.e., plastic Heresy, which in the past has been alluded to as GW's panic button.
Nah, the plastic thunderhawk gunship is the break glass in emergency only.
I think we've just seen the next one...
notprop wrote:Funny to see GW in this afternoons Evening Standard on the way home. Unfortunately it's a profits warning, sales are up but profit will fall short of £17M expected.
The group also said its visitor centre in Nottingham — Warhammer World — did well.
It boasts a café selling pancakes (or Dwarf-flattened Elf Cakes) for £5.50 and Urgluk Gitmasha’s Hot Sausage — two sausages, chips and beans — for £4.75.
Diversification! I expect the pancakes to show up in my local Centra before the next 6-month report. Where I'll look at them. Then buy the cheaper ones.
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: People with better economic knowledge than me are saying that this is not that bad, which is fair enough, but what's the next rabbit that GW are going to pull out of the hat?
We've had the knight, anecdotal evidence says that AOS has done a Titanic impression, HH has been tried, and I doubt if 40k players will be happy at a new version...
What now for GW?
Looking forward, I expect a further uptick in royalty income when Total War: Warhammer is released (it's not yet, right?). The next year and a 1/2 - two years is going to be make or break time for AoS; either it will outperform WHFB or it won't and 3 years is the norm to shake out adoption dips.
I'm not sure of Rountree's current strategy to open more shops, it seems a bit daft to me considering falling retail sales while trade and online continue flat or mild growth YoY. I've said this before but they need a diversified strategy when it comes to their retail arm; they can't apply the UK approach of opening shops everywhere to huge territories like the US and Canada. Open some nice, well-staffed, stores in large population centers (the old battle bunkers comes to mind) and then develop trade policies that encourage further trade sales growth. In essence, go back to the days when trade partners did their recruiting for them. This may entail a hard look at their recent web-exclusive strategy which has served to increase web sales but at the cost of trade and retail growth. Really, if you're going to be an e-tailer, don't open physical shops, jump one way or the other.
Six mistakes mankind keeps making century after century: Believing that personal gain is made by crushing others; Worrying about things that cannot be changed or corrected; Insisting that a thing is impossible because we cannot accomplish it; Refusing to set aside trivial preferences; Neglecting development and refinement of the mind; Attempting to compel others to believe and live as we do
infinite_array wrote: It's not bad, but it's not exactly great, either. The half year report includes the release of both AoS (where new editions of games usually bump up sales) and the Calth game - i.e., plastic Heresy, which in the past has been alluded to as GW's panic button.
Nah, the plastic thunderhawk gunship is the break glass in emergency only.
I think we've just seen the next one...
notprop wrote:Funny to see GW in this afternoons Evening Standard on the way home. Unfortunately it's a profits warning, sales are up but profit will fall short of £17M expected.
The group also said its visitor centre in Nottingham — Warhammer World — did well.
It boasts a café selling pancakes (or Dwarf-flattened Elf Cakes) for £5.50 and Urgluk Gitmasha’s Hot Sausage — two sausages, chips and beans — for £4.75.
Diversification! I expect the pancakes to show up in my local Centra before the next 6-month report. Where I'll look at them. Then buy the cheaper ones.
Those Dwarf-Flattened Elf Cakes will sell like hotcakes!
I'd make a snarky comment about tourist food... but the best darned corned beef hash that I ever had was at Disney World.... (Seriously, if you ever go to Disney, try out the hash.... It's been decades, but I still remember it and my mouth waters. )
The Auld Grump
Kilkrazy wrote:When I was a young boy all my wargames were narratively based because I played with my toy soldiers and vehicles without the use of any rules.
The reason I bought rules and became a real wargamer was because I wanted a properly thought out structure to govern the action instead of just making things up as I went along.
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: People with better economic knowledge than me are saying that this is not that bad, which is fair enough, but what's the next rabbit that GW are going to pull out of the hat?
We've had the knight, anecdotal evidence says that AOS has done a Titanic impression, HH has been tried, and I doubt if 40k players will be happy at a new version...
What now for GW?
Looking forward, I expect a further uptick in royalty income when Total War: Warhammer is released (it's not yet, right?). The next year and a 1/2 - two years is going to be make or break time for AoS; either it will outperform WHFB or it won't and 3 years is the norm to shake out adoption dips.
I'm not sure of Rountree's current strategy to open more shops, it seems a bit daft to me considering falling retail sales while trade and online continue flat or mild growth YoY. I've said this before but they need a diversified strategy when it comes to their retail arm; they can't apply the UK approach of opening shops everywhere to huge territories like the US and Canada. Open some nice, well-staffed, stores in large population centers (the old battle bunkers comes to mind) and then develop trade policies that encourage further trade sales growth. In essence, go back to the days when trade partners did their recruiting for them. This may entail a hard look at their recent web-exclusive strategy which has served to increase web sales but at the cost of trade and retail growth. Really, if you're going to be an e-tailer, don't open physical shops, jump one way or the other.
Informative reply. Thanks. Regarding new stores in North America, somebody was saying that GW are building new stores in places where the old stores failed.
Mikhalia was also saying that in his area, he's retired more GW stores than social security, so he's none to bothered
As for AOS, well, If AOS turns out to be a success, then I'll change my name to Tom Kirby, and you can quote me on that
"Our crops will wither, our children will die piteous
deaths and the sun will be swept from the sky. But is it true?" - Tom Kirby, CEO, Games Workshop Ltd
Kilkrazy wrote: Most companies do some spinning when they have to announce bad results.
Yesterday M&S, a major UK clothes retail chain, announced bad Christmas results and blamed it on weather, discounting by rivals, and lack of stock. M&S had a 30% off sale in December.
Weather certainly is a factor, but it's not hard to see that everyone can't be suffering from rivals discounting if they are discounting themselves, and it's hard to understand why you would run out of stock if your problem is you aren't getting enough customers into your shops.
In other words, the spin is obvious bs and I think most people are intelligent enough to see this sort of malarkey in any company report, including the GW one.
This has been one of the mildest winters, we've had for years.
Spin doesn't always work.
Marks and Spencer chief executive Marc Bolland to quit http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-35249317 Marks and Spencer chief executive Marc Bolland is to step down in April, the company said as it announced its Christmas results.
Mr Bolland will be succeeded by Steve Rowe, executive director of general merchandise.
Third-quarter sales of general merchandise were down by 5.8% for the thirteen weeks to 26 December.
Actually, the mild winter is what M+S were blaming, nobody bought new warm winter clothes.
Not cold enough people don't buy winter clothes, To cold people stayed in sales are down, there's always an excuse.
It's the wrong sort of snow, was a good one.(British rail)
Its hard to be awesome, when your playing with little plastic men. Welcome to Fantasy 40k
If you think your important, in the great scheme of things. Do the water test.
Put your hands in a bucket of warm water,
then pull them out fast. The size of the hole shows how important you are.
I think we should roll some dice, to see if we should roll some dice, To decide if all this dice rolling is good for the game.
agnosto wrote: Quick look and a couple of thoughts before I have to run to some meetings:
-The odd thing here is that their tactic with webstore exclusives seems to be working. 5.3% growth is respectable.
-Retail sales continue to be an issue. They opened 22 new stores and sales were flat. I think that we've all beat that particular horse to death but they apparently haven't learned why sales are down in that stream. Hmmmm. Seriously, operating expenses, driven by their retail activities, went up .3m but were flat. I hope someone's asking some hard questions there but somehow I doubt it.
- They've doubled licensing revenue so people must be buying all that shovelware that's been coming out.
-Inventory increased by .6m. By itself this doesn't necessarily mean much unless it's all boxes of AoS models.
-Cash is king and their net cash fell by .6m. Something I never thought about before is that we can know how much they spend on product development (6.3m) for next time people assume making model molds costs 100s of thousands of pounds...not so much.
Edit:
Overall, some negatives but the financial picture remains healthy; no doom and gloom here. Good news is that the sales slide has slowed so that means their potential market has bottomed out (or nearly) or we might see them turn things around in the 2nd half for positive growth. I'm happy that I was wrong on my dire prediction earlier in the thread of 6-8% loss.
Inventory is usually equipment or facilities, which means they invested in some infrastructure whether it's storage or new mould making equipment who knows.
That their cash on hand decrease is the same as their inventory increase means they spent cash to invest in their own growth, so there won't be future cost of paid off debt later to minimize future profits most likely.
We find comfort among those who agree with us - growth among those who don't. - Frank Howard Clark
The wise man doubts often, and changes his mind; the fool is obstinate, and doubts not; he knows all things but his own ignorance.
The correct statement of individual rights is that everyone has the right to an opinion, but crucially, that opinion can be roundly ignored and even made fun of, particularly if it is demonstrably nonsense!” Professor Brian Cox
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: People with better economic knowledge than me are saying that this is not that bad, which is fair enough, but what's the next rabbit that GW are going to pull out of the hat?
We've had the knight, anecdotal evidence says that AOS has done a Titanic impression, HH has been tried, and I doubt if 40k players will be happy at a new version...
What now for GW?
I certainly am not trained in finance beyond an intro course in high school and college but my amateur reading is that they pretty much treading water. Indicators like sales and profits are down but when you remove factors largely beyond their control (like their favorite "constant currency" conversion) it isn't as bad on paper (but the "constant currency" conversion doesn't help them in practice as the money is still gone). They had this mediocre year AFTER pulling several emergency parachute cords though. Most popular line Space Marine codex rehash? Pulled. Knight model and codex rehash? Pulled. Entirely new flagship game line launch? Pulled. Horus Heresy marines in plastics? Pulled. Continued rehash of 1-2 year life cycle books? Pulled. And all that barely kept them in the same spot. And their new flagship line didn't have a SINGLE model in their OWN top 28 most popular list by whatever metrics they chose to use.
(more)
(building)
(less)
In the real world, professional CEOs and CFOs of public companies are hired and paid disproportionately humongous salaries because of their ability to increase the value of the stock, with any ability or understanding of the company's core business being a plus, rather than a requirement. For little public companies (or private companies aspiring to become public), often, NOTHING matters other than the CEO's ability to raise capital (ie their ability to dog and pony shows). The company could be in the business of selling eggs, and the CEO could be incapable of distinguishing a male from a female chicken, and it wouldn't matter as long as they could raise the next $10 million.
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