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Scale model kits by major manufacturer having fit issues is not uncommon either,

(and neither is not fixing the problem when they re-jig the kits either)

 Fenrir Kitsune wrote:
Haha, now there's a politicians answer. It's a flawed design then.

A flawed design from what, over 15 years ago?

GW kits have come a long, long way in that time. Around the same time, I was dabbling in Warmachine. Now those were dodgy kits (didn't dabble for long, so can only speak for the kits as they were)

Meanwhile, about "GW Financials"...

It's been a couple of month's since GW last paid out a divi, so here's another one and a Trading Update:

link

Third Party link - not updated their own investor webpage yet. Important bit for the business highlit yellow.

Dividend and Trading Statement
Tue, 5th Sep 2017 07:00
RNS Number : 7931P
Games Workshop Group PLC
05 September 2017

Games Workshop Group PLC

DIVIDEND AND TRADING STATEMENT

For the quarter to 27 August 2017

For immediate release 5 September 2017

Games Workshop Group PLC announces that the Board has today declared a dividend of 35 pence per share. This will be paid on 27 October 2017 for shareholders on the register at 22 September 2017, with an ex-dividend date of 21 September 2017. The last date for elections for the dividend re-investment plan is 6 October 2017.

Following on from the Group's update in July, trading for the first quarter of the current financial year has continued strongly. Sales and, given the high operational gearing of the business, profits for 2017/18 to date are therefore well above the same period in the prior year.

A further update will be given as appropriate.

Edited to Add Bloomberg article - GW is the biggest %age riser in the FTSE All-Share Index YTD 2017.

Bloomberg

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/comment/games-workshops-heroic-knights-victorious-despite-chaos-lords-stalking-bexitland-a7930391.html

 reds8n wrote:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/comment/games-workshops-heroic-knights-victorious-despite-chaos-lords-stalking-bexitland-a7930391.html

Like many outsider financial analyses, this is very uninformed.

He's certain that Games Workshop is doing well because it has brick and mortar stores. This fails to take into account that they had brick and mortar stores last year when they made 1/3 as much in profit.

GW 2017 is doing about as well as GW 2014-16 combined. There's a reason for that.


My analysis- GW has started giving people what they want in a way that they've failed to do before.

They may be bringing in new customers and bringing back old customers by putting out new boxed games rather than treating their customer base like a fixed number and trying to funnel them all into their two main games (I know a lot of people who like Blood Bowl, Necromunda and Warhammer Quest who aren't interested in buying an AoS or 40k army).


In addition, they've addressed fan complaints about 40k with 8th, and turned around Age of Sigmar (by finishing their rules set) and started engaging with their audience online.

And honestly, some of their newest releases are some of the best looking minis they've done (new Lord of Change is amazing).

I think he's more meaning the physical presence of something truly nerdy helps them.

As you know, GW's rise in the U.K. preceded the rise of the FLGS, certainly those with space for gaming. So for their market, GW rule the High Street here - and that's also behind their rebranding stores to Warhammer, as that's a colloquialism they're better known as.

We know the benefits of having actual, physical stores. And for now, that seems to be outweighing the drawbacks (cost, basically).

So whilst their newfound approach is definitely working in their favour, it's helped that the wider range of games is easily found on the UK high street

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I think he's more meaning the physical presence of something truly nerdy helps them.

As you know, GW's rise in the U.K. preceded the rise of the FLGS, certainly those with space for gaming. So for their market, GW rule the High Street here - and that's also behind their rebranding stores to Warhammer, as that's a colloquialism they're better known as.

We know the benefits of having actual, physical stores. And for now, that seems to be outweighing the drawbacks (cost, basically).

So whilst their newfound approach is definitely working in their favour, it's helped that the wider range of games is easily found on the UK high street

Actually, it may be that Warhammer stores are outdated.

In the beginning, they made sense because there were no FLGS, and it still makes sense because GW is still responsible for the majority of new entrants to the wargaming hobby.

If that were to change...

I can only see it from the UK perspective, because that's the only one I've ever seen.

The UK doesn't have that many FLGS, simply because GW got their first, and then kept on growing.

And as GW seem to have the UK well sewn up as a market, that has a knock-on effect globally, as there's enough UK based Nerds to keep GW's games in the online spotlight.

Why do some gamers get into these financials so much? It's a game. The hobby is a game. When I go see a movie or eat a burger I don't check the financials to see if I should do it or not. What am I missing?

 krazynadechukr wrote:
Why do some gamers get into these financials so much? It's a game. The hobby is a game. When I go see a movie or eat a burger I don't check the financials to see if I should do it or not. What am I missing?

Some people likes to debate, and economy. I have a friend that is doing a math doctorade and he actually likes maths. To the point that he normally do math problems just for fun! Yeah. Doing maths for fun! To me is insane, but he loves it

 krazynadechukr wrote:
Why do some gamers get into these financials so much? It's a game. The hobby is a game. When I go see a movie or eat a burger I don't check the financials to see if I should do it or not. What am I missing?

That people have the capacity to be interested in more than one thing, and sometimes those things intersect?

I mean, that's not a hard to concept to grasp is it?

 Galas wrote:

 krazynadechukr wrote:
Why do some gamers get into these financials so much? It's a game. The hobby is a game. When I go see a movie or eat a burger I don't check the financials to see if I should do it or not. What am I missing?

Some people likes to debate, and economy. I have a friend that is doing a math doctorade and he actually likes maths. To the point that he normally do math problems just for fun! Yeah. Doing maths for fun! To me is insane, but he loves it

Math is fun, especially number theory, which is pretty much party time math.

However, in this hobby, it seems wise to know the financial health of a company before you get too invested. For example, say you just started collecting a force for Firestorm Armada or MERCS 2.... A heads-up would have been really helpful.

 frozenwastes wrote:
The departure from Kirby's approach I applaud Rountree the most for: Not distributing more than they take in as profit in dividends. It's like a sane, sustainable pay out ratio has arrived. This leaves the company with money to invest in the future rather than looting it to make the stock look good in the short term and to give Kirby compensation out of line with his accomplishments. The current dividend is still high and a large portion of the profit, but it's not a draining of cash reserves (or worse, when they borrowed to prop up a dividend when LOTR was falling) that Kirby undertook. My guess is that the fall dividend will be even higher, but still represent about 75% of their earnings (which is still a very high ratio).

Fall 2016 dividend 25p
Fall 2017 dividend 35p

If your 75% idea holds, that means sales are up 40% over the same period last year.

With 8th coming out during that time I could totally see that.

 krazynadechukr wrote:
Why do some gamers get into these financials so much? It's a game. The hobby is a game. When I go see a movie or eat a burger I don't check the financials to see if I should do it or not. What am I missing?

I don't look at the local cinemas profit line before I buy a ticket. Nor does anyone here go "oh, okay, tomorrow I'm going to play a match of 40k, let's check their financial report".
I'd take note, however, if they announced they had to close down or if they announced that they're so successful that they'll build another chinema closer to my place. Both would affect me.

But if GWs financials are so uninteresting - why did you look at this thread then? Was "oh I just wanted to ask why there is such a thread and why people are actually talking about it" really your only motivation?

Warren Buffet's "Invest in what you know" idea has a lot of traction with the public. I imagine many gamers past their teenage years actually hold some GW stock and were probably pretty frustrated during the Kirby years that things were basically moving sideways and the future was being sacrificed for the sake of cost cutting in the present.

And then there's the whole checking opinions against reality thing. When GW made decisions or did things that frustrated them, it's a useful check to see if you're being rational to look at their business results. And sure enough as soon as a new CEO gets in and stops doing stupid things the results shoot up like crazy.

Those who were frustrated with GW for years weren't alone. They actually were in touch with reality.

Chamberlain wrote:

Fall 2016 dividend 25p
Fall 2017 dividend 35p

If your 75% idea holds, that means sales are up 40% over the same period last year.

With 8th coming out during that time I could totally see that.

It's possible Rountree will go over the ~75% pay out ratio he's been using since he got the job. I think he'll stick with it and the half year report s going to be impressive. I think Q4 won't be 40% higher than the quarter that had a new edition of the game. So I expect the January dividend to be 30p.

Why look into GW financials? They're the best way to get an idea about the overall health of the wider industry.

GW are the big fish in this pond, and over recent times we've seen them experienced something of a boom.

Yes, their change of direction is definitely a factor - but the pace and size of their sales increase seems unlikely to be solely down to that.

If GW are doing well, it seems likely it's not just them.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I can only see it from the UK perspective, because that's the only one I've ever seen.

The UK doesn't have that many FLGS, simply because GW got their first, and then kept on growing.

The Uk had a massive number of gaming stores in the 80's, and there were gaming departments of other stores. every Virgin had a gaming centre, and there were one or two pecialist gaming stores mostly with hex boardgames, RPG's and miniatures games. There was a lot around. The downturn started in the late 80's and by around 1990 they were all gone, the independent FLGS's lasted only a year or two longer.

In most parts of the country GW alone survived.

There were catchments for RPG/miniatures stores at a rate of about one per major city, as a niche project. Stores in towns under 150K size tended to fail. However it was more common and survivable outside the home counties and less trendsetting regions. Even now there is no FLGS rennaissance in the UK. Shops exist in central London due to the vast catchment, but tend to fail in the surrounding belt as people in the south east tend to culture towards ever newer entertainments and that cannot really be found outside of electronics. However the zeitgeist is different in the west country, and market towns might have a suriviing even thriving games shop, a GW and one or two gaming friendly cafes.

It is odd that places like Hertfordshire might have a far greater population and wealth than Cornwall or Shrewsbury. But gaming thrives in the latter and is dead outside GW in the former.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Why look into GW financials? They're the best way to get an idea about the overall health of the wider industry.

GW are the big fish in this pond, and over recent times we've seen them experienced something of a boom.

Yes, their change of direction is definitely a factor - but the pace and size of their sales increase seems unlikely to be solely down to that.

If GW are doing well, it seems likely it's not just them.

GW success is survivable, but it has several factors internal and external.

GW policy related changes

1. GW management rebranding. They are still big corporation and after the bottom line, we cant forget that, and its ok, but they are no longer the moustache twirler villains.

2. Effort to move forward on gaming systems. This can have negative applications such as the death of WHFB, but all over it is good. GW games design is trying to get out of its rut, be innovative in a way we have not seen since the 80's.
Age of Sigmar took GW in a new direction and finally it got to work, it also proved to investors that the company was not stuck in a trap, GW management proved they could graw off the rotten leg, this got noticed on the exchanges.
Hopefully WHFB will return someday but...

3. Expansion of secondary product lines. Specialist games are back, and GW are learning how to exploit that. Space Hulk comes back, Dreadfleet stayed dead and critically Gw learned that those involved should not be central parties to games design), they release limited numbers of Blood Bowl stock then make the lines permanent when people resell special dice for 10X their face value when stocks ran out. Necromunda is returning....

4. Rapid turn around of new product. Not just another space marine codex, but whole new lines. GW have never been this active frankly.

5. Getting started boxsets that offer a visual deal. £50 can buy rather a lot nowadays in GW, or so it seems. Prices are still high buy there is an affordable way in offering nice toys to play with. getting Started boxes are filled with fun and offer an illusion of value. The hobby is still overpriced, but no longer seems unbearably so and customers are reacting positively to this.

Changes ancillary to GW policy.

1. End Times/Age of Sigmar/Legacy products. Sales if warhammer fantasy are booming, some of that is legacy 'Oldhammer' players, and a lot of those were panic buying in 2016-17 to complete armies that you can no longer buy. Some are genuine Age of Sigmar converts or new players, also a number of players have converted to 9th Age/8.5 or other continuation projects. All of which despite convoluted legal wording the the contrary is really still just warhammer. Crucially all the army lists mimic old GW products.
So you the following buying Games Workshop fantasy products
- Age of Sigmar fans.
- WHFB rush buyers, though this market will dry out as collections are completed and increasingly involves auction purchase and closing stock.
- Continuation gamers.

2. Media attention. Total War Warhammer has opened a thirst for Warhammer 'lore'. Many online gamers end up staying for more.

3. Regular media merchandising. You can buy a model of your favourite superhero or comic character, you can even get some for gaming. Now admittedly those are normally pre-assembled and coloured. However as interest grows for Total War Warhammer heroes people want to buy them and place them alongside other gaming merchandise. This is mostly niche and a collector with $800 for a Marvel licenced sculpt will want to have their Karl Franz pro painted, so its a limited earner for GW, but its crucially a genre bending market, and a gateway for collectors if not tabletop gamers.

Changes unrelated to GW.

1. Kickstarter fever is opening up more and more people to miniatures gaming, most of those end up or return to GW at some point.

2. The market as a whole is maturing. Upcoming rivals have matured, but without taking over GW's share. Privateer Press for example iis now seen as another Games Workshop, complete with codex creep, overpricing and other bugbears. Other bigger names are disappearing or being drowned out amongst the sea of modrrately profitable also-ran gaming companies. All this means that GW stands out more and more as the industry leader.

3. Chinese outsourcing and resin product explosion. Many of the smaller games companies outsource all manufacturing to China, some make this work very well, PSc is a good example for this. Other fare less well, such as Catalyst, Mantic and Rackham (which died as a result). GW might be expensive, but if they say they will make a new game they will, it wont arrive two years late of not at all, and everyone knows that the manufacturing quality will not be under question - at least since they fixed Finecast.
Customers value quality control both in delivery and manufacturing and are asking questions they took foregranted a decade ago. This is giving GW a rep for reliability in the industry, they always had it (Failcast excepted) but before it was taken foregranted.


In a nutshell 40K is doing will and 8th is popular, most importantly customers are now confident that broken units and rules will get fixed rather than ignored, and ignored races will receive fair treatment post reboot.
Fantasy is now split between those happy with the relaxed and open ended nature of Ave of Sigmar, and those who were never content with WHFB to begin with but now ca play they armies they love in a fan fixed ruleset with the broken stupidity taken away. the death of End Times also frees up nostalgia players to play something other than 8th, those who like 6th, or older editions can relive their own nostalgia day and be happy. in a way Gw fantasy has never been more alive because the idiots ruining it are out of the picture, people gravitate to the ruleset they want and the lore is increasingly and continuously accessible in myriad online products.


Back 20 years also the legendary Mauleed wrote that "GW got rich the same way Forrest Gump got famous, through no fault of their own". GW management is finally getting smarter, but at the same time GW studio's absence is improving the product.

Orlanth... there was no last chance to buy in in this excercise. And it's a tad fallacious to say that 9th-age players only go to GW, so it's not THAT high a market. Other than that, pretty solid statement.

I think the "9th age" players are smaller in number than the WHFB customer base that wasn't buying enough to keep the game going. When a game dies, only a subset continues on using fan rules or keeps playing an old edition.

Lord Kragan wrote:
Orlanth... there was no last chance to buy in in this exercise.

I disagree, and am right as I did exactly this. As have others in the 9th age community.

GW did not, and still does not offer warning though. You have to observe stock levels yourself.

An example for you. I m collecting Dark Elves,partly from ebay, partly from Triple Helix Wargames. I have seen Dreadspear boxes come and go with limited restock from GW available. Dark Riders have now completely dried up, they will soon officially be GW mail order only, and Black Guard have gone that way.

In 2016 I could buy the full Ogre Kingdom range including battalion boxsets, and they were being restocked in Waylands Forge and Element Games. I know this because I asked them at Salute that year. I also asked how long I had to buy, as I couldnt afford them all there and then, I was collecting up Warriors of Chaos at the time. Managers from those retailers warned me that lines disappeared from retock without warning. One day they could reorder boxset x, the next time they could not.

Over time I have watched lines disappear, sometime reappearing in AoS packaging, sometimes just disappearing.

I have not been panick buying, but over two years I have been both planning and rush buying as much as can be afforded and prioritising stock I think will disappear. It was just as well that I did, as many of the essentials are no longer available at a reasonable price. At the beginning of 2016 I had two full WHF armies and components for two more, now I have eight, six completed or near completed and two currently under the process, I left for last my Lizardmen as the AoS Seraphon army availability is strong and only have one or two items I need to mail order from GW at full retail price. Once the Lizardmen are done I will try to collect Dwarfs and Skaven, but I have mostly written off both as unlikely, and if I cant realistically cost them I will let them go. I have already written off collecting Beastmen now, and the door is thoroughly shut on my collecting a Tomb Kings army before I even had a chance to begin, and I was very lucky to complete my Bretonnians. I have yet to assemble let alone paint most of this stuff.

Lord Kragan wrote:

And it's a tad fallacious to say that 9th-age players only go to GW, so it's not THAT high a market. Other than that, pretty solid statement.

The 9th Age site actually gives manufacturer lists, and open sourcing is encouraged. However even in 1.3 and a supposed seperation there is no move to introduce new units not matched from old GW items, the one or two exceptions to this in fact hearken back to earlier GW models such as Bretonnian bolt throwers.
As a result completing a 9th Age army is normally done with Gw miniatures though not always.
An example for you. 9th Age will show a large number of wyvern models to use, but only Orc warlords get to ride wyverns, just as in WHFB. Chaos warlords get manticore and chaos dragons with two heads as options, but not wyverns. Now you can get a non GW wyvern for your orc, but GW has you covered and the basing size matches the GW model not the Mierce miniatures one et al.

There is no shoe in, but GW is athe availability default, except where it already wasn't under 8th. A good example here being Mantic zombies, which almost entirely replaced GW ones in all gaming outside GW even back whwn playing WHFB.

 Orlanth wrote:

Lord Kragan wrote:
Orlanth... there was no last chance to buy in in this exercise.

I disagree, and am right as I did exactly this. As have others in the 9th age community.

GW did not, and still does not offer warning though. You have to observe stock levels yourself.

An example for you. I m collecting Dark Elves,partly from ebay, partly from Triple Helix Wargames. I have seen Dreadspear boxes come and go with limited restock from GW available. Dark Riders have now completely dried up, they will soon officially be GW mail order only, and Black Guard have gone that way.

In 2016 I could buy the full Ogre Kingdom range including battalion boxsets, and they were being restocked in Waylands Forge and Element Games. I know this because I asked them at Salute that year. I also asked how long I had to buy, as I couldnt afford them all there and then, I was collecting up Warriors of Chaos at the time. Managers from those retailers warned me that lines disappeared from retock without warning. One day they could reorder boxset x, the next time they could not.

Over time I have watched lines disappear, sometime reappearing in AoS packaging, sometimes just disappearing.

I have not been panick buying, but over two years I have been both planning and rush buying as much as can be afforded and prioritising stock I think will disappear. It was just as well that I did, as many of the essentials are no longer available at a reasonable price. At the beginning of 2016 I had two full WHF armies and components for two more, now I have eight, six completed or near completed and two currently under the process, I left for last my Lizardmen as the AoS Seraphon army availability is strong and only have one or two items I need to mail order from GW at full retail price. Once the Lizardmen are done I will try to collect Dwarfs and Skaven, but I have mostly written off both as unlikely, and if I cant realistically cost them I will let them go. I have already written off collecting Beastmen now, and the door is thoroughly shut on my collecting a Tomb Kings army before I even had a chance to begin, and I was very lucky to complete my Bretonnians. I have yet to assemble let alone paint most of this stuff.

Lord Kragan wrote:

And it's a tad fallacious to say that 9th-age players only go to GW, so it's not THAT high a market. Other than that, pretty solid statement.

The 9th Age site actually gives manufacturer lists, and open sourcing is encouraged. However even in 1.3 and a supposed seperation there is no move to introduce new units not matched from old GW items, the one or two exceptions to this in fact hearken back to earlier GW models such as Bretonnian bolt throwers.
As a result completing a 9th Age army is normally done with Gw miniatures though not always.
An example for you. 9th Age will show a large number of wyvern models to use, but only Orc warlords get to ride wyverns, just as in WHFB. Chaos warlords get manticore and chaos dragons with two heads as options, but not wyverns. Now you can get a non GW wyvern for your orc, but GW has you covered and the basing size matches the GW model not the Mierce miniatures one et al.

There is no shoe in, but GW is athe availability default, except where it already wasn't under 8th. A good example here being Mantic zombies, which almost entirely replaced GW ones in all gaming outside GW even back whwn playing WHFB.

You're not really describing panic buying, but using your own anecdotal experience as a means of the entire sample. Those models ARE available, in the long term, so it doesn't really incite panic buying. Same goes for the 9th age, "third party" are becoming more abundant, as some in the forum noted.