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Blastaar wrote:

 John Prins wrote:

Blastaar wrote:

#2 It is very much an expensive hobby, if you look past total dollars spent and examine the value for your dollar. GW games are atrocious value.

It's easily affordable by anyone making a living wage. You can talk about nebulous 'value' all you want, but people pay hundreds of dollars to go to sports venues for a couple hours of entertainment. Same with a music concert. A single night at the bar can go through a hundred bucks pretty easily. People throw their money away on tobacco all the time. I do none of these things because they don't represent 'value' to me either. I do get a lot of enjoyment from building and painting miniatures that I like. Games Workshop is the elephant in the room - it's the easiest to get in a game of 40k or AoS than anything else, and that's how they get away with the increased price compared to the rest of the market. I could buy lots of miniatures from cheaper alternatives like Mantic (and, in fact, I have), but my chances of actually playing those games is pretty low, so their 'value' is far lower, especially when I have to deal with inferior materials (like Mantic's restic, bleurgh).

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of instances where GW has priced me out of stuff - especially single plastic HQ models - with their wonky pricing, but with Start Collecting and Battleforce Boxes I've managed to build armies at reasonable prices so that the odd big kit doesn't really bother me, and I'm not making big bucks, I'm well below average household income in my region.

I have been priced out, but even if that was not the case, GW prices would still be rip-offs. Regardless of budget. I can get more minis for far less from other, smaller companies. Sporting events and concerts are innately more expensive to put on (cost of production absolutely matters when discussing the value of goods and services) and are experiences, which are inherently more valuable. GW sells a few pennies' worth of plastic for $50+. You are overpaying. You may not mind that, but you are overpaying.

Ah yes. Another one who thinks only thing that costs GW is the actual plastic spent

Well, depends on what he means by getting plastic cheaper elsewhere. I made many comparisons recently and GW aren't really expensive when you consider everything. I'm paying around 60 euros per full squad of infantry (12 models) in Warmachine.You pay as much in Infinity. People need to start being more precise, though I do think it is rather issue with disposable income rather than company itself.

 Ernestas wrote:
Well, depends on what he means by getting plastic cheaper elsewhere. I made many comparisons recently and GW aren't really expensive when you consider everything. I'm paying around 60 euros per full squad of infantry (12 models) in Warmachine.You pay as much in Infinity. People need to start being more precise, though I do think it is rather issue with disposable income rather than company itself.

I do often note that people say you can get models cheaper; then when you compare it its more like other games just use less models on the table, which results in cheaper armies. Of course regional prices do affect this, sometimes the way exchange rates work out between the companies one can end up a lot cheaper than another in a specific country.

I also think a good few people forget that GW models often come with optional parts; variable weapons and sometimes a modular design. Many other companies you get 1 pose and 1 weapon per model. Warmachine is very like that and it was only with some warjacks (and some beasts) that you do get a multipart model with multiple options. But by and large (esp for infantry) its one model one weapon.

When people talk of their bits box its often chock full of GW stuff and very few other lines of models (and what is in there from other lines is often unbuilt rather than properly spare parts)

 Overread wrote:

 Ernestas wrote:
Well, depends on what he means by getting plastic cheaper elsewhere. I made many comparisons recently and GW aren't really expensive when you consider everything. I'm paying around 60 euros per full squad of infantry (12 models) in Warmachine.You pay as much in Infinity. People need to start being more precise, though I do think it is rather issue with disposable income rather than company itself.

I do often note that people say you can get models cheaper; then when you compare it its more like other games just use less models on the table, which results in cheaper armies. Of course regional prices do affect this, sometimes the way exchange rates work out between the companies one can end up a lot cheaper than another in a specific country.

I also think a good few people forget that GW models often come with optional parts; variable weapons and sometimes a modular design. Many other companies you get 1 pose and 1 weapon per model. Warmachine is very like that and it was only with some warjacks (and some beasts) that you do get a multipart model with multiple options. But by and large (esp for infantry) its one model one weapon.

When people talk of their bits box its often chock full of GW stuff and very few other lines of models (and what is in there from other lines is often unbuilt rather than properly spare parts)

Absolutely this. And I think this largely ties in with the whole thing about perceived value. If all you want from your models is something with the exact optimal loadout for competitive gaming, that you're not even going to paint and just chuck straight on the table, then yeah, what GW are offering is surplus to your requirements, so you're paying extra for a bunch of stuff you don't want. Whereas if you're looking at it as a modelling project, a painting project, *and* and something you can play games with, then extraneous aspects for which you're paying are reduced, I guess.

 Overread wrote:

 Ernestas wrote:
Well, depends on what he means by getting plastic cheaper elsewhere. I made many comparisons recently and GW aren't really expensive when you consider everything. I'm paying around 60 euros per full squad of infantry (12 models) in Warmachine.You pay as much in Infinity. People need to start being more precise, though I do think it is rather issue with disposable income rather than company itself.

I do often note that people say you can get models cheaper; then when you compare it its more like other games just use less models on the table, which results in cheaper armies. Of course regional prices do affect this, sometimes the way exchange rates work out between the companies one can end up a lot cheaper than another in a specific country.

I also think a good few people forget that GW models often come with optional parts; variable weapons and sometimes a modular design. Many other companies you get 1 pose and 1 weapon per model. Warmachine is very like that and it was only with some warjacks (and some beasts) that you do get a multipart model with multiple options. But by and large (esp for infantry) its one model one weapon.

When people talk of their bits box its often chock full of GW stuff and very few other lines of models (and what is in there from other lines is often unbuilt rather than properly spare parts)

Les Grognards from Wargames Atlantic are a box of 24 infantry for $35. That kit includes a whole ton of weapon options and eight different head varieties for a total of 192 (!!!) heads in the box.

Perry Miniatures sells American Civil War figures at 36 models for 20 pounds. They don't have much in the way of options, but that's incredibly cheap.

There are companies like Anvil, Mad Robot, and Victoria Miniatures that sell models comparable to GW in pricing, but for the latter two I would argue have significantly better sculpts than the GW ranges they are equivalent to.

So basically when people say you can get models cheaper than GW they're right; that doesn't mean everything else is cheaper. I definitely wouldn't use Privateer Press as an example of a cheaper alternative to GW.

Yes, but it is like apple stuff. All their stuff costs 3xtimes as much as Huaweis or Samsungs. You are praying for the brand.

w40k stuff is probably the same way. They could sell it for less, but if majority of buyers are willing to buy 10 models at 60$, why shouldn't they keep such a price.

And for places where 60$ per squad is not as acceptable, there are recasters.

More important question, do they support any worthwhile game? You can't exactly buy just miniatures if you want to play tabletop. You need to buy into models of some company or otherwise you will spend a lot more in trying to convert those. So, I think it is only fair to compare those models to a tabletop game which is not dead. Also, while those are the cheapest miniatures I had ever seen, I do not think that quality of them compares to Primaris marines for example. I have one next to me and even unpainted it looks awesome. Those often look like small toys by comparison and even when they are painted, they are not much to look at. Different companies which you had pointed to have a lot more pricey stuff like 30 euros for 10 dudes which are equivalent to GW prices.

Like here: https://www.anvilindustry.co.uk/regiments-custom-infantry-squad

Those are great models at least in preview, but they hardly are cheaper than buying from GW.

Edit: I had checked that those are made out of resin. Resin is more expensive material and is valued more highly so they are cheaper for what they are than GW products, though an average consumer would not be able to tell a difference. Most small companies are making their products out of resin, but it is only because they are not really selling them at worthwhile volumes and I bet that most people in those companies have second jobs. I don't think that they offer nearly as much new inventory as others. It seems that they are just stuck at producing however small or big their inventory is and rarely expanding their range. Which is another advantage/disadvantage of third party suppliers.

tneva82 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:

 John Prins wrote:

Blastaar wrote:

#2 It is very much an expensive hobby, if you look past total dollars spent and examine the value for your dollar. GW games are atrocious value.

It's easily affordable by anyone making a living wage. You can talk about nebulous 'value' all you want, but people pay hundreds of dollars to go to sports venues for a couple hours of entertainment. Same with a music concert. A single night at the bar can go through a hundred bucks pretty easily. People throw their money away on tobacco all the time. I do none of these things because they don't represent 'value' to me either. I do get a lot of enjoyment from building and painting miniatures that I like. Games Workshop is the elephant in the room - it's the easiest to get in a game of 40k or AoS than anything else, and that's how they get away with the increased price compared to the rest of the market. I could buy lots of miniatures from cheaper alternatives like Mantic (and, in fact, I have), but my chances of actually playing those games is pretty low, so their 'value' is far lower, especially when I have to deal with inferior materials (like Mantic's restic, bleurgh).

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of instances where GW has priced me out of stuff - especially single plastic HQ models - with their wonky pricing, but with Start Collecting and Battleforce Boxes I've managed to build armies at reasonable prices so that the odd big kit doesn't really bother me, and I'm not making big bucks, I'm well below average household income in my region.

I have been priced out, but even if that was not the case, GW prices would still be rip-offs. Regardless of budget. I can get more minis for far less from other, smaller companies. Sporting events and concerts are innately more expensive to put on (cost of production absolutely matters when discussing the value of goods and services) and are experiences, which are inherently more valuable. GW sells a few pennies' worth of plastic for $50+. You are overpaying. You may not mind that, but you are overpaying.

Ah yes. Another one who thinks only thing that costs GW is the actual plastic spent

If you had bothered to read some of my other posts, you would know this is not the case.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Overread wrote:

 Ernestas wrote:
Well, depends on what he means by getting plastic cheaper elsewhere. I made many comparisons recently and GW aren't really expensive when you consider everything. I'm paying around 60 euros per full squad of infantry (12 models) in Warmachine.You pay as much in Infinity. People need to start being more precise, though I do think it is rather issue with disposable income rather than company itself.

I do often note that people say you can get models cheaper; then when you compare it its more like other games just use less models on the table, which results in cheaper armies. Of course regional prices do affect this, sometimes the way exchange rates work out between the companies one can end up a lot cheaper than another in a specific country.

I also think a good few people forget that GW models often come with optional parts; variable weapons and sometimes a modular design. Many other companies you get 1 pose and 1 weapon per model. Warmachine is very like that and it was only with some warjacks (and some beasts) that you do get a multipart model with multiple options. But by and large (esp for infantry) its one model one weapon.

When people talk of their bits box its often chock full of GW stuff and very few other lines of models (and what is in there from other lines is often unbuilt rather than properly spare parts)

Skirmish games are naturally cheaper, yes. What about KOW? $90 gets you around 50 minis, for 4+ units. One may or may not like the sculpts (I really only care for the Empire of Dust stuff) but that's still better value per-dollar for gaming purposes than a Start Collecting box of 1 HQ 1 squad and 1 thing.

The extra bits in GW kits are nice to have. However- leftover bits are only useful if you have other minis for them. Bodies are always in short supply, as are weapons, IE tac squads with ML only, Devs with 1 Lascannon, or whatever. The dual kits are even worse. You pay extra for the "choice" between 2 data sheets, and cutting costs for GW.

If the rules were better, to the point a single kit is impactful in the game, maybe I would think differently.

A few weeks ago I bought 220+ EoD models to kings of war for about 180euro or 200dollar. Besides the 200 infantry models I got 4 characters, 4 warmachines, 3 large infantry/monsters and 3 swarms.

Their mega army or mega force deals are amazing value. I got 3 Invictor Warsuits, 3 eliminators and 2 characters to my BA army for the same cost as a complete KoW army. Both the KoW and 40k stuff bought at online stores with the best discounts I could find in europe. Quite a lot of extra bits as well for me since 164 of my models are base plastic and come with extra metal upper bodies,shields and heads so I could if I wanted build a whole undead army rising from the ground since I got like 200 extra upper bodies/heads/weapons.

about 60euro for all the rules for my armies and my friends armies in 2 books compared to the 25 euro a month we would have to pay for each new 40k book to keep up to date with the rules.

The only thing I really liked from GW lately are the big boxes like Shadowspear and the contrast paints. Shadowspear and Dark Imperium are at the price point things should be at and the contrast paints help me paint my KoW/9th age armies faster. I can paint a good looking wood elf archer or a mummy in less than 20min now without much effort and only 4-5 contrast paints. Rest of the paint range is a bit expensive. It costs about 20% more than Vallejo and you get 30% less paint and in bottles that dries up compared to vallejo or armypainter. Only reason I even buy paint there is that I go pass the local GW store about 6 times a week and the stores that sells other paints are further away so cant be bothered to go further if I just need 1 new paint bottle.

Well, I checked Kings of War on Wayland and you get similarly priced deals for mega collection and GW starter bundles like Dark Imperium. When I had checked for individual deals, models are around 5-15 euro range. Not exactly outright better deal, but this game seems cheaper. And common, overexegarration doesn't help anyone here. Codexes might be annoying to buy, but it takes reeaaallly long time before you need to buy another one. People are making fuss over nothing.

To me, the quality is what makes it cost more.
Not saying it’s a reasonable price as quite a few GW kits have a questionable price tag.

It’s alright dropping links to packs of 20+ infantry for half the price of GW, but even at a distance you can see a huge lack of detail and depth to the models.

KoW started out as average models at a good price.
Over time the quality has gone up, but the price has also followed on the newer stuff.

While it’s just my opinion, I don’t really see any companies on par for model quality.
Yes, the prices are higher, but a lot of the draw to GW is the models.
That’s why so many people refuse to hop over to other games, despite them being much cheaper.

 Ernestas wrote:
Well, I checked Kings of War on Wayland and you get similarly priced deals for mega collection and GW starter bundles like Dark Imperium. When I had checked for individual deals, models are around 5-15 euro range. Not exactly outright better deal, but this game seems cheaper. And common, overexegarration doesn't help anyone here. Codexes might be annoying to buy, but it takes reeaaallly long time before you need to buy another one. People are making fuss over nothing.

They sell many of the core units for about 1£ or less than 1,5€ a model. You get 20 skeletons for the same price as 10 cadians or you get 40 for the same price as 15 if you buy the large skeleton box. The skeletons arent worse sculpts than the cadians and you get extra weapons and other bits on the sprues as well. For KoW each army has multiples of deals at the same level or above the Dark Imperium box. Which is only good for 2 factions the other factions only have their start collecting boxes that are much inferior to the KoW deals. You save up to 50% on some of the KoW deals(the 100-120 euro boxes) and not just a free character thrown in that costs 15 euro, which is a lot for a small single model, to make the box look like a good deal. KoW have some more expensive monsters and such that look quite close to GW in price but their core units you need lots of are cheap and unlike GW they sell larger boxes for cheaper for those units and dont repack the models with half the amount and keep/increase the price.

In a group of friends you would probably need a book a month to cover everyones needs. CA and books like vigilus and PA exists outside of the codex cycle too. It isnt much spread out on multiple people but its a huge amount of books that feel quite unneccesary compared to gathering the rules in just one or two books for all 20 factions. Why should we pay the price for rules every month or every second month that equals the cost of what other games cost every few years for their rules.

You know in Lovecraftian/cthulu settings where there is a puzzle that slowly drives a person insane when they try to solve it? GW pricing is like that.

As others have pointed out, GW prices account for many different factors, from raw materials, production, development, and transportation. In the year ending June 2, 2019, GW had sales of £256.5 million with pre-tax profit of £81.2 million. In the most simplistic terms, they spent £175.1 achieve their sales.

So if GW made 31% profit off it's sales, just how much additional sales do they have to any specific price reduction make more profit? If they reduce prices 20%, that reduces profits down to 11% of sales, which means they need to nearly triple sales just to make the same profit on pounds. Not a good business decision since I double they will get that much more sales off that little of a price reduction.

So I guess GW prices are that insane. Or maybe we want a cheaper product that the quality and quantity of games and models we get from GW now?

 alextroy wrote:
As others have pointed out, GW prices account for many different factors, from raw materials, production, development, and transportation. In the year ending June 2, 2019, GW had sales of £256.5 million with pre-tax profit of £81.2 million. In the most simplistic terms, they spent £175.1 achieve their sales.

So if GW made 31% profit off it's sales, just how much additional sales do they have to any specific price reduction make more profit? If they reduce prices 20%, that reduces profits down to 11% of sales, which means they need to nearly triple sales just to make the same profit on pounds. Not a good business decision since I double they will get that much more sales off that little of a price reduction.

So I guess GW prices are that insane. Or maybe we want a cheaper product that the quality and quantity of games and models we get from GW now?

Even more than that. Reducing prices won't increase sales that much, but they will sell more models, which means more material, inventory, production, and other costs.

Also, pre-tax profits can be deceiving as those taxes can be as high as 40% though usually it is over 20%. So, profits would be more close to £60 million if we take 25% income tax and ignore any other expenses. This makes 23% profit. GW is not screwing its customers with monopoly, but it does have a healthy profit margin from what it seems. How efficient or how wasteful company is another matter, but I would rather have GW which prospers and can ever improve quality and quantity of their production rather GW which is struggling. I apply same attitude to my local hobby shop. I know how hard is to do business and I take prefer to take small loss and order from them anyways.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Klickor wrote:

 Ernestas wrote:
Well, I checked Kings of War on Wayland and you get similarly priced deals for mega collection and GW starter bundles like Dark Imperium. When I had checked for individual deals, models are around 5-15 euro range. Not exactly outright better deal, but this game seems cheaper. And common, overexegarration doesn't help anyone here. Codexes might be annoying to buy, but it takes reeaaallly long time before you need to buy another one. People are making fuss over nothing.

They sell many of the core units for about 1£ or less than 1,5€ a model. You get 20 skeletons for the same price as 10 cadians or you get 40 for the same price as 15 if you buy the large skeleton box. The skeletons arent worse sculpts than the cadians and you get extra weapons and other bits on the sprues as well. For KoW each army has multiples of deals at the same level or above the Dark Imperium box. Which is only good for 2 factions the other factions only have their start collecting boxes that are much inferior to the KoW deals. You save up to 50% on some of the KoW deals(the 100-120 euro boxes) and not just a free character thrown in that costs 15 euro, which is a lot for a small single model, to make the box look like a good deal. KoW have some more expensive monsters and such that look quite close to GW in price but their core units you need lots of are cheap and unlike GW they sell larger boxes for cheaper for those units and dont repack the models with half the amount and keep/increase the price.

In a group of friends you would probably need a book a month to cover everyones needs. CA and books like vigilus and PA exists outside of the codex cycle too. It isnt much spread out on multiple people but its a huge amount of books that feel quite unneccesary compared to gathering the rules in just one or two books for all 20 factions. Why should we pay the price for rules every month or every second month that equals the cost of what other games cost every few years for their rules.

It seems that they are twice as cheap than GW production. It is good to know the lower limit at how cheap those miniatures can be. Though, even this company has some egregious examples of expensive products.

https://www.manticgames.com/games/warpath/asterian-warpath/asterian-chira-transporter-chroma-force-platform/

They want 40 euros for this one model! That is same that GW generally asks for their own vehicles. It seems that more complex miniatures does possess far higher price without possessing same level of quality which GW has.

I'm not sure if it is true in regards to books. Codexes and rulebooks seem to come pretty seldomly and you need to wait a while until army gets updated. GW prefers to update point changes and Codexes are built with that in mind (they have no points over unit data page) and any changes you can alter with a simple pencil. Neither you need technically a rulebook or codex, you can just acquire pdf, but you are paying for convenience which you want. Though honestly, I'm not sure how you can have balance updates and factions without this system. In Warmachine we have to bother printing unit cards ourselves or buying them. It is a lot of bother, annoying and looks bad. It also means that meta is very stagnant due to low amount of support by comparison and your cards gets invalidated every revision. To make matters worse, company doesn't bother printing cards anymore so, feth you. In order for entire army ruleset to be fitted on a single card, game needs to be remade. Also, even other systems are not much better, because they omit information. What Pathfinder or Tough means? You have to know rules in advance in order to be able to read cards properly. Paper is only replaced by wikis which I bet you could just as easily with Warhammer.

 alextroy wrote:
As others have pointed out, GW prices account for many different factors, from raw materials, production, development, and transportation. In the year ending June 2, 2019, GW had sales of £256.5 million with pre-tax profit of £81.2 million. In the most simplistic terms, they spent £175.1 achieve their sales.

So if GW made 31% profit off it's sales, just how much additional sales do they have to any specific price reduction make more profit? If they reduce prices 20%, that reduces profits down to 11% of sales, which means they need to nearly triple sales just to make the same profit on pounds. Not a good business decision since I double they will get that much more sales off that little of a price reduction.

So I guess GW prices are that insane. Or maybe we want a cheaper product that the quality and quantity of games and models we get from GW now?

Lets not forget that GW have eventually expanded their production facilities to maturity/saturation at their current site and the factory runs almost continuously. The only ways they could increase production to facilitate extra sales is to buy and develop a new plot and / or reduce the variety in the range of miniatures (I heard it takes a non-insignificant amount of time to swap moulds around etc for plastic which cuts into production time).

 Nazrak wrote:
I guess the problem I have with people who like the GW designs, background etc, then draw comparisons with others offering cheaper models, is that they seem to be kinda ignoring the fact that *you're also paying for those designs/background etc* – the people creating those things aren't working for free, y'know.

Ultimately, sure, it'd be nice if *everything* was cheaper, but then I think we're getting into a situation where people's underlying beef is with capitalism, and I'm pretty sure this forum is not the place for that discussion.

In the end, you have to decide if what you get out of buying into the hobby is worth it *to you*, and spend your money, or not, accordingly. All the arguing/complaining on forums in the world isn't gonna make GW drop their prices when they're going absolutely gangbusters as a business with the current pricing structure.

I feel it's also worth noting that it seems every month or two on the rumors and news thread is news about one mini manafacturer or another going out of busniess. GW is stable and steady by and large they're unlikely to go anywhere soon. this is a good place for a busniess to be in. Also regarding prices, GW is the "big fish" in the industry, so their prices are going to be known quantities, all the compeition is going to try to charge less specificly to wrest away what they can of the pie. It's the same reason why disney + is cheaper then netflix.

To be honest, a lot of manufactures simply suck. Their miniatures aren't pretty and they have small variety with next to none development of new miniatures. Here is a hint why they are failing:

https://www.waylandgames.co.uk/zenit-reload/34067-luzbelle

On the other hand, I'm not seeing RagingHeroes doing poorly. They seem to have constant sales and shortage of products. I wonder what is the difference between the two.

Miniature market tends to be high quality business. So many things might go wrong and all of them need to be right. How miniature are made, defects are not tolerated. How designer creates a miniature, it must be attractive to their audience. It must have its own niche. Quality must be maintained. Level of detail must be maintained from a digital model to physical miniature. In a lot of cases, something, somewhere fails. In addition, miniature market is not same as wargamming market where low quality materials and lack of details is acceptable. A lot of more traditional wargamming miniatures get free pass due to historical reasons and no competition, but when it comes to miniatures, bar is set a lot higher.

 alextroy wrote:
they spent £175.1 achieve their sales

Of which the lion's share is operating costs for their useless wannabe IKEA storefront 80% of players don't get to ever set foot in.

People living out of range of GW stores are subsidizing them and their variety of evil managers sniffing your miniatures to catch you committing the crime of using a cloak from a 3rd party so everyone can be miserable together at the world's shittiest game tables.

So you know that the GW Stores have a lower profit margin then GW Sales overall? You know the impact they have on sales as a marketing tool?

LoftyS wrote:

 alextroy wrote:
they spent £175.1 achieve their sales

Of which the lion's share is operating costs for their useless wannabe IKEA storefront 80% of players don't get to ever set foot in.

People living out of range of GW stores are subsidizing them and their variety of evil managers sniffing your miniatures to catch you committing the crime of using a cloak from a 3rd party so everyone can be miserable together at the world's shittiest game tables.

Can you show me on the Space Marine where the bad man touched you?

For the record, GW Sales and Profit breaks down a follows (per the 2018-19 Annual Report https://investor.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/2018-19-Press-statement-final-1.pdf) for sales of product:

Trade Sales (Non-GW Stores) are 47% of sales and generate 52% of profit

Retail Sales (GW Stores) are 34% of sales and generate 11% of profit

Online Sales (GW Online) are 19% of sales and generate 35% of profit

What does this tell you? GW generates over half of their sales directly to customers at nearly the same profit level as their sales via the non-GW channel. The GW Stores profit is subsidized by GW Online Sales, which is actually the most profitable part of the business margin-wise.

And so dies the GW Stores inflate prices argument.

 alextroy wrote:
For the record, GW Sales and Profit breaks down a follows (per the 2018-19 Annual Report https://investor.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/2018-19-Press-statement-final-1.pdf) for sales of product:

Trade Sales (Non-GW Stores) are 47% of sales and generate 52% of profit

Retail Sales (GW Stores) are 34% of sales and generate 11% of profit

Online Sales (GW Online) are 19% of sales and generate 35% of profit

What does this tell you? GW generates over half of their sales directly to customers at nearly the same profit level as their sales via the non-GW channel. The GW Stores profit is subsidized by GW Online Sales, which is actually the most profitable part of the business margin-wise.

And so dies the GW Stores inflate prices argument.

I'm not sure how you can come to any conclusions from that...

To me it looks like sales from non gw physical stores subsidize gw stores. Sure GW direct sales have the biggest profit margin but other retailer sales still have over 3x the profit than GWs own stores and many of those sales have a 10-20% discount on them and 1-2 extra middlemen taking share of the profits.

The actual cost to make a box for GW is almost nothing even when including factory, personel, packaging, storage and shipping for that box compared to what they sell them in their own non discounted stores be it physical or online. The stores cost them a lot of money and its hard to see if the marketing is worth it today. Before the internet made it easier to both market and sell stuff they were probably crucial to GWs success and they probably still help in spreading their name/hobby in some places but in most cities now though?

The largest seller of GW product and the store with the largest GW inventory in my city isnt the Warhammer store but the fantasy book store a few hundred meters away. And its not because of discounts since they only have about 0-3% off on GW stuff. They usually just round the numbers down to the closest 0 or 5 and since the SEK is worth 1/10 of the euro its usually only 0,1€-0,5€ off in total. The GW store have downsized twice in the last 15 years both in store area, location, personel and opening times while the book/nerd store have more than doubled in size twice in the same timeframe and still looking to continue expanding. It used to be much smaller than the GW store but are now at least 6x the size if not counting the cafe and gaming/reading area. Wouldnt be surprised if its the case in many more locations as well.

 Overread wrote:

 Ernestas wrote:
Well, depends on what he means by getting plastic cheaper elsewhere. I made many comparisons recently and GW aren't really expensive when you consider everything. I'm paying around 60 euros per full squad of infantry (12 models) in Warmachine.You pay as much in Infinity. People need to start being more precise, though I do think it is rather issue with disposable income rather than company itself.

I do often note that people say you can get models cheaper; then when you compare it its more like other games just use less models on the table, which results in cheaper armies. Of course regional prices do affect this, sometimes the way exchange rates work out between the companies one can end up a lot cheaper than another in a specific country.

I also think a good few people forget that GW models often come with optional parts; variable weapons and sometimes a modular design. Many other companies you get 1 pose and 1 weapon per model. Warmachine is very like that and it was only with some warjacks (and some beasts) that you do get a multipart model with multiple options. But by and large (esp for infantry) its one model one weapon.

When people talk of their bits box its often chock full of GW stuff and very few other lines of models (and what is in there from other lines is often unbuilt rather than properly spare parts)

There is a lot of varibles, It even can depend on what army you have.
But for me, its the rules and the game bringing down and lowering the value.
But also that you can get a 40k army and have it made redundant since the studio creating the game is rather daft at times.
It does not help that in aus, new kits for 40k are going up super fast in price D:

Bits i do not even keep anymore, so i find effectively worthless now. The only reason they are useful at the time is not even the devs know which ones will be useful

LoftyS wrote:

 alextroy wrote:
they spent £175.1 achieve their sales

Of which the lion's share is operating costs for their useless wannabe IKEA storefront 80% of players don't get to ever set foot in.

People living out of range of GW stores are subsidizing them and their variety of evil managers sniffing your miniatures to catch you committing the crime of using a cloak from a 3rd party so everyone can be miserable together at the world's shittiest game tables.

You know what? I don't give a crap what problems those who choose to play in a GW store experience. It doesn't matter to me at all how GW chooses to split up the $ they make from my most recent purchase. What I care about is A) Did they make a model I want? B) Am I willing to pay the price they're asking?

 alextroy wrote:
For the record, GW Sales and Profit breaks down a follows (per the 2018-19 Annual Report https://investor.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/2018-19-Press-statement-final-1.pdf) for sales of product:

Trade Sales (Non-GW Stores) are 47% of sales and generate 52% of profit

Retail Sales (GW Stores) are 34% of sales and generate 11% of profit

Online Sales (GW Online) are 19% of sales and generate 35% of profit

What does this tell you? GW generates over half of their sales directly to customers at nearly the same profit level as their sales via the non-GW channel. The GW Stores profit is subsidized by GW Online Sales, which is actually the most profitable part of the business margin-wise.

And so dies the GW Stores inflate prices argument.

I don't follow anyone's logic on this. Sure, it shows very low profitability of GW stores, but they are still quite profitable. Thus argument that we have to subsidize GW stores is inherently false, because they do not lose money, they make money for GW. Furthermore, I'm not sure that majority of people here understand what marketing truly is. How costly it is and how often crucial it is for long-term success of a product or a brand. GW stores to me seems as extremely good way to promote GW production to public. It is a self-sustaining and self-promoting form of marketing where instead of spending money, you are getting paid for marketing your product and that is truly insane!


Also, it confirms what I was saying. Nobody who knows what they are doing buys from GW directly. I know for sure that retailers are getting their production more than 15% off and GW eats up shipping costs. I can acquire any GW product at 15% discount, this means that real price of their products are a lot lower, probably 30% or more.

LoftyS wrote:

 alextroy wrote:
they spent £175.1 achieve their sales

Of which the lion's share is operating costs for their useless wannabe IKEA storefront 80% of players don't get to ever set foot in.

People living out of range of GW stores are subsidizing them and their variety of evil managers sniffing your miniatures to catch you committing the crime of using a cloak from a 3rd party so everyone can be miserable together at the world's shittiest game tables.

Aren’t you just a bundle of joy.
I’m sure your local GW reciprocates the same feelings towards you.
Literally almost every thread you make or post on is negative.
If you dislike the game this badly, why get involved in discussions about it?

I’m sure I’ll come across as a GW apologist with this, but…

I can get a box of models from Company X for so much cheaper than GW, so surely GW can do the same.
GW has a dominant position in the market, so they can afford to charge what their fans are willing to pay. So many smaller companies who don’t have a hardcore fanbase are competing against each other to for customers, so they have to price their product as attractively as they can manage in order to generate sales. GW don’t need to do that – they’ve got a huge number of people who just want to buy GW models. It’s a great position for the company to be in, even though it’s not so good for us hobbyists in terms of what we have to pay. A lot of small companies are probably run by dedicated hobbyists who are doing it for peanuts because they love doing it. I’d think their setup costs for each kit will be higher given they don’t have GW’s expertise and volume, but their running costs could well be less – it makes it hard to compare.

You can get a no-brand t-shirt much cheaper than a branded one or a good spec Android phone for much cheaper than an Apple one. Their offerings may be a bit more slick and polished, but the value for money is certainly less. Yet people still buy the more expensive option and those companies feel correct and justified in the prices they charge. And I’d argue that they’ve got even less of a captive audience than GW do. Fundamentally a shirt is a shirt and a phone is a phone, even if they’ve got minor differences. But GW have their settings, which are by far the most popular sci-fi/fantasy wargaming settings. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’ve been a big fan of GW’s settings for about 20 years now, I’m deep into the lore, love the aesthetic etc. No other fantasy/sci-fi setting I’ve seen from a wargames company has come close to tempting me, and licensed properties aren’t nearly as well set up for use in wargames (too few factions, too restricted in models/paintjob if you want to stick to the lore, game could die if the company loses the license, etc.) I think their settings are their biggest selling point, but GW also have some of the best, most detailed plastic models in the industry that are a joy to work with; a lot of their competitors’ models just don’t look as crisp or detailed, never mind what you think of the design aesthetic. They also have a huge range and a breakneck release pace. If you don’t like a model, there’s another release next week that you probably will. I’m not into branded shirts, and I’m baffled by people who fork out for Apple gadgets – but GW have got me captured pretty firmly. If there’s a cheaper kit from another company, but I don’t want to buy it and would rather buy the more expensive GW one, then why would GW try to match the cheaper company’s pricing? I’m not going to buy the cheaper kit just because it’s cheaper, if I don’t actually want the models.


Hobby X is so much cheaper than GW.
Hobby Y is so much more expensive. Comparing one hobby to another is utterly pointless. Of course writing poetry is cheaper than buying models. Of course restoring classic cars is more expensive.


Yes, but it’s expensive for a few pence/cents worth of plastic, and I can’t afford it.
That sucks. But there are plenty of people that can and do afford it – and the GW corporate machine isn’t about to lower prices to help the poorer hobbyist if it means reducing their profit. And the costs that the prices need to cover are so much more than just the cost of the plastic. They’re covering materials, time on the casting machine, packaging, warehouse space and GW corporate running cots, including the costs of developing new kits. They’re high enough that all of their sales channels – retail stores, trade and online can cover their associated costs and are in profit, thus keeping the company healthy.


GW could make a larger profit by lowering prices because sales would rise.
Looking at the 2018-19 report, GW generated revenue of approx.. 255 million GBP, and profit (including royalties) of approx. 81 million GBP. If we were to ignore the fact that royalties are in there and assume this is all model/book sales, that puts an average 31% profit margin on their sales. Obviously the financials and calculations are a lot more complicated than this, but just on headline figures, drop prices by 15%, and you cut profits in half. Would a 15% drop in price double sales? I doubt it. It would also disproportionately impact the retail stores – we’ll get into those later.

On top of that, their production has been maxed out. I’m not sure where their new factory is in the process of being brought online, but until that’s open they can’t handle higher demand anyway. It’s worth mentioning that this is a FTSE250 company. I’m sure they’ve got marketing experts, sales analysts, and all sorts of number crunching to figure out where their best sales volume/profit margin point lies. That doesn’t necessarily mean they’re going to get it right, but I’m sure they put a lot more thought into these things than the average internet hobbyist thinks.


Hold on – if that’s the case then why can they offer Start Collecting and Battle Boxes for a discount?
The cost of production of the sprues is fairly low, so it’s not like they’re making a loss on those boxes. The Start Collecting kits are what it says on the tin – they’re there to attract you into starting a new army, and then buying a whole bunch of the regular kits and making loads of money off you that way. They’re usually full of models that have long “paid-off their moulds”. They’ve made their big chunk of profit from pre-order and release day sales, and have settled into that comfortable ongoing sales period. They’re happy to offer them in a discount set if it can entice you to start a new army.

Battle boxes are very much a known quantity for them, at least the ones that sell out. We often ask why they don’t produce more of them when they know that they’ll sell. I suspect that they like the known quantity. If they make X copies of a box, know that they’ll sell, then they know in advance exactly how much profit they’ll make on that run. If you know you’ll make a certain amount of profit, it makes it easier to commit to that print run in the first place. Also don’t forget that a lot of people impulse buy battle boxes on pre order because they expect them to sell out, making it a self-fulfilling prophecy. I bet GW loves that – especially if said person doesn’t really need the contents of the box and just leaves some or all of them on the shelf. I’m guilty of that in a few cases myself. Cases where I wanted one faction, and while the other wasn’t models I really needed right now, I might do something with them eventually. So they’re on the shelf and haven’t been touched. I’m sure GW would be quite happy with that turn of events, because I bought those sprues, left them untouched, and kept buying other kits.


But if a kit has paid off it’s mould, surely the price can be lowered, right?
A kit paying off it’s own mould is more of an accounting thing that anything else. It’s a measure of how well a kit has sold that tells the company if it was worth making that kit in the first place. It’s not actually the sales of that kit that are used to pay for it. GW makes money from sales. Some of it goes into operating costs, the rest is profit. I’d expect moulds are considered an operating cost rather than a capital investment out of profits, if only because producing new kits is a major part of GW’s sales model. Each new mould is paid for out of the sales from existing kits, then “has it paid off it’s own mould” is used as a measure of whether a kit was successful or not.

Not to mention that if they operated a model of making a kit cheaper once it had paid off its setup costs, how many people would wait to buy it, knowing it would get cheaper in future? Early sales would drop, meaning it would take longer to pay off its setup costs, and if enough people were waiting for the price drop it might not even get there.


But what about GW stores? Are online / FLGS sales subsidising those?
No, other sales channels aren’t subsidising GW retail sales, because retail sales still made a profit. It was a much lower profit margin than trade and online sales certainly, but still a profit.

As Alextroy pulled out of the Investor Report:

 alextroy wrote:
For the record, GW Sales and Profit breaks down a follows (per the 2018-19 Annual Report https://investor.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/2018-19-Press-statement-final-1.pdf) for sales of product:

Trade Sales (Non-GW Stores) are 47% of sales and generate 52% of profit

Retail Sales (GW Stores) are 34% of sales and generate 11% of profit

Online Sales (GW Online) are 19% of sales and generate 35% of profit

What does this tell you? GW generates over half of their sales directly to customers at nearly the same profit level as their sales via the non-GW channel. The GW Stores profit is subsidized by GW Online Sales, which is actually the most profitable part of the business margin-wise.

And so dies the GW Stores inflate prices argument.

Retail stores are the lowest profit margin because they need to cover the costs of the high street location and store staffing. Trade profits are better, because GW doesn’t have to eat any store cost, even though the sales price is lower. I think trade sales are normally at something like 50-60% of RRP. Online is the best profit margin because the full 100% of the purchase price goes to GW, but their only costs associated with that sales channel are the warehouse/postage.


Yes, but doesn’t that mean prices need to be as high as they are in order for GW retail to make a profit? If we got rid of them they could lower prices.
That’s correct, retail and online sales could handle a lower RRP far better than GW retail stores could. However would they do it? GW wants to make money after all, and this all falls back into the previous points. If people are willing to buy kits at their current prices, what incentive does GW have for lowering them? Even if there was increased demand at a lower price point, could they service the demand? If they cut retail stores – and 34% of their sales – would those sales switch to FLGS and online, or would they leave the GW ecosystem entirely?

How would the influx of new hobbyists be affected? After all, new hobbyists are the future of the company, and making a short term decision to improve margins that negatively impacts future growth is a sure way to crash a business. Yes, with the internet nowadays a physical presence is less necessary, but GW stores are still a visible part of the high street that makes Warhammer a household name, in the UK at least. I suspect the brand awareness would be much lower if they didn’t operate the retail chain, and that a lot of young hobbyists’ first steps are still taken with a painting lesson on a free space marine in a GW retail store. Even if that person eventually ends up buying exclusively online and FLGS.

Then the next argument would be – could they lower prices even further by cutting out FLGS and going to direct online sales only? After all, that’s their highest profit margin. But I couldn’t imagine their retail and trade sales all migrating to direct online sales if those channels were removed – could you?


It’s not like that in my country/region.
Fair enough. I probably don’t know about your region – but GW clearly thinks it’s worth operating stores there. Again, they’ve almost certainly got a bunch of number crunchers saying it’s a good idea.


Yeah, but even with all that, this stuff is pretty expensive, right?
It certainly feels that way, and I would love it if it were cheaper. But if the current pricing structure leads to a healthy, profitable company, I’ll accept it.