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Today I learned from my local GW that 75% of all Space Hulk sets have been pre-ordered. The manager believes that GW will be sold out of Space Hulk before the release date.

Wow.

That has to mean something good for GW...not sure WHAT it means, but its pretty impressive.

It means they didn't make enough of them and will lose sales

Sorry, just trying to look at the dark side of life.

bugger

I guess I better buy one. I suppose you can only buy them from gee-dub.

I have mine on order through local shops.

I want to do a Warstore order anyway I will call them tomorrow. feth gee-dub I already did my last order with them.

It is a great set though, definately picking one up. It is almost TOO good, not generic looking enough. But hey. It (they) have character.

I am not too fussed tbh

Deadshane1 wrote:Wow.

That has to mean something good for GW...not sure WHAT it means, but its pretty impressive.

All it means is their silly marketing ploy is still unfolding. It's the same crap that Disney does with putting their classic movies in "the vault", never be to available to the public again. Or at least until they decide to open the vault every couple of years and give the false impression of scarcity to pump sales.

GW will sell out by the release date. A month or so later they will announce that the wild popularity of Space Hulk has inspired them to produce some more, but again for only a limited time offer. And some time after that they'll put it into full scale production.

Danny Internets wrote:

GW will sell out by the release date. A month or so later they will announce that the wild popularity of Space Hulk has inspired them to produce some more, but again for only a limited time offer. And some time after that they'll put it into full scale production.

I dunno, they were serious about keeping Battle of 5 Armies and Talisman limited.

Danny Internets wrote:GW will sell out by the release date. A month or so later they will announce that the wild popularity of Space Hulk has inspired them to produce some more, but again for only a limited time offer. And some time after that they'll put it into full scale production.

Unless they don't, because selling the number they currently have gets them the maximum return on their investment in its production.

Liquidice281 wrote:The manager believes that GW will be sold out of Space Hulk before the release date.

That's certainly something they've never done before...

I think some of you might be looking at this from the wrong perspective. The more successful GW products are (any of them) then the more time they can spend updating armies that no one cares about that everyone bitches don't have new rules.

Hmm, I don't believe it's limited. If it really is, they're idiots. Wait, they are!

How are they idiots? If they make 100,000 copies and sell them all, they have made money.

Let's say they sell/distribute 100,000 copies at a 45% discount, so USD 55 per set.

They just made 5.5 million dollars minus cost of production, etc. That is, in no way, idiotic. As an old friend of mine once said: "No one ever went broke selling out".

Look, I know ya'll hate GW and whatnot, but let's not be dumb about it.

They are idiots because they could make 11m Dorrah instead of just 5m

So what if they make 200,000 sets and don't sell them all...what if they're left with 45~50% stock unsold for years? What's your plan then, run the company on hopes and dreams and lollipops and candy canes? While this plan is delicious, it's not in the best interest of the company.

You have to be very careful in this industry to not be too greedy, to not over-extend yourself...that will drive a business to ruin as quickly as anything else.

If they have stock left, and people can always buy it, it kills the eBay market for them. And GW hates eBay.

RxGhost wrote:So what if they make 200,000 sets and don't sell them all...what if they're left with 45~50% stock unsold for years? What's your plan then, run the company on hopes and dreams and lollipops and candy canes? While this plan is delicious, it's not in the best interest of the company.

You have to be very careful in this industry to not be too greedy, to not over-extend yourself...that will drive a business to ruin as quickly as anything else.

While the prodcution and transport costs are non-trivial, the marketing and development costs (not to mention overhead and equipement) are fixed. They do not go up by increasing the print run.

Capping the print run at 100k regardless of demand is silly, if the market can bear 150k or 200k why not sell that number?

Kid_Kyoto wrote:
While the prodcution and transport costs are non-trivial, the marketing and development costs (not to mention overhead and equipement) are fixed. They do not go up by increasing the print run.

Capping the print run at 100k regardless of demand is silly, if the market can bear 150k or 200k why not sell that number?

Who are you to say that the market can bear 150k, or 200k? What if it can only bear 100k?

Liquidice281 wrote:Today I learned from my local GW that 75% of all Space Hulk sets have been pre-ordered. The manager believes that GW will be sold out of Space Hulk before the release date.

Maybe they will make more sets to live up to the demand.

Marketing.

Create a (false) sense of scarcity and watch the product fly off the shelves.

Gotta get one now while I still can.

TobintheGnome wrote:Marketing.

Create a (false) sense of scarcity and watch the product fly off the shelves.

Gotta get one now while I still can.

Nintendo are the Masters of this, though they have the balls to actually create a shortage.

Gwar! wrote:

TobintheGnome wrote:Marketing.

Create a (false) sense of scarcity and watch the product fly off the shelves.

Gotta get one now while I still can.

Nintendo are the Masters of this, though they have the balls to actually create a shortage.

Balls, or stupidity?

TobintheGnome wrote:Marketing.

Create a (false) sense of scarcity and watch the product fly off the shelves.

Gotta get one now while I still can.

With a big underlined false. From the beginning there have been reports of how limited this game is and nearly from day one there were always rumours that "there's not much left!". Thing is, the alleged limit went from 5,000 through several other figures up to 100,000+. Yet there has never been a verifiable statement by anyone informed, all there is is random rumours and a lot of hot air. And everybody seems to believe it! How come, I wonder.

I don't know, there seems to be a lot of "arm-chair" generals in on this one!

Noone here truly understands GW strategy, so why the endless pages of discussion about things that are, to be quite honest, way beyond your understanding. Now, I'm not saying you guys don't understand business, or economics, but you sure as hell don't understand GW master plan, whether it exists or not!

The main point here is that the game may sell out. Now, thats what a limited run is SUPPOSED to do! You don't create a limited run on the hopes that you have stock remaining. So, by its very nature it can't be idiotic.

The bottom line is as it always was, if you want the game, get it! regardless of its percieved scarcity or not! If you're buying as a risk based investment, take that risk, its 50 - 50, and if you don't want it, don't buy it...full stop!

Everything else is just noise.

All I k ow is our store's recieved 13 pre-orders for our 10 copies we'll be getting.

Awesome. The Mystery Box is a grand success. Bonus money to the Marketing wonks who thought it up.

I look forward to their next marketing stunt.

They made 75k. The production was set, and work started over 6 months ago. The problem with making more is the time it would take. To do them at the same price they'd need to do another 75k print run. Doing 10-20k extra would be more expensive and raise the price.

Regardless of how easy it seems in hindsight, setting the print run for a game like this isn't easy. Demand is a bit higher and they sell out? Fine, they made money. Much better than making 125k and not selling them all.

The first run hasn't even sold out yet. I expect it to, but we won't know until it does.


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Aduro wrote:All I k ow is our store's recieved 13 pre-orders for our 10 copies we'll be getting.

And if your store is smart, they talked to their GW rep and asked for more, like I did. After the initial few days, they found that some stores didn't want all they could take, and they let other stores take more.

Surely it would be cheaper per unit to make more of them than less?

If you made them all at once, you could have savings in production costs.

Two different runs will cost more than one large one.

The problem is knowing 6 months ago how the game would sell today.