Glenn is right, No pictures means No sales to me. I live in California. Most
of the good miniature conventions are on the East coast so they are
inaccessible to me. Many of the mini companies are also from the UK, again out
of my range for "personal inspection". So that leaves me the web and all of
you.
When I start a new scale or genre I often start by looking at what my friends
have, then do web searches. It is sad that in some cases these companies loose
not just my money but that of many of my friends. I have become one of their
sources for information. For example when we wanted to do colonialism it was
the printouts I did from Foundry that caused almost 50 packs to be ordered.
Had there not been pictures I would not have even brought them up and we would
not have ordered.
OK I will get off the soap box for a while :-)
Daniel
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Not to mention that most stores (at least in the Bay Area) carry only Evil
Empire. Closest store that carries no Evil Empire is an hour away.
Michael Brown
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<rant> Back at Games of Berkeley (c.1990) Scott Jensen and I had historical
mini sales up to 1.5% of total sales. That was tending towards 2% when I left,
but did include the special order business.
The big problem is that GW figures are less work to order. I've never seen a
gamestore that stocked its shelves in any relationship to what the game
requires, nor does anyone seem to take care that someone can walk in, pick up
the rules and a few packs of minis to strat an army or a fleet.
At GOB the problem turned into: all minis have a SKU based solely on price
(plus the DbaseIII (not III+) inventory system couldn't cope, even if I
would do all of the data entry for every miniature in production). We already
have 200 packs of minis at $1.25 (oldstyle Grenadier fantasy for example), so
you can't order 30 more. Explaining that these are the same 30 packs we sell
every weekend (and will sell again next weekend) met with blank stares. The
popular figs sold out and stayed that way, sales of miniatures immediately
tanked.
To do things right requires someone who will keep accurate inventories, make
detailed orders, and maintain the stock you'll actually sell on a regular
basis. You have to know what figures everyone only needs one or two of, and
which can be picked up on a whim to expand an army. It requires a dedicated
specialist, I spent two hours every Friday and Monday doing the orders. The
same figs kept selling, we made a lot of money.
*sigh*
Nowadays, you can order exactly what you need over the Internet, and usually
pay less even with shipping. At Gamescape (SanFran) these days I just look at
Fleet Action and Star Blazers minis just out of morbid curiosity. I don't even
go into GOB more than twice a year anymore (although I am dead sorry I missed
the clearance sale when they got rid of the old display cases, a lot of unique
OOP figs went by - plus there were all our clever names for figs).
</rant>
Thanks for listening.
Does anybody think a local gamestore would actually do the work to implement a
"How to Double Your Miniatures Sales" pamplet?
> --- Michael Brown <mwbrown@veriomail.com> wrote:
Michael,
Your "Rant" addresses one of the reasons Games Workshop is making money while
many others are not. Mind I am not a fan, I just respect a company that knows
who it's customers are and markets to them. Games Workshop runs like a real
business. They have shareholders to answer to.
The mind set you describe could fit many of the stores I have seen here in Los
Angeles. They are owned by people who are playing at it rather then working
it. Many got into it because they liked the hobby and wanted to play all day.
To run a business takes a lot of hard work. The execution of a successful
small business requires effort and forward thinking. Sadly I see many do not
have the knowledge or the drive to do it right. So sad.
On Fri, 9 Feb 2001 13:07:21 -0800 (PST), Michael Llaneza
> <imperialdispatches@yahoo.com> wrote:
> The big problem is that GW figures are less work to order. I've never
This is very, very true. I've seen the same thing at Crossed Swords, the
miniatures store in Toronto. They have a heavy GW collection, but also a good
selection of historicals.
I went through their historicals looking for some ancients for DBA. I couldn't
get them. They had sold out of the figures I was after. They did have other
figures for the era (they were Celts), but not what I was after. The reason?
They just bought X number of packs of every type of Celt. Forget that most
games, like DBA and Armati, require more warbands -- which means
standard
spear armed guys -- than cavalry. The packs should be available in the
proportions used in the game, but no dice.
I saw this in every range, historicals and other. They still have a number of
FT scout ships. They did the same thing, and as a result they have a whole
bunch of FT ships still sitting there. They are hesitant to buy more, because,
well, they still have a whole bunch unsold. Forget that I told them that what
they have left over are the unpopular figures.
So, I buy via the Net mostly these days. Or at conventions. The Old Glory
distributor for Canada has a bad rep, but they are in Toronto and have two
open houses a year, and I've been able to get stuff from them.
It takes effort to run a miniatures store, effort that most storekeepers can't
afford, or don't want to be bothered with.
Of course, if you look at GW's financials you will realize that while they are
making money they are not running the business very well. A company that drops
it's earnings per share by 60% for the year is not the sign of a healthy
company.
They lost business in the UK and Europe, but the growth in the US made up for
the difference. And apparently there was a huge restructuring of the business.
Take a look at http://www.games-workshop.com/investor/
and read the tale of woe.
Nicholas Caldwell clcaldwell@kreative.net
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