Uesugi Kenshin | 19 Oct 2010 1:02 p.m. PST |
Im sure this has been covered before and I apologize for re-asking, but does anyone in the USA, Canada, or Australia carry Heroics & Ros 6mm minis? |
ScoutJock | 19 Oct 2010 1:53 p.m. PST |
I have ordered H&R from The Last Square in Madison, WI in the past. It looks like they still list them on their site: link |
RobH | 19 Oct 2010 1:55 p.m. PST |
You may find some stocks left at the old stockists but all distribution died when Navwar (previous owners of H&R) stopped anything other than direct sales. As far as I am aware (certainly in Europe) Andy (new owner) has not set up distribution deals yet so direct remains the only way to get H&R figures. |
John Leahy | 19 Oct 2010 4:06 p.m. PST |
Can the last Square pricing be explained to me? The packs cost 2.50 pounds. That's less than 4 dollars a pack. Last Square retails them at $6.50. Sorry, that's highway robbery. John |
Porkmann | 19 Oct 2010 4:09 p.m. PST |
They have to pay the courier pigeons to fly then over the sea. Millet costs a bomb. |
Extra Crispy | 19 Oct 2010 5:15 p.m. PST |
I don't know how H&R price to other retailers, but here might be atypical example. Packs retail for $2.50 USD GBP. Call it $4. USD They give a 1/3 discount so a pack costs the dealer 2.67. He then spends 15-20% to ship it and 3% on transaction fees. If the net is he makes less than 10% he will not import it. He (or I) can put that cash to use selling the latest and greatest whiz bang game which I can buy from a US source, with free shipping, at a 40% discount. I have no dog in the fight either way, but I have had to do similar pricing myself. Mark "Extra Crispy" Severin ScaleCreep.com FlagshipGames.com DeepFriedHappyMice.com |
Mike G | 19 Oct 2010 5:25 p.m. PST |
Can the last Square pricing be explained to me? The packs cost 2.50 pounds. That's less than 4 dollars a pack. Last Square retails them at $6.50. Sorry, that's highway robbery. John, I have thought about this also. There are two explanations, you came up with one explanation, "Highway Robbery". The other is that H & R charges Last Square the 40% international shipping charge that H & R tags on the order for private individuals. If H & R does charge that much for shipping to Last Square, than the price is not too far out of line. Well, I guess that shipping charge is would be highway robbery also. So I guess there is only one explanation. H & R can charge anything they want for shipping and I will buy or not buy, that is up to me. What I do not understand. Spirit Games, I used to buy my H & R from them and they were great to deal with, charged a reasonable amount to ship to the states. How could Spirit Games do this and H & R cannot? Oh by the way, Spirit Games no longer carries H & R. They were cut off by the previous owner. Mike |
Uesugi Kenshin | 19 Oct 2010 5:45 p.m. PST |
I appreciate the info. I will hit up L.S. and check on their stock. I suspect they have only increased their prices to cover shipping from the UK. |
Uesugi Kenshin | 19 Oct 2010 7:31 p.m. PST |
Contacted L.S. They do have some H&R in stock. Those not in stock are back ordered in 3-4 weeks. Packs vary in cost from $1.50 USD to $6.50. |
John Leahy | 19 Oct 2010 9:20 p.m. PST |
Hi. If the example used about profit and shipping were typical nobody would likely import very many UK ranges due to shipping costs and low profitability. I completely understand some mark up over the exchange rate to cover shipping. Fair enough. However, a markup of almost 100% is excessive any way you slice it. Can't make any profit at a reasonable price? Don't carry the product or accept a lower return. If the owner of H&R charges excessive shipping to Dealers boycott him. I refuse to buy direct from him at 40% shipping. I'll buy Baccus, Irregular or Rapier instead. Sooner or later they tend to get the message. YMMV. Thanks, John |
fuzzy bunny | 20 Oct 2010 4:14 p.m. PST |
Several things are in play first of which is that H&R or Navwar usually gave a 10% discount not 30% or even a 20% discount for large orders to customers or retailers in all my years of importing experience from the UK. A 30% to 40% shipping markup to the US has been fairly standard for UK shippers for decades. The cost of funds varies between 2.5% and 7.5% depending on your financial organization, which also depends on your purchase volume and the amount of individual purchases with larger purchases costing less if you make them regularly. A 2.50 GBP Infantry package purchase will "cost" closer to $5.00 USD (don't forget the import duty applied by customs) when it arrives if all things work correctly so $6.50 USD isn't at all out of line if you can stay in business with a 20-25% markup,
which few retailers can do. Slight variances to the above occur but I'd bet my estimate is closer to reality than not. Most retailers need a minimum of a 40% markup to survive if they have an actual retail outlet,
as opposed to mail order shops that don't have all the fees, taxes, and employee expenses associated with an actual retail footprint. For years our wargame group would go to the UK once a year to purchase figures. We would throw away our clothes and anything that was disposable for the return trip carrying figures and books in our luggage instead. That was before the recent baggage charges were installed,
and when we could fly first class as a result of frequent flyer miles. Purchasing miniature figures or anything that has to be mailed from the UK will never be inexpensive especially with the massive postal rate increases that are coming
Will |
John Leahy | 20 Oct 2010 8:40 p.m. PST |
Hi, allow me to retort. ;-D 30-40% shipping is the top end of UK shipping charges and certainly NOT the norm to dealers and never has been. If you are buying from a Company that only gives dealers a 10% discount let me humbly suggest that perhaps you might want to reevaluate your decision to carry the product. It isn't feasible. I wouldn't say a word if the retail was around 5 dollars. I can understand that. It also covers any currency fluctuations. There are reasons WHY some UK products aren't carried in the USA. Dixon is a prime example. As an aside, based on your line of reasoning it would have made more sense for dealers to buy from Spirit Games (when possible). The shipping was way cheaper than 40% even without the 10% product discount. I am aware that some UK companies charge retail customers 30-40%. Ros, Essex, Irregular and some others. However, there are also several companies that charge either cheap flat shipping or 10-20%. Copplestone, Gzg, EM-4, HLBS, 15mm.co.uk, Baccus, Rapier and several more. Why the difference? Oh, and for the record I have been an owner and importer of UK miniatures in the USA. Thanks, John |
fuzzy bunny | 22 Oct 2010 5:17 a.m. PST |
John, thanks for your opinion, your experience, and your knowledge! I'm not sure purchasing from Copplestone, Gzg, EM-4, HLBS, 15mm.co.uk, or Rapier would fill Kenshin's desire to purchase 1/300 scale miniatures from Heroics & Ros though Baccus' "close to that scale figures" might fill his needs if the "periods" are correct. If he is looking for vehicles in that scale there aren't really many choices depending on location. Perhaps he has specific needs that only H&R address within their product lines and manufacturers like GHQ might not offer what he requires or perhaps their price point is outside his budget. If you are an experienced importer why not do it again if you think you can do a better, less expensive, job than the Last Square. I'd imagine importing a huge amount of H&R product via surface shipping would greatly reduce the overall costs as long as you can afford to have your funds tied up for the time it takes for them to arrive and you can make a really good guess at what will sell and what won't. Inventory control under "surface shipping" constraints is really critical since any savings can quickly be eaten up by the stock numbers that just sit there, not selling, eating liquidity. I'm sure the micro-armor advocates would greatly appreciate a discount source for their needs. Will |
Uesugi Kenshin | 22 Oct 2010 5:33 a.m. PST |
Unfornately the one thing I need are 6mm Russian Airborne troops, which asfaik are only made by H&R. Sine I am only looking at $2 USD I'm really not sweating the price. Its worth it to me to get the correct figures for my needs. |
Pierce Inverarity | 22 Oct 2010 6:58 a.m. PST |
Thing is that even with shipping H&R are still cheaper than GHQ and C-in-C and often of nearly the same quality. For one thing, there's the unit price: GHQ: 5 Shermans for $10. USD C-in-C: 5 Shermans for $7. USD H&R: 5 Shermans for GBP 2. For another, you can order all models individually. That's a huge plus. |
John Leahy | 22 Oct 2010 10:58 a.m. PST |
Hi. If you order $40.00 USD worth or more you get 10% off C-in-C. They have an additional 5% sale now plus 5% more if you pay by check or Money order. For US Customers that makes them fairly competitive. If you are ordering only a couple of packs that changes. Fuzzy Bunny I have no clue if you are being sarcastic or not. I'll assume you aren't. My postage comment was relating the fact that loads of UK Companies seem to be able to ship to the USA fairly cheaply. Ros/Heroics doesn't. That seems to be pertinent. Your comments about me picking up and carrying the line are silly. First, I believe better product is made at the scale. Ros appeals to me ONLY due to the fact that I own a lot of their packs and need to fill out some periods. Otherwise, I use Baccus or other Companies. Your point about needing to know what sells and stock levels and so on falls completely flat. Every importer of goods everywhere in the world faces the same challenges. Those in our hobby (being more pertinent) seem to not have any problem with pricing on ANY other miniature line from the UK or elsewhere that the LS does with Ros. Seems to be a one off situation. Maybe the LS IS getting a raw deal from Ros? I don't know. However, I do know when a product's price is grossly inflated or the shipping price is not justified. Maybe it's not to big a deal when ordering a few packs. Most guys I know rarely order only a few packs. I just ordered 58 packs of Ros about a week ago. I got them from a secondary source and certainly didn't pay 40% shipping or $6 USD plus a pack. Thanks, John |
sector51 | 24 Oct 2010 2:27 a.m. PST |
My postage comment was relating the fact that loads of UK Companies seem to be able to ship to the USA fairly cheaply. Yes I used to think that once. In fact so convinced I was of that, that I aimed to help out a gamer in Canada who was going to pay a high price for shipping (UK to Canada). As a trader I have access to discount shipping services. Surprisingly I found that my costs were almost exactly the same as it would have cost to ship from the manufacturer to customer. I came to the conclusion that some businesses subsidize shipping costs, especially on larger orders – in fact I do myself. So although some businesses choose to charge less it is a mistake to imagine that that is the actually cost of shipping. |
fuzzy bunny | 24 Oct 2010 12:43 p.m. PST |
I recommend viewing these link which is a pretty good example of figure size compared to a H&R Tiger tank and this link providing a really good reference for a comparison of vehicle detail. Not being sarcastic at all. Retail success comes from having what the customer wants "when he wants it",
which in the hobby industry can cause a retailer nightmares especially if the product comes from overseas. Delays due to ordering times can cause problems when so much of the hobby industry is impulse purchasing. Knowing what customers will want at any given time is almost impossible to "guess", which is what almost any retailer must do when ordering unless he has an established track record upon which to base his ordering procedures. This picture illustrates the use of H&R infantry with "first generation" GHQ vehicles. They work pretty well together because the H&R figures are very close to GHQ's actual scale. This picture illustrates GHQ's crew figures which fit well with their equipment but are actually smaller than their infantry and closer to GHQ's and CinC's equipment scales. Pierce Inverarity's point about price is great as long as you don't mind how your vehicles appear. CinC and GHQ miniatures are much more attractive and accurate than the H&R vehicles in my opinion but I still use H&R infantry with GHQ or CinC vehicles because they look more correct together even if the H&R figures aren't as detailed as GHQ's. This picture illustrates GHQ infantry with H&R vehicles. They appear fine together under the circumstances because they aren't directly adjacent. Thanks again for your comments
Will |
Jagger | 24 Oct 2010 7:59 p.m. PST |
In Europe, you can get a VAT Tax refund if you do not live in the Eurozone. That can be a significant savings. Is there also a VAT tax in England as well and can you get a VAT tax refund if you do not live in England? Again that can be significant savings if you buy in bulk as a dealership. |
fuzzy bunny | 24 Oct 2010 8:40 p.m. PST |
This link will take you to a pretty good reference for Soviet WW2 airborne forces. Other than the fur collar on the M-43 tunic I don't know of a great difference between the regular infantry uniform and the airborne uniform. This link gives a fair example of the uniforms of the day. Will |
CoolHistoryGamer | 09 May 2019 7:43 p.m. PST |
Highway Robbery cracks me up. This isn't highway robbery, since you can choose not to be on the highway. We are part of a very selective hobby and the fact that there are not more producers is because the hobby is very 'niche,' and there isn't a lot of ability to make any "real" money. Most of the suppliers are in the business because they love the hobby as much as we do, not because this is their "get filthy rich" scheme. They aren't robbing anyone who isn't willing to pay the prices they are charging. If you want the figures and they are only available from retailer ABC for price $X, you are either going to pay the price or not have the figures. I don't see $6.50 USD as unreasonable considering we gamers expect the retailers to have what we want on hand when we want it, so they are either carrying a large amount of stock (few packs of many types) to meet our demand, or they are ordering piecemeal from UK which drives up their unit costs and makes us wait (which of course we don't want to do). This hobby was never destined to be a cheap one. |