"Yet Another Warhammer Lament" Topic

A thought occurred to me as I think of the local brick & mortars with sizeable space dedicated to the GW hobby: if GW suffers from the fallout of these Age of Sigma (AoS) decisions, the stores that rely on GW sales will also suffer.

The question is: will the collaboraters survive without a thriving GW section?

The three best gaming stores in northern Virginia all have significant amounts of pre-AoS merchandise. If that goes, will there be enough to keep the historical parts alive?

Until I know, I'm turning down the glee inherent in watching this ridiculous company self immolate.

Most gamestores in greece survive on cardgames and to a point party board games. This was the case in other places I have been to. So if there is strong card game scene, the store should be ok.

A good retailer will be able to find good new product. X-Wing, Pokemon, boardgames….

Assuming, of course, the hit to their cash flow doesn't drive them out of business….

As I stated on a similar thread I have talked with a few of our local store owners and they are pretty miffed over the way GW handled the AoS thing. One store owner told me he is just phasing out miniatures long term as there is too much competition from the secondary market and now that GW opened a store 30 minutes away from him. Another store owner that did a brisk buisness with Warhammer and 40k was also affected by the AoS and the opening of the same GW store that interestingly is also placed 30 minutes away. Got to wonder about that. However in case of both these store owners they are savvy business people first and gamers second. Both have been growing their card and board game business and have begun to reallocate their shelf space accordingly. The sad thing is both these stores had devoted a large area of their space for actual gaming. Although I doubt they will shrink it as they can host large card game tournaments but that means that the same space may become less available for those of us who supported and frequented the store to set up and run miniature games. Support your local game stores folks or see them go away or find better customers.

It was well known that if you built a substantial GW following, GW would open a store in your area.

Support your local game stores folks or see them go away or find better customers.

That is hard when they don't carry your interests.

That said I am buying Reaper Bones figures to fill out some Legacy gaming (Fantasy, FRPG, etc.,) but there is only some much you can buy for solo Dungeon crawls in a scale that is not even a tertiary priority (25+mm.)

Well, if they can make up for the lost revenue from dumping GW products by carrying other "popular" games like Warmahordes and Flames of War, they might survive.

Talking to one of my local stores about it extensively they weren't worried. 40K was outselling WHFB 8:1 so even if WHFB sales dropped to zero it would only mean a diminution of their sales in GW stuff by about 10% and that might be offset by selling off all their remaining WHFB stuff at cost or slightly above.

But one never knows how AoS would do. He also said their preorders for it were substantial.

Well if Ebay is any indicator, the starter box sets are selling VERY well. Numerous dealers have bought copies en masse from GW and are reselling them on Ebay at anywhere from $25 USD to $40 USD off the retail price of $125. USD

Ebay dealers are also selling the 5-figure sets of Liberators at huge discounts, as low as $14.99 USD.

Thing is this – even if you don't but AOS directly from GW, when you buy a sealed GW set from an Ebay dealer, it IS still a sale for GW. Why? Because it means that dealer will buy more from GW as soon as their own Ebay stock runs out.

Not all sales on Ebay "bypass" GW from making money. You are simply buying a GW product new with a middle-man in between.

GW has been walking back their relationship with retailers for good long time.

Anyone with an ounce of savvy has pulled out by now when it comes to stocking a large amount of GW merch.

They called me today wanting me to carry there lines but I no longer qualify as B/M

Did not want them anyway.

I want to read the Masters Thesis on this when it's all over.

I'm guessing many years of new Star Wars franchises may fill some of whatever void arises.

>Not all sales on Ebay "bypass" GW from making money.

Sure. Thats true of all "new" stuff, that is simply cut down into smaller batches. Note that this only pays off when some of the retailer cut is given to the buyer, so this yields less money to GW then any direct sale.

On the other side, almost every sale of used stuff is money that does not go into GWs pocket: the buyer just spend money on GW products that do not reach GW, and while the seller DOES get fresh money, he just sold GW stuff, so is statistically more likely to be in a group that will not shell out for new GW stuff.

The stores that I frequent sell very little Fantasy, mostly 40k. They sell even less historicals, even FoW right now. They survive on card games sales.

For historicals stores have two of diffrent attitudes in my experience.

1) Do not let people play with stuff that does not sell in it. Which means no historicals in most times(Kaissa for example in Athens). Your bet is that the people will submit to your stuff and spend the money on your stuff as opposed to other you will not bring.

2) Let people play historicals even if they do not sell them (for example Galactic Comics and Games in Statesboro). In this case you bet on the money people will spend on other in store stuff, or even on special orders.

The case of a game store that fully stocks historical is very rare in my limited experience.

If you are a savvy store owner you don't need to stock a lot of historical stuff since most players are looking for something specific that you're not likely to have stocked anyway. You just need to be smart & responsive when it comes to placing special orders (which so many are woefully inadequate at).

How did you first get into playing a miniatures war game? I walked into a store, saw a couple guys playing with some beautifully painted medeival armies and the rest is history. If you ban people from playing something you don't sell you're also cutting off the opportunity to start selling/carrying something new.

That said: everything in moderation. I was never keen on letting players take up space in my store if they weren't encouraging involvement or doing anything to foster a good atmosphere.

At least around here, the GW sections are mostly 40K in any event.

>a game store that fully stocks historical

I just froze for a minute trying to imagine a store that "fully stocks" historicals…

Total fail – need a reboot…