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Author Topic: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread  (Read 1683647 times)

Offline TWD

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8445 on: May 24, 2018, 06:03:30 PM »
Well it is probably the biggest game store on the planet. My experience with other independent retailers is the same though. From talking to them in person or at trade events they almost all have the same experience of their 40K and AoS client base.
With respect that's still not a representative sample. I think later on you say something about stepping out of our own shoes... :)
We're probably both expressing our own cultural/national experiences and biases. I've an Anglocentric view of the hobby, yours is (I'm guessing) North American.

I suspect that if there are any churn and burn kids they are probably going to be at GW stores since people with no experience of the hobby would go there directly. The amount of product available at the average GW outlet now is pretty small though so I don't know how much an impact that makes since anyone getting more involved in the hobby will have to buy somewhere other than a local GW location.
The type of hobby store you work in is actually atypical of independent stores in the UK (and, from my time working in GW not the majority worldwide either). Most GW products sold by independents in the UK go through toy stores, where GW stock sits alongside dolls, traditional board games Lego, teddy bears, train sets etc. Hobby stores like yours are infrequent here (though seeing a resurgence in recent years to my untrained eye). As far as I know toy sales are significant in NA and Euro markets as well, though smaller than in the UK.

Hobby stores, of the type run "by gamers for gamers" inevitably attract an older, dedicated crowd but they're not the majority of stores, and nor do they generate disproportionately high sales across the independent sales as a whole. They're important, and they provide great resources and support to the older hobby section but they're not the bulk of GW customers.

Many GW store managers in conversation always used to insist it was the veterans and regulars - older hobbyists like themselves - who kept the tills whirring. Analysis of actual sales figures and impartial observation always revealed it was the younger, passing through crowd who really kept them going. A good manager new the value of both.
Quote
I don't think that it is nostalgia as much as GW is working to bring back their Specialist Games range and their "non-core" titles as they have been asked for more than a decade.
Older guys asking to have back games they used to enjoy in their youth sounds like the definition of nostalgia to me. :D

Quote
They have these existing and established properties and it makes sense for them to once again expand them to help broaden their market. The fact that we have nostalgic feelings for them shouldn't be confused with GW marketing them as nostalgia titles. We all need to try to step out of our own shoes and look at these releases independent of our own presumptions about them.

To be fair I am basing my perceptions of this on places like here where the overwhelming feeling is "Cor, Necromunda's back - I used to love that!" Clearly it can't be only nostalgia that's driving sales, they must be attracting new players (or so my fat dividend cheques tell me :)). Wonder if they'll stay or churn and burn? (My gut feeling 90% churn, 10%stay).

Quote
They are using them to get gamers into their marketspace in the way that the games were used, accidentally or deliberately, in the past. Necromunda has a totally different experience in the core boxed set than it did previously for instance. Its just that not a lot of companies would build a huge range of games like this and then ignore them for as long as GW has.
They didn't ignore them. A lot of time and money was invested in Specialist Games when they had their own team and magazines. And the sales didn't justify it. They needed time out of the limelight, time for some new Games Devs to be given their head to have another crack at them and, just maybe,  time for a little nostalgia to kick in.

Offline Ray Rivers

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8446 on: May 24, 2018, 06:09:47 PM »
Do you spend more than $10,000 a month on minis? If not then you're not even close to being a whale. :)

Individually.. nobody does.

Have you seen the collection of Mongoose Matt? If he invested the money he buys on GW minis into stocks instead, he would be a majority shareholder.  lol

Offline pixelgeek

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8447 on: May 24, 2018, 07:25:35 PM »
Analysis of actual sales figures and impartial observation always revealed it was the younger, passing through crowd who really kept them going.

What sales figures are you referring to? GW has never released any sales figures even broken down by game type not to mention breaking them down by age demographics.


Offline pixelgeek

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8448 on: May 24, 2018, 07:31:22 PM »
Individually.. nobody does.

So I don't really understand your point then. Who are the whales in this example then? If they buy so much then where are the UK and NA equivalents of the LE figures they sell in Japan?

Offline TWD

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8449 on: May 24, 2018, 07:32:12 PM »
Who said anything about them being released?
I worked there. I had access to sales figures. I also went and observed in stores and read reports and analysis.

Offline pixelgeek

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8450 on: May 24, 2018, 07:38:34 PM »
With respect that's still not a representative sample. I think later on you say something about stepping out of our own shoes... :)

Interesting comments about the UK. Its pretty much the exact opposite of what occurs in NA. Maybe its an issue with rental rates for retail?

The 40K boxed sets that GW made to put into retail stores are almost impossible to find here except when you order then specifically and when we do sell them people aren't even sure what they are because they aren't available in retailers like Toys R Us or Walmart here. Not even sure if people can get them in retail locations in the US.

Wonder what the European experience is?

Offline pixelgeek

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8451 on: May 24, 2018, 07:39:43 PM »
I worked there. I had access to sales figures. I also went and observed in stores and read reports and analysis.

Then say that. People can't read your mind.

Do you have some examples you can share and from what years/markets they are from?

Offline Ray Rivers

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8452 on: May 24, 2018, 08:16:13 PM »
Wonder what the European experience is?

I have a GW store and another 3 brick and mortar shops that sell GW products within easy driving distance. And I don't live in a major city here in Spain.

As for the "Whales" these folks buy thousands of Euros of GW product. To dismiss them out of hand shows you are not willing to have a rational discussion.

Adios for now!

Offline TWD

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8453 on: May 24, 2018, 08:19:39 PM »
Then say that. People can't read your mind.

No mind reading necessary. Just the ordinary kind would do.

Quote
from my time working in GW

 :D





Offline commissarmoody

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8454 on: May 24, 2018, 09:16:20 PM »
2 cents from a normal hobbyist, it was the GW/Milton Bradley board game "Hero Quest", bought in a local malls KB toy that started my life as a table top gamer.

I belive I was 9 years old at the time. Point being, is every one has to start the hobby some where. So I dont see any problem with more entery leval products to get more, life time gamer's involed.
Also, how may of those turn and burn players will in their mid teens or early 20s. Find the old minatures they bought as a kid and decided to give it another go? :D
"Peace" is that brief, glorious moment in history when everybody stands around reloading.

- Anonymous

Offline JamesValentine

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8455 on: May 25, 2018, 01:25:28 PM »
...why are people talking about giant fish buying GW products?
I mean the shops are empty enough 24/7 to fit a whale easily...if and when open.
But whales play GW games?

Offline Cubs

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8456 on: May 25, 2018, 01:40:28 PM »
Cetaceans in general have a long habit of gaming. I remember in the 90's there was a craze among porpoises for playing Space Hulk and Warlock of Firetop Mountain. It ruined a lot of gaming clubs for the other members because, a) they demanded to be wetted down every five minutes, b) they kept their dice in their blowholes and it made a mess every time they rolled them.
« Last Edit: May 25, 2018, 04:29:36 PM by Cubs »
'Sir John ejaculated explosively, sitting up in his chair.' ... 'The Black Gang'.

Paul Cubbin Miniature Painter

Offline TWD

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8457 on: May 25, 2018, 04:00:02 PM »
OrcaMorka!

Offline FramFramson

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8458 on: May 25, 2018, 06:54:31 PM »


I joined my gun with pirate swords, and sailed the seas of cyberspace.

Offline ink the troll

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Re: The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread
« Reply #8459 on: May 25, 2018, 11:45:25 PM »
[...] b) they kept their dice in their blowholes and it made a mess every time they rolled them.
“keep yer dice dice in yer blowhole”  does sound like an euphemism for something or the other. Possibly...

3.) something that involves, erm, suction and caters to some kind of very special interests/tastes that probably shouldn't be discussed here (even if by sheer accident you happened to be a marine biologist).
2.) something along the lines of, say, a squad leader yelling  ''Hey there, nancy boys, keep yer dice in yer blowholes- no reason to get yer knickers in a twist or shit yerselves just 'cause them's a bunch of alien muthafuckas tryin' ta peel the faces off yer skulls!! Ye joined the Army to fry bug brains, no?!' *ratatatatat*
1.) something like “Oi landlubbers, ye might be thinking the sea is rough now, but  it's gonna get rougher once we're rounding Cape Horn- so keep yer dice in yer blowholes- no need ta feed tha fuckin' fish just yet!” ( Mostly because here in Germany we have the term 'Würfelhusten' and the expression 'Würfel husten'- literally translated 'dicecough' and 'dice coughing' or 'to cough dice'-  both synonyms for/ colloquial expressions for 'kotzen'/ to vomit.)
sanity is for cowards

 

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