As it happens, it seems I'm not the only one capable of screwing even seemingly succesful ventures up. Games Workshop, who are (as many of you know) my main source of hobby addictives, seem to be trying to sever parts of its market.
Three sets of actions are currently setting ye olde Blogosphere (phrase stolen from Brent) abuzz.
Constant Price Increases
This first one isn't new. The trouble is that, in the current economic climate, many of Games Workshop's customers worldwide are having difficulty coping with these increases. The financial guys at GW allegedly considers their products to be luxury items, and thus immune to changes in the economic climate. I think they're wrong (as does SandWyrm, here).
Holding back these price increases might help at least give the impression that GW cares.
FineCast
Tying into the first, the launch of the so-called FineCast line, replacing metal minis with plastic/resin hybrids, would probably have been fine if it didn't entail another price increase - despite making the minis themselves cheaper to produce. There is also some dissention about the qualities of resin versus metal, but I personally haven't used enough resin to have an opinion. A list of minis to be replaced can be found here.
New retailer terms and conditions
This one comes in two parts: exchange rates and new conditions. First, GW seem to update the exchange rates for their products far to seldom, leading to great discrepancies between the cost of their products, depending on whar currency you pay in. Aussies pay nearly double what Americans do, apparently. Which means many people in those places who suffer, buy their products from other retailers, such as Maelstrom.
Obviously, GW doesn't like this, so from the end of May, European retailers can't retail GW products to places outside of Europe. Bummer if you live in Australia.
See a couple more links, here and here.
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