How have Gw price rises affected your purchasing habits?

[Saxon]

20 minutes ago, PlasticCraic said:

Yep I certainly wouldn't disagree that we are paying over the odds one way or another!  I just wouldn't put it all at the door of the government (on this occasion).

I had a quick look at the last thing I bought, which was a Beastclaw Raiders Start Collecting.  That's GBP 55 in the UK, which is GBP 46.81 of sales revenue + VAT.

Add 5% on for tariffs (again I could be wrong), plus 10% GST, at the current Exchange Rate of 1.86 and that gives you a sticker price of AUD 100.56

Current price is AUD 150, which is a markup of 49.2%.  There's a few things chipping into that (freight, exchange rate uncertainty, higher wages etc), as well as the tariff which we've already built in.  But whatever way you slice it up, that's quite a bit of fat.

It would be quite interesting to do a "Burgernomics" analysis: how many hours does a GW retail sales assistant need to work, to buy one SC out of their wages?  I'd guess the equation then looks a lot tighter than the actual price at the actual exchange rate would suggest, and is probably a fairer comparison.

But bringing it back to the original premise: the experience in Australia suggests that as much as we might not like it as consumers, in practice, when push comes to shove people will continue to find the money even at prices significantly above those currently seen in the UK.

All very fair points but surely there is a point where even regular purchasers such as you and i go 'enough, that's too expensive'. 

Most people in my gaming group use buy/swap/sell pages and discounted sellers to reduce our hobby costs. 

A lot of my group have moved on to Bolt Action due to costs. I'm a little more stubborn and insist on completing a project before i start another one. 

[PlasticCraic]

Fair enough, your answer is certainly relevant to the topic of the thread if it's driven your gaming group to other games systems or alternative channels. 

I hope you guys enjoy BA, my local group played a bit of Antares for a while there and it's a great system.  I'm hoping the new 40k moves in that direction (activations rather than turns), like they already did with Killteam.

I've always used a mix of sourcing stuff from the UK and local online discounters (e.g. Emerald Games) depending on the timescale I'm working to.  I don't really have an FLGS to support, so to answer the question of the thread directly, it is unlikely to change my personal purchasing habits. 

I'll carry on playing Warhammer, and carry on both working around the geoblock and supporting local online retailers.  Biggest concern I have is that it could make growing our local group harder if it puts off new players, but that remains to be seen.  I'd only be guessing.

[Saxon]

18 minutes ago, PlasticCraic said:

I don't know what GW pays its retail staff, but looking at minimum wages as a benchmark is quite illuminating.  

So looking at the UK Minimum Wage, it's currently GBP 8.21 per hour for adults.

That's 6.7 hours of minimum wage work to cover the sticker price of a Start Collecting BCR.

In Australia, the level 1 retail award is $21.41 (more at weekends, more at higher levels). 

That's 7.0 hours of minimum wage work to cover the sticker price of a Start Collecting BCR.

When you look at it like that, the pricing seems pretty well-adapted to local conditions.  Not everyone earns minimum wage, and GW may well pay above that, but I think it gives a good feel for the wages that selling prices need to cover for local warehousing and retail staff, what your average person can actually afford, and so on. 

Given that there are real extra costs to cover (e.g. freight + import tariff) I don't actually think the pricing structure looks that far out of whack?

This is a fair assessment .

Do you think the average person is going to analyse these sorts of things when entering a game? I'd think they're going to look at the upfront costs on the box. As those costs increase, the harder it will be to justify to new players. $100 for a small box of Sigmarines is a hard sell. Thank god for starter sets. At least GW got something right  

I looked up GW to see what things cost these days and interestingly the cost of space marines (A basic tactical squad) hasn't risen that much since i started playing 15 years ago. They're $55 now and were $40 when i first started. $1 a year increase. I have also discovered that i know nothing about 40k because there are now about 20 types of marines you can buy when back in the day there were about 5 haha!

[EccentricCircle]

Does anyone know what kind of margin the discount sellers make? My Flgs has a 15% discount, and some like Triple Helix seem to have a 25%. That suggests that buying for retail must be cheaper than that, but I wonder by how much? (Not saying its a solution ti the problem or anything, clearly we can't all open gaming stores! I'm just curious.)

[Marcvs]

3 hours ago, Saxon said:

I looked up GW to see what things cost these days and interestingly the cost of space marines (A basic tactical squad) hasn't risen that much since i started playing 15 years ago. They're $55 now and were $40 when i first started. $1 a year increase. I have also discovered that i know nothing about 40k because there are now about 20 types of marines you can buy when back in the day there were about 5 haha!

Whatever your opinion on the issue (I do not have a strong one myself), I think that looking a the increase in prices in absolute terms might be a little misleading. What's a few dollars/euros anyway? The problem with that is that a yearly increase of 1$ over a 40$ product is a 2.5% - 2% increase year over year. I don't know much about Australia, but that would be higher than the inflation rate in the US and the Eurozone for most years of the past decade.

The present increases, while not covering the full product line, are often around 10%  (if numbers floating around are to be belived, ofc). If you are in Europe the 2019-2020 inflation rate is 0.4% at the moment I believe, so that's a pretty big hit to your hobby budget: if you are an "average" worker (buying the 400 or so products getting an increase) your hobby budget can now buy you 10% less toys.

[Infernalslayer]

5 hours ago, PlasticCraic said:

I don't know what GW pays its retail staff, but looking at minimum wages as a benchmark is quite illuminating.  

So looking at the UK Minimum Wage, it's currently GBP 8.21 per hour for adults.

That's 6.7 hours of minimum wage work to cover the sticker price of a Start Collecting BCR.

In Australia, the level 1 retail award is $21.41 (more at weekends, more at higher levels). 

That's 7.0 hours of minimum wage work to cover the sticker price of a Start Collecting BCR.

When you look at it like that, the pricing seems pretty well-adapted to local conditions.  Not everyone earns minimum wage, and GW may well pay above that, but I think it gives a good feel for the wages that selling prices need to cover for local warehousing and retail staff, what your average person can actually afford, and so on. 

Given that there are real extra costs to cover (e.g. freight + import tariff) I don't actually think the pricing structure looks that far out of whack?

Indeed, looking at minimum wages, there are countries in Europe who have it way worse than Australia if you compare how many work hours are needed to buy a Start Collecting.

I am in Greece and minimum wage is 3,90 euros per hour. (549 euros per month, net earnings)

If i want to buy one of the cheaper Start Collecting sets, which costs 70 euros here, i have to work 18 hours for it.

[Beastmaster]

I find the disparity between cheap and expensive armies annoying. A box of gluttons is 32,50 €, they can be had for 26 €. 6 big models, still quite modern-looking, lots of spare parts and some bonus gnoblars, 240 points on the table. Compare with basic Idoneth Thralls/Reavers: 10 somewhat newer but not much more detailed models, less spare parts, no extras, 130 points on the table go for 40/34 €.  Why?

[zilberfrid]

2 hours ago, EccentricCircle said:

Does anyone know what kind of margin the discount sellers make? My Flgs has a 15% discount, and some like Triple Helix seem to have a 25%. That suggests that buying for retail must be cheaper than that, but I wonder by how much? (Not saying its a solution ti the problem or anything, clearly we can't all open gaming stores! I'm just curious.)

I've read on Reddit that it was 40%, he was thinking of opening a store recently (was in a similar thread).

[Kramer]

1 hour ago, Infernalslayer said:

Indeed, looking at minimum wages, there are countries in Europe who have it way worse than Australia if you compare how many work hours are needed to buy a Start Collecting.

I am in Greece and minimum wage is 3,90 euros per hour. (549 euros per month, net earnings)

If i want to buy one of the cheaper Start Collecting sets, which costs 70 euros here, i have to work 18 hours for it.

How much is rent? 

[Rodiger]

7 hours ago, Saxon said:

A lot of my group have moved on to Bolt Action due to costs. I'm a little more stubborn and insist on completing a project before i start another one. 

I am just curious, how does Bolt Action compare in price from the U.K to the Australia, does it have a similar markup in price like GW stuff has, or is it the same price as the U.K stuff? I have no idea why Australia costs so much more, if Bolt Action has a similar markup then it could be import fees and taxes, if it doesn't then it might be GW using costs for running GW stores etc. My mate is from New Zealand and he says New Zealand pay an extortionate amount too, I have also been in a GW shop in Japan and the prices in there were astronomical. 

[Ravinsild]

12 hours ago, PlasticCraic said:

Have you tried high-quality, non-GW brushes?  

I've saved a fortune since I switched to Winsor & Newton.

I was constantly churning through GW brushes because they lose their point so quickly.  I started buying W&N one brush at a time, and I've never looked back.  

They are expensive up front, and of course anything will wear out eventually.  But I'd never go back to Citadel "throwaways" after using these. 

The quality is supreme and it works out so, so much cheaper over time.  I think if most people even just bought a Size 1 to get started, they'd be converted.

I guess it never occurred to me where to look. However just having a few solid stable brushes would be nice! Mostly it’s my Small Layer brush that gets messed up. I do a TON of tiny detail work and edge highlighting. 

[Infernalslayer]

1 hour ago, Kramer said:

How much is rent? 

I am lucky to live in my own house at the moment, otherwise i doubt i would even think of touching a warhammer miniature with these prices.

One could find a small studio apartment at an old building in a non-commercial area for around 200 euros but the rent prices jump to above 500 euros when you get to better areas. And that's without electricity/water bills.

[Skreech Verminking]

Gw prise rices haven’t really affected me in the past.

although there are certainly a few units I never really bought from the Skaven range, like for example Acolytes.

But then again at 20$ per model this unit probably hasn’t seen any buyer for the last 15years and considering how cheap (compared to other units) clanrats and Plague monks have been sold as 
i never really had any problems.

Clanrats and Plague monks may be getting a price rise but considering how I already own 300of each means that I’mot really concerned about buying more (for now at least) I don’t really think it’ll be much I’ll be spending more money on then usually.

sure I’m interested in adding another 80Stormvermins to complete my dream of having 200of them in my army, buut they aren’t on the list for a price rise, so there isn’t really much I care about it

Edited May 25, 2020 by Skreech Verminking

[Saxon]

13 hours ago, Marcvs said:

Whatever your opinion on the issue (I do not have a strong one myself), I think that looking a the increase in prices in absolute terms might be a little misleading. What's a few dollars/euros anyway? The problem with that is that a yearly increase of 1$ over a 40$ product is a 2.5% - 2% increase year over year. I don't know much about Australia, but that would be higher than the inflation rate in the US and the Eurozone for most years of the past decade.

The present increases, while not covering the full product line, are often around 10%  (if numbers floating around are to be belived, ofc). If you are in Europe the 2019-2020 inflation rate is 0.4% at the moment I believe, so that's a pretty big hit to your hobby budget: if you are an "average" worker (buying the 400 or so products getting an increase) your hobby budget can now buy you 10% less toys.

Well absolute terms is how I justify buying or not buying. I don't look at something and go "oh it's only gone up by 2.5%". There is a point when only a few dollars is just too much. 

[Saxon]

9 hours ago, Rodiger said:

I am just curious, how does Bolt Action compare in price from the U.K to the Australia, does it have a similar markup in price like GW stuff has, or is it the same price as the U.K stuff? I have no idea why Australia costs so much more, if Bolt Action has a similar markup then it could be import fees and taxes, if it doesn't then it might be GW using costs for running GW stores etc. My mate is from New Zealand and he says New Zealand pay an extortionate amount too, I have also been in a GW shop in Japan and the prices in there were astronomical. 

As an example, a Waffen SS starter set (1000 points) is 90 Pounds Sterling (equivalent to $167AUD).  It retails in Aus for $202.50 (we don't have warlord all stockists are independent retailers). The mark up is therefore about 22%. It's still a lot, but you can get a playable army for way cheaper with Warlord games.

I think its not terribly dissimilar to GW but the price point for what you get is a fair bit lower. Quality of sculpts etc. can be argued. GW has some fantastic models whereas the WWII era games is lower. 

As per some of the earlier comments in this thread, in Aus we have extortionate rents, high minimum wages as well as import costs (freight and tarrifs) so we are always going to pay a higher amount. I'm just disappointed that GW would choose this time to raise prices when affordability of their games is already very difficult and 6 million people in our country are now out of work. 

[Saxon]

9 hours ago, Ravinsild said:

I guess it never occurred to me where to look. However just having a few solid stable brushes would be nice! Mostly it’s my Small Layer brush that gets messed up. I do a TON of tiny detail work and edge highlighting. 

I am the same. I destroy my small layer brushes. They're lucky to last a fortnight. I have purchased a couple of army painter brushes to test them out and so far they seem fairly durable in comparison. Like many things you get what you pay for. 

[PlasticCraic]

14 hours ago, Ravinsild said:

I guess it never occurred to me where to look. However just having a few solid stable brushes would be nice! Mostly it’s my Small Layer brush that gets messed up. I do a TON of tiny detail work and edge highlighting. 

I think the closest thing to a Small Layer brush would be a W&N Size 0

Maybe grab one of them, see how you go and take it from there?

[Beastmaster]

Do they have a policy of never lowering prices? Surely, say, old acolytes would at least sell a bit better if they did? What’s the logic behind this?

edit: Maybe it’s like this: People do have their hobby budget (whether explicitly or implicitly) that they spend for GW stuff. That’s, say, 50 or 100 € a month that GW gets anyway. So the only difference that the price makes is how much stuff people get for their budget. So, GW would actually profit from higher prices.

Of course, that’s only the case for those customers already on the hook. Years before I delved in I remember actually calculating what an army that interested me would cost me, and decided against it. Don’t know if that’s representative, though. 😅

Edited May 26, 2020 by Beastmaster

[zilberfrid]

40 minutes ago, Beastmaster said:

Do they have a policy of never lowering prices? Surely, say, old acolytes would at least sell a bit better if they did? What’s the logic behind this?

edit: Maybe it’s like this: People do have their hobby budget (whether explicitly or implicitly) that they spend for GW stuff. That’s, say, 50 or 100 € a month that GW gets anyway. So the only difference that the price makes is how much stuff they get for their budget. So, GW would actually profit from higher prices.

Of course, that’s only the case for those customers already on the hook. Years before I delved in I remember actually calculating what an army that interested me would cost me, and decided against it. Don’t know if that’s representative, though. 😅

I don't think they actually want to sell acolytes. I suspect they don't want to sell metal, and to a lesser degree finecast models with plastic being just better for everyone involved. I think (hope) all the metal and finecast entries are just there as placeholders until they make them in plastic. There is a guideline that there shouldn't be a warscroll without a model in the shop (though FEC isn't really compliant).

[Firefrog]

Yes, prices are crazy and it has for sure thought about my spending. I've started 2 years ago, and such I've only had 2 price increase (including the one coming up) and even before I thought the prices were a bit steep. Luckily, I've got relative "cheap" armies, namely Skaven (cheap, but I currently have most of the range, though kitbashed quite alot), FEC (spam a few SC and a few boxes of flayers) and Tzeentch (also quite old). Now, in the case of Tzeentch, I pay 40 euro's for 20 Kairic Acolytes, expensive but I can live with that because you get 20 clanrats for 30 euro which are quite old, so fair.

I've recently started thinking about collecting another army, and my only interest is with Idoneth, Daughters and Sisters of Battle. Now, they're insane price wise because they're new(ish). I'm a player that likes options, so I don't just buy 1 list, no I buy the whole range. Daughters I would want 14 boxes of Witch Aelves, 45 euro a box! Insane how steep the price is.

So, I'm scouring 2nd hand sites to collect those armies and buying the models from an online retailer for 15% off. Shame for the store, but my money isn't infinite and even if it was I'd think twice about spending it.

[EccentricCircle]

2 hours ago, Beastmaster said:

Do they have a policy of never lowering prices? Surely, say, old acolytes would at least sell a bit better if they did? What’s the logic behind this?

edit: Maybe it’s like this: People do have their hobby budget (whether explicitly or implicitly) that they spend for GW stuff. That’s, say, 50 or 100 € a month that GW gets anyway. So the only difference that the price makes is how much stuff people get for their budget. So, GW would actually profit from higher prices.

Of course, that’s only the case for those customers already on the hook. Years before I delved in I remember actually calculating what an army that interested me would cost me, and decided against it. Don’t know if that’s representative, though. 😅

They have been known to combine things, so that you get more for the same or a slightly higher price. However its very rare for a price to definitively go down. They never hold sales. I recall, back when AoS launched, I asked the manager of my local shop whether there would be a discount on the old army books for 8e, as a result of their upcoming obsolescence. I was basically told, "no they are collectors items, so it wouldn't be fair on the people who paid full price if we now reduced them to clear." That makes no sense on multiple levels, not least that unlike models the books tend not to hold their value on the second hand market. It does though seem to be the company line. Because warhammer anything is a collectors item, it can't be reduced because then it wouldn't maintain its value.

As to some ranges being more expensive than others, when I was putting together my Daughters of Khaine army, I found that it was cheaper to buy out of production metal witch elves than the new ones!

[Moldek]

Regarding the economic impact on the pandemic, I don’t know if it’s one of the reasons for the price increase but I could see it making sense.

they may be expecting the volume of sales going down, with less people willing to start a costly hobby. So they’d rise prices to compensate, speculating that the people who will keep buying can stomach an increase, and the ones that won’t were either on their way out already or would have stopped buying to save money regardless of an increase.

[Beastmaster]

2 hours ago, EccentricCircle said:

They have been known to combine things, so that you get more for the same or a slightly higher price. However its very rare for a price to definitively go down. They never hold sales. I recall, back when AoS launched, I asked the manager of my local shop whether there would be a discount on the old army books for 8e, as a result of their upcoming obsolescence. I was basically told, "no they are collectors items, so it wouldn't be fair on the people who paid full price if we now reduced them to clear." That makes no sense on multiple levels, not least that unlike models the books tend not to hold their value on the second hand market. It does though seem to be the company line. Because warhammer anything is a collectors item, it can't be reduced because then it wouldn't maintain its value.

As to some ranges being more expensive than others, when I was putting together my Daughters of Khaine army, I found that it was cheaper to buy out of production metal witch elves than the new ones!

That may well be the argument, but is that really the case? I mean, if I bought several boxes of unit xy some weeks ago, and now all of a sudden those same boxes go on sale with 20% off, I won’t be angry. More likely, I‘ll immediately buy a couple more boxes of xy to be able to run a full xy list. 😁

Let‘s face it, wargame miniatures are not collectors items. They are mass products that only possess a worth if you own plenty of the same.

Edited May 26, 2020 by Beastmaster

[EccentricCircle]

1 hour ago, Beastmaster said:

That may well be the argument, but is that really the case? I mean, if I bought several boxes of unit xy some weeks ago, and now all of a sudden those same boxes go on sale with 20% off, I won’t be angry. More likely, I‘ll immediately buy a couple more boxes of xy to be able to run a full xy list. 😁

Let‘s face it, wargame miniatures are not collectors items. They are mass products that only possess a worth if you own plenty of the same.

Agreed, it seemed like a ridiculous excuse to me.

[Grimrock]

7 hours ago, Beastmaster said:

edit: Maybe it’s like this: People do have their hobby budget (whether explicitly or implicitly) that they spend for GW stuff. That’s, say, 50 or 100 € a month that GW gets anyway. So the only difference that the price makes is how much stuff people get for their budget. So, GW would actually profit from higher prices.

Of course, that’s only the case for those customers already on the hook. Years before I delved in I remember actually calculating what an army that interested me would cost me, and decided against it. Don’t know if that’s representative, though. 😅

I think this is exactly the case, and of course the end result of that line of thinking. I believe most players have a budget of sorts and will continue to spend it as long as they're in the game. GW doesn't care if a customer stops a particular army because it's too expensive or got nerfed or whatever, as long as they continue spending their budget on GW products. Really the only issue they face is the minor amount of attrition that comes along with the price increases, losing some players completely. In theory that should be made up with new players but of course as prices get higher and higher the likelihood of new players gets lower and lower. The fear is typically that the flow of new players willing to pay the frankly absurd entry cost for the game will eventually dry up and the game will wither on the vine so to speak. Of course that fear has been around for years and the game still seems to be doing fine, so who knows if it'll ever actually come to pass. 

Personally, I know that the hikes have basically made me embarrassed to suggest the game to people because I just can't imagine anyone willing to pay the costs out of the gate, and I know exactly how people would react to the sticker shock. They've also killed my desire to start new factions because it takes too many months of hobby budget to get a functioning force up and running. That leaves me with fleshing out my existing factions which is plenty of hobby time for now, but will also eventually dry up unless GW starts going back and adding new models to the ranges.