GW would need to sell roughly 33.27+ units for each of it's 334 hobby centers (if hobby centers accounted for 100 percent of the sales) to break initial cost. I would have to take your word on the 3 months Herr Blessing because I have no idea how long it takes to sell take many units in a hobby center.
I wonder how many regular consumers GW has, on average, at each hobby center.
Theory_Man
This varies one hell of a lot on every basis.
Blisters of special characters, for example, may take years to sell the 34 units. OTOH, something popular will sell that easily when the stock arrives.
Also, I was told by someone at GW that in the US at least they had more independent retailers now carrying the product with them than before. Also, Alliance also distributes to many more stores that don’t “carry” the line. The trade sales department in the US seems to have changed a lot, and while it has taken a while, they seem to be trying to figure out how to help more stores…
Could be why they are back to growth here in America?
Also, not sure on the 32/34 units math. They sell to independent retailers at a discount (which varies in each country), and that only covers the mold being made, not the plastic that goes into it (which as a per piece may be neglible, but after 11,000+ units would still be pretty stiff), nor the boxes (which often cost more than the plastic inside (obviously). You also have employees and other bills to pay (ie production costs, manufacturing costs, storage costs, shipping costs, sales costs, etc.). That would bump the number up quite a bit, and then the number would be reduced by the amount the independent retailers could sell. I just don’t think it ends up at 32/34 units.
At our Gw meetings the managers used to throw the 100 units number around. I don’t know if that is a hard number used to determine profit margin, as they probably factor in sales vs rent and employee pay, and shipping, packaging, storage, etc… I know the 30 someodd boxes is not the final number to break even…
On the subject of paint pottles, I see the cost of them is surging as well. Locally, GW paints will be going up by a third, which means I’ll probably just permanently switch to using Vallejo paints now.
Theory_Man, it was just a ballpark guess for 3 months, if I’m perfectly honest, but it seemed like a reasonable amount of time…
slev, that’d be hilarious
Unfortunately for me, I’m too lazy to look at cheaper paints. I guess that’s something GW rely on: brand loyalty… Alas, when the prices are getting as high as they are, even those loyal to brand are at least tempted to other, cheaper, sources.
