Kill Team Kill Team - Gallowfall (Terrain teased page 4)

[phandaal]

1 hour ago, WrathOfTheLion said:

I think it's an issue that GW is going to have to handle. If they expect 40k to go bigger than it is now, having it so releases get strangled out will be a massive problem for that happening.

 

100%. They better get this stuff sorted out before Henry Cavill hard carries 40k for Amazon.

[WrathOfTheLion]

10 hours ago, phandaal said:

 

100%. They better get this stuff sorted out before Henry Cavill hard carries 40k for Amazon.

It's where the simplicity of 'sold all stock == good' breaks down, if their higher up corporate folks are reasonably competent. If a critical release strangles itself and people just walk away, such as what might happen if Leviathan/10E goes south, then it's essentially a failed launch as for what it was intended to do. Those kinds of releases are intended to draw in the current player base (or new ones, depending on the release) to generate future sales.

 

As KT boxes currently are, there's no way any of the potential expansion from the Amazon deal will ever generate anything for the game, as it's failing to generate its potential for just the current customer base.

 

At work, our sales wizard who can sell anything and make you love it, has all those potential sectors for improved sales, what is appealing to them, etc. all charted out. The point there being that were this scenario to happen at work, a large disparity/misstep in potential revenue would definitely get attention beyond a simple 'made some money is good'.

Edited May 7, 2023 by WrathOfTheLion

[Lord Marshal]

The separate Exaction Squad release (temporarily) sold out almost as quickly as Gallowfall.

 

I don't think the sales team are going to see this as an L.

[Cleon]

3 hours ago, Lord Marshal said:

The separate Exaction Squad release (temporarily) sold out almost as quickly as Gallowfall.

 

I don't think the sales team are going to see this as an L.

The Sales team won't see this as an L, but the company as a whole should. Unless they are literally selling everything they produce, then making sumo fire dwarf Sigmar patrols that sit on the shelf instead of kill team boxes that they have unmet demand for is a poor allocation of resources.

[phandaal]

2 hours ago, Lord Marshal said:

The separate Exaction Squad release (temporarily) sold out almost as quickly as Gallowfall.

 

I don't think the sales team are going to see this as an L.

 

If your stock consistently fails to meet overall demand, people in charge at the company start asking questions, because they want those additional sales.

 

I know this from experience, having worked with teams who consistently did not have enough product to meet demand. Number one question was when would they have enough available. "Eventually" is not a good answer either, because some of those people who wanted to buy are not going to stick around.

 

GW just seems to have a lot of trouble forecasting and preparing for demand. If scalper prices are any indication, they are falling well below whatever number people want to buy on launch day.

[No Foes Remain]

Not only that but you've also got the PR department having to deal with (rightfully) angry customers who haven't been able to get the product they want (all of the Kill-team stuff is gone on GW site, including the upgrade parts), and won't be able to get it if the prior releases are anything to go by. With the boxes never re-appearing on GW's site and the indivdual teams constantly showing as out of stock.

[Toxichobbit]

5 minutes ago, phandaal said:

 

If your stock consistently fails to meet overall demand, people in charge at the company start asking questions, because they want those additional sales.

 

I know this from experience, having worked with teams who consistently did not have enough product to meet demand. Number one question was when would they have enough available. "Eventually" is not a good answer either, because some of those people who wanted to buy are not going to stick around.

 

GW just seems to have a lot of trouble forecasting and preparing for demand. If scalper prices are any indication, they are falling well below whatever number people want to buy on launch day.

 

There's someone high up in GW who is very respected by both the company/community and has a lot of influence, who was championing an impulse buying strategy - which FOMO is a part of. I found out about this a good few years ago (pre-covid), so it's old info and might not be relevant anymore. I don't know if this person is still of that train of thought, but they definitely had an impact. The point is though that for a while at least, impulse buying/FOMO was part of GW's strategy, and it still might be. So I'm not 100% sure that the people in charge will be asking questions, at least not yet. I had hoped Indomitus was a wake up call and GW's MTO response was a change of direction, but not only have things slipped back, I reckon they've got worse. I'm not going to hold my breath for things to improve anytime soon. 

[Scribe]

56 minutes ago, Toxichobbit said:

 

There's someone high up in GW who is very respected by both the company/community and has a lot of influence, who was championing an impulse buying strategy - which FOMO is a part of. I found out about this a good few years ago (pre-covid), so it's old info and might not be relevant anymore. I don't know if this person is still of that train of thought, but they definitely had an impact. The point is though that for a while at least, impulse buying/FOMO was part of GW's strategy, and it still might be. So I'm not 100% sure that the people in charge will be asking questions, at least not yet. I had hoped Indomitus was a wake up call and GW's MTO response was a change of direction, but not only have things slipped back, I reckon they've got worse. I'm not going to hold my breath for things to improve anytime soon. 

 

Its the Apple concept no? Its quite clearly intentionally shorting the amount of product. The Arbites being out of stock again makes it pretty clear.

 

GW would rather sell all they have, than make too much. Thats how you can get to an exact profit margin and just keep churning through the releases.

[SpaceDwalin]

Conspiracy theory time, but maybe there is something deliberate happening here, supercharging the Fear in FOMO ahead of Leviathan launching to make sure everyone buys it on day one?

I mean, haven't they already told us it won't be going made to order after the initial release....

[Brother Captain Alberic]

5 minutes ago, SpaceDwalin said:

Conspiracy theory time, but maybe there is something deliberate happening here, supercharging the Fear in FOMO ahead of Leviathan launching to make sure everyone buys it on day one?

I mean, haven't they already told us it won't be going made to order after the initial release....

Which I hope doesn’t mean they want us to mainly buy direct but given previous track records I’m not even confident third parties will get many again.

[Doghouse]

This sums up GW's attitude to people complaining to them about not being able to buy their product as it sells out in minutes perfectly for me.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Emo3j6LA0-k

[Lord Marshal]

1 hour ago, phandaal said:

 

If your stock consistently fails to meet overall demand, people in charge at the company start asking questions, because they want those additional sales.

 

I know this from experience, having worked with teams who consistently did not have enough product to meet demand. Number one question was when would they have enough available. "Eventually" is not a good answer either, because some of those people who wanted to buy are not going to stick around.

 

GW just seems to have a lot of trouble forecasting and preparing for demand. If scalper prices are any indication, they are falling well below whatever number people want to buy on launch day.

 

Thing is, it's an early-release FOMO box where the separate contents will tally up a lot more than the discount box. Buying the standalone Kill Team + book costs over half what the boxset does, for about a quarter of the overall contents. Considering how quickly the standalone releases appear to be selling out, GW probably see it as a win they can underproduce the FOMO box and then rake in more money when they're separate anyway.

 

Like don't get me wrong, I don't think it's a good thing and I'm certainly not defending them, but if the playerbase has shown anything it's that they're very bad at punishing GW for it's practices. 

 

I suspect the overproduction of Dominion (selling fast!) has also scared them a lot, which is why they're not announcing an MTO for Leviathan. I can only assume they're happier everything selling out than having it gathering dust in a warehouse.

 

 

Edited May 7, 2023 by Lord Marshal

[mel_danes]

Agreed Lord Marshal.

The sales team have metrics on sell through for each range, there's no way they don't.

40k is the main seller, far and above the other products.

Dominion could have easily been avoided. I think they bought into their own hype, wanted it to do really well and over produced. AoS is not 40k, they know this, but acted like "Starter Box make big money, make Mawr!"

And got stung.

 

Now that being said Cursed City was a mystery, fantasy property that just flew off the shelf. Nostalgia, good marketing, I don't know?

 

FOMO as a base sales model is predatory and antagonistic to your current client base, future clients don't see it, it's all they've known. People burn out when they can't buy what you're selling.

But there's no reason to stop doing it for the accountants, sales are sales. In the long run probably not sustainable, but I'm not a GW exec and they know plenty I don't.

 

 

[Toxichobbit]

2 hours ago, Lord Marshal said:

 

I suspect the overproduction of Dominion (selling fast!) has also scared them a lot, which is why they're not announcing an MTO for Leviathan. I can only assume they're happier everything selling out than having it gathering dust in a warehouse.

 

 

And I doubt they've forgotten the lessons of the 2000s, where they expanded too fast on the back of the popularity of LotR and got burned for it. That was when they did a massive restructuring of their retail stores, many switching from having multiple staff to just one to reduce overheads. Covid is kind of similar to the LotR popularity, a large boost to sales that isn't permanent. So I'd imagine they are being more cautious in the post-covid world than they were during the LotR boom.

[Interrogator Stobz]

3 hours ago, SpaceDwalin said:

Conspiracy theory time, but maybe there is something deliberate happening here, supercharging the Fear in FOMO ahead of Leviathan launching to make sure everyone buys it on day one?

I mean, haven't they already told us it won't be going made to order after the initial release....

It's not a conspiracy theory, it's a business strategy decision made by a team conspiring together to make money for their shareholders. 

So yeah, it's a conspiracy. But that is normal. 

[ZeroWolf]

55 minutes ago, Toxichobbit said:

 

And I doubt they've forgotten the lessons of the 2000s, where they expanded too fast on the back of the popularity of LotR and got burned for it. That was when they did a massive restructuring of their retail stores, many switching from having multiple staff to just one to reduce overheads. Covid is kind of similar to the LotR popularity, a large boost to sales that isn't permanent. So I'd imagine they are being more cautious in the post-covid world than they were during the LotR boom.

I did wonder when the retail side of things changed so drastically. It was quite a shift in what I was expecting when I returned to the hobby.

[Flaherty]

GW had gotten control of this problem up until Shadowvault. 

 

The sets before that were incredibly easy to get ahold of. You can still get KT: Into the Dark and Nachmund at steep discounts. The Black Templar box hung around forever, Eldritch Omens is still available at 3rd parties, and my LGS has six Leagues of Votann launch boxes collecting dust. Most of the Christmas bundles are available for weeks.

 

After Indomitus, they used the queue systems for a bit, but seemed to solve the demand problem with a mix of:

 

+ Reduced savings: The Cadia Stands box still sits for this reason - it was a middling deal at the tail end of the edition. 

+ Overproduce: They were producing "second waves" for some boxes. This diluted the scalper market, though likely frustrated some retailers who were left holding a lot of expensive stock.

 

Given the timing of this reversion to shortage, it seems likely that the 10th edition launch is the culprit and hopefully once it's released they'll be back to the channel-stuffing sales strategy we know and love.

 

 

 

 

 

[spessmarine]

Valrak's video from today makes had compelling conjecture on the issue, that possibly factory/manufacture time has been dominated by Leviathan for recent stocking issues. Machine time for the past who knows 6-8 months would've involved competing with Leviathan. Edition launch is June 24th but the manufacture stage would be completed months prior over some unknown timespan.

[MegaVolt87]

nvm wrong topic/ OT. 

 

Edited May 8, 2023 by MegaVolt87

[Ephialtes]

On 5/6/2023 at 10:04 AM, Toxichobbit said:

Sold out before 10am. What the  is the point in a pre-order if it's sold out before it even goes on pre-order. I wish GW had compatent staff, rather than a bunch of idiots who fell upwards.

 

On 5/6/2023 at 10:10 AM, Toxichobbit said:

 

It shouldn't be up until 10. Their pre-order is 10, not 09.55. I had it in my cart at 09.57 but by the time I got to checkout it was gone. Absolutely awful customer service from their website, as always. Sadly, the same thing will happen with the terrain when it comes out separately, it'll be gone within minutes & if you want to finish the season the only option will be eBay and the scalping  on there. I won't be buying into next season after the complete and utter catastrophe that this one has been. I'll spend my money with another games company instead.

 

GW always adds its products to the website a few minutes (5 or 10?) before 10am - it seems to be the front page that updates at 10am itself for the pre-order.

 

On 5/6/2023 at 12:31 PM, 307kg said:

The part I just do not understand is, why they don’t use the queue system that was implemented after the Idomitus and Cursed city releases.
 

That seemed to help for the popular releases immediately following, and the GW website seems to still direct to it when you type in the website url…

 

The queue itself just seemed to slow down how fast everything sold out, it wasn't the silver bullet that actually fixed the issue of everyone getting the things they wanted. The fix for that was Made To Order (aka how to do an actual pre-order). Their in-hand stuff still sold out (you could see the switch over in delivery times on the website), but it was often into the middle of the week of the pre-order rather than t-minus 2 minutes to launch.

 

On 5/6/2023 at 1:54 PM, ZeroWolf said:

The other thing about the queue system (I've heard so a pinch of salt needed) is that they have to buy in with every use or something along those lines. GW being GW will penny pinch till they know they can buy it and still make lots of money...aka why they're probably going to implement it for 10th edition.

 

They used a system called Queue-It previously (a fair few vendors used it during the pandemic). You can either pay for individual queues or take out a long term subscription to those guys. GW were using it as recently as the Horus Heresy launch - they first used it at the start of the pandemic so that's 2+ years before they seemingly retired it.

 

On 5/6/2023 at 1:27 PM, Khornestar said:

Painting Phase and I believe Honest Wargamer have also said they just can’t keep up with production; their factory capabilities just aren’t enough to meet demand. They’re looking to expand, apparently.

 

They have 2 factories in Nottingham already - the second was only fully commissioned during the pandemic. I recall hearing they have a 3rd nearby which is leased space but can't remember where I heard that so it might be nonsense.

 

I was at Warhammer World the other week, and if you walk down the road they are on you can see they have land banked for future expansion but nothing is happening in terms of building. There's a patch of wasteland next to their newest office/factory (which doubles as the smoking patch for staff), and there's what looks like an old factory of some kind at the bottom. The factory itself has been mothballed and it looks like it's just a car park right now - I assume they bought that whole patch.

 

They could just repurpose that building, but it depends on the state of it inside I guess. It didn't look like anything was happening right now (could be wrong) so they're a way off sorting out the production issue with plastic.

 

***

THAT SAID we're talking about this like it's a GW only problem. GW do not print boxes and rulebooks or make dice and rulers. They don't print Black Library books. And at this point, everything is selling out and they are failing to meet demand (is Saturday the first time a generic book has been scalped like this)?

 

To solve this problem their entire supply chain needs to increase its capacity, and their production model needs to change. That is hugely challenging for any business, nevermind one that seems so determined to trip itself up at every opportunity like GW.

 

Given they ran with Made To Order for a significant period of time over multiple releases and then chose to stop...they've already looked at the fix and decided it didn't work for them. Yes, it worked for you and I, but they knocked it on the head and this is the nonsense they've left us with.

 

My guess: we'll see a Made To Order follow up release for the things that actually cause a ruckus (The Lion, probably Leviathan, not Gallowfall though), and that queue is 100% going to come back again for at least Leviathan (their website will not cope otherwise) but I don't see them changing any time soon.

[Redcomet]

All these supply issues are really making me completely disinterested in new releases. Why get hyped when you can’t buy any. And no I don’t just buy something else from GW. I have bought furniture, preordered Shatterpoint and added to my Mech collection. 
 

I can’t be the only one who spends his money elsewhere these days.

[Matcap86]

I'm just weirded out by what gets scalped, sometimes there's no rhyme or reason it seems. Not every killteam box went this hard and lots of HBs from BL are available for quite some time. With others from the same preorder selling out and reappearing on ebay in minutes. 

[Lord Marshal]

3 hours ago, matcap86 said:

I'm just weirded out by what gets scalped, sometimes there's no rhyme or reason it seems. Not every killteam box went this hard and lots of HBs from BL are available for quite some time. With others from the same preorder selling out and reappearing on ebay in minutes. 

 

I think scalpers are just aware of GW having production issues and reacting to certain things accordingly. Plus stores tend to know just under a week in advance how many copies they'll be getting and share that information around. If it's an extremely limited release, they know there's at least a small profit to be made when LFGS' are only getting 2-3 boxes of something. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of scalpers are some LFGS owners with their own stock.

 

Into The Dark wasn't difficult to get hold of, but it still went out of stock at most of the big retailers within a week or two. After a short while it turned out Navy Breachers were an S-tier team, so stock got a lot more limited because it was sold out everywhere and Ebay prices for them skyrocketed. Then Shadowvaults sold out in minutes because Karskin were hotly anticipated, but the scalpers also knew by this point it wasn't like the first season where stock would be sat on shelves gathering dust due to limited production. Then because of that, scalpers were ready and waiting to pounce on Soulshackle. Then because Soulshackle went out of stock in minutes, Gallowfall suffered a similar fate. 

 

If GW have resolved their production woes by the third season and stores are getting plenty of stock, they'll probably ease off. If they haven't? Well, here we go again...

 

Edited May 8, 2023 by Lord Marshal

[Ephialtes]

There was a comment in here that Investors will take note - and they will note the growing bad sentiment (if it is indeed growing) around the issue. But I don't think that's the thing that makes GW twitch. In the past 18 months we saw their share value drop by 50% and then steadily climb again, and on the investor side we didn't see or hear of anything different at all in their behaviour.

 

However, the thing that could really bite GW is if trade accounts start to get sick of the hassle they get in return for 2 happy customers. Couple it with the challenges around restocks - which at least one US stockist was public about it making it a waste of his time stocking GW paints, for instance - and you have the potential to piss off 50% of your revenue generating distribution network.

 

The point at which they are unable to sign up new stockists quicker than they lose them is the point at which GW sit up and smell the problems they've consistently failed to address.

[Khornestar]

It’s been so much success in spite of themselves I have a hard time seeing things turn around on them, but it’s certainly possible.

They make the stuff we wanna buy, and boy do we buy it - when we can. But people have been predicting the consequences of their practices for a looooong time, and they’ve only grown as a company.