September 2026 - Price Rises

[Jukkiz]

Noting WotC is that they´re laying of people because D&D side been abysmal and MTG been saturated with way too much stuff lately, making people lose intrest and unabale to keep up fully with what hasbro thinks people are willing to pay for. 

Good comparison is later "expanded universe" idea AKA lets bash every ip under the sun into magic the gathering. Be it spongebob, Hatsune miku or kratos form god of war

[Dark Shepherd]

Personally Ive entered a resentment phase with GW (prices) so Im buying non BL books, finishing pile of shame (famous last words), selling sprues, but the more common one is I am in my maelstrom buying paints/modelling tools from GW any more

 

The nostalgia push for things like new speeders, rhinos, libby on bike, etc will keep GW going but they need to be careful

 

Edited Thursday at 10:16 PM by Dark Shepherd

[darkhorse0607]

Just talked to my local store manager (so take this with a grain of salt), said that GW as a whole is ending the free mini of the month program  

 

So, you know, good they're making record profits and are raising prices and all that

[Lathe Biosas]

 

1 hour ago, darkhorse0607 said:

Just talked to my local store manager (so take this with a grain of salt), said that GW as a whole is ending the free mini of the month program  

 

So, you know, good they're making record profits and are raising prices and all that

No reason to spend money at the local Warhammer store ever again. That should save me some money then.

[phandaal]

1 hour ago, darkhorse0607 said:

Just talked to my local store manager (so take this with a grain of salt), said that GW as a whole is ending the free mini of the month program  

 

So, you know, good they're making record profits and are raising prices and all that

 

It's because of tariffs or something, sorry can't be helped. 

[Antarius]

Are we sure it's a cost-cutting measure, though? Because I can't/don't believe they're considering the cost of a few plastic miniatures prohibitive, if they feel it's drawing in customers. I think a more likely answer is that they don't feel the program is working or that they're cooking up something else to replace it.

[alfred_the_great]

4 hours ago, Antarius said:

Are we sure it's a cost-cutting measure, though? Because I can't/don't believe they're considering the cost of a few plastic miniatures prohibitive, if they feel it's drawing in customers. I think a more likely answer is that they don't feel the program is working or that they're cooking up something else to replace it.

Why give James Workshop the benefit of the doubt? The internet must take the worst possible take, and cannot be appeased…

[darkhorse0607]

10 hours ago, Antarius said:

I think a more likely answer is that they don't feel the program is working or that they're cooking up something else to replace it.

 

I think it's more of a combination probably. Along the lines of "why are we giving free models to people that are already engaged with our brand (given that they know about the program in the first place) when we already give free stuff to new customers"

 

That all being said

 

I don't think it's the "worst possible take" as the other Frater said to suspect a company that most recently, checks notes, took a 19 year old kit off the webstore to remove components from it, before putting it back up at a higher cost and charging you for the pieces they removed

 

of cutting other corners to lower costs

[Jukkiz]

Speaking of price hikes, this is quite... A hard pill to swallow, but follows started box pricing with another 5-10% rise and another... 

[01RTB01]

7 minutes ago, Jukkiz said:

Speaking of price hikes, this is quite... A hard pill to swallow, but follows started box pricing with another 5-10% rise and another... 

There's a lot to be said for box splitters. I grabbed a second Armageddon half for $110 CAD. Considering the dakkarig is $98 on its own, the solo mini prices are bonkers.

[Lathe Biosas]

Whew. I got finished (almost) buying all my Adeptus Custodes forces. (Just waiting for the Telemon to be released).

 

With these price increases it looks like I'm going to have to put my Space Marine army on hold for a while.

[Dark Shepherd]

Just saw that the Custodes dice are €37.50, thats €2 a die, so much for them being the cheap army to collect :)

[Doghouse]

11 hours ago, 01RTB01 said:

There's a lot to be said for box splitters. I grabbed a second Armageddon half for $110 CAD. Considering the dakkarig is $98 on its own, the solo mini prices are bonkers.

 

That is most definitely a defining example of bonkers as you so rightly stated. You can pick up each of those for under a tenner on ebay at the moment.

[Arikel]

18 hours ago, 01RTB01 said:

There's a lot to be said for box splitters. I grabbed a second Armageddon half for $110 CAD. Considering the dakkarig is $98 on its own, the solo mini prices are bonkers.

Wasn’t going to grab this box or anything from it either, but randomly saw an offer to sell the sm half for 100 and took it and ran. I admit, not even sure why, apart from poor impulse control as I don’t really use any Primaris scale models at all. On the quebec fb sales site, the lowest I saw it offered for is $140, but currently it’s usually $150-160 for the lot, occasionally with the book or other box extras included

[Lathe Biosas]

Time for Plan B...

 

There's also a Kroot Sprue army out there.

 

 

Edited 19 hours ago by Lathe Biosas

[N1SB]

On 8/28/2026 at 10:51 AM, Antarius said:

Are we sure it's a cost-cutting measure, though? Because I can't/don't believe they're considering the cost of a few plastic miniatures prohibitive, if they feel it's drawing in customers. I think a more likely answer is that they don't feel the program is working or that they're cooking up something else to replace it.

 

On 8/28/2026 at 3:14 PM, alfred_the_great said:

Why give James Workshop the benefit of the doubt? The internet must take the worst possible take, and cannot be appeased…

 

You're right about the Internet's bad takes, but Brother Antarius is NOT the Internet; he IS a valued Brother and raises an excellent point:

 

 

This chart is of GW's operating expenses, where the largest slice of the pie at 47% is Retail, a.k.a. Warhammer Stores.  That's where GW's biggest costs already lie.  The free-mini-of-the-month, and remember, they're not infinite, they're on a 1st-come-1st-serve basis, would be a drop in the bucket.

 

(Tariffs would be in that Design to Manufacture or Merchandising and Logistics, like 2%+2%.)

 

Moreover, who gets the free minis?  Usually their regulars.  I literally just painted a Kroot with a new speedpaint technique to test Green skin tones...which I'll probably use for the new Ork minis rather than Kroot!  Btw, that was successful, it's a Zenithal basecoat with just Athosian CamoShade, looks great.

 

In other words, the free minis might not be bringing in new business, taken by people who were going to buy anyway.

 

+ + + + +

 

HOWEVER!  As backwards as it seems, whenever a business is cutting back costs, sales & marketing is the 1st thing to go.  Like they stop spending on ads, cut sales & marketing staff.  I do think GW treats free-minis-of-the-month AND EVEN things like White Dwarf magazine as their equivalent of ads/marketing.

 

(Example - awhile back Netflix had a slow down in subscription numbers, 1st thing they did was lay off their sales/marketing staff.  I remember reading a YouTube comment on that news like, "Wait, if you want to get more subscribers, aren't sales & marketing the guys you want to keep?"  It's so true, it's so paradoxical.)

 

+ + + + +

 

I find it helps to imagine if we worked at GW.  Tariffs introduced this sudden, huge cost, I increase prices and cut costs.

 

So I tell everyone to cut costs.  Every department has been asked to, like, sacrifice one of their children, to be fair to everyone.

 

If I'm in charge of Retail/Warhammer Stores or Marketing, I could close down stores/lay off my own people, OR cut some programs.  Before I fire a single person, I'd definitely look at what programs I could cut, like free-mini-of-the-month or the gimmicky collectible coin of the month.

 

Replacing it with something just cheaper (I'm not even talking cost-effective, I've just been told to reduce my costs, like a Balance Update screwed me up my army list, I want a quick replacement like an HQ or dropping an upgrade instead of changing a whole unit) MIGHT WELL be the plan.

 

Brother Antarius, Brother Alfred, you might not be disagreeing.  Your points are not mutually exclusive, they prolly even align.

Edited 10 hours ago by N1SB

[alfred_the_great]

I need to be better at leaving /s at the end of posts….

[darkhorse0607]

4 minutes ago, alfred_the_great said:

I need to be better at leaving /s at the end of posts….

 

that's my bad if it was a /s post, I misunderstood, thought it was serious