The company we all love to hate

[Tott]

And in regard to GW's business plan.

Once every 2-3 years they'll release new armybooks/codexes changing just enough that you need to buy new minis.

That's a fact Jack!

well yes, that is a business plan! you dont want to make a product that never needs replacing. you go out of business that way.
how old is your mobile phone? how old is your car? how old are you clothes? all apple needs to do is change the coating on a phone from metal to plastic and plenty of people will spend another £500 on a iPhone.

[Goblin-King]

Let's not get into how old my phone and car is!!!
Suffice to say the phone has green display and the car has a cassette player.

Anyways... Sure that IS a business plan. And one of the many reasons they are called Greed Workshop.
Honestly I don't think they would go out of business if a player never "needed" to replace anything for the following reasons:

* New players are born every day.
* Old players might try out a new army.
* Old players might want to expand or change his army.
* Old players might want to replace models with newer versions (new sculpts) <--- This is something I actually want GW to do
* Hobby tools, books and new sculpts should be enough. Besides I think their target audience is new players. Buy the rulebook, codex, paints and army - then gtfo. NEXT!

The counter argument, if every single model stayed usable, could be that in time there would be more accumulated armies than there are players.
But then, new players might want to paint it up themselves and would rather want new minis.

Also I don't have a business degree - just calling 'em like I see 'em

[Tott]

i dont have a business degree either, but i know a business needs demand or it goes bankrupt. no business on the planet will try to sell less stock, its suicide. no business can rely on new customers only, you have to have return business and as much of it as you can. look at vaguely similar products like D&D, magic: the gathering, world of warcaft. they all bring out completely new stuff every year - they have to!
i agree with the argument that they charge too much for high level models - at the end of the day that's a lot of money for a small amount of plastic, but you cant really criticize a company for wanting to stay in business.

[IvenBach]

how old is your mobile phone? how old is your car? how old are you clothes?

[rant]Phone: 3 yrs old with a a cracked screen. Only reason it got upgraded last year was my friend got a new one and it was cheaper to transfer phone companies and use his old phone. Before that my previous phone was 4 years old.
Car: WTF?! You think I have a car? Seriously... I've got a bike. And it 12+ years old and has, no joke, a few thousand miles on it from me peddling my broke *expletive* around everywhere since I was a poor kid biking 10 miles to my friends house (uphill in the snow both ways - well not really) till now using it to go to college with all my books. I'm not rich like GK who's got a richmans cassette player in his.
Clothes: Every garment I have is from 2007 or prior, with only a few T-shirts since that were given to me. Sure they may have stains on them, be faded, some have small holes (I do take the bad ones out of use and turn them into rags), have paint or drywall on them from remodeling but I try to 'waste not & want not'. Oh and don't even go anywhere NEAR my hat or mention about me getting rid of it. Just because its sunbleached light grey from the original black and has the bill all tore up doesn't mean it's all used up. It's just now broken in.

i dont have a business degree either, but i know a business needs demand or it goes bankrupt. no business on the planet will try to sell less stock, its suicide. no business can rely on new customers only, you have to have return business and as much of it as you can. look at vaguely similar products like D&D, magic: the gathering, world of warcaft. they all bring out completely new stuff every year - they have to!
i agree with the argument that they charge too much for high level models - at the end of the day that's a lot of money for a small amount of plastic, but you cant really criticize a company for wanting to stay in business.

Duly noted but you got to look at it this way. In the clip GW thinks of itself as the thin version and us its customers as the fat version.

[/rant]
Had to speak out. Mornings are never a good way to start my day. I'm more coherent now but figured I'd leave it as in substance it sums up my thoughts.

[Daedalus]

Again I only got into minis within a year of now so I really have no qualified or substantive argument Sarcasm: just a loud mouth 'Murican's opinion that he's right about any and everything. /Sarcasm

PS: Is there some way to make a sarcasm tag? Maybe with pink background and non-standard text?

Good thing nobody uses pink-blocked lettering here. link

[IvenBach]

I have been studying all day and away. I probably should excuse my earlier comments as being boorish at best. After thinking about it my response it probably came off as a bit much. Not trying to cover them up just admitting a mistake . I know Tott was simply making a valid point and my response came out much worse had I worded it another way . I'll do better next time and think longer about any responses that may come off as harsh or rantingly incoherent without cause. My mistake...

[Goblin-King]

Yeah, your post was bad and you should feel bad! Now go spank yourself! And stand in the corner!

(I snickered at "richmans cassette player")

[IvenBach]

As much as I dislike being wrong I try to be responsible and admit it. The same goes if I go too far without meaning to.

At least you have a cassette player...

[knightkrawler]

No post in this here thread can ever be more evil than the business (non-)demeanor of the company I hate.

[Spiky]

I stopped hating GW once I realised that they weren't releasing updated rules with the aim of improving them

Now I merely dislike them. The washes are the only thing I buy there for which I've not found a similar product elsewhere yet.