why I sell to retailers

[MatrixGamer]

A retailer needs to demand better, more fun games from game publishers. And he needs to find the good ones out there and advocate them in his store.

When I sold books I certainly looked for ones I considered good. Any retailer wants that. If they don't - and follow a cookie cutter model - then they will go out of business. Retailers are also looking for reliable suppliers as well. If I run a store I want to know I can restock. A game with great buzz that is unavailable to me on terms I can make a profit on or which is just unavailable in quantity isn't much use.

Now a days we talk about speicialty game stores - but remember these did not exist until the late 70's. Prior to that games were sold through hobby stores (love them model rail roaders!) Games might also appear in gift stores or even toy stores. Imagining how to reach these alternate venues and then carrying out a campaign to so do is possible. Our forefathers and mothers in the gaming hobby did it. It's just a lot easier to do if you find enjoyment in the mechanical activities of business.

Say I want retailers to be more open to new stuff. How can I communicate that to retailers I contact? The Forge is certainly one way to do that - but that message is blunted if an anti business message is pushed.

Before you get the idea I'm some right winger - I a Liberal Democrat Social Worker. My pro business stance is because I really believe it can be fun. I don't want Clinton to choke, and everyone is free to not do business but don't poo poo it out of hand. Just think of it as another form of role playing...Today I am a salesman...

Chris Engle
Hamster Press

[Luke]

Just to chime in: It was my goal from the beginning to get into distribution and therefore into retail stores. I have, in fact, personally solicted a handful of retailers and convinced them to carry BW.

But as Ron said, I my goals were not really to profit from that arm. It's promotional, pure and simple. As Ralph said, kids see BW, buy it, it changes their life and then their group starts ordering direct -- usually because we have such an strong online presence.

The kids who buy from retail stores are VERY LIKELY not the same kids who shop online or who surf the forums for what's cool. The online rpg community is a small fraction of the total gamer community. Before I started publishing BW, I was just another Joe Blow Gamer. I didn't go online for game, I prowled the stacks of gaming stores. As did my entire group -- prolly about a dozen gamers. I want to reach those kids. More to the point, I do not want to exclude those kids from being able to get Burning Wheel.

I want BW to be self-sufficient. That means more than just covering print costs. It needs to cover my convention expenses, website expenses plus maybe even paying me once in a while. In order to pay for all that, it's got to sell at a pretty high volume.

I don't make any money at all in distro. Gasp! I make back the cost of printing and that's it. Why bother then? Because my direct orders have already paid for the printing of the game. Gasp! So even the low margin distro orders end up being essentially profitable. They advertise, they spread the word, they sell, they get other copies sold. It works very nicely for me.

That said, 90% of retailers don't really support small press games very well. They don't know how to sell them. So printing thousands and thousands of copies and saturating distro with them isn't a recipe for success. But retailers are a vital part of the gaming ecology. They spread the word, too. And the more that they, personally, experience how small press stuff can be successful, the more likely they are to buy more small press and to give the thumbs up to other retailers.

I'm rambling. Sorry. Just be sure to consider all your options.
-Luke

[guildofblades]

Hi Chris,

>>Aside from Eero, how many of you have run a retail business?<<

The Guild of Blades ran a small game store back in 99-2000. For just shy of a year. Basically we were looking to move the publishing business out of our basements to meet growth demands and we found a nice small shop that was compartmented in such a way that we figured we could run the manufacturing part of our business out of one half and run a small retail store out of the other. This left us with about 200 square feet for actual retail goods, plus 3 private rooms for gaming.

The store was an interesting experiment. We chose to focus, well, primarily on our own products, of course. But after that we focussed on small press and indie product. Our RPG section did not include a lick of D&D, White Wolf or SJG. That was during the height of Pokemon, so yes, we did sell that. But out #2 selling card game was On The Edge from Atlas Games. We used to store to showcase the divsersity of gaming items the local gamers never otherwise got to see and otherwise used it to support in store gaming and events for our own line of products.

And the store was making money as well. But sadly, not enough money after 10 months to support the hiring on of a full time retail manager. If we had kept the store open another half year, at the rate its sales were increasing, that might have been posible. But as things were, the store kept gobbling up the majority of our available time and our own publishing efforts nearly ground to a halt. We were forced to chose between being a publisher and being a retailer. So, we closed the store.

We do, however, have eventual plans to launch another game store/club in the future. Though this one will be far and away even more different that the traditional hobby game retail inviornment. Sadly, though, to launch it right will take gobs of money as well, hence we have to wait...for now. :)

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Publishing Group
http://www.guildofblades.com

[MatrixGamer]

I was pretty certain that you had waded in the stream of retail, Ryan. It is time consuming and I know I prefer to focus on manufacturing which is why I appreciate that others want to do this. Did you find that it influenced how you looked at games - ie did it change the way you made games so they would be more store worthy?

I think about how a game will be stored when it gets home, how it will look when it is played and how it will look in the store. I go over to the local store and check it out. I always come away with new ideas to experiement with. Just because  game is independent doesn't mean it can't look good.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press

[Matt Snyder]

Excellent considerations all around, folks. Luke, you ain't just ramblin'.

I do want to remind everyone of the distinction here, though. I'm seeing two issues getting muddied together, perhaps. We have two issues:

1. Will we (publishers) offer specific discounts to dealers at the GenCon 2005 Forge Booth
2. Will we (publishers) publishers offer discounts to dealers in general

I think that's worth bearing in mind for this thread and its related discussions.