Warhammer & Games Workshop

[johnofwessex]

Youngest son (13) has discovered Warhammer

 

(Fantasy Wargaming)

 

You can get it either on line or from Games Workshop shops.

 

Not only c an you buy the bits - figures paints, books etc but you can use tables in the shop with glue paint etc to make your models and play the games.  each month they also give away a figure .  They also provide packs for schools who set up Warhammer clubs

 

Now model railways are a very different thing, lots of different scales and gauges, manufacturers etc etc but presumably there must be something that some of the bigger manufacturers/retailers could take from the Warhammer model to draw a new generation of modellers in.

 

Discuss

 

 

[Edge]

I have been a Warhammer but for about fifteen years at this point, and there is a great deal to admire about how games workshop runs its business. Social spaces and practical guidance for new starters are one of the biggies, but also the ability to get everything you need in one go is extremely useful as a jumping off point.

 

I think probably the biggest thing for me is the starter boxes though. Games workshop starter sets have some of their best miniatures combined with a great story and instructions for the total beginner upwards. Perhaps a few principles can be applied to the world of model trains.

[Ben Alder]

GW grew from a complete backwater to the colossus it is today by putting a massive amount of input to the demand side of the product that no other hobby company would dream of. They created a market by opening their own shops with enthusiastic young staff and gaming and painting tables and encouraging youngsters in to participate in the game by supplying figures and explaining as they went, creating a community along the way, something the general sectors of the hobby either dismissed or ignored....

[Jeff Smith]

And the acrylic paint is excellent, although requires some experimentation to find the colour you need as the names are strange indeed.  They're British made too.  Ratskin Flesh is good for GWR Stone No 3.

 

Vallejo now make a wargames range.

[StuAllen]

Warhammer world in Nottingham is well worth a visit. 

[jjb1970]

I have a nephew who was nuts about Warhammer 40K and it is true the way they use their shops as local hubs for hobbyists, help people to learn about making and painting the kits, connect with other enthusiasts and promote their hobby is a lesson for how to do it. And the shops are welcoming. I remember going into shops to buy gifts and not having a clue what I was looking for, I was always made very welcome and guided to what I should get my nephew (and he was always very happy). Compared to some model railway and kit shops it was night and day.

 

I have never been interested in the gaming side, but I did build a few of the kits just because I liked the figures and still enjoy reading the stories. There's a YouTube channel called 'Baldermort' which is great, even if you have zero interest in that little world Baldermort can tell a great story and there's something really rather compelling about it all.

[Enterprisingwestern]

 

I've always considered the GW business plan to be like the drug industry, but in a good way if that's possible!

Create a need that only you can supply and fuel that need by encouraging widespread use and making a social event out of usage.

Although the model railway world would do well to copy them, because of the numerous manufacturers involved who can't even agree to standardise on couplings, wheel back to backs etc etc, there is no one central focus which could be exploited, it being left up to the rapidly diminishing number of model shops to fulfil this need.

I also am not sure I could withstand a hobby full of what seem to hyperventilated over-enthusiastic modellers, although I admire their commitment and enthusiasm.

 

Mike.

[Ben B]

 

They do starter boxes for youth groups; this was our Scout and Cub group last week. Figures are detailed, clip together so you don't really need glue, and the box comes with paints, brushes, rule books for a simplified version of the game... all really well thought out. By contrast the Airfix version of the youth group box had the Spitfire and Messchersmidt bf109 which many of the kids found trickier to do (and being older kits, were sometimes a bit warped or had flash issues). The Warhammer option can be done over a couple of weeks, so you don't lose interest (and crucially, being clip-together, you don't risk 30 kids getting high on poly-cement fumes).

 

I've dipped in and out of Warhammer since I was about 10, and my mate Owen took me to a Games Workshop store. Even when I've not modelled, I've read the books though- anything by Sandy Mitchell or Dan Abnett (both acclaimed Sci-fi and comic book authors) is worth a read. It's a very immersive I.P, with some great stories and art supporting it. And I'd echo comments about the paints, and the welcoming stores. My eldest is into it, and more than once I've gone with her into a shop, thought 'I'll buy some paint whilst she's browsing' and ended up leaving with at least a book, if not an actual kit :)

 

 

Something I'm working on at the moment... a new version of the first GW kit I ever bought all the way back in 1994... the Rhino a.p.c.

When I saw they'd released an upgraded version of the kit to modern standards, I had to buy it :)

[pete_mcfarlane]

I find my local Games Workshop a bit odd. Go in for a can of spray paint and I get pounced on by the staff, who try and pressure sell me gaming stuff that I'm not interested in. It's a retail experience that you normally only get in the States. 

 

 

[micklner]

8 minutes ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

I find my local Games Workshop a bit odd. Go in for a can of spray paint and I get pounced on by the staff, who try and pressure sell me gaming stuff that I'm not interested in. It's a retail experience that you normally only get in the States. 

 

 

Similar experience when I always used to use their Varnish Aerosols , sadly they changed the formula for that for the worse a few years ago, and I now use other makes. The staff always looked disapointed when I only want some paint!!.

Shortly after they started closing shops in my area. Lakeside and Brentwood are long gone , now the only one left is Romford which is tiny shop down a dingy old Arcade, and I believe opens one or two days a week. i have just looked on their website, and its open today at 12pm , no other information obvious as to other opening times or when it closes !!.

Heading towards Mail Order only?,  which again is quite sad.

[Mike Bellamy]

 

When it was first announced (March 2022), the Bachmann "Model Collect Create" shop at Hinckley was said to be following the Games Workshop store experience

 

Quote

 

MCC will also be introducing a series of workshops and demonstrations through the year, while there will also be a children's craft and play table in-store to keep younger visitors entertained

 

The aim of the store is to get people to put down their screens and create something amazing using the products on offer and expert advice on hand. This is a store for all members of the family to enjoy, with products for all ages and abilities.

 

 

https://www.keymodelworld.com/article/Bachmann-launches-first-retail-store-hinckley-leicestershire

 

However when I look at the Bachmann site for a list of retailers, it isn't mentioned - so either they haven't updated the list recently, or it has closed  -  any one know any more ??

.

[gwrrob]

15 minutes ago, Mike Bellamy said:

 

When it was first announced (March 2022), the Bachmann "Model Collect Create" shop at Hinckley was said to be following the Games Workshop store experience

 

 

https://www.keymodelworld.com/article/Bachmann-launches-first-retail-store-hinckley-leicestershire

 

However when I look at the Bachmann site for a list of retailers, it isn't mentioned - so either they haven't updated the list recently, or it has closed  -  any one know any more ??

.

 

It is still open as I was in there a few weeks back.

[33C]

All my children were into Warhammer. Sunday afternoon's, I would take them into the shop to watch the battles. When they had an army of their own, (Silver Skulls, Ultramarines, Blood Angels and Tyranids!), I could drop them off and pick them up 3 hours later and listen to the epic that had happened that day...until one Sunday, after a change of manager. He questioned the painting of the players miniatures. 4 colours minimum and only the company paints. When asked, my lads said, I had done them all for them(true), and with car spray paint and Humbrol. They were then told to leave. They called me from the corner phone box to pick them up. So....long story short, he left soon after, under a very big cloud.

A great, youth hobby, nearly ruined by one selfish individual.

The shop survives, just, but it was never the same.

The battles continued at home, and we incorporated a railway into the battlefield, much like the "Steam-punk" stuff of much later! And they made up their own rules. 

Kids do modelling, just not our modelling....

[Taz]

Ah, warhammer - my other hobby love.

I used to play as a teenager but drifted away from it. Always thought I only really had time to do one hobby or another so I concentrated on my model railways.

Then Covid struck and my eldest daughters boyfriend came to stay with us during lock down. He was a warhammer  40K player and the flame was reignited.

so I started playing and collecting again and forgot all about my trains.

I packed them all up and decided to sell to concentrate on Warhammer.

But then when I went to DRAG to hand over some sold items I realised I missed the guys and the model railways.

 

So now I have decided to try and do both hobbies. It causes me internal consternation as I feel I haven’t got time to do justice to either (or rather achieve what I would like to do with them both - first world problems….).

 

My current warhammer project is this custom space marine chapter:

[Jim Martin]

I've been into their Liverpool shop several times for advice about painting, and they've always been very helpful. I've never pretended to have any interest buying anything else (in fact, I've usually had a reference photo of a particular bit of railway equipment on my phone) and they've never tried to upsell me at all.

 

I find the GW business model really interesting. Businesses are always claiming to want "a relationship" with their customers. Usually, that's something utterly superficial: pay an annual "membership" and get some barely-there benefit in exchange (every year, the escalators at Merseyrail stations abound with ads for underwhelming offers of this kind from the football clubs) but here you've got a whole sector - because it's not just Games Workshop - where the shops are social hubs. Another sector that seems to have the same sense of authentic communities built around shops is knitting. It's fascinating how they've been able to secure the Holy grail of retail that way.

Edited October 18, 2023 by Jim Martin

[33C]

39 minutes ago, Jim Martin said:

the shops are social hubs. Another sector that seems to have the same sense of authentic communities built around shops is knitting.

This is the key I believe. A shop/meeting place/small cafe environment. Like minded individuals, relaxing, modelling, buying! There were three or four of these places in the high street, always popular and busy hubs of the community. The council whacks up the rent "to attract big names", this never happens and these big spaces sit empty and locked up. 

 

I seriously believe that ANYTHING that makes people happy, the council likes to trample on. Prove me wrong.

The Warhammer shop is a quarter of the size it was and you have to look for it...the shop it was in was empty for ages and is now a charity shop...

[Kickstart]

I still have my original Warhammer boxed set from the early 1980s. Never really played 40k, but a friend has tried to convince me to try Kill Team (40K skirmish game), so I have painted a few figures for that. 95% painted, but still need to do the banner.

Their paints are pretty good. The contrast paints are very good for figures (it is designed to flow into the low areas, to give you a highlight / lowlight easily). Not sure where the nearest Warhammer store is but my local games shop does stock Warhammer and paints, along with board games and some other miniatures.

 

As to their business model, not so sure. They have had some fairly dodgy tactics at times (they have a reputation for setting up a shop in a town where an independent is doing well with Warhammer, killing off the independent shop), and they seem to often rely on enthusiastic youngsters to run the shops on a shoe string.

 

But Warhammer World is good.

 

Their prices can be eye watering for what you get. Quick look on their web site and a box of 10 Genesteelers (a best seller) is £32, while in comparison Great Escape Games have a box of 10 western gunfighters (same scale, also plastic multipart figures) are £15, or from Warlord Games you can buy 20 plastic Napoleonic multipart figures with 4 metal command figures again in the same scale for £26. Or if you want to frighten yourself check the prices of their Forgeworld range.

 

As a game they have a habit of changing things very often, so what works as an army 1 year will likely be useless a year later. This appears to be deliberate to try and get more sales, both of the figures and also of the rules books / army lists.

 

Games Workshop is noticeably absent from most wargames shows (can't remember the last show I went to which they were at - possibly about 8~9 years ago at Salute in London when they were clearing out the Warhammer Historical range of games).

 

While I can see the advantage of their sales regime, I am not sure how this could be extended to something with a far lower ability to churn over new customers, and without the ability to minimise people buying 2nd hand instead (imagine if Hornby every few years changed their entire range to make it incompatible with what they had already sold).

 

All the best

 

Katy

[johnofwessex]

I have been to GW in Oxford, Salisbury and Bath where youngest and I are most welcome even if all he wants is a free figure and the opportunity to assemble and paint it

[33C]

2 hours ago, Kickstart said:

a game they have a habit of changing things very often,

Yes, that's why my lads wrote their own rules and modified anything I could find at the bootsale. 

I still have MY Jagd-rhino!

Two of them still have their entire armies, just in case, or cases!

[pete_mcfarlane]

9 hours ago, 33C said:

 He questioned the painting of the players miniatures. 4 colours minimum and only the company paints. When asked, my lads said, I had done them all for them(true), and with car spray paint and Humbrol. They were then told to leave. They called me from the corner phone box to pick them up. So....long story short, he left soon after, under a very big cloud.

A great, youth hobby, nearly ruined by one selfish individual.

Which reminds me of this Viz strip from a few years back: https://jodrell.org/2012/05/08/34-year-old-obsessive-war-workshop-assistant/

[Nearholmer]

3 hours ago, 33C said:

I seriously believe that ANYTHING that makes people happy, the council likes to trample on

Overall, I think you’ll find people tend to be happier than otherwise when their bins are emptied, their children get schools, their elderly relatives get care packages, stuff like that. So, councils aren’t total killjoys, just perennially skint and on the lookout for ways to increase income.

[33C]

Since most stuff is contracted out and not kept in-house, i haven't seen an improvement in my services which we all pay dearly for, so it's back to fleecing the motorist again, with LTN's, LEZ, ULEZ, Con Charge, Toll roads,tunnels and bridges, PCN's and ANPR. And if all this is to get me on, deregulated, public transport, HA! i tried it a couple of times, and 18 minutes, there and back, by car or, 2 hours and £7.95, by 4 buses, actually, 8 buses, because 4 of them drove straight past and/or closed the doors in our face. No contest. When i tried to complain, they locked me out of the office. Not that i'm bitter.............!

[Kickstart]

This popped up a couple of days ago

 

Quote

Thousands of men who secretly play table-top games with little plastic figures, have had their details published online in the latest high profile web security breach.

WAYNE’S BERKSHOP actively encourages its users to collect, paint and then argue about the rules for moving piles of badly painted models around a pretend battlefield that looks suspiciously like your dining table – and to do all of it behind their partner’s backs.

Espousing the ethos of ‘Life’s short, be a goblin’, the Nuttingham based company has strenuously denied that it’s products such as thier table-based Warplanner 40,000 undermine relationships as men disappear for entire Saturday’s with suspiciously light tool boxes and flimsy excuses about “Going over to Dave’s to watch Babestation”.

“It’s disgusting” said Claire Smith, a 33 year old mother from Suffolk, who is one of thousands of wives, girlfriends and boyfriends who have discovered that their partner held an account on the site. “I’d suspected for sometime that he was into ‘that’ type of thing, but I had no proof” she said, tearfully. “He’d often get plain packages in the post, but he just told me they were football DVDs and car manuals. I feel so stupid. When I saw his name on the list I immediately ran into the bedroom and found a shameful box of 50-sided dice, broken models and indecipherable yet impressively illustrated rule books, which he’d attempted to conceal beneath his back issues of Bra-Busters and a Katie Price autobiography. I feel like I don’t know him anymore, I just keep imagining him undercoating tiny little tanks with other men!”

37 year old Web Designer, Dan Jones (not his real name) agreed to talk to us following his recent ‘outing’.
“Sarah’s furious, I’m living in the shed” he said dolefully. “But on the plus side, there’s plenty of space here to air-dry my units from the 101st Airborne Lazertrons, and the ventilation’s good, I had a mate die from flock inhalation a few years back. Still, I don’t think people realise how many men are addicted to this. I mean everyone expects teenagers to dabble in this sort of material as part of growing up, but no one thinks that grown men are into it.”

“The thing is, you can’t bloody afford to buy all the stuff when you’re a kid, – 2 platoons of Moon Goblins and a Whackattack Ship just set me be back £60, and I broke half of them just trying to get them out of the sprues and lacerated my arm. I’ve got a skirmish on Saturday and I don’t even understand the warp-range offside rule! If I get thrashed by an 11 year old again I wont be able to show my face at the local store.”

Dan says he is trying to stop but that there isn’t any support for 35-50 year old’s who have lapsed into gaming. “I’ve cut up my credit cards and am trying to learn to play Monopoly and Trivial Pursuit, but just looking at a die with with only six sides makes me sick. I mean six sides?! What the hell can you calculate with that?”

All the best

 

Katy

[Reorte]

Little plastic figures? They've gone plastic? :( They were all whitemetal when I was a kid, other than some starting sets.

Edited October 19, 2023 by Reorte

[62613]

17 hours ago, 33C said:

This is the key I believe. A shop/meeting place/small cafe environment. Like minded individuals, relaxing, modelling, buying! There were three or four of these places in the high street, always popular and busy hubs of the community. The council whacks up the rent "to attract big names", this never happens and these big spaces sit empty and locked up. 

 

I seriously believe that ANYTHING that makes people happy, the council likes to trample on. Prove me wrong.

The Warhammer shop is a quarter of the size it was and you have to look for it...the shop it was in was empty for ages and is now a charity shop...

I would point out out that the council has no powers to up the rent on a business premises unless they own it. Businesss rates have been set by central government since about 2013 (unless that's been changed since), and local authorities receive a proportion back in their ever - shrinking rate support grant.