# Games Workshop Half Yearly Figures 2013



## humakt (Jan 2, 2008)

GW have released their latest half yearly figures.

http://investor.games-workshop.com/2014/01/16/half-year-results-2013-2014/

It looks like they are down 25% on their sales for last year. This may seem bad, but looking at the figures under the covers they seem to be in a strong financial position even if there was no interim dividend.

Anyway I will leave you all to discuss.


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## scscofield (May 23, 2011)

Incoming rants about how the Man is putting us down....


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## mal310 (May 28, 2010)

Games Workshop’s half year results are horrendous. The shares dropped 20 percent today!!! Sales are down across the board. If the full year results are similar or worse the company could be in serious trouble! Now the sales figures are provided as a cash figure. In recent years the value of the sales have been going up, BUT it’s been generally acknowledged that the number of actual transactions (ie number of actual models sold as opposed to the cost of those models has been going down). With these numbers everything must be going through the floor! The sooner Tom Kirby goes the better. He seems to run the whole company to benefit himself financially. I’m not a Games Workshop hater but the company just does too many things that piss off their customers. I love the company that’s why I want Kirby to go and someone brought in who actually cares about customers instead of just seeing them as entities to drain money from.

There was also no dividend.


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## humakt (Jan 2, 2008)

mal310 said:


> Games Workshop’s half year results are horrendous. The shares dropped 20 percent today!!! Sales are down across the board. If the full year results are similar or worse the company could be in serious trouble! Now the sales figures are provided as a cash figure. In recent years the value of the sales have been going up, BUT it’s been generally acknowledged that the number of actual transactions (ie number of actual models sold as opposed to the cost of those models has been going down). With these numbers everything must be going through the floor! The sooner Mark Kirby goes the better. He seems to run the whole company to benefit himself financially. I’m not a Games Workshop hater but the company just does too many things that piss off their customers. I love the company that’s why I want Kirby to go and someone brought in who actually cares about customers instead of just seeing them as entities to drain money from.


Some big assumptions on the part of the internet here, although I think it would be helpful if Kirby was not Chairman and CEO.



mal310 said:


> There was also no dividend.


My mistake, I have corrected my original post, but it doesn't change my view.


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## bitsandkits (Mar 18, 2008)

Releases for that six months were a bit poor to be honest, a bad result to be fair but you cant be up every year, retail is about peaks and troughs, they are down in sales but they still made a decent pre tax profit, its when your business stops making a profit that your in trouble.


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## mal310 (May 28, 2010)

Sales volumes have been dropping for years. Any in-depth analysis of their yearly results will show this. Kirby’s answer to this issue has always been to raise prices and cut costs. This as a long term strategy is destroying the company. When profits have been announced massive dividends have been dished out to shareholders, of which Kirby is a massive holder. There is little to no money ‘in the bank’.

Far too many people have been priced out of the hobby and this in my view is disastrous. 

The company’s total paranoia around internet leaks and providing information is also bizarre. They seem to be of the view that sales will be damaged by people having prior knowledge of what is to be released!!! Black Library for example has went from an arm of the company that was universally loved to one that is now constantly bitched about because of a recent change in attitude towards its customers. Kirby has his paws all over that I fear. 

If sales continue to deteriorate at the rate they are (and a ten percent drop over a year for a company GW’s size is horrific) the company will go bust. That’s not scare mongering, that reality. 

The share price closed 25 percent down. A quarter of the value of the whole company gone in one day. 
Kirby needs to go. Now.


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## Straken's_Fist (Aug 15, 2012)

They still made 7 million in profits. It's not as if they are in trouble. You can fully expect them to be back at 100% of 2013 profits by the end of the year.


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## SilverTabby (Jul 31, 2009)

Did they mention whether any of that is due to the Hobbit going down as well as expected or not?

Also, last year was not a Core System re-release year.


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## fatmantis (Jun 26, 2009)

i dont understand much about all this finance stuff...but if what you smart people are saying..and the company is losing money wouldnt the other investors or directors be gunning for the top man??? wanting answers or a resignation?


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## bitsandkits (Mar 18, 2008)

fatmantis said:


> i dont understand much about all this finance stuff...but if what you smart people are saying..and the company is losing money wouldnt the other investors or directors be gunning for the top man??? wanting answers or a resignation?


the company isnt loosing money, the company has performed ok, it just hasnt performed as well as it did in the same period 12 months ago, but as silver mentioned it wasnt a core game release period, it was a pretty stagnant 6 months anyway, we had 2 months of Dark Elves ,lizardmen,eldar and apocalypse, dark elves,lizardmen and eldar are hardly the goto cash cow ranges, i think marines were in the period, but i dont think the space marine release really had much excitement to it and the marines got a lot of flack over the centurians models.

But as always its doom and gloom when ever one of these reports comes out, last year despite doing exceptionally well there were those in this very forum claiming the results were all just smoke and mirrors and despite having the numbers in black and white proving GW was doing well they still claimed the opposite, its been the same for years, and despite the predictions of GW going under within 18 months or corporate buy out by hasbro they are still here and still number one.

I look at it like this

GW MADE £7 MILLION PROFIT IN 6 MONTHS AND PEOPLE HAVE THEM DEAD AND BURIED,YET ALMOST EVERY OTHER MINIATURE WARGAME COMPANY IN THE WORLD WOULD KILL JUST TO HAVE £7 MILLION IN SALES GO FIGURE ???


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## Einherjar667 (Aug 23, 2013)

fatmantis said:


> i dont understand much about all this finance stuff...but if what you smart people are saying..and the company is losing money wouldnt the other investors or directors be gunning for the top man??? wanting answers or a resignation?


They aren't losing money since they posted a profit. However, heads will roll if that does happen.

Bit has it right.


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## Achaylus72 (Apr 30, 2011)

While in Australia GW gutted operational expenses to cover the 1 million pounds sale loss, creating a false profit.

This is the 7th straight year it seems that GW will fail to make a full year sales profit, yet again GW is forced into gutting its operational expenditure to cover the massive loss in sales revenue.

On the record i have been told that GW is expected to lose roughly 2 million pounds plus in sales for the full financial year


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## SilverTabby (Jul 31, 2009)

Losing that in sales is not the same as having that amount as a loss.


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## Achaylus72 (Apr 30, 2011)

SilverTabby said:


> Losing that in sales is not the same as having that amount as a loss.


You have to be kidding, surely you can't continually gut operational costs year in and year out for over a decade just to stay in business like GW Australia PTY LTD has done, in fact over the last 7 years alone they GW Australia PTY LTD has gutted over 13 million pounds out of their operations and have had over that time had lost in the order of of sales over 11 Million pounds.

Australia is looking at losing 2 million pounds and you think that's a good thing, way to go, you would be good as the Greek Federal Treasurer.

Oh by the way the rumour is now going around that GW will officially kill off Sisters of Battle, also Tomb Kings, Wood Elves and Bretonnians. Also there will be a reduction of available stock at B&M stores by a further 30% to 35%


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## Uveron (Jun 11, 2011)

The report could have been worse, the stock price hit will simply be on the fact they didn't issue a dividend. Which was the correct action for the health of the company. 

I expect that we will see Kirby find a new CEO in the next 16 months, he has almost finished re-structuring the company, so will be ready for the new broom.


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## SilverTabby (Jul 31, 2009)

Achaylus72 said:


> You have to be kidding, surely you can't continually gut operational costs year in and year out for over a decade just to stay in business like GW Australia PTY LTD has done, in fact over the last 7 years alone they GW Australia PTY LTD has gutted over 13 million pounds out of their operations and have had over that time had lost in the order of of sales over 11 Million pounds.
> 
> Australia is looking at losing 2 million pounds and you think that's a good thing, way to go, you would be good as the Greek Federal Treasurer.
> 
> Oh by the way the rumour is now going around that GW will officially kill off Sisters of Battle, also Tomb Kings, Wood Elves and Bretonnians. Also there will be a reduction of available stock at B&M stores by a further 30% to 35%


Please read what I wrote before you start putting words in my mouth. And making personal insults never helps your case, it just makes you come across as aggressive and lacking in a substansive responce.

What I said was there is a big difference between losing x off your profit margin, and having a loss of x. Nothing else. No mention of it being a good thing, nor that it was good working practice.

And whenever sales or stock go down, rumours like that start flying. Which is rubbish, because if you're having a hard time, of course cutting out a percentage of your player base will help...


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## Gret79 (May 11, 2012)

Right, thats it, it's the thin end of the wedge!

*Finds the tallest hill in the land*

TEH SKY IZ FALLING!:shout:

GW is RUINED FOREVER!

If GW australia lost 1 MILLION DOLLARS (raises little finger to mouth) in sales, that would need more context as to whether it was a loss or not.
How much did they sell for that financial period?

If they sold $50 and lost a million thats cause for concern. If they sold 5-6 million and were 1 million down on the last figures...well hey, they've still made 5-6 million from sales.



Bits&Kits said:


> GW MADE £7 MILLION PROFIT IN 6 MONTHS AND PEOPLE HAVE THEM DEAD AND BURIED,YET ALMOST EVERY OTHER MINIATURE WARGAME COMPANY IN THE WORLD WOULD KILL JUST TO HAVE £7 MILLION IN SALES GO FIGURE ???


Couldn't have said it better myself. Thats why B&K said it, not me :laugh:


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## Tawa (Jan 10, 2010)

Gret79 said:


> TEH SKY IZ FALLING!:shout:


Just as well I've got all this unopened stuff to hide under :laugh:


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## Grins1878 (May 10, 2010)

I'm pretty certain they won't be too bummed out by it all. They still produce some of the best miniatures out there and continue to update them and release new stuff monthly. I think they're pretty safe.


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## Mokuren (Mar 29, 2011)

bitsandkits said:


> the company isnt loosing money, the company has performed ok, it just hasnt performed as well as it did in the same period 12 months ago, but as silver mentioned it wasnt a core game release period, it was a pretty stagnant 6 months anyway, we had 2 months of Dark Elves ,lizardmen,eldar and apocalypse, dark elves,lizardmen and eldar are hardly the goto cash cow ranges, i think marines were in the period, but i dont think the space marine release really had much excitement to it and the marines got a lot of flack over the centurians models.


I suppose we'll have a better idea of how 2013 went when we'll have the full figures.



bitsandkits said:


> But as always its doom and gloom when ever one of these reports comes out, last year despite doing exceptionally well there were those in this very forum claiming the results were all just smoke and mirrors and despite having the numbers in black and white proving GW was doing well they still claimed the opposite, its been the same for years, and despite the predictions of GW going under within 18 months or corporate buy out by hasbro they are still here and still number one.


But finance *is* all about smoke and mirrors, and this is a financial report.

"But GW didn't lose money! The _profits_ are still high they're number 1!", that's the finest example of smoke and mirrors, and the worst part of it is that the rules of the game say that it's all that matters. Of course if you calculate the outcome of a time period based on the most convenient set of rules that you can appropriately "game" and call them "profits", you're going to improve, but what did these profits cost?

As it has already been said, higher prices and cost cuts. Yes, that is "necessary"... For a company the size of GW, which is why I believe that marketing and finance are killing the hobby. Just think of all the staff that was cut from the brick and mortar, the stores that have been closed outright. And oh, how to not forget the latest news: White Dwarf and Warhammer: Visions are going to be _english only_.

Sure, this might not be a problem for you english-speaking people, and before anyone goes "abloo abloo go learn ur english ******" consider the following: you're going to implicitly send the message you don't care for anyone that isn't a native english speaker and they're not welcome to be "part of the club" anymore, because you're not providing something you used to until a few moments ago. Is this bad? I think it's terrible from a PR standpoint, but financially? _Profit_.

Think of all the translators, all the editors, all the typesetters and related people that just lost their jobs because of this move. Oh, I'm not going to pretend GW doesn't need restructuring, I just want you to understand that _*£7 million*_ profits doesn't mean much if we don't know how much cost-cutting had to be done to net that amount, and what was lost because of it.

Yes, because you might still flaunt they have the biggest ePenis of all miniature companies worldwide, but you know, making profits has been disconnected from actual product quality and customer satisfaction from a long time, assuming such a correlation ever existed. GW has frustrated its fanbase plenty in 2013, especially the latter half, and I'm not talking about the usual internet whine: I myself have been circling around the hobby for nearly a decade but it's not until the days of eCodex that I've been told "Fuck you and your language, give us 26€ for pretty pictures on electronic paper that you already have or have already seen for free around the internet and some lazy copypasta of rules and fluff that you may or may not already have", or lately when I've been told "Remember when you ritually visited your FLGS and talked about the new issue of White Dwarf? Well fuck your language, go translate all your non-english speaking friends for free so we don't have to pay someone to do it".

This is not "oh, another price hike" or "abloo abloo codex creep spehs mhreens suck", these are explicit strategy choices that don't even try to hide how little to no care they have for anyone that doesn't fit their target audience. I thought I was pissed that Sisters didn't get new models after 20 years, but it's a laughable matter compared to the eCodex and White Dwarf "fuck you world" politics.

At this point, I'd rather GW go under.



bitsandkits said:


> GW MADE £7 MILLION PROFIT IN 6 MONTHS AND PEOPLE HAVE THEM DEAD AND BURIED,YET ALMOST EVERY OTHER MINIATURE WARGAME COMPANY IN THE WORLD WOULD KILL JUST TO HAVE £7 MILLION IN SALES GO FIGURE ???


Would they, really?

I absolutely hate the notion that if you're not BIGHUGE you're worthless and don't count for nothing. I don't care if all other miniature companies are pale, malnourished midgets scraping a living in the shadow of GW's sky-piercing ePenis, more money doesn't mean better things, and the company that makes most profits isn't the best company.

The only ones that benefits out of all these mind-blowing piles of money are shareholders, and every move Tom Kirby ever made was in their benefit. Which is also his own, of course. Let's stop pretending their financial report, or them making billions of "profits", has any benefit whatsoever for the customer base. It does not. We'll still see price hikes and cost cuts until we get another CEO because this one can't think of anything other than this, and I don't see why he should: it keeps working. From a _financial_ standpoint.

I'll stay with the small losers with no experience, no reputation and that will die because their profits are laughable as long as they keep providing what I'm looking for, thank you.


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## humakt (Jan 2, 2008)

Mokuren said:


> Sure, this might not be a problem for you english-speaking people, and before anyone goes "abloo abloo go learn ur english ******" consider the following: you're going to implicitly send the message you don't care for anyone that isn't a native english speaker and they're not welcome to be "part of the club" anymore, because you're not providing something you used to until a few moments ago. Is this bad? I think it's terrible from a PR standpoint, but financially? Profit.


As disappointing as it is that WD and Visions will be English only, as a trading company I'm guessing all that translation that was required may not have been cost effective. We have no idea the number of copies that were sold of the non speaking versions so have no idea if they even sold enough to cover the production cost. 

As much as you hate to admit it, GW is a public limited company. There job is too look after the share holders interests. Kirby may be the wrong man for the job, but currently I am happy with the product they make and the price is not so exorbitant that I can't buy what I want and play. 

GW appears to be successfully moving to digital format (people having been asking for this for years). They have no abandoned their paper buying customers and any digital device is usable for a majority of data slates produced. But your complaining about this saying its a money grabbing exercise. Well maybe it is but there is still a production or do you expect the Design staff to get paid nothing? 

The very fact that GW made £7 million profit after tax is a clear sign they are making money. The doom laddened rant you just posted does come across as somebody who dislikes Kirby and sees the latest results as an opportunity to hang him for his crimes against gamers.


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## Mokuren (Mar 29, 2011)

humakt said:


> As disappointing as it is that WD and Visions will be English only, as a trading company I'm guessing all that translation that was required may not have been cost effective. We have no idea the number of copies that were sold of the non speaking versions so have no idea if they even sold enough to cover the production cost.


I don't deny it's cost effective to do so, I'm actually more than certain it's been one of the most cost effective choices they make.

Employment is a cost, personnel is one of the highest expenses for most enterprises, and I'm sure GW is no exception, or they would still have plenty of brick and mortar with a plethora of staff around and still run official events all year long.

However, I'm saying that they've been producing translated content and then, all of a sudden, they're doing a change in release schedule for the White Dwarf that may or may not work, alongside this new monthly magazine, and cutting every translation. I don't know the figures, of course, but there _is_ a market outside of UK and US (and Australia, too, but I don't know how involved they feel considering the treatment I hear them receiving) and this market _will_ notice the change, and I'm pretty sure it won't like it.

They probably didn't have a choice from a strategical perspective, it doesn't mean it's going to be good for the fanbase or the customers or for making sure the game's legacy continues.




humakt said:


> As much as you hate to admit it, GW is a public limited company. There job is too look after the share holders interests. Kirby may be the wrong man for the job, but currently I am happy with the product they make and the price is not so exorbitant that I can't buy what I want and play.


I know GW is a public limited company, I know their job is to look after the share holders' interests, I'm not denying they're doing a good job at it. Except for not paying dividends, that's the entire reason shareholders keep invested, but I guess the company isn't so healthy as it first looks if they have to do that.

I'm just saying that the fact they're successful at making profit and looking after the share holders' interests doesn't mean everything they do is Objectively Right and none of their choices can be criticized by anyone ever because *LOOK £7 MILLION PROFITS NOBODY ELSE DOES THAT!

*They're two completely different and completely unrelated levels and one doesn't justify the other, I wish this kind of confusion would stop.



humakt said:


> GW appears to be successfully moving to digital format (people having been asking for this for years). They have no abandoned their paper buying customers and any digital device is usable for a majority of data slates produced. But your complaining about this saying its a money grabbing exercise. Well maybe it is but there is still a production or do you expect the Design staff to get paid nothing?


Of course people have been asking for years to get digital releases, nearly any other gaming and wargaming company did that already, I was personally starting to wonder if they were aware dinosaurs no longer roamed the earth.

I'm saying their digital releases have a cost that I cannot personally justify: you can say that roleplaying games are completely different from wargames and you'd be right, but a book with rules and pretty pictures is a book with rules and pretty pictures no matter what the exact contents are, and no digital book with pretty pictures I ever bought had a price tag anywhere close to what GW is asking for what I find to be, in comparison, a small amount of poorly laid out copypasta.

This is my personal opinion, of course.



humakt said:


> The very fact that GW made £7 million profit after tax is a clear sign they are making money. The doom laddened rant you just posted does come across as somebody who dislikes Kirby and sees the latest results as an opportunity to hang him for his crimes against gamers.


I couldn't care less about how much they're making money and, again, what I'm saying is that this *£7 MILLION PROFIT!!!* that keeps getting tossed around doesn't mean shit if you don't go and look just how these figures came into being, and like I said I strongly believe it's been due to cost cuts, which already brought very visible results, the latest of which being an english-only WD.

I don't have a crystal ball and can't roll on the divination table for powers, but I've been seeing my share of companies relying on cost-cutting and little else since around 2007 and most of them have fallen apart or are in the process of doing so. They've cut on brick and mortar, they cut on translators, what else are they going to cut on next? Because restructuring and cost optimization are nice words, but when they don't just get rid of inefficiencies or bring innovative processes and practices, it simply means they're kicking people out.

If their current profits are happening because of restructuring and cost-cutting and have little other substance behind the game of finance, it might be a problem in the long-term because if they don't find a way to turn the tables before they run out of costs to cut they're actually going to have losses. I am aware they're working on this but, like with their digital move, I think they're coming to bear more than a bit late and more clumsily than they should.


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## Einherjar667 (Aug 23, 2013)

I only heard WD was going to be printed in English only, nothing about the rulebooks or codexes or army books. So won't they need their translators still?


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## Uveron (Jun 11, 2011)

Einherjar667 said:


> I only heard WD was going to be printed in English only, nothing about the rulebooks or codexes or army books. So won't they need their translators still?


Different departments, and its the amount of translators needed. 4 Codex's a year can be outsourced. Something each week, that starts to cost!


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## Einherjar667 (Aug 23, 2013)

Uveron said:


> Different departments, and its the amount of translators needed. 4 Codex's a year can be outsourced. Something each week, that starts to cost!


Ah, true, the weekly thing escaped me. That makes more sense.


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## venomlust (Feb 9, 2010)

The manager at my local GW store is being let go because the store's sales weren't high enough. 

I understand they expect a certain amount of sales and such, but damn, they really don't make it easy for him! They won't even supply him with new terrain. He'd have to pay for it out of his own pocket. How ridiculous is that?

They need to start supporting their stores a lot more if they want the kind of traffic that generates the dollars they expect.


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## Achaylus72 (Apr 30, 2011)

SilverTabby said:


> Please read what I wrote before you start putting words in my mouth. And making personal insults never helps your case, it just makes you come across as aggressive and lacking in a substansive responce.
> 
> What I said was there is a big difference between losing x off your profit margin, and having a loss of x. Nothing else. No mention of it being a good thing, nor that it was good working practice.
> 
> And whenever sales or stock go down, rumours like that start flying. Which is rubbish, because if you're having a hard time, of course cutting out a percentage of your player base will help...


Yeah, my bad, my appologies over the hissy fit.


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## SilverTabby (Jul 31, 2009)

Achaylus72 said:


> Yeah, my bad, my appologies over the hissy fit.


That's ok, we all have our moments. :grin:


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