Apologia Primarchica |
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CrimsonFury
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Post subject: Apologia Primarchica  Posted: Thu Feb 19, 2004 2:41 pm |
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| Brood Brother |
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Joined: Wed Oct 29, 2003 2:04 pm
Posts: 766
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While Epic obviously won't sell as well in places without in-store support, IMO it will still do well enough for GW\Fanatic to continue producing and selling it (even in the US).
I read some interesting points about GWs marketing strategy in the Appendix of their 2003 final results. You can find the full article here: http://investor.games-workshop.com/Resu ... endix1.htm
Here are some quotes from the article (underlining added by me on points I thought were interesting)
In short the model is that of a niche business and the story is that it appeals to a relatively small number of
people devoted to the Games Workshop Hobby.
Niche businesses are not widely understood. They do not, generally, follow accepted business norms. Much
of what is written about business is written about varieties of mass-market activities; most of the day to day experiences we have are with mass-market companies. A niche business is a tightly focussed activity that knows that what it does is not for everyone, but for a narrow group of individuals. It knows that quality is more important than price, and that respect for the customer is paramount. It knows that mass-market advertising is expensive and for niche businesses ineffective compared to the power of word of mouth. These are a few examples of the differences, there are many others. |
This is what Games Workshop does; we create materials of the highest quality that appeal to a minority of
the population. The challenge for us is not to try to get everybody to buy our products but to reach out and
find the people who want them, anywhere in the world |
Secondly, our future growth is dependent above all on maintaining product quality, continuing to introduce
more people to the Hobby, and keeping people in the Hobby longer.
We do not need ?hit? lines, nor innovative packaging, nor cut-throat pricing.
Our customers are special and unusual people. They, like us, love their Hobby. Their main concern is with
quality and integrity. So our biggest challenge is to ensure we constantly provide a level of detail and service that is appropriate to and respectful of the devotion of our customers.
These are the keys to understanding Games Workshop: niche marketing and selling to a pre-selected, quality obsessed, narrow customer base.
As a Group we understand niche markets, providing excellent products and service to devoted gamers. That
is what we are good at, and that will continue to be our obsession.
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as opposed to Resent