Black Friday

As we did last year, we will open at 5  a.m. on Black Friday (that's the Friday after Thanksgiving for those who missed the hoopla), with the front two tables packed full of merchandise including booster displays of Magic and Yu Gi Oh, Pathfinder and D&D books, assorted graphic novels, Warhammer 40,000 and Warhammer Fantasy Battle items and more.
  Each hour discounts on the items on the tables will progressively drop according to the following schedule:

5 a.m. to 6 a.m.  10% off

6 a.m. to 7 a.m.  20 off

7 a.m. to 8 a.m. 30% off

8 a.m. to 9 a.m. 40% off

9 a.m. to 10 a..m. 50% off

Yes the discounts are lower earlier in the day, but you have a much better selection.  You can wait until the 50% off hour rolls around but we will likely have sold out of the best stuff.  We will also have a few unannounced sales that will only last for an hour but you will have to be at the store to take advantage of them.

We will also have toasted bagels and cream cheese for those who haven't had breakfast yet.

More on Pricing

Most stores hear several times a month, if not weekly, “Wow, you have such and such.  I have been looking for this for a long time.”  Looks at the price. “Oh, well I was looking for this for a reasonable price.”

Most customers don’t realize that stores do set items at a reasonable price (after all, we are in business to sell stuff) but that price has to take into consideration both scarcity and demand. 

 There is a reason why the Dark Tower boardgame sells for $400 on Amazon and Advanced HeroQuest lists for around $200, while a Theros Thassa’s Bounty sells for a dime or less.  Dark Tower is scarce, Thassa’s Bounty much less so.  There are millions of Thassa’s Bounty cards in print, while no one is making any more Dark Tower or Advanced HeroQuest games (unless Games Workshop or whomever holds the copyright to Advanced HeroQuest decides to do another print run).  People who own copies of either AHQ or Dark Tower generally have a pretty good idea of the value of the game and won’t turn loose of it unless 1) they get what they consider a reasonable price for the game, 2) really need the money or 3) find something they want more. Generally stores get in these games under conditions 2 or 3, as purchasing a product #1 doesn’t leave much profit for the store.

The other major factor coming into play here is demand. There is demand out there for Thassa’s Bounty cards, plenty of demand, but nowise enough to absorb all of the cards that WOTC has put into print.  Conversely, there is demand out there for Advanced HeroQuest and Dark Tower, much more demand than the few copies available can satisfy, driving  the price of those few available copies way up beyond what most people consider “reasonable”.  However, if you really want a copy of the game, either because it will fill out an empty spot in your collection or you have fond memories of it from your youth (which is what drove sales of the reprints of 1^st and 2^nd edition AD&D books WOTC release over the past year), $400 is a “reasonable price” to pay for Dark Tower, especially a working copy of the game (our last copy only worked sporadically and sold for $250).

The Rule of Pricing Equivalency

The rule of pricing equivalency says "Similar items should be priced similarly".  This especially comes into place when size is an issue. Take, for example, soda and bottled water.

when you buy a bottle of water, you get....water. When you buy a bottle of soda, you get.... water, flavoring, carbonation, sugar (or other sweeteners) and flavoring.  Yet customers willingly pay the same price for either, because they are the same size, even though you get much more with the bottle of soda.

Same thing with games.  Customers willingly pay $24.99 for Munchkin, even though it has only a deck of cards and a rule sheet (and a reputation).  However, I can point to a number of games that have come out packaged smaller than Munchkin, with similar contents but with a price point twice as much, that just sit there.  Why?  Equivalency.  Unless either the retailer or the publisher works to show the customer why the game in the smaller box is worth more than Munchkin (and this is where promotion comes in), the customer is going to look at the two boxes, see the $24.99 price point on Munchkin, see the much higher price point on the other game and decide the game is not worth it. The customer doesn't know anything about printing costs or economics of scale or branding, they just know that they have two games in front of them that look the same size with the same contents, but one costs twice as much.  Which one do you think the customer will choose?

Revolving Door

The news that Publisher Services Inc hired one of Target's employees who was responsible for game buying at the chain doesn't matter much to the average consumer.  However it is rather interesting to those within the industry as PSI is the company responsible for putting most specialty games on the shelves at Target.  I guess PSI thought he did a pretty good job and wants to use his expertise in getting their clients' products on the shelves in other chains.

Comic Values and Pokemon Values

If you collect comics, planning to sell them at a later time to fund a car, college, house, etc. read this first.  Back in the late 90s, when Pokemon was hot and I had people lining up outside the store for the new set, I had people planning to hold onto their collections or buying cards for their kids, expecting to sell them later when the price appreciated.  I always told the parents, and tell parents who look at Yu Gi Oh card prices now, "Don't do it."  Most cards (and comics) have not held value over the long term.

With very rare exceptions, you will get almost nothing (and by almost nothing I mean a nickel to 10 cents) for any comic published during the past 20 years.  Scarcity drives up price and too many people held on to their comic collections, and Magic collections, and Pokemon collections, and Yu Gi Oh collections, expecting they would get more valuable over time.  There is a reason Bayou sells for between $50 to $1100; no more are getting printed and there are not that many around. 

The Egyptian God Cards for Yu Gi Oh used to sell for $30+.  However, Konami has reprinted them several times, bringing  the price for some of them to the $3-4 range.  Vampire Lord, at one time a $20 card, now sells for a dime.

The other factor driving prices is demand. There is not a huge demand for older comics, nor older Pokemon cards.  I might sell a comic for $3-$4 that I only offer you a dime for, but I will also probably keep that comic (or card) in inventory for a reaaaaal long time.

Halloween at Castle Perilous

Here's a schedule of events for Thursday, October 31, otherwise known as Halloween, (or All Hallow's Eve):

All Day:  Come in, enjoy some free mulled cider, and get a free comic off the Free Comic Book display, 2 comics if you are a preferred customer, 1 more for each stamp you earn on your Castle Card

4 p.m.   Halloween HeroClix 

Trick or Treat Golden Age 600 pt
Before a character is given any non free action you must roll a d6. On a 1-3 you have been tricked and modify -1 to all combat values this turn. On a 4-6 you have received a treat and modify all combat values by +1 this turn.

5 p .m.  Warhammer 40,000

5 p.m. to 8 p.m.  Trick or Treating   Candy and comics for all who come in costume. Free mulled cider and hot dogs, while quantities last.

8 p.m.   Costume Contest.  Prizes for Cutest, Most Original, Most Elaborate, Viewers' Choice.

8:30  p.m.  Raffle prize drawing.  Must be present to win or arrange for someone to collect for you.  Over $1000 worth of prizes including a booster box of Magic 2014 and boosters of HeroClix Fear Itself.  Get one ticket for coming in (as long as you are in good standing with the store), one if you are a preferred customer, one if you are in costume,  one for each 5 canned food items brought in (no tomato sauce or ramen)  and one for each stamp you earn on your Castle Card.

 

The Boardgame Trend Continues

One of the runaway hits from last GenCon, Gale Force 9’s Firefly boardgame, finally made it into distribution. Firefly, which sold hundreds of copies within tens of minutes to eager customers has done quite well since it hit store shelves and represents trend number one:  a company gets started in another area of the gaming industry moves into boardgames.

Gale Force 9 got its start producing a wide assortment of products to use in sculpting and modifying miniatures.  Until GF9 came onto the scene, miniatures games were whatever tools they could find in hardware stores or the tools available from either The Armory or Games Workshop .  Unfortunately, Alliance Distribution, which inherited the Armory line when Chessex Distribution and The Armory merged, does little to promote the line and Games Workshop sets a premium price point on its products.  Into the void between the two came Gale Force 9, offering a wide selection of basing materials and tools, with high quality display materials and decent promotion.  As time went on, the company developed serious in-stock problems but that’s not germane to the discussion.  What’s important is that a miniature accessory company has decided to enter the boardgame industry following several others that started off in other parts of the industry, then moved into boradgame development.

AEG got its start with role-playing but it is probably better known for the Legends of the Five Rings TCG.  However, boardgames have accounted for most of the company’s recent major releases. Same thing with Fantasy Flight, which has almost abandoned RPGs.  A few years have elapsed as well since Steve Jackson Games has released a print RPG, closing instead to Munchkinize the world, while Privateer, Paizo and Cryptozoic have all released entries in the deckbuilding genre., significantly removed from the areas in which they got their start. While Paizo and Privateer still remain strong in their original fields, Cryptozoic has completely abandoned its TCG base to move into traditional and deckbuilding cardgames.