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View Full Version : Selling before release okay? Does Time Zone matter?



JMichael
05-30-2013, 10:13 AM
Items seem to go live and for sale on GW.com at midnight GWT.
Does anyone (store manager?) know if LGS are allowed to sell new releases (i.e. Eldar) at midnight GWT per GW policy?
I live in California, U.S. and we are -8hours GWT, so 4pm local time. Is it okay for our stores to sell Eldar at 4pm local time on Friday the 31st?

Houghten
05-30-2013, 11:26 AM
My local store had a midnight release party for Dark Vengeance.

lobster-overlord
05-30-2013, 07:33 PM
As a former GW rogue trader independent store manager, I can tell you what GW told me back in the day....

Their release dates are SOFT, not HARD release dates. Yes, they don't want it released until then, but if you have solid customers who are top people for you, they can get their hands on things early. In a lot of cases, this helps with hype, especially if that customer will paint it up and have it ready for release day. In part, the black boxes they were doing for a couple of years were for this reason.

White Dwarf has gone to a HARD release date. They are NOT to be released early under penalty to the store. GW has changed their view in the last year, and I have not been involved with my local store lately, so I don't know if the policy changed this last year, but even as late as codex GK, my customers that were anticipating it or had preordered it could get it a day early. Walkins had to wait until saturday. Again, my rep had said this kind of service was cool by GW

John M>

JMichael
05-30-2013, 10:53 PM
Thanks Lobster,
The main reason I'm curious is in the hopes of talking my fav LGS to sell me the codex on Friday (as my Sat is booked).
Some of our stores do sell 1 day (midnight GMT) early, and even advertise it on their websites.

lobster-overlord
05-31-2013, 01:02 AM
your situation is exactly why we would sell 1 day early. Someone gungho for it who can't make it saturday...why delay it when you know it's going to be an advertiser for the product.

John M>

pauljc
05-31-2013, 05:03 AM
Not sure if it is dependent on territory, but as an independant stockist of GW, EU trade agreement specifies that GW have the right to 'punish' early sellers by witholding future new release items until a month after the release day.

So if I started selling Eldar to people today (Friday), and GW learn of it, they will hold back any future new release items from me until 1 month after the release.

magickbk
05-31-2013, 06:31 AM
The entire release thing is a mess. I used to preorder from GW mail order, but I received three straight preorders at least a week after they were in stores, and all were damaged. Now, I have to try to pick one up at one of a few local stores. One starts selling at midnight Friday, which I can't get to, and they also do preorders for their regular tournament players so they frequently sell out of new releases before the store opens Saturday. The others are lucky to get 3 copies of any book, so if you can't get there when they open, there isn't much of a chance of getting what you want. Pile the shortages from the Tau release in there, and you get a lot of sad gamers.

lobster-overlord
05-31-2013, 07:19 PM
Not sure if it is dependent on territory, but as an independant stockist of GW, EU trade agreement specifies that GW have the right to 'punish' early sellers by witholding future new release items until a month after the release day.

So if I started selling Eldar to people today (Friday), and GW learn of it, they will hold back any future new release items from me until 1 month after the release.

as of 2 years ago, we didn't have a penalty for anything early sold in the US (or at least not one that was being readily enforced). The last revision I saw added the White Dwarf provision though.

John M>

guard40k
07-02-2013, 10:53 AM
Why don't you ask at your local GW?

Tuatara
07-02-2013, 10:57 AM
Here in New Zealand we are 12 hours ahead of GMT and have the bizarre situation where the GW store won't sell till midday Saturday (midnight GMT) so you pop over to the LGS and they'll sell to you first thing in the am.

Morgrim
09-30-2013, 08:15 PM
In Australia they'll sell you the things as soon as the store opens on Saturday, but that only works out an hour or two earlier than midnight GMT at most. It'd be too much hassle to say there is a specific arbitrary time after opening that things can be sold.