LGS Project idea, rebuilding a WFB community..

[pauljc]

So, taking some inspiration from similar projects I've tried in the past, Tale of 4 Gamers kind of stuff, etc.

Situation is, that in my LGS community, the WFB is a bit sparse. People are interested, but getting them into the same location at the same time to play can often be more tricky than people thing. Naturally, as a LGS manager, I want to continue building my sales and customer base.

I've got this idea for a community army building project, that would go something like I have outlined below:

The project can be joined by beginners or vets alike. But some commitment is required from all participants.

-- Everyone begins by purchasing an army book for the army they wish to begin
-- Each participant purchases enough models to build an initial 500 pts. Participants could perhaps benefit from a certain level of discount.
-- Next, everyone builds an army list for 500 pts, following the rules for army construction as closely as possible (25%+ Core, minimum 3 units, etc).
-- The group has a month to paint the initial 500 pts, and in that time, we all get together to play 500 pt games, or allied games. Naturally, I would take part also. In addition to building a new army under a controlled, motivated environment, players also learn how to play the game and their new army.
-- At the start of the second month, the participants buy another 250 pts worth of minis to add to their list, paint them up, and now we all play with 750 pts.
-- The next month a further 250 pts is added, and so on and so on.. up to 2000 pts, at which point, the plan is that the LGS would have a rich WFB gaming community going.

The LGS's forums or website could follow the event with staff/gamer write-ups, tracking progress, showing off photos, and generally helping to inspire and motivate the rest of the community. And of course, the LGS makes consistent sales, and even inreases their customer base.

So basically, this plan contains many benefits, from my point of view, especially for new or younger players. Army list building, painting and modelling, learning the game, community, making informed purchases, etc.

I'm still toying with the idea in my head, looking for areas where it won't work, or where I can add to it.


Any input would be appreciated!

[Atrocity]

Sounds like a great slow grow league sort of starter. The only issue that really comes to mind is the percentage system that Fantasy now operates on might make it difficult to field certain Lords/Heroes at 500 points. This is fine for the most part, as a fully decked out vampire lord/slann/Tzeentch sorc. is rough at that level. Just certain armies will be more constrained earlier on than others. The fixes for this off the top of my head are to either relax the point limit on some Lord/Hero choices early on (within reason of course) or to start out at a slight higher points limit (~750?)

I do think that starting out at a low points value, 500 like you suggested, makes it seem like much less of a cash grab. Much more friendly and lowers the barrier to entry considerably. Feels like it's being done primarily with players in mind, and isn't a high pressure situation that many stores would try to pull. Growing at 250/month is also a big part of this too methinks.

Cheers to you, wish more LGS's did something like this more often.

[Lord Azaghul]

Main thing: LGS needs to provide an incentive to BUY at the store. Getting players in the store spending money and encouraging other to do the same is a huge key - get them excited about it.

Asking for players to drop 150$ at retail can be a bit rough, and then an additional 50$ a month...it adds up! The store offering a nice discount to these core gamers would really help.

The game 'looks' neat, you just need to get ppl to bite. Gamers WILL spend money if they like something, offering them a cheaper buy in is a good start IMO.

My store is currently offering the IoB set for 60$ just to get ppl back in the game!

[T-ORK-amada]

At the time I managed my LGS, we did something similar to what you described. What we did was if you buy a battalion, or a battalion equivalent, you would get a blister under $20 for free. We ran it buy our GW rep and got him to throw us the blisters/small boxes for free. It was a hit and we did it a few times. Every time was a success. It got our newer players into the hobby and got them a good start on their army and gave an excuse for the old salts to start a new army or expand an existing one.

[pauljc]

Thanks for the responses, and useful feedback.

The idea is definitely geared toward the players as much as it is about increasing sales. My business philosophy is that good products sell themselves, and that customers usually know if they're going to buy something or not. My job is to help them make informed decisions.

I have pretty solid gaming groups going for all the major gaming systems, from Magic TCG to Infinity and Flames of War. But WFB always seems to be a sticky one. The funny thing in my city, is that a lot of the kids (early teens) are into WFB, and the older ones go for 40K. That's why I wanted to keep the initial costs kinda low at first.

[magickbk]

An Escalation League is great for getting people in the store and playing, and usually results in strong initial sales. Where they usually go wrong is month 2-3. At this point, you have a number of players signed up. About 20% won't have money the next month to buy their next army chunk, for a variety of unimportant reasons. These people really won't ever catch up to the group. Another 20% won't get their painting block done for 'real life' reasons. These people are also unlikely to catch up to the group. Another 10% will disappear on vacations, with family issues, etc. At this stage, 50% of your sign-up group is effectively out of the event, and the others will start to dwindle as they tire of playing each other repeatedly.

I've run large leagues and tournaments at Independent Retailers as a non-employee, and I also worked for GW for 4 years. What I learned is, as soon as you look at the financials, your event is already heading down the wrong path. Keep your costs low to run the thing, by all means, but don't force purchases. If you build the ultimate community, people will be knocking your door down to shove their money in your register.

Here are some suggestions:
1. Fun. If people enjoy themselves, they will be at your store to play, and they will work on their armies, and they will spend their money. Some things you can do to promote fun:
a. Host a weekly or semi-weekly special crazy event. Encourage people to make something new and ridiculous for it, but don't require it. These can be hero battles, wizard battles, monster battles, bring a core unit battles, etc. Something outside the norm, one-off, and most importantly, accessible to everyone and simple to prepare for.
b. Host a painting competition. You will either need to bring in some non-biased judges, or have the group vote on the entries. Don't enter yourself.
c. Build some awesome scenery. Seriously. Nobody wakes up and rushes down to the store to put their army on an unpainted sheet of plywood. People will try to be first in line to play on the new table you've constructed for the event.
2. Find a way to keep people who may not be building quite as quickly involved. A challenge board/pyramid is a good way to do this. Battles on the lowest rung are 500, and increase at every step. If someone wants to get to the top of the board, they are going to need to expand their army to one large enough to play the big battle at the top (say, 2500 points).
3. Host painting nights, and clinics. Ask some of your better painters from the group if they would be willing to teach some techniques if you aren't the best painter yourself.
4. Track progress by improving/completing models or units. For example, I might already have enough skeletons for my Tomb Kings. Don't make someone re-buy basic stuff if they have it. They probably already bought it from you. I may have slapped some paint on them. But if I add some shading/highlighting and touch up the detail work, and base them, then that should count towards the expansion.

Not all of this will work for you, and only you know your players. But my experience has been that you need to separate your accounting from your event planning. Your loyal players already gave you their money, and you should reward them with cool events. This will keep them excited, and they will spend money. It will keep the player base active, which will draw new players, who will give you their money. But always, always, the money comes from the hobby, not by trying to find ways to make the hobby generate money, if that makes any sense.

Hopefully something in this will be helpful to you.

[T-ORK-amada]

If you want to keep it low cost and slow build, try Warhammer Skirmish and Mordhiem.

[weeble1000]

I think Magickbk has some fantastic ideas.

As a player, I get very excited when I seem my LGS making an honest effort to support what I love to do, and I like to respond in kind as a way to show that this support is a valuable part of the business. This not only means making a deliberate effort to spend money in the store, but also to lend a hand and help wherever I can.

But as Magickbk has said, a vibrant gaming community with support from the LGS definitely brings money in. I know that I always end up spending more on the hobby when I'm in the store every week playing and having a good time. It's a natural extension of being around the products while enjoying their use. Would I buy that cool new pack of dice if I wasn't playing in the store every week and only swinging by to make a deliberate purchase? Probably not. But if I'm playing with my army, enjoying it, and I know that there's a sweet set of dice on the shelf that would be perfect for my magic phase, one week I'll have cash in my wallet, make the purchase, and excitedly use it in a game that night.

A lot of what I saw in Magickbk's suggestions were ways to keep things fresh and interesting for customers. I think this is very important because hobbyists can get bogged down and bored in a long term project like assembling and painting more ghouls every week to increase the size of one's Vampire Counts army. Simple, low commitment activities and events can be a great way to reinvigorate interest. Bored of building ghouls? Well next week I can build a crazy-cool wizard for the special event. I can use this model I have as a base, but I'll definitely need to pick up this kit, and it looks like I'm all out of Red Gore paint.

Little projects like these can also help boost the confidence of customers that might have a hard time finishing up larger projects like a new army. For example, even if I'm still fielding half-painted models in the 4th month of the escalation league, everybody in the store might have gotten excited about a cool piece of terrain I built and donated for the event last week.

[magickbk]

Your thread got me to thinking about all my old events more than I have in a few years, and while I was driving home from work last night, I thought of some other points:
-Limit how many times each of your players can play against each other each week. This forces people to play outside their regular circle of opponents. You'll frequently find that in stores, the players end up splitting up into groups. These generally run along the lines of 'the old guys', the 'competitive guys' the 'kids from the local high school', etc. You need to be able to get all these players playing against each other to have a successful community.
-Considering coordinating the event with something going on online, such as the Storm of Magic campaign. This will give your players an opportunity to get even more excitement and inspiration by seeing what other people are doing elsewhere in the world.
-If you have a new table/terrain, put it on the most prominent table, and give the players with the most fully/well painted armies priority to play on it.
-Consider using an alternate mission/battle selection chart. This can force your players to use all the scenarios, try others they might not have otherwise, or play some that you've managed to scavenge from a variety of sources: tournament packets, White Dwarf articles, campaign booklets, the GW website, etc. You could also vary this throughout the event, or have a special scenario each week: for example, in week 3, allow your players to roll on the chart or choose to play the Death Match scenario (available on the GW website). Make it so that they can only play that scenario that week. Making sure the scenarios stay balanced also forces the players to build balanced armies.
-Utilize your players for help. Use the right ones. These may not always be the first volunteers, and they might not be the most prominent group members. You will need to know who is the best to use for certain things. The guy who comes in every week with a different one of his kid's old toys painted bright green as terrain isn't the right one to help you build the store tables. The guy who comes in once a month but can build a Games Day quality table out of $30 in materials from the local Home Depot is the right guy.
-Clean up the gaming area. Seriously. Your store might be brightly lit and have a dedicated room with tables, chairs, etc, or it might be a few temporary tables that get brought out each weekend in the stock area. Either way, try to keep it neat and tidy. Clean the floor, repaint the walls every few years, etc. Your younger players' parents need to feel as if they are letting their kids go somewhere nice.