Mystery of the Abbey is in a few french monastery shops. I don’t know if it sells a lot there.
Carcassonne is in most of the tourist shops in Carcassonne.

Hi Greg,

I’ve often heard companies talk about getting into these specific markets when they have a product with a matching theme. Unfortunately, it just isn’t that easy. Just because a game is the correct subject matter, it doesn’t mean these retailers are going to be jumping up and down for it. They’ve already got more than enough product. What they need is more sales. So when a game comes out on dogs, are all pet stores going to carry it? No way. And even if the stores carry this game, is it going to sell well? Who knows?

One of my favorite examples of this type of marketing was years ago when DALLAS was the big tv show. The big game companies as well as SPI and Yaquinto brought out DALLAS games. All of them were failures. Because the people who loved watching DALLAS on tv had no interest in games.

I tried this marketing approach (on a very small scale of course) when I published MUSH for my company White Wind. I advertised in several dog magazines, bought a mailing list and sent out flyers to pet stores, and even called a few pet stores. I think my total sales to pet stores was less than 10 copies!

For years, the book stores resisted carrying games. I was at meetings with some of them when I worked for F.X. Schmid/Ravensburger USA. Their attitude was that they sold books, not games, and they just didn’t know how to sell games, and they didn’t think games would sell in their stores. In this case, the retailers were wrong, but they discovered this on their own, and now you can find games in book stores year round, which is awesome (except that none of my games have ever been in B&N).

Other potential problems include the ability to get into the distribution channel for a new market, dealing with professional buyers for chain stores who change yearly or monthly, dealing with retailers directly that have never bought games before and may have different terms of sale than game companies are used to, etc. As another example, again from FX/RAV, I bought the license to a product called NOAH’S PARK. I really thought this license had huge potential the licensor assured me that they could facilitate FX/RAV getting into the Christian market and Christian retailers. It just didn’t happen for some of the reasons I’ve mentioned here. The market is controlled by one or two big distributors. You basically have to beg them to take your product AND agree to their terms which are of course very favorable to them, or you don’t get in. But even if you do get in, you are product 3004 on their list so it isn’t like they are pushing your product.

The other problem is that companies may not have the personnel to persue these “opportunities.” Most companies function with the smallest possible staff, and many of them are doing everything they can just to stay afloat. They can’t afford to hire someone else to attack a new, special market, and they can’t afford to take someone off their current job to do it either. Marketing without having enough money to advertise on tv is a tough job, and not a fun one in my experience. So what you call a lack of creativity on the part of game companies, I would call a lack of money and time, and in many cases a simple matter of risk vs. reward.

To end on a positive note, one effort in this area that I believe is going to be very successful is the TICKET TO RIDE MARKLIN Edition.

Alan

Thanks for the insight, Alan.  As mentioned, I am NOT privy to such insider information.  I figured that cost was a factor, but I do know that large companies such as Hasbro have entire marketing divisions to handle the promotion of games.  I actually contacted them in the early days of the Avalon Hill acquisition and shared a bunch of ideas.  To my knowledge, all of them were completely ignored.  Being ignored is something I’m used to! :o)

While I agree that small companies might find it financially prohibitive to pursue such marketing tactics, larger companies already have divisions or individuals in place whose job it is to promote and market the games.  I just don’t see much creativity happening in these areas.

Regarding the smaller companies, has there ever been an effort to pool resources to hire someone or a firm to attempt new marketing ideas?  Just a thought ...

As for large companies that have the budget being creative, I think they often try to be. I think the reason you don’t hear about it much is that these efforts are often not successful (I’m sorry if that sounds like I’m using circular logic to support my opinions), which just goes to show how difficult it is to open up new markets. Plus, many companies that are successful with business as usual see no reason to change. Of course, if their sales fall off, it can then sometimes be too late to change. The best companies in the world change with the times. My favorite example being 3M. The Minnesota Mining Company now certainly has little or nothing to do with Mining. It is still successful though because it changed with the times. I can’t think of a game company that has ever made this kind of change.

I don’t know of an attempt by small companies to pool their resources to hire a marketing firm. But again, even if ten small companies combined, I doubt they would have enough resources (cash) to make it work. Cash flow is the death of most small companies. So if I’m running a small game company and I have a few thousand dollars in cash, do I keep it as a reserve, pay myself with it, produce an extra game, or use it to hire a marketing expert? I know what I’d do. Plus, my experience with companies hiring marketing firms (limited as it is) is that the only company that makes money on this deal is the marketing company! Sort of like that author who writes a book on how to become a Millionaire.

Alan

I know from talking with publishers that the three-tier system in the game store industry makes this an easier market to crack than other retail sources. You can sell your game to probably 4 distributors and have access to 90% of the game shops. There are lots of smaller distributors as well, but most every shop orders from at least one of the biggies. My understanding is that with gift shops and educational stores (two natural places that games could expand into) you are dealing direct with the shops and not working through a distributor. Note that both Educational Insights and Thinkfun have sales staffs and are taking on many of the roles that the distributor does in the game store market.

When you have an established publisher-distributor-retailer system in place (like in game shops, also comics shops and independent bookshops, there are still a few of those left, yes?) it is easier to focus on selling through those channels. When you want to break into those other markets, you have to do a lot more grunt-work, hand-selling individual shops and handling fulfillment and getting paid. It is a lot more work. Almost a whole different model than what publishers face selling to game shops. I think that’s why you see a company like Educational Insights, that has this whole other sales and distribution arm, better able to get Blokus into gift shops and such than other game companies.

Even in the game store market it can be hard for single publishers to get noticed and paid.

http://www.impressionsadv.net/

Impressions Advertising & Marketing handles, I believe, the soliciting of orders from distributors, fulfillment of the product and collects the money. They take a cut, of course, but it allows small game publishers to focus on the game and know they will get paid in a timely manner.

The problem with getting Scream Machine specifically themed and sold through amusement parks is they view that sort of thing as a licensing opportunity and would want at least a cut and maybe money upfront and shift most of the risk of selling it to the game company.

Realities of the market aside, Greg, are there really that many people at these fringe locations looking for games like these?  Victory & Honor is a very difficult game with an opaque rule book; somehow I doubt that Uncle Sid, the Civil War fanatic, is going to be too thrilled getting this as a gift.  Scream Machine is a pretty straightforward game, but probably much more complex than anything the average Disney tourist has ever seen.  And Modern Art in a museum?  I just don’t see many people enjoying that purchase.  I know you like the tie-in idea, Greg, but I just don’t see too many people getting a positive reaction from it.  Folks looking to buy games usually don’t have any trouble finding them; people looking to buy souvies won’t be expecting (or appreciating) things of this complexity.

Being in sales and marketing myself, Greg has the right concept.  And Alan correctly tied in the fact that the subject material (ex: dogs) must be effectively matched to a corresponding interest in games. 

For instance, selling a “dog” based boardgame in a pet store may not be the best application here because there is no concrete understanding that the customer that walks into the store is looking for an entertainment option as well.  They just want to get in, get their dog their Puppy Chow and be off to the next chore, right?

Marketing surveys, everyone!

BTW, great topic Greg!  Wonder where the inspiration came from to write about this?  (LOL) : ) Anyway, VERY interesting discussion but I am literally off to Disney World at this very moment… so I will have to pick up more of the discussion later and will have more to offer.

Hi Greg,

I think your topic is right on but I want to give credit where it is due.  For a period of time in 2005 Eagle Games handled distribution for Uberplay and I can say that Arc of the Covenant and Settlers of Zarahelma are carried in many (certainly not all) religious stores (this was in place before we started our work with them).

One of our (Eagle Games’) targets for Railroad Tycoon has been the railroad museums so your thought isn’t lost on us :-). 

Depending on the structure/manpower of the company I think it can be very difficult to spin off into non-traditional channels.  Not that it isn’t sometimes worth the effort, but I think that most companies are run pretty lean so the time required to get a relationship/partnership off the ground can be a little prohibitive.  Also, sometimes the return just isn’t worth the effort and may not be affordable.  Several license negotiations I have been privy to often involve money up front.  Combine that with production cost and it becomes a non-trivial cash burden.  For a theme park, the amount of money that the games might bring into a theme park are probably minimal relative to other sources of revenue and my guess (and it is only a guess) the parks would see it as a favor to enter into an agreement so they would expect to extract a lot.  All this combined with the fact that I think most game companies that make it are somewhat risk averse (which is reinforcing your point I think) this leads to a preference to stick with what they know.