John Coviello of Little Shop of Magic saw the news about Days of Wonder going exclusive with Diamond-Alliance (see “Days of Wonder Goes Exclusive” ) and says it’s a “bad idea:”
In response to DoW's announcement of their exclusive distribution agreement with
As retailers we may fool ourselves into thinking this has little effect on us and, considering the minor weight of DoW within our industry, that may be true in the short run. The real problem, however, lies in what these kinds of practices will mean for us and the end consumer in the long term. How cheap do you think Wal-Mart prices really would be if they succeeded in eliminating ALL opposition as Diamond has with the comics industry?
It's time to stop kidding ourselves and to take a stand: we HAVE to send the message to both
Stop dealing with
We personally plan on dropping the entire line and not restocking it until either:
DoW drops the exclusive deal or, they go out of business.
We killed GW's products for years and managed to do just fine - now we're back to dealing direct thanks to their change in tune. We stopped carrying Wizkids TMG's and our TMG sales are up 25% since that decision (thank you, D&D and Star Wars miniatures). These may look like foolish decisions, especially when you consider that miniatures account for 40% of our total yearly business, but they worked for us in the end.
We know that each and every one of us can afford to drop DoW and let them swim on their own for a while. You can always choose games from other board game manufacturers who somehow, someway seem to be doing just fine dealing with multiple distributors without running into “logistical” or “marketing” problems. Push these games first and watch your sales grow or sit back and enjoy dealing with whatever terms a monopoly holder can impose on you.
The opinions expressed in this Talk Back article are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.
