Susan Waldbiesser of Six Feet Under Games of New Holland, Pennsylvania comments on Looney Labs decision to cut the number of distribution choices for their products (see "Looney Labs Cuts Distributors").

After reading the article "Looney Labs Cuts Distributors" and Rhonda Becker's Talk Back response (see "Rhonda Becker of The Gamers Den on Looney Labs Cutting Distributors") I have to say that I agree with everything Rhonda has to say.  I also wonder if Looney Labs, Days of Wonder, Playroom Entertainment and the others that are going to exclusive distributors have considered the effect that their decision has on the bottom line for the Friendly Local Game Store (FLGS)?

Besides the relationship and individualized attention that my favorite distributor offers me, they also offer me a better bottom line.  On the Looney Labs products I will see an increase in my cost.  I understand that it is only about 50¢ on a standard Fluxx deck, but that does add up over the number of games that are sold.  When you start looking at the fact that every 16 copies of Fluxx that I purchase from ACD I could have purchased 17 from my other distributor it starts to show the effect to the bottom line.

I understand that Looney Labs believes that they will be able to improve marketing and support to the retailers, but I don't feel that there is any support that they could offer that will account for the difference to my profits.  I understand that Looney Labs feels that the FLGS will be able to get subscriptions with ACD and Alliance, but I have found that there are definite gaps and flaws.  This leads me to be concerned about attempting to have a subscription for Looney Labs items.

With this effect to the bottom line of this FLGS in these economic times, I know that any game company that makes the decision to reduce the number of distributors or go exclusive will be lower on my restock list.  All I can do is hope that this disturbing trend in the industry comes to an end before the board game industry is affected the way the comic industry was.

The opinions expressed in this Talk Back are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.