Doctor Who Merchandise Updates & Answers
As we've already had three people asking us the same questions on a couple of different product lines, (so, a total of six people,) it seemed best to give an update and answer the various flavor of question being handed to us. When given questions, we should give our best answers, and this time it may add a little information here to anticipate others again asking the same things.
For the Doctor Who audios series by Big Finish, we are in a situation where Big Finish on physical releases does what is called "exclusive windowing," in addition to having "exclusives." The grand impact of this is to delay or deny release of things to its retailers, its partners in the supply chain who give them free promotion and improved sales reach, which, ultimately, delays our customers getting merchandise. We know keenly our customers very definitely do not approve of that treatment, and we hear about it regularly, so the talk it generates is wholly negative, which certainly doesn't assist sales growth. At best, it is continual confusion and overhead for all. We received the Doctor Who main series release #272 earlier in January, by mistake, instead of #270. To be fair, their staff was good enough to get #270 out to us, and it was received today, so we have #272 earlier than they would have chosen (and still await #271, coming, we believe, soon). But, why we all needed the delays of an exclusive window in the first place eludes me, and why they tolerate the drama of that confusion by persisting in the policy is even more baffling. We can't answer that. Perhaps they will give you good answers to direct questions, if you are interested, and they deserve the right to answer for themselves, if you want to ask them directly. Perhaps, as some have said, you've already tried to get an answer and were not satisfied.
For action figures, we're dealing with a recent change in the US distributor who is doing "price support," which is a scheme to set pricing from everyone in the US. It includes the use of a sales strategy that seems to set a sale price on releases at some point, after their best customers have paid their highest prices, and those recently have been prices above what we told them (and will tell them again) we would intend to charge. Because of the devils-in-the-details with their terms, because we feel we couldn't serve our customers well, properly, competitively, or (most importantly) fairly with what was required, we stopped carrying the Character Options Doctor Who action figures line for now, and will wait until a new distributor is named before attempting to resume a relationship, in spite of definitely wanting to provide good products our customers demand, and regardless of how long that may take. Where we've said little about this topic, we've had rather substantial contact from many customers who often will not purchase these figures until the distributor currently licensed is no longer in this supply chain, and we thank the very many loyal customers who so strongly support us as to insist we get a different paradigm. Voting with your wallets as well as your words does matter to Character Group, and in making sound business decisions it will be interesting to see what happens here in the fullness of time. At the very least, Character Group has representatives who have signaled they are aware of the broader situation, and they seem to be studiously cautious in how they proceed from here.
Why an exercise of power here with this brand and this license is necessary, even desirable, escapes us. We had one senior person at one of our suppliers say they desired to use a more "modern" approach to sales strategy. While the internet is the modern tool, the approach of trying to manipulate markets, set artificial pricing, have different tables for price for each item and each market into which it is released, is something the Brits, especially, should find familiar and ancient and odious from their history books, where the Wardens of the Cinque Ports back to the 11th century would have to interpret and enforce the king's duties and tariffs on items, based on what the item was, where it was coming from or going to, who was buying it, and so on. It's not modern and doesn't even really reach to the middle ages as far as how it works and works so badly for the modern world. A modern tool wasted on an archaic strategy is still a waste.
The BBC should be involved with entertainment. For their licensed products and to make sure they give robust opportunities to their employees and the many, many talents they employ, they deserve fair profits. For merchandise their license holders sell, they are also most certainly entitled to set a wholesale price, and retailers can buy or not buy at that price. As items of entertainment, there is also a level at which business has to occur, and I think that has everyone's understanding and agreement. But, when this comes down to exercise of power rather than pure business, as it might sometimes appear to some these days, where customers literally pay more for being loyal and buying releases immediately upon release in some cases, where discrimination happens based on where in the world you live and which retailer you might choose to give your custom, that is beyond mere business. We have angry customers here over these issues. We're not ignoring that input. We have presented the issues as best we can to the powers-that-be, and hope they will look to their own interests in the long-term and discontinue selected policies rather than hurting themselves, us, and customers. But, we are never ones to withhold or artificially overprice if given any choices in the matter. That will never be us, and for our part that's the best we can do in answering the rightfully upset customers with such questions we've heard lately. We have already told people about such policies we feel they are just wrong. And, businesses and people make the choices they do, and these particular items are not of our making.
To quote another sage from the UK, familiar, I believe, for the use of his estate in an episode or two of Doctor Who, "You can't always get what you want." But, we try sometimes...and will continue in that spirit to stand with our customers, without whom we have no business nor a chance to make things better for all. We appreciate you all. And we'll continue as best we can to work with what we're allowed to carry, in the spirit of competition and quality service.
Michael Salvo (& Patty Cryan)
Mike's Comics
http://www.mikescomics.com
For the Doctor Who audios series by Big Finish, we are in a situation where Big Finish on physical releases does what is called "exclusive windowing," in addition to having "exclusives." The grand impact of this is to delay or deny release of things to its retailers, its partners in the supply chain who give them free promotion and improved sales reach, which, ultimately, delays our customers getting merchandise. We know keenly our customers very definitely do not approve of that treatment, and we hear about it regularly, so the talk it generates is wholly negative, which certainly doesn't assist sales growth. At best, it is continual confusion and overhead for all. We received the Doctor Who main series release #272 earlier in January, by mistake, instead of #270. To be fair, their staff was good enough to get #270 out to us, and it was received today, so we have #272 earlier than they would have chosen (and still await #271, coming, we believe, soon). But, why we all needed the delays of an exclusive window in the first place eludes me, and why they tolerate the drama of that confusion by persisting in the policy is even more baffling. We can't answer that. Perhaps they will give you good answers to direct questions, if you are interested, and they deserve the right to answer for themselves, if you want to ask them directly. Perhaps, as some have said, you've already tried to get an answer and were not satisfied.
For action figures, we're dealing with a recent change in the US distributor who is doing "price support," which is a scheme to set pricing from everyone in the US. It includes the use of a sales strategy that seems to set a sale price on releases at some point, after their best customers have paid their highest prices, and those recently have been prices above what we told them (and will tell them again) we would intend to charge. Because of the devils-in-the-details with their terms, because we feel we couldn't serve our customers well, properly, competitively, or (most importantly) fairly with what was required, we stopped carrying the Character Options Doctor Who action figures line for now, and will wait until a new distributor is named before attempting to resume a relationship, in spite of definitely wanting to provide good products our customers demand, and regardless of how long that may take. Where we've said little about this topic, we've had rather substantial contact from many customers who often will not purchase these figures until the distributor currently licensed is no longer in this supply chain, and we thank the very many loyal customers who so strongly support us as to insist we get a different paradigm. Voting with your wallets as well as your words does matter to Character Group, and in making sound business decisions it will be interesting to see what happens here in the fullness of time. At the very least, Character Group has representatives who have signaled they are aware of the broader situation, and they seem to be studiously cautious in how they proceed from here.
Why an exercise of power here with this brand and this license is necessary, even desirable, escapes us. We had one senior person at one of our suppliers say they desired to use a more "modern" approach to sales strategy. While the internet is the modern tool, the approach of trying to manipulate markets, set artificial pricing, have different tables for price for each item and each market into which it is released, is something the Brits, especially, should find familiar and ancient and odious from their history books, where the Wardens of the Cinque Ports back to the 11th century would have to interpret and enforce the king's duties and tariffs on items, based on what the item was, where it was coming from or going to, who was buying it, and so on. It's not modern and doesn't even really reach to the middle ages as far as how it works and works so badly for the modern world. A modern tool wasted on an archaic strategy is still a waste.
The BBC should be involved with entertainment. For their licensed products and to make sure they give robust opportunities to their employees and the many, many talents they employ, they deserve fair profits. For merchandise their license holders sell, they are also most certainly entitled to set a wholesale price, and retailers can buy or not buy at that price. As items of entertainment, there is also a level at which business has to occur, and I think that has everyone's understanding and agreement. But, when this comes down to exercise of power rather than pure business, as it might sometimes appear to some these days, where customers literally pay more for being loyal and buying releases immediately upon release in some cases, where discrimination happens based on where in the world you live and which retailer you might choose to give your custom, that is beyond mere business. We have angry customers here over these issues. We're not ignoring that input. We have presented the issues as best we can to the powers-that-be, and hope they will look to their own interests in the long-term and discontinue selected policies rather than hurting themselves, us, and customers. But, we are never ones to withhold or artificially overprice if given any choices in the matter. That will never be us, and for our part that's the best we can do in answering the rightfully upset customers with such questions we've heard lately. We have already told people about such policies we feel they are just wrong. And, businesses and people make the choices they do, and these particular items are not of our making.
To quote another sage from the UK, familiar, I believe, for the use of his estate in an episode or two of Doctor Who, "You can't always get what you want." But, we try sometimes...and will continue in that spirit to stand with our customers, without whom we have no business nor a chance to make things better for all. We appreciate you all. And we'll continue as best we can to work with what we're allowed to carry, in the spirit of competition and quality service.
Michael Salvo (& Patty Cryan)
Mike's Comics
http://www.mikescomics.com