Reply To: Plastic is the future!

I remember reading many years ago that the initial start-up costs for setting up plastic production are quite astronomical, but once you got going, cost per item drops to virtually nothing. In other words, if you produce in volume, your profit margin will be quite huge, sort of like the profit margin for soft drinks. Production of metal items works the opposite way, start-up is relatively cheap, but material costs are fairly high.

What I’d like to know is why Minifigs are able to sell classic sculpts from the 1970s, made in, as best I can tell, from brand new or refurbished molds that yield excellently cast figures while GW are apparently unable to do the same with slightly less classic sculpts from the 1980s or 90s. It can’t be a storage space issue, GW have plenty of very large buildings at their disposal – probably many times the storage space Minifigs have – so there should not be any problem having all those old molds on shelves somewhere. It can’t be a mold issue, Minifigs have perfectly working molds, and they are a much smaller company, at least today. It can’t be a demand issue, there are plenty of us grognards who actually prefer the older fairy tale sculpts over the new video game figures. I personally know 2 guys who quit WHFB because GW axed their favorite army, the Chaos Dwarfs, and were no longer supporting the line or selling the figures. And that’s just me in my little gaming circle, I’m sure there are plenty of other such examples.