The good news is that it is still there and open for trade. The bad news is that it still looks like they have not had any new stock and could well just be treading water until all hope has gone. They did have a reasonable stock of Flames of War and Forged In Battle though nothing like the full ranges.
They also had a sale table that had a great deal of kit on either at £1 or Make Me An Offer which included part painted minis and lots of rule books and supplements. I bought myself a couple of packs of Forged in Battle infantry packs for the 3D Sniper Project. I pick up the bases that I commissioned Warbases to make for me. I also got four of the Field of Glory Renascence army lists at £2 each and Check Your Six rules for just £1. The 15mm figs were the usual RRP less 10% so I was rather pleased with my haul.
Stock wise though they are looking really thin, Vallejo are extremely low, and much of what they do have is not much more than one item deep. I can't see how they are making it pay day to day and I doubt they are building any revenue up to purchase new stock. I would like to be proven wrong but I can't see how they can come out the other side. Again I looked for signs in the window or in the store declaring that they had gone into administration (as Maelstrom) but nothing. I still think they will be unable to just dump their debts and re-surface now owning the stock as a separate company. They launched Eye of the Storm (Mansfield) Limited on the 20th of June 2012 but the stock that was originally owned by Maelstrom is the exact same stock Maunsfeld is now selling.
I think given how many bridges they burnt with people , they will struggle to rebuild a trading model - i sure won;t buy anything from them.
ReplyDeleteWhich FoG:R lists did you get? £2 a pop is a damned good find :)
ReplyDeleteThe same here heard nothing than bad news about them, so will choose for another online retailler.
ReplyDelete@ Dave, I don't think it was intentional, poor management, poor stock control and very bad business decisions (going into high risk figure development), if they had kept to what they were good at maybe they would still be around. It's how they handled the whole situation from then on in which was the issue.
ReplyDelete@ Tamsin, Cities of Gold, Clash of Empires, Colonies and Conquest and last but not least, Duty and Glory. They also had a few copies of War and Conquest for £1 which is still a fairly new set of rules
Ian
At WNT, well the phone was not ringing when I was there. The bloke behind the counter was both cold (no heating on at that end of the shop) and bored.
ReplyDeleteIan
Damn! I had hoped my promised outstanding FOW order would be honoured - that looks doubtful now... If they had fulfilled that outstanding order I may have risked a small subsequent order, but thats had it now...
ReplyDeleteIf you go to the store again can you ask what happened to Scott's, Elefants, Flak 88s and brummbars?! ;-)
DeleteFunny enough I was going to offer the same. If you go to my profile you will see my e-mail, if you can e-mail me your order number as I doubt they will talk to me without it. They were supposed to be honored by another company.
DeleteIf they will credit you with other items do you want to go to the eye of the storm online shop and pick alternative products. I could then pick them up and mail them to you
Ian