SALEING in Eye of the Storm

Eye of the Storm or Maunsfield Games, whichever name floats your boat. As it's close to the Hospital and I have been going two to three times a week recently for one thing or another I have dropped in every week and in a couple of cases twice in one week. I have already bought a number of the FoG:R army lists and one for FoG the Decline and Fall of the Byzantine Empire. Well a bunch of the others were sitting on a shelf at the back of the store, I had not paid much attention to them but I took a look the other day and saw Legions Triumphant amongst them. Now that was one I would like so I was hoping it would make the table. Well it never did. I called in on Monday on my way home and started to chat with the guy in the store who I was starting to get to know. I needed to get a bit pally as I wanted to ask him about a fellow bloggers never received order. Well I gave him the order details and he disappeared into the the back to check. Turns out they are attempting to honour all outstanding orders but can only do so a few at a time. They are again buying from some of their suppliers and intend to restock most ranges but it's down to cash flow, they need to sell stock they have to gain money to then purchase sold stock and afford to post out the stock, you see the whole free postage and cut price figures has made this into a nightmare scenario. I say hats off to them for attempting to do this as in reality the outstanding orders are Maelstrom's responsibility not Maunsfield Games. The only way it could be the new companies responsibility is if they had been trading the on line store without changing the company name (Maunsfield Games was registered in June or July of last year) which whilst possible does not make sense as they were going to be rolled up anyway. Maelstrom Games are awaiting a court date at which point they will be officially wound up. So if you still have an outstanding order it's quite possible you will get it at some point in the future.

So how are they generating money? Well from a recent visit I do know they are still selling Game Tickets for events and they still remain very busy at weekends and game nights (Tuesday and Thursday), so revenue is being generated with the game tickets and some of the guys using the game facilities will be buying some stock. Indeed I am sure that Battlefront and Forged In Battle stock has been going up. The problem is how much of these sales have to be ploughed back into rent, rates heating and lighting and wages? I can not see how the store even with a full range of stock can survive without sales through the webstore. The shop remains very understocked on all other products, but if they are to survive AND manage to supply all those unfulfilled orders they need to slowly increase their stocks, regain confidence and manage it all very well.

One last way they are generating money is the sale table. They have put a massive amount of stock through this table, these days it's starting to look rather sick, most of what is now left on it is the things most people just don't want. Gone are the best pickings, I have had a good many items myself. However back to those pesky army lists. I asked if they were going on the table and was told yes but if I wanted any of them to make an offer. I looked through them all and went for all but the lost scrolls list, in all eight books which I offered £15 for and got the lot. So I am rather chuffed about that. At some point in the future I am thinking about doing a FoG 6mm army using the same bases as 15mm but packing the bases with lots of figures, those pike blocks would look epic! So as long as I end up using two of the books I have more than broken even, though a couple of the books I don't see as likely to be kept after having a good look through them.

I do expect more of the slow to no moving items yet to find their way to the table and I will but other items from them that are not in the Sale (now do you get the title joke?) and I truly hope they survive the next few months and if they do manage to get all those miniatures out to those at the moment out of pocket then hats off to them.