Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is coming! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Monte Cook Leaves WotC - No Longer working on D&D Next [updated]
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Kobold Boots" data-source="post: 5900239" data-attributes="member: 92239"><p>I get where you're coming from. Here's another point of view: </p><p></p><p>Really successful companies look to streamline their product lines and costs. As an example.. one publisher I know of specifically chooses to only publish fiction and biographical works when there's a very, very high chance that they'll end up on the best sellers lists. Another chooses to service product lines in addition to the fiction and biographical.</p><p></p><p>The one with the fewer products and a higher percentage of best sellers survived the recession, grew through it, and had several properties do well enough to fund movie adaptations. The one that didn't found itself filing for bankruptcy and outright cancelled a few lines before that.</p><p></p><p>So when I'm looking at Hasbro and I characterize them as big company with many product lines that needs to make decisions about what product lines to keep and which ones to scrap, there's a deeper equation there.</p><p></p><p>1. What is the necessary margin that the company wants to maintain such that we can guarantee a certain amount of income after taxes?</p><p></p><p>2. What is a decent product portfolio number to gauge our lines against?</p><p></p><p>3. What is the net promoter score and brand value of the lines we're evaluating? </p><p></p><p>The above set some margin number that's the same for each brand but may result in different numbers when compared to the cost of production for the product line. It may be 50 million for Magic and it may be 50 million for D&D all things being judged, but that may require more sales for Magic and less sales for D&D to make the cut (or vice versa).</p><p></p><p>The problem is when a product line has so much dedicated to it in terms of production cost that it can't compete against a line that is optimized to reduce costs. </p><p></p><p>So functionally, I agree with your statement as presented. Arbitrary assignment of numbers is stupid. I just don't think that the designers are the best judges of business needs, nor do I think they'd be in on the business meetings where they'd get the information needed to make responsible statements about the situation we're on about. </p><p></p><p>From a purely business point of view, depending on the size of the firm, if I'm putting in say 150 million to make 200 million and that nets 50, then I'm ok. If I'm putting in 150 million to make 160 million and net 10.. that's almost not worth getting up in the morning for when I'm running a billion dollar firm and make more in salary and options than I'm netting on the product line and I could be investing in Bakugan or Pokemon or whatever and really making some serious money.</p><p></p><p>Perspectives. I don't really think the CEO of Hasbro makes that much cash, but it's not out of the realm of CEO and CMO pay averages and that line of thinking happens.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Kobold Boots, post: 5900239, member: 92239"] I get where you're coming from. Here's another point of view: Really successful companies look to streamline their product lines and costs. As an example.. one publisher I know of specifically chooses to only publish fiction and biographical works when there's a very, very high chance that they'll end up on the best sellers lists. Another chooses to service product lines in addition to the fiction and biographical. The one with the fewer products and a higher percentage of best sellers survived the recession, grew through it, and had several properties do well enough to fund movie adaptations. The one that didn't found itself filing for bankruptcy and outright cancelled a few lines before that. So when I'm looking at Hasbro and I characterize them as big company with many product lines that needs to make decisions about what product lines to keep and which ones to scrap, there's a deeper equation there. 1. What is the necessary margin that the company wants to maintain such that we can guarantee a certain amount of income after taxes? 2. What is a decent product portfolio number to gauge our lines against? 3. What is the net promoter score and brand value of the lines we're evaluating? The above set some margin number that's the same for each brand but may result in different numbers when compared to the cost of production for the product line. It may be 50 million for Magic and it may be 50 million for D&D all things being judged, but that may require more sales for Magic and less sales for D&D to make the cut (or vice versa). The problem is when a product line has so much dedicated to it in terms of production cost that it can't compete against a line that is optimized to reduce costs. So functionally, I agree with your statement as presented. Arbitrary assignment of numbers is stupid. I just don't think that the designers are the best judges of business needs, nor do I think they'd be in on the business meetings where they'd get the information needed to make responsible statements about the situation we're on about. From a purely business point of view, depending on the size of the firm, if I'm putting in say 150 million to make 200 million and that nets 50, then I'm ok. If I'm putting in 150 million to make 160 million and net 10.. that's almost not worth getting up in the morning for when I'm running a billion dollar firm and make more in salary and options than I'm netting on the product line and I could be investing in Bakugan or Pokemon or whatever and really making some serious money. Perspectives. I don't really think the CEO of Hasbro makes that much cash, but it's not out of the realm of CEO and CMO pay averages and that line of thinking happens. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Monte Cook Leaves WotC - No Longer working on D&D Next [updated]
Top