new TERRAIN company...

[xmanowarx]

hey guys...my friends and i started a company last year called LR HOBBIES. we make miniature terrain that can be used with most RPG's and tabletop games. it's good stuff and it's pretty affordable. if you want to check us out we can be found here:

lrhobbies items - Get great deals on RPG Accessories, Dungeons Dragons items on eBay Stores!

LR Hobbies | Facebook

thanks! any feedback would be appreciated...

 

[Dungeonmastermark]

...

looks like some good work..

i have always liked bruce hirsts molds..


do you offer a full dungeon set for sale ?

 

[xmanowarx]

we started off using those hirst molds...though we have begun molding our own stuff.

we do sell entire dungeons. whenever we go to cons we offer up each dungeon for a pretty reasonable price. at icon last month we were selling dungeons for around $150-200.

we'll be posting our dungeons shortly...if you have a map you've drawn up that you want made into a dungeon we can do that also. we're actually in the process of doing this for george strayton's LEGENDS and LABYRINTHS.

if you have any questions you can email us at rich.parla@lrhobbies.com...

 

[Alan Shutko]

I'd suggest somehow cleaning up your ebay listing. When I go to see what you make, the first twenty items are identical 1"x1" tiles. Then there are three items without photos. There are 19 pages to look through, and I don't know if I want to go click through all of them so I just click another page to see if the duplication is rampant throughout, and I get a page that lists trading games and baseball cards.

At this point, as a typical customer I will have written your company off and gone to find a terrain dealer with a better website, where I can actually browse what they have.

 

[xmanowarx]

wow, you're right - i'm not sure why there are 19 images of a 1" floor tile. that wasn't there the last time i looked at the site. must be some problems at LRHQ...i'm on it.

and i agree with you about the ebay site...truth is, we are just using ebay as a placeholder until our actual site is ready to go online. we put our stuff up there so that the people we were running into at cons and the whatnot would have a way to purchase our stuff with a minimum amount of hassle. we'll have a "professional" site up and running soon enough.

 

[xmanowarx]

ok, those 19 images should be down in a few minutes. our head honcho made a mistake while doing something with the page. those pieces with no photos will have photos in the next few days (if not sooner)...and confirmation from HQ is that our actual site will be up and functional within a month or so.

 

[Perram]

Well,

I looked at your site and... yeah. Your EBay story isn't very inviting in my opinion and it could be a little more organized.

Now, as for your products themselves:

As a 3d terrain company, and as a Hirst reseller, you're competing against both Dwarven Forge and Hirst Arts and the other resellers. So... its really important that you let your customers know what you bring to the table?

Against Dwarven Forge:
- Is your stuff better quality?
- Is it unique items I can't duplicate there?
- Is it at a better price?

Against Hirst:
- Is it a better convenience?
- Is it affordable enough that I shouldn't just do it myself?
- Is it painted well? (HUGE bonus that you at least paint your stuff.)

Against other resellers:
- Price and selection alone make the difference.

 

[xmanowarx]

well, we are basically just starting out. i realize that the ebay site isn't optimal but it's what we have for right now. a cleaner, better webstore is being worked on as we speak.

here's what i can say for our stuff - it looks great and i think it's very affordable. do we have the same range of selection as dwarven forge? no, of course not - they've been around for 15 years! will we offer things that they don't? yes. will they offer things that we don't? yes. i also don't look at this as "competition" - i'm a gamer and have been since 1979 - i love some of the DF stuff and we as a company are interested in supporting the gaming hobby as a whole.

that being said, back to our pieces: our stuff is VERY durable - i've thrown some of the pieces against concrete walls and they were fine. the people who have seen, handled, and used our pieces have been impressed with the quality and the pricing - among them frank mentzer and george strayton. as far as unique pieces go - yes, we are starting to manufacture our own stuff.

we will be at several cons this summer (dexcon, retcon) and george strayton will be using our stuff to run LEGENDS AND LABYRINTHS at gencon. we'll also be at NY COMIC CON...if possible, come down, play some games with us, check it out for yourself and see what you think!

 

[draxthis]

This is the type of feedback I was hoping for, thank you. Apparently when you ask Ebay to maintain an inventory level it does this by duplicating the item. This has been fixed.

In addition, we were originally a hobby store with the wider range of product. We are moving away from the ebay store. Although the new site is not complete, we started to move our product to www.LRTerrain.com and when we complete the transition we will point LRHobbies.com to the new site as well.

Thank you again.

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[draxthis]

Well,

I looked at your site and... yeah. Your EBay story isn't very inviting in my opinion and it could be a little more organized.

Now, as for your products themselves:

As a 3d terrain company, and as a Hirst reseller, you're competing against both Dwarven Forge and Hirst Arts and the other resellers. So... its really important that you let your customers know what you bring to the table?

Against Dwarven Forge:
- Is your stuff better quality?
- Is it unique items I can't duplicate there?
- Is it at a better price?

Against Hirst:
- Is it a better convenience?
- Is it affordable enough that I shouldn't just do it myself?
- Is it painted well? (HUGE bonus that you at least paint your stuff.)

Against other resellers:
- Price and selection alone make the difference.

Agreed, the ebay store is on its last leg...you can say goodbye as soon as the new site is up.

Yes, this is important, what do we bring to the table. We are in direct competition with Dwarven Forge but less so with Hirst Arts. Hirst Arts does not directly sell completed pieces just the molds to cast the pieces. We build and remold larger items from Hirst's stuff and we are in a licensing agreement so Hirst benefits if we are successful. I have had many conversations with people that use Hirst to create their own stuff and the time, effort, and material cost usually makes the premade worth purchasing but not everyone will agree and I understand that.

As for Dwarven Forge, we highly respect Dwarven Forge, the quality, and the Artistry but it is expensive and, from what I understand, heavy. More importantly, you can only get Dwarven Forge product from the Dwarven Forge website. Our product will be in some of our local stores shortly, which increases market penetration (and hopefully increases brand recognition). We have been told that our product is lighter and easier to transport.

There will be some duplication across items but we have an in-house sculptor and we have some unique stuff out (Dwarven Doors) and more coming.

Are we better in every category? No
Did we think of everything? No, which is why we are here.

This is all very much appreciated.


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