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Message: <blockquote data-quote="RyanD" data-source="post: 1814365" data-attributes="member: 3312">Here's the text of a message I wrote in an industry insider forum that sums up what I know about the relative sizes of the gaming industry over time:You could divide the history of hobby game retailing in North America into 4.1 phases.The ".1" is the part when Avalon Hill boxed wargames and similar products were sold in diverse outlets (book stores, toy stores, "hobby" stores [places where you might by RC models, knitting supplies, macrame, etc.], etc.), miniatures games were dominant in terms of dollar sales, and RPGs were proliferating via mimeograph machines and illicit photocopies. Call this period 1975 and before.Phase .1: Total size of the hobby gaming market was less than $10 million/year. (RPG sales accounted for about 1/3 of this total by the end of the period.)From the mid '70s to the mid '80s, most hobby gaming products were sold through book stores, toy stores, and "specialty" stores catering to the target demographic, like Spencer's. Starting in the early '80s, the toy store channel was consolidated by Toys R Us and its siblings, and the "toy store" as a small, independent retail outlet mostly ceased to exist. Some RPG sales migrated to Toys R Us, but the experiment was not successful over the long run. These were the years when RPGs had the highest unit sales volumes in their history (+1 million units of the Basic D&D boxed set sold per year in the early 80s, for example).Phase I: Total size of the hobby gaming market was less than $30 million/year. (RPGs accounted for about 2/3 of this total [$20 million] on average throughout the period, rising near the end to a height of perhaps $40 million.)In the mid '80s to the start of the '90s, specialty retailing for comic books and for hobby games took off. Consolidation in the book channel converted about half the existing book stores to empty store fronts, and forced the remaining independents into niche marketing. This period was marked by the rise of a large number of RPG publishers who competed effectively vs. TSR for marketshare. Even as unit volumes declined, unit prices increased (as did production values). During this time TSR also branched out successfully into novel publishing, essentially doubling its sales.Phase II: Total size of the hobby gaming market was less than $50 million/year. (RPGs accounted for about 3/4 of this total [$37.5 million] throughout this period, rising to perhaps $50 million total by the end of the period.)In 1993 Magic released, and in 1995, more than 100 CCGs were marketed to the hobby gaming channel. At the same time, Games Workshop's annual compound growth rate took it past $50 million ($10 million in North America). Sales of hobby gaming products had consolidated primarily into hobby gaming speciality stores, book stores and some comic book stores. As TSR stumbled from '94 to '96, the growth in CCGs and GW more than made up for the negative trend in RPGs. This period saw fairly continuous growth through 1999.Phase III: Total size of the hobby gaming market was less than $100 million/year in '95 and about $250 million/year by '99. (RPGs accounted for about 10-20% of this total, between $25 and $35 million annually throughout this period.)In 2000 Pokemon was successfully launched in the US, followed in 2002 by Yu-Gi-Oh. GW continued to grow at its normal annual compound rate, taking it above $100 million ($30 million in North America). The hobby gaming market diversified with an increase in collectible games of many kinds, and high-end board games. Increasingly large amounts of money were spent to bring a mainstream audience to hobby gaming products - but only by a handful of large companies. Smaller companies saw a general downsizing over time and were squeezed by challenges in the distribution and speciality retailer segments of the channel.Phase IV (now): Total size of the "hobby gaming" market which now includes mass market products fluctuates between $500 million and $1 billion annually, depending on the sales cycle of the mass market products. (RPGs account for about $25 million of this total annually, with occasional "spikes" of up to $30-$35 million.)</blockquote>

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