WotC WotC Generates 75% Of Hasbro's Profit

ICv2 is reporting that WotC generated $110M of Hasbro's $147.3M operating profits in the first quarter of this year, with an increase of 15% on last year.

Of overall sales, WotC generated (only!) 22% of Hasbro's $1.1B.

The growth is attributed to Magic: the Gathering and D&D. Recently, Hasbro restructured with 'WotC and Digital Gaming' getting it own division.

WotC - D&D Gets A New Division At Hasbro

Hasbro is reorganizing and giving tabletop gaming -- Dungeons & Dragons and Magic: the Gathering -- a higher priority. According to the Wall Street Journal, WotC's revenue last year was $816 million (a 24% increase on 2019). Brian Goldner, Hasbro's Chief Executive, says WotC is predicted to...

www.enworld.org

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Then WotC is now Hasbro "golden girl" or blue-eyed boy, the favorite or darling.

Golden goose would be the conventional English phrase. Golden Girls are awesome but very different:

The Golden Girls - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Not necessarily. I suspect there's a ton of profit from licensing deals with DNDBeyond, Roll20, Larian Studios, and OneBookShelf - all of which cost WotC nothing. So that's profit WotC is generating but not based on direct product sales.

I think that this profit exists but I suspect it's a lot smaller than you'd expect, certainly for everything except DNDBeyond. It is, however, basically free money. And I suspect Beyond is pretty big money compared to the rest, and maybe actually is on WotC's radar, profit-wise.

 

[Burnside]

I think that this profit exists but I suspect it's a lot smaller than you'd expect, certainly for everything except DNDBeyond. It is, however, basically free money.

I think Roll20 is real money, though pre-pandemic I'd agree with you. But their revenues are up 80% and the overwhelming usage of Roll20 is people running 5E WotC adventures and sourcebooks.

Larian's Baldur's Gate 3 should be real money if it isn't yet; early release sales are very strong and that's a AAA game that will reach a wide audience.

DMsGuild I think does really well for WotC. I am strictly small potatoes and I generated thousands of dollars for them last year as a creator at basically zero expense to them. There are hundreds and hundreds like me, and dozens who are far more prolific/successful than I am - as in, individual creators who are EACH generating low 6 figures for WotC annually just on DMsGuild.

 

[NotAYakk]

And licensing, like BG3, books profit from the license, but not the revenue of selling the stuff.

So if they sell a copy of BG3 for 100$ (super elite mega season pass shiny version), and WotC gets a 10$ cut, WotC gets 10$ in revenue and 10$ in profit. That is a good marginal profit margin, but misleading. (against that, WotC would book the effort to find licensees and the like)

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I think Roll20 is real money, though pre-pandemic I'd agree with you. But their revenues are up 80% and the overwhelming usage of Roll20 is people running 5E WotC adventures and sourcebooks.

80% of not very much is 1.8x not very much though.

And I used Roll20 a ton in the pandemic. How much did I pay them? Nothing. Sadly. Not sure the DM did either. Why? Because we were using DNDBeyond and a browser extension, and just using Roll20 as a grid and for a few other things.

I suspect that's pretty common based on discussion from around the time (including here).

DMsGuild I think does really well for WotC. I am strictly small potatoes and I generated thousands of dollars for them last year as a creator at basically zero expense to them. There are hundreds and hundreds like me, and dozens who are far more prolific/successful than I am - as in, individual creators who are EACH generating low 6 figures for WotC annually just on DMsGuild.

Skeptical face, frankly.

Not about your personal profit, but about you thinking that so many people are doing it that it's big money. Last I heard, DMsGuild and Drivethru had sold like 100k copies of anything ever total. That was figures from someone earlier this year. If they moved every one of those 100k at $30 average (unlikely, I think), that's what, $30m over their entire existence?

In 2007 OneBookShelf said they made $2m annually. Even if they're making say, double that now, that's $4m. If say 50% of that is DMsguild (and I think we know it's lower, though I could be wrong), that'd be $2m. If WotC are taking 50% upfront, which seems to be the case, that's $1m.

Out of $824 revenue for WotC last year, $1m is yeah, pretty tiny. Even if we double the figures again, it's $2m, which is still pretty tiny.

So I'm going to say that's pretty small potatoes for them.

 

[TheSword]

Small staff, global product, licensing, amazing brand that has very good retention, massive back catalogue of IP.

It’s an operating profit dream!

Good on them. I’m damn happy with what they’re providing.

Hasbro execs needs to take a good hard look at themselves though if $500m is only translating into $27m profit.

Hopefully this puts down the rumour that Hasbro doesn’t consider WOC important

 

[Shardstone]

As a publisher, the amount they make on books is insane. They charge 50 for books that print at probably between $1-$5 a pop, if not less. Speaking from practical experience here.

If they sell 100,000 books, each getting anywhere from 10 to 50 times the margin, they're makng a lot of money.

Of course distribution, warehouses, etc all eat into profits too. But still. WotC is NOT limping along.

 

[Burnside]

80% of not very much is 1.8x not very much though.

And I used Roll20 a ton in the pandemic. How much did I pay them? Nothing. Sadly. Not sure the DM did either. Why? Because we were using DNDBeyond and a browser extension, and just using Roll20 as a grid and for a few other things.

I suspect that's pretty common based on discussion from around the time (including here).


Skeptical face, frankly.

Not about your personal profit, but about you thinking that so many people are doing it that it's big money. Last I heard, DMsGuild and Drivethru had sold like 100k copies of anything ever total. That was figures from someone earlier this year. If they moved every one of those 100k at $30 average (unlikely, I think), that's what, $30m over their entire existence?

In 2007 OneBookShelf said they made $2m annually. Even if they're making say, double that now, that's $4m. If say 50% of that is DMsguild (and I think we know it's lower, though I could be wrong), that'd be $2m. If WotC are taking 50% upfront, which seems to be the case, that's $1m.

Out of $824 revenue for WotC last year, $1m is yeah, pretty tiny. Even if we double the figures again, it's $2m, which is still pretty tiny.

So I'm going to say that's pretty small potatoes for them.

It's not that anybody is selling 100k copies of anything. It's that a ton of people are selling a thousand copies of things.

There are 562 products on DMsGuild that have sold between 1,000-2500 copies. That's somewhere between 562,000 and 1,500,000 sales.

There are 189 products that have sold 2,500-5,000 copies, and 62 that have sold 5,000+ copies. Millions of sales.

What OneBookShelf made in 2007, several years before DMsGuild even existed, is irrelevant. And at this point DMsGuild has far eclipsed the other OneBookShelf sites in terms of sales volume.

It's an army of indie creators who are making a few thousand or $10-$20k for themselves, but who are ALL collectively sharing royalties with WotC.

 

[Morrus]

Last I heard, DMsGuild and Drivethru had sold like 100k copies of anything ever total.

That's definitely not true. I've sold more than that on DTRPG just by myself, and I'm nowhere near the top list on the site. And I'm one of those who has generated hundreds of thousands in royalties for DTRPG (not DMsG).

 

[Ruin Explorer]

That's definitely not true. I've sold more than that on DTRPG just by myself, and I'm nowhere near the top list on the site. And I'm one of those who has generated hundreds of thousands in royalties for DTRPG (not DMsG).

Ok good to hear - it was reported the total number of copies of things sold was about 100k (not money made, obviously) by someone on here and I was rather appalled, but they seemed very convinced.

Still skeptical that the overall impact of DMsguild and the D&D stuff sold on DTRPG is enough to make WotC even blink though.