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2008 Earnings and Top Games For Eurogame Retailers

16 Feb

Posted by Yehuda Berlinger as Card Games, Modern Board Games

chart-up-3 Performance statistics are easy to find for the large public companies, such as Hasbro and Jakks. A recent Bloomberg article indicated that proprietary board game sales were up six percent to almost $800 million (US only, supposedly includes all board games bought online or retail; I don’t know if that includes generic game items such as poker sets and chess boards).

So how did the privately-held mid-sized companies do in 2008?

I asked several private companies – Eurogame retailers and publishers – how 2008 was for them compared to 2007, indicating that I would aggregate the results rather than associate a result with a particular company. Many didn’t respond, while some wrote back saying that they declined to answer. A few indicated that any comparison numbers wouldn’t be helpful, because they started operations, or did major acquisitions or sell-offs, in 2007.

Eight retailers and four publishers answered.

Q4 2008

Earnings ranged between -20% to +58% over Q4 2007. Four reported losses, while seven reported at least 20% higher earnings (some didn’t specify an amount, but indicated “higher” as opposed to “slightly higher”).

2008

Earnings ranged between -13% to +50% over 2007. Two reported losses, while eight reported at least 20% higher earnings (some didn’t specify an amount, but indicated “higher” as opposed to “slightly higher”).

Curiously, one company said that 2008 was higher than 2007, but Q4 2008 was lower than Q4 2007. All the other companies performed at least as high, or higher, in Q4 2008 as they did for the year overall.

Top Sellers

Six retailers provided their top selling games for the holiday season. The following games were on more than one of their lists:

5 of 6 top lists: Ticket to Ride (2004), Agricola (2007)

4 of 6: Carcassonne (2000), Pandemic (2008), Dominion (2008), Race for the Galaxy (2007)

3 of 6: Citadels (2000), Race for the Galaxy Expansion (2008)

2 of 6: The Settlers of Catan (1995), Bohnanza (1997), Stone Age (2008), Galaxy Trucker (2007), Battlestar Galactica (2008), Qwirkle (2006), Ticket to Ride Europe (2005), Wasabi (2008)