Rolling for Initiative is a weekly column by Scott Thorne, PhD, owner of Castle Perilous Games & Books in Carbondale, Illinois and instructor in marketing at Southeast Missouri State University. This week, Thorne takes a look at the Pitch Black prerelease for Pokemon TCG this past weekend, and other scheduling and promotional issues.
Despite having a couple of high-profile events scheduled for this past holiday weekend, such as the Disney Lorcana: Wilds Unknown (see “’Disney Lorcana: Wilds Unknown’“) Store Championships and Pokémon TCG: Pitch Black prerelease (see “’Pokemon TCG: Mega Evolution – Pitch Black’“), customer traffic was lighter than normal. I really wish companies would look at the calendar when planning their releases. Yes, people are crazy about Pokémon TCG right now, but there is no way Pokémon competes with July 4th weekend at the beach, grilling on the backyard patio and an evening of things going boom.
Similarly, Bandai has scheduled release tournaments for an upcoming One Piece set in the middle of the holiday season, with the preliminary dates scheduled between Christmas and New Year’s. These holiday dates do not change. A publisher can look at the calendar years in advance and work their release schedule around it. After all, Gaming Days LLC looked at Wizards of the Coast’s decision to put a June prerelease on the third Sunday in June, which had been the home of Free RPG Day for well over a decade (see “Thoughts on the Upcoming Free RPG Day“), and decided not to compete with it; they moved the event to the last Saturday of June.
Retail stores, which are the focal point of a successful Free RPG Day do not have the bandwidth to focus on both a Magic: The Gathering prerelease and Free RPG Day. Similarly, Ravensburger had scheduled its Toy Story 5 Disney Lorcana Pack Rush event for the same weekend as the Universes Beyond Marvel Super Heroes prerelease, but opted to change/expand dates when the company realized stores could not successfully focus on both events.
It would have been nice for Wizards of the Coast to look at events already on the third Sunday of June and alter its prerelease schedule, so as not to conflict with Free RPG Day. However, when a company does the kind of business Magic does, it expects other companies to accommodate them (rather than the other way around).
As long as I am commenting on things I wish companies would do, how about more communication regarding releases from Konami and The Pokemon Company? WotC fills my email box and social media feeds with all sorts of information about upcoming Magic releases and regularly reminds the store to schedule prerelease and other events. We get boxes containing marketing materials from WotC concurrent with every new release, and finally, a sheet included with how stores should use the content. All of this comes directly from the company.
Maybe I have not opted into the right email lists or social media groups, but I get almost nothing from The Pokemon Company or Konami regarding new releases, save for requests to schedule events months in advance, then no reminders or promotional materials as the event draws nigh. Granted, The Pokemon Company does send boxes full of promotional materials for Pokémon League, but it is always a toss-up as to whether it comes from The Pokemon Company or through a distributor. As far as promotional material for Yu-Gi-Oh!, save for items sent as prizing for specific events, we get zilch. WotC and The Pokemon Company send materials designed to reward players for in-store play but nothing from Konami.
Comments? Are you getting the information I am missing? Send them to castleperilousgames@gmail.com.
The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.
Source: ICV2
