darkSpyro

Hello, everyone, I'm Ryan
**everyone says "Hi Ryan!"**

I continue to read ongoing threads and discussions of US and European release dates and availability. In those topics, many assumptions are stated to why US and Europe differ in both release date and quantity available. I've worked for almost 20 years in the consumer retail and technology product industry; feel free to assume anything for geeky store sales person to clueless marketing guy to strategy dork. Anyways, I wanted to post the most common business reason why the gap between US and Europe distribution exists.

Why Not (most cases):
First, let's get the "Not" reason out of the way. It is NOT because Skylanders/Toys for Bob/Activision-Blizzard is an US based company and is giving privileges to its home country; sentimental business decisions are seldom good ones


Why (most cases):
As with most decisions in business, it is simply an economical decision with the US presenting a better economic return per unit based on cost to overall sales:


(The Fixed Cost of product shipping from Asia + Cost of doing business in a Country)
/
Total Unit Sales per Country
=
Cost per Unit

Why does this have such an effect on European Countries? I'm glad asked!!! It is because every country (the US, Canada, and every single European country) has an individual cost of doing business including but not limited to:

• Packaging and Documentation
  
• Retailer Negotiations (Merchants for Retailer X in Germany is often separate (or different) than Retailer X (or Y) in France) resulting in individual country:
  
-- Product Cost and Support
-- Retailer and Country Requirements in Merchandising and Advertising
-- Shipping, Receiving, and Returns

• Legal Requirements
  

This means that every Skylanders product sold in any given European Country makes less money for Activision-Blizzard then those sold in the US. Combine this with Skylanders' Demand being greater than Skylanders' Supply, and you end up with two choices in business:

1) Make less money by shipping US and Europe Countries quantities proportionate amounts based on estimated units sale percentages
2) Make more money by shipping disproportional amounts to US.

I know this doesn't make the people in Germany, UK, France, or any part of Europe happy, but it is a proper business decision. However, the most important thing to take away from this economic's session is this:

US business does not dislike Europe! We love Europe and all of you in Europe Heck, I love all of you! So, please, remember this before making conclusions

Wow. Looks like you've done your share of research, or you're just really smart ^.^

It's finally nice to see posts from mature users/adults again.

I had out a lot of the delays down to translations myself as that is what delays a lot of video game releases. A lot of our video games are delayed between 9 months to 12 months on average due to the European law stating that in order for something to be released in Europe it MUST be translated into at least 5 different European languages.

I gave the benefit of Skylanders being a US based product based on the Japanese Anime/Manga/other model where many Japanese items never leave Japanese shores, because Japan (sorry can't think of any other reason really).

Hey, I'm Ryan!

To me it's not that the US gets them first. It's that the rest of the world is left in the dark about when we get them. Just give us a release date.

Quote: mantez

To me it's not that the US gets them first. It's that the rest of the world is left in the dark about when we get them. Just give us a release date.

Honestly, we wish the same thing in the US .... we find out mostly everything from retail advertising

Quote: Slivers

Quote: mantez

To me it's not that the US gets them first. It's that the rest of the world is left in the dark about when we get them. Just give us a release date.

Honestly, we wish the same thing in the US .... we find out mostly everything from retail advertising

This is true. Take a look at the skylanders. We don't know really when they are going to be released. If we are lucky we will get a few days notice as too when they are going to come out by pics being leaked on the interwebs.

Quote: Slivers

Hello, everyone, I'm Ryan
**everyone says "Hi Ryan!"**

I continue to read ongoing threads and discussions of US and European release dates and availability. In those topics, many assumptions are stated to why US and Europe differ in both release date and quantity available. I've worked for almost 20 years in the consumer retail and technology product industry; feel free to assume anything for geeky store sales person to clueless marketing guy to strategy dork. Anyways, I wanted to post the most common business reason why the gap between US and Europe distribution exists.

Why Not (most cases):
First, let's get the "Not" reason out of the way. It is NOT because Skylanders/Toys for Bob/Activision-Blizzard is an US based company and is giving privileges to its home country; sentimental business decisions are seldom good ones


Why (most cases):
As with most decisions in business, it is simply an economical decision with the US presenting a better economic return per unit based on cost to overall sales:


(The Fixed Cost of product shipping from Asia + Cost of doing business in a Country)
/
Total Unit Sales per Country
=
Cost per Unit

Why does this have such an effect on European Countries? I'm glad asked!!! It is because every country (the US, Canada, and every single European country) has an individual cost of doing business including but not limited to:

• Packaging and Documentation
  
• Retailer Negotiations (Merchants for Retailer X in Germany is often separate (or different) than Retailer X (or Y) in France) resulting in individual country:
  
-- Product Cost and Support
-- Retailer and Country Requirements in Merchandising and Advertising
-- Shipping, Receiving, and Returns

• Legal Requirements
  

This means that every Skylanders product sold in any given European Country makes less money for Activision-Blizzard then those sold in the US. Combine this with Skylanders' Demand being greater than Skylanders' Supply, and you end up with two choices in business:

1) Make less money by shipping US and Europe Countries quantities proportionate amounts based on estimated units sale percentages
2) Make more money by shipping disproportional amounts to US.

I know this doesn't make the people in Germany, UK, France, or any part of Europe happy, but it is a proper business decision. However, the most important thing to take away from this economic's session is this:

US business does not dislike Europe! We love Europe and all of you in Europe Heck, I love all of you! So, please, remember this before making conclusions

You must be the ryan that goes to my school. What grade are you in dude?