Essen Spiel 2014

[Zarniwoop]

#spiel2014 is almost upon us and it got me thinking that whilst these shows prove a fantastic outlet for smaller publishers and designers they also starve more traditional outlets like your FLGS.

Let me explain that further, there are often small runs off games sold at these shows that never get seen or sold anywhere else.  This is both good and bad because those that can not afford to travel to these shows may miss out on gems as they are unlikely to make general distribution.

This potentially makes this hobby a little elitist which is a shame.  I know the FLGS could obtain games from shows but not all of them have budgets to attend all of these shows or have the time to attend.  Why would they need to attend? To try the games as there is likely to be little or no information on them outside of the shows themselves.

What I would hope is that as this industry continues to grow that smaller companies get better access to wider distribution. This way people of all budgets get a chance to sample all of what this hobby can produce.