Fabs said:

Regardless of the product type, this is still poor planning and forecasting.

paradox23 said:

If FFG has no control over printing/manufacturing delays they need a new lawyer. Contract penalty clauses are there to ensure that if delays occur it costs the manufacturer with a capital C.

When production delays occur, the customers with penalty clauses in their contracts get bumped to the top of the production list and those without get shuffled down (okay it sucks to be the other guy, but if you want to cut costs on legal expenses, expect to get tucked up by your supplier in favor of the other customers).

I'm sure FFG are as desperate to see the product released as we customers are to have our (looooong awaited) pre orders fulfilled. This doesn't mean that FFG are not responsible for poor planning and forecasting.

wikkid_devil said:

I don't have any particular stake in defending FFG here, but what makes you think their contract has been particularly nice to the manufacturer over the past few months? Do you know someone in either FFG or their Chinese suppliers?

Vorpal Sword said:

I have no inside knowledge regarding FFG or their suppliers, I'm just talking about the principle of protecting supply chains involving third party manufacturers and maintaining control over manufacturing delays.

These delays may be costing the manufacturer a bomb.

From experience I know keeping your customer base fully informed goes a long way to mitigating complaints arising from delays. 

I understand that retail is very different from my experiences in engineering/logistics, where I would be dealing with clients individually as part of the account management role and not in a public forum like this. However FFG do not seem to have the capability to answer individual queries (via email, or their own contact us facility) in a meaningful amount of time (i.e. within 48 hours) or at all for that matter. If FFG are being swamped with information requests from customers and do not have the resources to deal with them, then perhaps using this forum to provide accurate updates would be more reasonable.

Failing to answer the concerns of their customer base just seems short sighted to me.

Well I'll just wait and see what arrives and when. At the end of the day these are only my opinions, feel free to ignore at your leisure.

As I was once informed by a customer:

 "Opinions are like ****holes, everyone has one, I'm only interested in mine".

That put me in my place lol.

FFG does use third party production partners. Unfortunately, that means less information passed to the customer, not more.  There are liability issues involved in revealing private business goins-on to the public. 

Also, Star Wars (along with many other FFG products) is a licensed property.  It would not suprise me at all to find out that there are contract stipulations which forbid them from disclosing any pre-release details beyond promotion of the product itself.

Lastly, and this is factual, FFG does not impose "street dates" on its suppliers; they don't have the size or clout of WotC in order to do so. When they get it into their warehouse, they turn it around as soon as possible.  Unfortunately, while you can then ship to your most distant regions on Day 1, and your most local regions on Day 2, you could still have instances where one supplier gets it a day sooner or a day later.  Plus, certain stores get direct sales from FFG, which is an additional layer of material to manage.

Given all the factors and moving parts, I'm not surprised that they don't give an exact dates.  "Street Dates" are for companies with vertically integrated supply chains and enough bulk to have their product wait in the back rooms of stores until zero hour.  FFG has only about 100 employees and relies on third parties at every stage of production. They just don't have hands on control everywhere, and if they blamed every delay on their business partners, they'd lose those relationships.

Grimwalker said:

Some good points well made, which I had not considered. 

It is good to know there are games distributers out there who do not try to strong arm independent retailers (such as the aforementioned and a certain workshop based in the UK) 

However, I'm sure I'm not alone in that I have been brought into the FFG customer base purely off the back of the Star Wars product and have little interest in the company beyond this point. This may not give me a rounded point of view regarding FFG, but it does result in frustration.

Short version, if I want this product (which I do) I have no choice but to put up with the level of service on offer (which I will). I still reserve the right as an Englishman to whine about something and the subject of British weather is now boring.

Stile2112 said:

Remember when Japan was the red-headed step-child of the manufacturing world? They are now home to some of the most respected companies in the world: Honda, Toyota, Nintendo, and Sony, just to name a few. I have a feeling that China will eventually be on par with Japan, as far as international perception of their production capabilities is concerned.

As you say, they are great about hitting production and shipping deadlines. However, in my experience, the delays usually happen once the containers are in port in the US. If a ship comes in with 2 containers from a Chinese company, US Customs will arbitrarily drag their feet on one container while letting the other one go right away.