GW Profits Soar As Hobbyists & Stores Struggle To Find Product

By Travis Pasch | August 3rd, 2023 | Categories: Finance, Games Workshop, Tabletop Gaming News & Rumors

Games Workshop has released its financials ending on May 2023, and profits have soared despite the many allocations and product issues.

The Games Workshop Investor page just released a deep financial summary breakdown of revenue, costs, and profits for half their fiscal year, which ended on May 28, 2023.

When looking at their numbers from last year, things have taken off for them, despite this being all before the launch of 10th Edition Warhammer 40k, which didn’t happen until June.

Let’s look at last year’s numbers and then jump into the new report.

GW Profits & Revenue (2021-2022)

(Mid-year financials)

(2021-2022 full year)

Last year, core operating profits only increased by £1 million with overall profit going down by 5 million. This was the first time we saw those numbers drop in a long time, and earnings per share were down as well.

Since the pandemic last year was the biggest dip we had seen, with a lot of numbers going down or just not increasing. Compared to their previous growth, this was nothing for them in terms of growth, and profit did not increase all that much.

Games Workshop Profits Soar As Hobbyists & Stores Struggle To Find Product

Here are some highlights:

Profit before tax is estimated to be not less than £170 million, which is up about 14 million from last year.
Core revenue to be not less than £440 million, which is up about 60 million.
Licensing income of £25 million is down by about 3 million from last year, which is interesting as this seemed to keep profits afloat last year.
Profit share cash payments (to employees) are up by about 1 million, amounting in total to £11 million.
Dividends per share went up by an insane amount, almost doubling.
Dividends declared and paid in the year were £136 million.
They gave numbers for Warhammer+ for year 2, and the number of subscribers has only gone up around 20,000.
Taking into account bonuses of £11m, and a payout of around £136m in dividends, they still retained over £30m which is just about half of their overall profit from last year’s financials.

It’s interesting to see the numbers on Warhammer+, as they haven’t really changed much over the past full year:

Warhammer+
Our subscription service for Warhammer fans is approaching its second year. It is a new way to explore the worlds of Warhammer. You’ll find original animations and shows, access to Warhammer 40,000 and Age of Sigmar apps, a digital vault archive packed with decades of lore and magazines, subscriber offers, and exclusive miniatures. The exciting content delivered through Warhammer+ will remain an integral part of our digital offer and how we share our IP. Subscriber numbers are currently 136,000 (2022: 105,000).

This also is one of the most interesting parts of the whole thing, at least for hobbyists in the States who want to get more product:

Whilst new systems and automation have been in place all year, it has not been until later in 2022/23 that software updates and modest improvements to our old back-office systems allowed the team to use them fully. During the 2023/24 financial period, we will decommission our legacy warehouse system and equipment. The back office systems will be replaced as part of an ongoing systems improvement plan.

This transition has been slow and could very well be a reason so little product has gone out and we’ve seen such heavy allocations.

Will Games Workshop Continue to Thrive?

All signs point seem to point to yes.

At this point, with 10th Edition Warhammer 40k here and so many new faction codexes on the horizon, we don’t see things slowing down for the company any time soon.

Especially considering not only do you have the release of 10th Edition (which isn’t included in any of this report), there will be Warhammer Old World and Legions Imperialis released within the year as well.

While we’re not sure what’s going on with their product levels and constant allocations, the company is doing insanely well financially.

Plus, with all the new releases to their product lineup, revenue will most likely continue to increase, especially with Henry Cavill and Amazon releasing something in the future as well.

What do you think about Games Workshop profits heading into 2023 versus stock levels?

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