A Wind of Change
- Thread starter Robbo
- Start date
mmmm.
woodsball and scenario style games have the potential to make good tv far more easily than the difficult to follow (from a commentary/camera point of view) than tourney style games. if a big company wants to make big money then it needs tv - and the advertising royalties that can go with it. woods games would be easier to film - head/gun cams, a few steady cams, remote variable direction cams, etc - edited together like a little war movie. paintball on tv, real easy, real cheap and stuck in front of a mass audience. this would create a bigger pull for new blood, all be it into the woods type market.
so this area is likely to be a big growth sector. i'd see a lot of push on mil-sim type stuff and woods ball friendly (dust black, olive, camo) markers - look at planets new etek colour schemes for example.
the big conglomerates? well are they really? many of these smaller companies are bought up by investment firms, creating more of a portfolio than a merged company. the drive to improve profit will be there and this will be done by carefully selecting which companies to group together. then the product lines will be looked at and directions set as to what ranges are carried on and by whom. i'd see these companies narrowing there product range but producing some damn good sh*t. and they'll still produce a new marker every year.....
they will need to be careful on pricing. if anything i'd see prices stay the same. they won't drop, even tho' the slicker operations should make it possible, as this would lower profits. they could push prices up to up profit as suggested, but this would endanger the customer base.
smaller companies? they need to maintain a product base which contains a few top-of-the-line items at sensible prices, backed up by a few changing products to broaden there range.
damn, that's a lot of writing!
summary for those that can't be bothered reading it:
*sport - aiming for TV coverage, most likely by developing woodsball/scenario
*companies - big 'uns: less overlap of product, but top quality
- small 'uns: narrow "specialist" ranges, extremely high quality
woodsball and scenario style games have the potential to make good tv far more easily than the difficult to follow (from a commentary/camera point of view) than tourney style games. if a big company wants to make big money then it needs tv - and the advertising royalties that can go with it. woods games would be easier to film - head/gun cams, a few steady cams, remote variable direction cams, etc - edited together like a little war movie. paintball on tv, real easy, real cheap and stuck in front of a mass audience. this would create a bigger pull for new blood, all be it into the woods type market.
so this area is likely to be a big growth sector. i'd see a lot of push on mil-sim type stuff and woods ball friendly (dust black, olive, camo) markers - look at planets new etek colour schemes for example.
the big conglomerates? well are they really? many of these smaller companies are bought up by investment firms, creating more of a portfolio than a merged company. the drive to improve profit will be there and this will be done by carefully selecting which companies to group together. then the product lines will be looked at and directions set as to what ranges are carried on and by whom. i'd see these companies narrowing there product range but producing some damn good sh*t. and they'll still produce a new marker every year.....
they will need to be careful on pricing. if anything i'd see prices stay the same. they won't drop, even tho' the slicker operations should make it possible, as this would lower profits. they could push prices up to up profit as suggested, but this would endanger the customer base.
smaller companies? they need to maintain a product base which contains a few top-of-the-line items at sensible prices, backed up by a few changing products to broaden there range.
damn, that's a lot of writing!
summary for those that can't be bothered reading it:
*sport - aiming for TV coverage, most likely by developing woodsball/scenario
*companies - big 'uns: less overlap of product, but top quality
- small 'uns: narrow "specialist" ranges, extremely high quality
I'm not convinced we'll see a widespread price increase... Oligopolistic market structures (such as ours is becoming with these mergers) - ie a few large firms - tend to compete not on price, but in non price ways. If they change their prices up, demand for their products will decrease, and demand for their competitors will increase. If one company puts their prices down, it will start a price war, as all the other competing firms are forced to do so to remain competitive. This is detrimental to all competitors in the market, and as such, it is rare.
I think seeing a broader range of products from each company is more likely, particularly with the emphasis (as has already happened) on entry level priced equipment.
I think seeing a broader range of products from each company is more likely, particularly with the emphasis (as has already happened) on entry level priced equipment.
Sup air is much easier to film, you can see almost everything thats going on on the field. Woodsball is too big and would be hard to keep track of everything especially if its live, may be a little better like you said with the editing but still. Plus i find sup air more entertaining, but thats my opinion, i would of thought sup air games would bring in more viewers as a lot of ballers are into tournament style, millenium, nspl etc...
I seriously hope your not right. I cant think of anything worse than more people thinking we're all wannabe soldiers and advertising that whole army bull**** on television.Maybe the market is getting bigger in that area and common sense dictates large companies are going to concentrate on where the profit is at ,but god help the rest of us if the scenario crowd end up being the poster children for paintball ,thats the death toll of the whole thing.
Ok thats kind of what i was trying to get across^^ But i was trying to be polite
But yeah i think hes absolutely right with the wannabe soldiers and poster children, could screw it up big time. I just wish we could get more paintball coverage in the UK, i hear about it in the US, but have never seen paintball coverage in the UK.Does anyone know of any channels/dates there showing in UK, if at all?
following on from the topic of TV coverage.
to my knowledge there has only been two shows; mission paintball (i think thats what its called), which seemed to be a Tournament playing mainly "punter" scenarios.
and the other one which i think was on channel four, which seemed to take a "futuristic" theme, dunno if any one else remembers that.
so neither really focusing on sup air or scenario but i guess both are proof that paintball if suitable for TV.
I think that people are focusing too much on the link between TV and big firms, although it may generate new customers the sunk costs involved probably make it inviable, as Tom Allen said the chances are these mergers will not affect us greatly, look at the car industry there are about 4 big firms who own the majority of the other firms, all that this has lead to is slightly lower prices, no grand monopolies.
to magic_8ball, paintball is not really an oligopoly, the "large" firms are not large enough, it is really a monopolistic market. as such price competition still exists, look at the ION for proof of this. product differentiation in paintball comes down to personal taste more than any thing, as all modern markers are able to shoot at 15bps +, tend to be easy to maintain and have eyes.
to my knowledge there has only been two shows; mission paintball (i think thats what its called), which seemed to be a Tournament playing mainly "punter" scenarios.
and the other one which i think was on channel four, which seemed to take a "futuristic" theme, dunno if any one else remembers that.
so neither really focusing on sup air or scenario but i guess both are proof that paintball if suitable for TV.
I think that people are focusing too much on the link between TV and big firms, although it may generate new customers the sunk costs involved probably make it inviable, as Tom Allen said the chances are these mergers will not affect us greatly, look at the car industry there are about 4 big firms who own the majority of the other firms, all that this has lead to is slightly lower prices, no grand monopolies.
to magic_8ball, paintball is not really an oligopoly, the "large" firms are not large enough, it is really a monopolistic market. as such price competition still exists, look at the ION for proof of this. product differentiation in paintball comes down to personal taste more than any thing, as all modern markers are able to shoot at 15bps +, tend to be easy to maintain and have eyes.
How are the firms not big enough to be an oligopoly (several large firms), yet are big enough to be a monopoly (one HUGE firm)? I think you'd struggle to argue that DYE/KEE/Planet/SP are all one company mate...
Indeed, im not suggesting that product differentiation wouldnt be a component of the competition, but i think you're making the mistake of classing a DM7 and an Ion in the same market, when realistically, the Ion is in a separate market, with the PMR...
I remember that, ahh man i used to love that show, they had jeeps as well with mounted paintball guns, good times...good times, and after i have remembered that, i realise scenario is suitable for TV but i would still prefer sup air/tourny over scenario/woods coverage any day, as im sure a lot of us would,
i personally do not think the mil sim/scenario is the way to go as far as TV is concerned. i think the big investers will push the "pro" side of paintball to the general public. Extreme sports channel the Xgames that sorta thing. when it comes to products i think that the big companies will cop on to the fact that allot of the Punter style players love the game and will create products to not only suit their budget but also the game style they love. i also hope that they will help make it easier to transfer from woodsball to tourny ball.