Diamond Bankruptcy Update

It's a horrible story. I hope the many affected publishers make it out of this crisis. This really is the time to support them for those who can.

Will this affect stores in Europe too?

Will this affect stores in Europe too?

Yes. Diamond also services Diamond UK, which sold into the book trade in Europe. Paizo does have several hobby distributors in Europe, so favorite local game stores should continue as normal.

-Jim

I’m so glad that I’m already supporting my local stores with these purchases.

I just bought Zo! vs Zo to reflavor it Zo! vs Diamond

Horrible that these corporate twerps think they can just take stock they don't own and/or got on credit and sell it without paying you.

They should either not being able to do it or beyond forced to consider you a debtor they have to repay with the liquidation.

Even then the liquidation will hurt book companies because the stock will be liquidated for pennies and will end up in clearance stores that won't give any of the sales to the publisher will also selling them cheaper.

Buy direct, folks! Avoid clearance emporiums for books if Diamond gets away with this. They are basically trying to fence stolen goods!

Luckily I get all the stuff I want from my suscriptions. Except the novels, because you guys don't have a novel suscription yet.

Please add a novel suscription. :p

Wooo man. Gonna absolutely hope for the best for the Paizo and re-up my lost omens subscription!

Horrible that these corporate twerps think they can just take stock they don't own and/or got on credit and sell it without paying you.

They should either not being able to do it or beyond forced to consider you a debtor they have to repay with the liquidation.

Even then the liquidation will hurt book companies because the stock will be liquidated for pennies and will end up in clearance stores that won't give any of the sales to the publisher will also selling them cheaper.

Buy direct, folks! Avoid clearance emporiums for books if Diamond gets away with this. They are basically trying to fence stolen goods!

From what I can find, Paizo has claimed creditorship, so at least the company has that recourse.

Yes, they should at least be a general unsecured creditor, but that’s not worth much. The issue is whether they are legally in a consignment agreement under the uniform commercial code, whether or not each or either party thought they were. Generally to count you have to “perfect” your consignment status by making certain filings and notifications to interested parties. Otherwise no bank could ever know if it was safe to loan to a business against their inventory. “They claim they own the inventory in their warehouse and it’s an asset against the loan? No third party has a consignment on file saying that, no, actually, they own it and it’s just stored in that guy’s warehouse? Ok, we’re good to go.” (There’s an exception where “everyone knows” everything they do is on consignment, but it’s unlikely you can prove that for relevant parties and definitely not soon or at low cost.)

There’s good policy reasons it’s set up this way (we want businesses to be able to borrow without long and expensive audits of their assets, killing the loan market, or killing consignment-like arrangements), and good reasons smaller parties don’t know about or don’t go through the required expense and hassle to protect against this. There are no perfect solutions, only trade offs in risk and costs/benefits.

And this is a part of why monopolies suck: when they go down, EVERYONE suffers.

Will the GenCon releases still be purchasable at the convention? My partner and I are going this year, so it would be great to know if they should be preordered instead (which I will happily do, if need be)
Thanks in advance for any clarification!

News of the bankruptcy is definitely a crit fail, but it's also a powerful reminder of how strong and resilient our gaming community is. I plan to stock my shelves the old-fashioned way, expanding my collection of Golarion and Pact Worlds books and maps by shopping thru Paizo and my FLGS. See you all at GenCon!

Followup question, after a convo with my FLGS:
If your preference is for retailers to buy direct from yall, how should a store reach out to Paizo about placing an order as a retailer, rather than a consumer?
My FLGS is half-bookstore and half games, so they'd been getting their Pathfinder books from Diamond. We found the website link to register as a Paizo-friendly retailer, but not any details about how to buy direct as a retailer. If yall don't do wholesale to retailers, are there any other wholesalers who you'd recommend?
I'm so sorry you're goin through this, team. It sucks, and you deserve so much better.

I have several SF2e pre-orders I made at my local game store weeks ago. I called my local game store, and they said they get their Paizo book from Alliance Games, then I realised that Alliance Games is on the bankruptcy notice. Will stores getting books from Alliance be affected too?

I have several SF2e pre-orders I made at my local game store weeks ago. I called my local game store, and they said they get their Paizo book from Alliance Games, then I realised that Alliance Games is on the bankruptcy notice. Will stores getting books from Alliance be affected too?

Hello!

Alliance was purchased by Universal Distribution and has maintained business as usual under new ownership. Paizo products are still happily shipping out to them, no worries there. :)

Will the GenCon releases still be purchasable at the convention? My partner and I are going this year, so it would be great to know if they should be preordered instead (which I will happily do, if need be)

Thanks in advance for any clarification!

Hello!

Yes, all Gen Con releases will be available in the Paizo booth during Gen Con. :)

Followup question, after a convo with my FLGS:

If your preference is for retailers to buy direct from yall, how should a store reach out to Paizo about placing an order as a retailer, rather than a consumer?
My FLGS is half-bookstore and half games, so they'd been getting their Pathfinder books from Diamond. We found the website link to register as a Paizo-friendly retailer, but not any details about how to buy direct as a retailer. If yall don't do wholesale to retailers, are there any other wholesalers who you'd recommend?
I'm so sorry you're goin through this, team. It sucks, and you deserve so much better.

We announced our upcoming Direct to Retail program earlier this year. While we are hard at work bringing this program to life, it won't be launching until later this year.

In the meantime, your FLGS is doing everything right: Register on our retailer locator, and sign up for our retailer newsletter.

We will be contacting these retailers to let them know when the program launches. If your FLGS is interested in being one of my guinea pigs and wants to be a pilot store to test the program before it goes live for everyone, have them email their store info and interest to Paizo Retail at <directtoretail [at] paizo.com>.

LoreMonger13 wrote:

Will the GenCon releases still be purchasable at the convention? My partner and I are going this year, so it would be great to know if they should be preordered instead (which I will happily do, if need be)

Thanks in advance for any clarification!

Hello!

Yes, all Gen Con releases will be available in the Paizo booth during Gen Con. :)

Awesome, thanks so much! We'll definitely be swinging by to pick up some swag <3

exigo wrote:

Will this affect stores in Europe too?

Yes. Diamond also services Diamond UK, which sold into the book trade in Europe. Paizo does have several hobby distributors in Europe, so favorite local game stores should continue as normal.

-Jim

If this affects the UK does this affect Canadian distribution? My FLGS dislikes whomever distributes Paizo's content in Canada and doesn't carry much as a result. This direct to retailer project sounds interesting. Is that valid for Canada too?

Jim Butler wrote:

exigo wrote:

Will this affect stores in Europe too?

Yes. Diamond also services Diamond UK, which sold into the book trade in Europe. Paizo does have several hobby distributors in Europe, so favorite local game stores should continue as normal.

-Jim

If this affects the UK does this affect Canadian distribution? My FLGS dislikes whomever distributes Paizo's content in Canada and doesn't carry much as a result. This direct to retailer project sounds interesting. Is that valid for Canada too?

I suspect major book chains in Canada will be impacted (if they purchased from Diamond), but Canadian Hobby Retailers can purchase from:

Lion Rampant/Asmodee Canada
Universal Distribution

Many North American distributors ship into Canada as well.

-Jim

So sad to hear! But all the more reason to support local game stores!

This story is so insanely infuriating. I can't believe how malicious and unfair bankruptcy law is.

I hope some of the smaller companies that were screwed over by this are able to get by as well.

Really bad news in Australia, as there's basically no 'friendly' local gaming stores here, it's mostly horribly overpriced chains, and Amazon has been the only option.

Really hope a new solution is found quickly.

Really bad news in Australia, as there's basically no 'friendly' local gaming stores here, it's mostly horribly overpriced chains, and Amazon has been the only option.

Really hope a new solution is found quickly.

Paizo has partnered with Aetherworks in Australia to better service the Australian market. Your favorite local game store should be able to contact them for the latest Paizo products.

-Jim

with this likely causing a bit of hit to the paizo's finances, I hope there won't be any layoffs to the employees working there

Hello, Brazilian fan here!

I'm so sorry for this situtation and all the loss. I really hope that you get through this as well as it can be.

Unfotunately, almost all my books where bought from Amazon, because that's the easiest (and cheapest) way to import them to Brazil.

If I got it right, for the forseable future, at least, I won't be able to buy them in this way, right?

Oh boy, I was so anxious to all things Starfinder 2e.... I guess I'll only have them digital for a while :'( ....

This is a really bad news, I order mainly though amazon because while I'd love to order directly from paizo.com the shipping costs to my country are killing it. On a $35 book I can expect over $20 shipping cost, so like 60% markup. Maybe this is a good opportunity to look into expanding storehouses into Europe to cut this overhead?

Ouch, the timing of this could not be much worse, given the SF 2E release schedule. I'm very glad that my wife and I recently preordered several of those books.

Safe sailing through these troubled seas, mates!

Yes, all Gen Con releases will be available in the Paizo booth during Gen Con. :)

Related question: do you know if there'll be a way to use Paizo Store Credit (like for having GM'd at PaizoCon) at the Paizo Booth at GenCon?

Related question: do you know if there'll be a way to use Paizo Store Credit (like for having GM'd at PaizoCon) at the Paizo Booth at GenCon?

Hey Kishmo! To clarify, are you referring to vouchers or other stored Paizo store credit?

It’s wild that they can just liquidate this stock with no consequences. I know the law seems on Diamond’s side but I hope these smaller companies get their stock and/or money back

Here's a timeline of events for anyone not as familiar with the happenings.

Absolutely gutted about this was looking forward to battlecry and Starfinder 2e.

Living here in the UK getting Paizo books here for anywhere near MSRP is difficult at the best of times, I guess I'll be looking earlier '26 before I can now, in the meantime I'll just have to read with envy about the folks who have them.

Minor grumbles aside, I hope Paizo comes out of this ok, and doesn't get shafted by awful business laws.

Absolutely gutted about this was looking forward to battlecry and Starfinder 2e.

Living here in the UK getting Paizo books here for anywhere near MSRP is difficult at the best of times, I guess I'll be looking earlier '26 before I can now, in the meantime I'll just have to read with envy about the folks who have them.

Minor grumbles aside, I hope Paizo comes out of this ok, and doesn't get shafted by awful business laws.

I saw this in a reddit post

"Paizo has new distributors. In Europe, it’s now Penguin Random House, handling physical books in most European countries. Additionally, in the United Kingdom, Modiphius Entertainment manages a good portion of the shipments and local stock. Or at least, I believe so. I think they still need one in USA."

Starfinder2e Reddit .

Dan_Dare74 wrote:

Absolutely gutted about this was looking forward to battlecry and Starfinder 2e.

Living here in the UK getting Paizo books here for anywhere near MSRP is difficult at the best of times, I guess I'll be looking earlier '26 before I can now, in the meantime I'll just have to read with envy about the folks who have them.

Minor grumbles aside, I hope Paizo comes out of this ok, and doesn't get shafted by awful business laws.

I saw this in a reddit post

"Paizo has new distributors. In Europe, it’s now Penguin Random House, handling physical books in most European countries. Additionally, in the United Kingdom, Modiphius Entertainment manages a good portion of the shipments and local stock. Or at least, I believe so. I think they still need one in USA."

Starfinder2e Reddit .

Unfortunately, that's not true. Diamond sold products directly to Penguin Random House. That link is now broken. The distributors of Paizo products in Europe are:

ACD Blackfire Entertainment
Asmodee UK
Asmodee Nordics
Bliss Distribution
BNW Distribution
Burst
GMS Distribution
Spiral Galaxy Games

-Jim

I assume you guys are in contact with companies like Penguin Random House for your European distribution, because it's certain that they are also left scrambling in the wake of this event.

I am beyond horrified at this turn of events. Know that the hearts of the greater Paizo Community are on your side, and will support you however we can.

Hmm

Hey Kishmo! To clarify, are you referring to vouchers or other stored Paizo store credit?

I appear to have a voucher from Outpost VIII; but it would be good to know for either, really :)

Here's a timeline of events for anyone not as familiar with the happenings.

Wow that's such a fractal of crazy. Any one item you read deeper into turns into more crazy things.

Roll For Combat just made an update video on their situation with Diamond, not sure I'd call it good news, but it's at least better or hopeful news. Posting this here because I'm wondering if this applies to Paizo too?

Update on Diamond Bankruptcy: Just Mostly Screwed??? .

Thinking of you all during these challenging and changing times. You and your work are valued.