Postmortem Studios Financial Year

My financial year runs 1st January to 1st January so far as my accounts go.

I’m not going to give absolutely precise figures to you but I’m going to let you know where the business currently stands financially and what I think this means for me, and potentially for you if you work in this sort of area or have expectations thereof.

Postmortem Studios covers my income from fiction self publishing, RPG self-publishing, freelancing for other RPG companes/small publishers and also my income from stands at conventions, sales via distribution through third parties and so forth.

Postmortem Studios has a diverse RPG product portfolio with many different games and one-off products, support materials for other companies and generic products.

In our last financial period we made around £8,000 and have approximately £500 worth of stock currently in storage.

We made less than the UK minimum wage, but more than the US minimum wage (close to $13,000).

The year was a difficult year due to the economy being bad enough to reach into the leisure market and due to personal problems and additional expenses. My depression kept me from working at my full capacity and turned more than one month completely unproductive. Medical costs have increased for me despite the NHS and the cost of learning to drive has been considerable but may pay for itself later on with easier and increased convention attendance.

Agents of SWING was the banner product, supported by hardy perennials such as the 100 seeds books and increased access to distribution.

The best move I made was probably becoming involved with IPR and supplying them with hardcopy product though cashflow issues have prevented me fully exploiting that avenue for sales. Potential profits have also been impacted by the relative slow speed at which third party access to distribution has been processed.

I speculate that had I not been so ill this past year I would have been able to break the UK minimum wage barrier for yearly income for the first time, rather than merely the occasional month. Without a strong hit (like Agents of SWING) I am unlikely to make the same amount this year, particularly as I intend to concentrate on my diversification into written fiction.

Good things we did this year

• The $1.99 pricing for short or one-off products seems to work well and to attract interest to things that might otherwise be passed over.
• Conventional pricing for larger products seems to work better than cheap pricing.
• Blog engagement has been good and has driven sales, especially in hardcopy.
• IPR has been worthwhile to join and e23 sales have continued to grow.
• Assisting/boosting new writers has been good and driven engagement and enthusiasm.
• Social media engagement, especially Twitter and G+. Facebook doesn’t appear to be worth the effort.
• Managed to pay artists more and get good rapport with co-workers and bind regular co-workers together.

Things that didn’t work out

• Deluxe versions of products are very expensive with little return other than buzz.
• Still haven’t managed to find a stable, usable and common enough platform for running demo games or found people to reliably run demos etc at cons.
• Depression, enough said.
• Didn’t get to more cons.
• No improvement in direct sales.