Survey Update: 60 Respondents
Here is an update of the survey responses, my analysis based on the results at hand, and my preliminary conclusions based on said data. This post is acting as a log entry of my results as they were collected and analyzed on August 24, 2019. The analysis and chart screenshots below the cut are only accurate to that date. Please visit https://www.teampurplelion.com/merchandise-survey/ for live updates to both the charts and my analyses until my next log entry.
To participate in the survey, go to: https://forms.gle/nJHvea9F64TdiqRj7
As a disclaimer, here are some factors that may potentially skew my data:
Availability of official merchandise
Current respondent pool
Fandom participation
While I will do my best to make an effort to demonstrate where these factors are present and form conclusions with them in mind, it’s worth mentioning that availability of official merchandise is precisely one of the things I hope to examine with this survey, and demonstrate to WEP LLC, the main party in handling merchandising, where the market is and has been for the past three years.
Charts and analysis below the cut.
Vrepit Sa!
General Spending Overview and Observations
[ID: A pie chart titled “Do you prefer official or fan-made VLD merchandise?” displaying four slices that represent four types of responses. The largest slice is blue and labeled “Fan-made”, taking approximately 2/3 of the available chart. The next largest is “Both”, taking a little under the remaining third, and at the top of the chart are two very small, unlabeled slices in yellow and green.]
Fans largely prefer fan-made merchandise, with two-thirds of respondents selecting that as their preferred type. Many fans also like both official and fan-made, and when asked about why they preferred the type of merchandise selected, the responses consisted of wanting to support independent artists, higher quality of merchandise in fan-made products as opposed to official, fan-artists provide a wider variety of options in characters, and that Season 8 of VLD altered their preference away from official merchandise, with one respondent returning approximately 500USD worth of official merchandise after Season 8 aired on Netflix.
[ID: A bar graph titled “Total Spent on Merchandise (USD)” with two bars, and the Y-axis features money amounts in increments of $5,000. The legend on the right labels the blue bar as “Official” and the red as “Fan-made”. The blue bar is short and measures under the $5,000 line, while the red bar is significantly taller, coming in between the $15,000 and $20,000 lines.]
When we look at the estimated totals spent by respondents, we can see that fan-made merchandise has brought in over 400% of the income that official merchandise has. In other words, WEP LLC would need to sell over 12,000USD more merchandise to approach the amount sold in fan-made merchandise.
Since fans prefer the larger variety, higher quality, and flat out availability of certain characters (such as Lotor, members of the Blade of Marmora, etc), and given how some respondents specifically cited Season 8 as being why they prefer fan-made merchandise, it’s not a surprise that fan-made merchandise purchases vastly outpace official purchases.
[ID: A bar graph titled “Total Spent, by Category (USD)” with five different pairs of two bars along the X-axis, and the Y-axis features money amounts in increments of $5,000. The legend below the title labels the blue bars as “Official” and the red bars as “Fan-made”. From left to right, the pairs are labeled along the X-axis as “Total Spent”, “Solo”, “Ship”, “Ensemble”, and “Symbols/Bots”. In “Total Spent”, the blue bar does not reach $5,000, while the red bar is squarely between $15,000 and $20,000. In “Solo”, the blue bar only stretches about a quarter of the way up to the $5,000 line, while the red bar is firmly between $5,000 and $10,000. In “Ship”, the blue bar is exceedingly short, while the red bar is nearly at $10,000. In “Ensemble”, both the blue and red bars are very short, with the blue bar reaching approximately a third of the way to $5,000, while the red bar is about half that height. In “Symbols/Bots”, the blue and red bars are even shorter, at about the same ratio in height.]
This chart compares the totals spent per category to the overall estimated total between official and fan-made merchandise purchases. The total spent estimates for official merchandise is 3,498.90USD and fan-made is 17,300.58USD. However, there is something interesting about those estimates. When purchases are broken down, people give pretty specific amounts and specify what they spent it on, so when we add the subtotals of each category for official merchandise, we get the total of 4,888.40USD, which is a nearly 1,400USD discrepancy. When we do the same for the fan-made purchases, we get a total of 18,161.91USD, a discrepancy of 861.33USD. With that in mind, we see that out of the respondents, people underestimate how much they’ve spent overall, which I find extremely interesting.
[ID: A bar graph titled “Solo Character Purchases (USD)” featuring 16 different pairs of blue and red bars along the X-axis, and the Y-axis is labeled in increments of $1,000. The legend labels the blue as “Official” and the red as “Fan-made”. The character names along the X-axis are, in order: Shiro, Keith, Lance, Hunk, Pidge, Allura, Coran, Lotor, Zethrid, Thace, Throk, Krolia, Sven, Kosmo, Kaltenecker, and Unspecified. Lotor features the tallest of the red bars, reaching nearly $3,000, and has no red bar. Allura has the next-tallest red bar, coming in over $1,000, and a very small blue bar. Shiro, Keith, Lance, Hunk, and Pidge all have varying heights of red and blue bars, with red always being taller, but none passing $1,000. Coran, Zethrid, Thace, Throk, Krolia, Sven, Kosmo, and Kaltenecker, meanwhile, do not have any blue bars and very small red bars. The “Unspecified” category has a small red bar and then a blue bar approximately half the height of the red.]
In terms of solo-character sales, Lance is most popular for official merchandise, bringing in approximately 325USD overall, with Shiro coming in second at 275USD. However, Lotor is most popular for fan-mademerchandise, bringing in nearly $3,000 by himself with Allura coming in second at approximately 1,218USD. This appears to be partially shaped by merchandise availability, as Lotor has no official merchandise. However, the demand for merchandise of him remains stronger than Lance. As a contrast, if we take the most popular official merch character, Lance, we can see he does not even come close to breaking the 1000USD line on that chart for fan-made merchandise.
[ID: A bar graph titled “Ship Purchases (USD)” featuring 17 different pairs of red and blue bars along the X-axis. Y-axis goes up in increments of $1,000. The legend below the title labels the blue as “Official” and the red as “Fan-made”. The ships are listed left to right as follows: “Lotor + Allura”, “Keith + Lance”, “Shiro + Keith”, “Pidge + Lance”, “Lotor + Thace”, “Sendak + Haxus”, “Zethrid + Ezor”, “Keith + Lotor”, “Shiro + Allura”, “Shiro + Pidge”, “Hunk + Pidge”, “Pidge + Keith”, “Krolia + Texas”, “Keith + Matt”, “Keith + James”, “Allura + Lance”, and “Unspecified”. “Lotor + Allura”, “Keith + Lance”, “Shiro + Keith”, and “Unspecified” are the only categories with blue bars, though none of the blue bars approach the halfway point between 0 and $1,000. “Shiro + Keith” has the tallest red bar, nearing the $5,000 line at the top. “Lotor + Allura” comes in second at the $3,000 mark, and “Keith + Lance” comes in third with the red bar nearly at the $1,000 line. All other ships have very small or nearly-invisible red bars, and no blue bars.]
In terms of relationship sales, Lotor and Allura are the most popular for official merchandise, bringing in nearly 300USD even with Shiro and Keith coming in second at nearly 232USD. Shiro and Keith are the most popular for fan-made merchandise, bringing in over 4,500USD in sales, while Lotor and Allura trail behind them at a little over 3,000USD. While only Lotor was the most popular solo character in either category of merchandise type, ships with Lance, the other most popular solo character, do not break 1,000USD in sales for any one ship, with Keith and Lance coming in just shy of that for fan-made merchandise, and only 163USD for official merchandise.
[ID: A bar graph titled “Ensemble Totals (USD)” with five pairs of bars along the X-axis, labeled in order as follows: “Canon Material”, “Team Voltron”, “Team Sincline”, “Blade of Marmora”, and “Unspecified”. The Y-axis goes up in increments of $250. The legend under the title labels the blue bars as “Official” and the red bars as “Fan-made”. “Canon Material” has no red bar, due to being limited to official merchandise such as the DVDs and comic books, and its blue bar reaches nearly $750. “Team Voltron” has a very short blue bar, and the red bar is near but below the $500 line. “Team Sincline” and “Blade of Marmora” have no blue bars, and very small red bars. “Unspecified” has a very tall blue bar, passing the $1,000 line, while the red bar is approximately one-third its height, passing the $250 line.]
In terms of ensemble sales, not many respondents specified what they purchased, however canon material such as DVDs and comic books brought in nearly 750USD alone, vastly outperforming any character-related merchandise. However, considering there were no ensembles available beyond the two configurations of the Paladins, it’s no surprise that even Team Voltron ensemble merchandise performed better when fan-made as opposed to official. With no Galra Empire merchandise, Team Sincline, the Blade of Marmora, or any other factions, fans simply did not seem to have the option to make those purchases at all unless they found fan artists who would.
[ID: A bar graph titled “Robots and Symbols (USD)” with 9 pairs of red and blue bars along the X-axis, and the Y-axis ascends in increments of $100. The legend under the title labels blue as “Official” and red as “Fan-made”. The categories along the X-axis are as follows: “Voltron Symbols”, “Voltron”, “Black Lion”, “Red Lion”, “Green Lion”, “Blue Lion”, “Yellow Lion”, “Galaxy Garrison”, and “Unspecified”. “Unspecified” on the far right has by far the tallest blue bar, reaching nearly $500, while its red bar is only approximately a quarter of the way to the $100 line. “Voltron Symbols” has a blue bar reaching approximately two-thirds up to the $100 line, while the red bar is squarely between the $200 and $300 lines. “Voltron” has a blue bar reaching nearly the $100 line and the red bar is in line with the $200 line. “Black Lion” has a slightly taller blue bar than red, but it only reaches approximately halfway to the $100 line. “Red Lion” has a slightly higher blue bar than “Black Lion”, but the red bar is approximately one-third the height of the blue. “Green Lion” has a blue bar reaching nearly the $100 line and a negligible red bar. “Blue Lion” and “Yellow Lion” both only have blue bars, with “Blue Lion” nearly reaching the $100 line and “Yellow Lion” close behind. “Galaxy Garrison” has only a small red bar and no blue bar.]
In purchases of symbols of Voltron and/or the robots, fans also did not disclose the majority of official merchandise purchases, however again fan-made merchandise purchases continue to outpace official when specified, at least for symbols such as the Voltron V and Voltron itself. Given how there are options to purchase official merchandise of the lions and other robots or symbols, it’s not a surprise that these are preferred, since most fan-made merchandise seems to focus on characters, ships, and symbols heavily associated with characters (i.e. Keith’s knife, or Garrison uniforms) rather than general affiliations (i.e. the Galra Empire, the Voltron Coalition).
Current conclusions based on this data: fans underestimate their purchases by a significant margin, and official merchandise would fit the typical Star Wars style niche in which you align yourself with different factions had they chosen to sell anything beyond Voltron-related merchandise, and would benefit from selling higher quality solo character merchandise, especially if they expanded to include other major characters such as Emperor Zarkon, Haggar, and Lotor, as well as minor characters such as Kolivan, Thace, etc. The market exists. However, only fan artists are serving it in a significant and observable way.
Consumer Faith Responses
This section focuses on if fans would purchase official merchandise as Season 8 currently stands as opposed to if the original is released, as well as their reasoning for their answer.
[ID: A pie chart titled “Would you purchase official merchandise for VLD as it currently stands on Netflix?” There are 10 slices of the chart, with only two labeled. The largest slice takes nearly three-quarters of the available chart, is blue, and labeled “No”. The next-largest slice is yellow, takes up approximately a third of the remaining space, and is labeled “Yes”. Seven of the remaining eight slices are of equal size, with the eighth being a slightly darker yellow and twice the thickness of the others, though unlabeled.]
[ID: A pie chart titled “If the original s8 gets released, would you purchase official merchandise?” There are 11 slices of varying sizes, with only three labeled. The largest slice is red, labeled “Yes”, and takes up less than half the available space. The second-largest slice is powder blue and labeled “Maybe”. The third-largest slice is orange and labeled “No”. Two of the remaining eight slices have comparable sizes to “Maybe” and “No”, and then the remainder are all significantly smaller.]
Notable preliminary responses
In the first question, 73.3% of responses are resounding nos. 11.7% would purchase merchandise with VLD as it stands currently, 5% say it depends or probably not, and the remainder would but only if certain conditions are met (i.e.: quality of merchandise goes up).
In the second question, only 10% would not purchase merchandise even if the original season is released. While 40% said yes, the remainder either need to see the season and/or merchandise first, or they would purchase merchandise if certain conditions are met (i.e.: seasons 7 and 8 are official, not director’s cuts).
Current conclusion: consumer faith in VLD as a show and in its merchandise are low, and in order to regain customers, seasons 7 and 8 must be reverted to their original forms.
