TSR, Inc.
TSR, Inc. was an American game publishing company, best known as the original publisher of Dungeons & Dragons. Its earliest incarnation, Tactical Studies Rules, was founded in October 1973 by Gary Gygax and Don Kaye. Gygax had been unable to find a publisher for D&D, a new type of game he and Dave Arneson were co-developing, so he founded the new company with Kaye to self-publish their products. Needing financing to bring their new game to market, Gygax and Kaye brought in Brian Blume in December as an equal partner. Dungeons & Dragons is generally considered the first tabletop role-playing game, and established the genre. When Kaye died suddenly in 1975, the Tactical Studies Rules partnership restructured into TSR Hobbies, Inc. and accepted investment from Blume's father Melvin. With the popular D&D as its main product, TSR Hobbies became a major force in the games industry by the late 1970s. Melvin Blume eventually transferred his shares to his other son Kevin, making the two Blume brothers the largest shareholders in TSR Hobbies.
TSR Hobbies ran into financial difficulties in the spring of 1983, prompting the company to split into four independent businesses, with game publishing and development continuing as TSR, Inc.. After losing their executive positions, the Blume brothers subsequently sold their shares to TSR Vice President Lorraine Williams, who in turn engineered Gygax's ouster from the company in October 1985. TSR saw prosperity under Williams, but encountered financial trouble in the mid-1990s. While their overall sales and revenue were healthy, TSR's high costs meant the company nevertheless became unprofitable and deeply in debt. TSR was left unable to cover its publishing costs due to a variety of factors. Facing insolvency, TSR was purchased in 1997 by Wizards of the Coast. WotC initially continued using the TSR name for D&D products, but by 2000, the TSR moniker was dropped, coinciding with the release of the 3rd edition of Dungeons & Dragons.
WotC allowed the TSR trademark to expire in the early 2000s. Two other companies have since used the TSR trademark commercially.
History
Tactical Studies Rules (1973–1975)
Tactical Studies Rules was formed in 1973 as a partnership between Gary Gygax and Don Kaye, who collected together $2,400 for costs related to startup, to formally publish and sell the rules of Dungeons & Dragons, the creation of Gygax and Dave Arneson and the first modern role-playing game. The first TSR release, however, was Cavaliers and Roundheads, a miniature game, to start generating income for TSR. The partnership was subsequently joined by Brian Blume in December 1973. Blume was admitted to the partnership to fund further publishing of D&D, as Cavaliers and Roundheads was not a commercial success. In the original configuration of the partnership, Kaye served as president, Blume as vice-president, and Gygax as editor.In January 1974, TSR—with Gygax using his basement as a headquarters—produced 1,000 copies of D&D, selling them for $10 each. This first print sold out in 10 months. In January 1975, TSR printed a second batch of 1,000 copies of D&D, which took only another five or six months to sell out. Also in 1974, TSR published Warriors of Mars, a miniatures rules book set in the fantasy world of Barsoom, originally imagined by Edgar Rice Burroughs in his series of novels about John Carter of Mars, to which Gygax paid homage in the preface of the first edition of D&D. However, Gygax and TSR published the Mars book without permission from the Burroughs estate. Warriors of Mars was quietly dropped from the catalog and never reprinted.
When Don Kaye died of a heart attack on January 31, 1975, his role was taken over by his wife Donna Kaye, who remained responsible for accounting, shipping, and the records of the partnership through the summer. By the summer of 1975, those duties became complex enough that Gygax himself became a full-time employee of the partnership in order to take them over from Donna Kaye. Arneson also entered the partnership in order to coordinate research and design with his circle in the Twin Cities.
TSR Hobbies, Inc. (1975–1983)
Brian Blume and Gary Gygax reorganized the business from a partnership to a corporation called TSR Hobbies, Inc. At first, it was a separate company to market miniatures and games from other companies, an enterprise which was also connected to the opening of the Dungeon hobby shop in Lake Geneva. TSR Hobbies then moved to buy out the old TSR partnership's assets. Brian's father, Melvin Blume, invested $20,000 in the nascent company which enabled it to buy out Donna Kaye's share of the original TSR partnership. On September 26, 1975, the assets of the former partnership were transferred to TSR Hobbies. Brian Blume became the largest shareholder, Melvin Blume the second largest, and Gary Gygax the third largest. Gygax served as president of TSR Hobbies, and Blume as vice president and secretary. The Dungeon hobby shop would become the effective headquarters of the company, including the offices of Blume and Gygax. TSR Hobbies subcontracted the printing and assembly work in October 1975, and the third printing of 2,000 copies of D&D sold out in five months. Tim Kask was hired in the autumn of 1975 as Periodicals Editor, and the first employee that TSR hired for full-time work.Empire of the Petal Throne was the first game product released by TSR Hobbies, followed by two D&D supplements, Greyhawk and Blackmoor. Also released in 1975 were the board game Dungeon! and the Wild West RPG Boot Hill. The company took $300,000 in revenues for the fiscal year of 1976. TSR started hosting the Gen Con Game Fair in 1976, and the first D&D open tournament was held at the convention that year. D&D supplements Eldritch Wizardry and Gods, Demi-Gods & Heroes were released in 1976. Also in 1976, the company opened The Dungeon Hobby Shop at 723 Williams Street and TSR Hobbies moved out of Gygax's home and into the building, with its offices upstairs from the hobby shop.
TSR also began to branch the Dungeons & Dragons product into two: Dungeons & Dragons as a general audience product intended for novices, and Advanced Dungeons & Dragons for a more complicated product aimed at hardcore fans. In 1977, the Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set was released for D&D, and the Monster Manual was released as the initial product for AD&D, making TSR the first game company to publish a hardbound book. The next year, the AD&D ''Players Handbook was published, followed by a series of six adventure modules. Due to the inclusion of the word "Advanced" in the title, TSR did not pay Dave Arneson any royalties on AD&D products, saying his co-creation rights extended to the base D&D name only. In late 1978, TSR Hobbies and the Dungeon Hobby Shop moved from 723 Williams Street into downtown Lake Geneva, to 772 West Main Street, with its offices once again located above the hobby shop. In 1979, the AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide was published, and radio ads featuring "Morley the Wizard" were broadcast, a figure created "as the poster child for the softer, child-friendly image" promoted at that time. All of these core books would go on to be major hits; the D&D Basic Set sold well in 1977 and 1978, would sell over 100,000 copies in 1979, and would continue to be updated and re-released for years.
During this era, there were a number of competitors and unofficial supplements to D&D published, arguably in violation of TSR's copyright, which many D&D players used alongside the TSR books. Among these were the Arduin Grimoire, the Manual of Aurenia, and variants such as Warlock and Tunnels & Trolls. TSR regarded these very warily, and in cases where they felt their trademarks were being misused, they issued cease-and-desist letters. More often than not, this legal posturing resulted in only slight changes to competitors' works, but caused significant animosity in the community.
In 1979, TSR signed a contract with Random House with unusual terms. In most deals between publishers and distributors, publishers are paid directly based on books sold downstream by the distributor to bookstores. In TSR's contract, however, Random House would loan money to TSR as an advance upon shipment of product from TSR to Random House, a loan equivalent to 27.3% of the suggested retail price. The arrangement was mutually beneficial at first: TSR could acquire money up front to fund their work, and not have to worry about immediate sales. Many of TSR's products had consistent sales over time, and the loans allowed the company to recoup the investment immediately and use the funds to make more books. Returns were generally low, leading to Random House's confidence in TSR. However, the arrangement would cause trouble later in the 1990s.
Gygax granted exclusive rights to Games Workshop to distribute TSR products in the United Kingdom, after meeting with Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson. Games Workshop printed some original material and also printed their own versions of various D&D and AD&D titles in order to avoid high import costs. TSR was unable to reach an agreement with Games Workshop regarding a possible merger, so the company created the subsidiary TSR Hobbies UK Ltd, in 1980. Gygax hired Don Turnbull to lead the subsidiary, which would expand into continental Europe during the 1980s. TSR UK published a series of modules and the original Fiend Folio. TSR UK also produced Imagine magazine for 31 issues.
The first-published campaign setting for AD&D, the World of Greyhawk, was introduced in 1980. The espionage role-playing game Top Secret came out in 1980; reportedly, a note regarding a fictitious assassination plot on TSR stationery, as part of the playtesting of the new game, prompted the FBI to visit TSR's offices. That same year, the Role Playing Game Association was founded to promote skillful roleplaying and unite players around the country. In 1981, Inc. magazine listed TSR Hobbies among the hundred fastest-growing privately held U.S. companies. That same year, TSR Hobbies moved its offices again, into a former medical supply building with a warehouse attached. In 1982, TSR Hobbies broke the 20 million sales mark.
TSR Hobbies terminated Grenadier Miniatures's license in 1982 and began to directly manufacture an AD&D miniatures line, followed by a toy line. Part of the licensing of the AD&D toy line went to LJN. Also that year, TSR introduced the Gangbusters and Star Frontiers role-playing games. TSR established exclusive distribution for the D&D game in 1982 in 22 countries, with the game being translated first into French, followed by many other languages. In 1982, TSR established an educational department with the intention of developing curriculum programs for reading, math, history, and problem solving, with the most successful program among these the Endless Quest series of game books.
Melvin Blume's shares were later transferred to his son Kevin Blume. After this, the leadership of TSR consisted of Kevin Blume, Brian Blume, and Gary Gygax. In contemporary articles from the early 1980s, Gygax said that the three worked as a team, and only proceeded with unanimous consent and buy-in. In interviews years later, Gygax downplayed his role, and described his position as primarily a powerless figurehead CEO, with Brian Blume as president of creative affairs and Kevin Blume as president of operations. In 1981, TSR Hobbies had revenues of $12.9 million and a payroll of 130.
TSR Hobbies diversified by purchasing or starting new commercial ventures such as producing miniatures, expanding into toys and gifts, and adding an entertainment division to explore getting into films and television. Many parts of this expansion were later criticized as bad investments and over-extension. Greenfield Needlewomen, a needle craft business, was one particularly criticized acquisition; it was owned by a cousin of the Blumes. Sales of D&D-themed needlecraft were abysmal, and the acquisition was criticized as nepotism. The company was similarly accused of favoring friends and relatives of the Blumes and Gygax in hiring. The management also used company funds to raise a shipwreck from Geneva Lake for no clear financial benefit. The company acquired the trademark and copyrights of the magazine Amazing Stories'', although it had only ten thousand subscribers.