You have to understand that these games are not "Horribly Marked Up". The prices they sell for are a direct function of how much it costs to import foreign games from Europe. The average retail price for a board game in Europe is typically 15-25% higher than a game produced in the US or Asia. This is due to a couple of factors:

1st - quality of the box, board and components are much higher than American quality (quality costs).

2nd - The publishers in Europe give their quality authors a decent percentage of sales (5-15% of wholesale) this adds to the overall cost of the game.

3rd - The discount that foreign publishers sell to volume buyers (like Chessex, Mayfair, Cafe Games, & Rio Grande) is typically 5-10% less than the discount offered by domestic publishers.

4th - Import costs. Games take up a lot of volume in a container or on an airplane. It costs quite a lot to import them. US Manufacturers will typically spend an additional 10% on top of the cost of the game just to cover import costs, customs fees and mandatory brokerage fees.

5th - Mark up. The publisher/importer in America needs to pay their staff and their taxes like everyone else; otherwise they wouldn't be in business to import us these great games. In fact, if it weren't for the hard work of companies like MFG, the general American boardgamer probably wouldn't have heard of the "Spiel des Jahre" at all.

Once you add all of that up, you can understand why these games are "expensive". But consider this, how much would it cost you to fly over to Essen, exchange your cash and buy these games yourself? Don't forget to add hotel and food costs. And you will have a copy of the game that will have to be translated for you.

The advantage to the editions imported by US publishers/distributors are the translations of the rules (and that's another additional cost that I forgot to include in my previous list). Sadly there are fewer Americans who speak German than there are Germans who speak American English.