I don\'t think GW can cut out the retail stores completely. It\'s what gets new people (read kids) into the hobby (read addiction). Before the store at the Mall locally no one knew what mini painting was. There was one store that was mainly a video game rental place that ran games every now and then, but they tended to stick to the specialist games. No one knew anything about GW.
Now I can have CMON open at work and pretty much everyone that sees it asks if it has anything to do with the store in the mall. Or they note their kids, cousins, brother, dad play the game.
What I would like to see and what I think would be financially viable to them is getting back to the old GW Specialist stores and Roge Trader shop deals. Where specialist shops would not only carry their product but also do open gaming and run tournaments. This would take the stress off of their pockets and move it to the FLGS.