I just spent a good chuck of the afternoon writing an article for a blog about brick and mortar gaming stores and what they need to do to survive. I am sure, most people are like me and love the experience of shopping in the FLGS but sometimes the pricing online is just too good to ignore. I would love for people to read the article and let me know what their opinions are. I know its a wall of text, but your time is appreciated.
Not to sound jerky and trying to discourage a new member, but this is a topic that has been talked about at length here and will most likely end in an argument and lock at some point.
I buy stuff online, but I always purchase something whenever I am at the store to play. My way of paying "rent" for the table.
FLGS have to provide me with something of worth. Just being a FLGS and having tables isnt enough. Been to stores that did that and they always turn on you in the end no matter how much support you give them.
Happened at least twice. Basement dweller now, and quite happy not to have to deal with FLGSBS. Playing with 6-12 different folks in someone's basement has given me alot in return that no FLGS has been able to duplicate thus far.
Doesnt mean I wouldnt in the future. But currently havent seen one worth its salt in my travels. There might be some given some of the ones here posting, but they arent by me.
Speaking as someone in the UK, I wish I was lucky enough to have an FLGS near me.
My nearest gaming store is GW York, but I would love to have a gaming shop that had a discount (maybe), sold varied ranges of models/tools/paints, and generally offered an experience different from GW.
I make most of my purchases online these days, but if I had a local store to support, I would.
Where I live (Atlantic Canada), the only GW store is near Halifax. We have a chain of FLGS style stores which offer no discount or really any other benefit other than space to play and decent customer service (well at my store anyway).
The store does good business, but the only real reason anyone buys stuff there is so that they dont feel bad about using their space all the time.
Im not saying that FLGS in general are in dire straits, but they do not have the margins to be giving discounts like an online retailer unless there is some sort of membership or points programme.
But then again my store has a monopoly in the region, its them or the internet....and they are getting less and less useful to me and my friends as we play more and more non GW games. (They only stock GW stuff for minis games)
So basically cater to Gen Ys sense of entitlement and offer store breaking discounts and you will be successful, won't be able to put food on the table or afford a store bigger than a couple hundred square feet, but you can stay in business! Gotcha.
Must be great for all these people who live in a place with a ton of clubs ran out of houses, but us folks out here in the wide open southern states pretty much have to be supportive of people kind and gracious enough to run stores that offer space to game, or we just can't game.
SSDD, with a touch of not doing the research. The Warstore is primarily an internet seller. and that lets them offer a much steeper discount without cutting into their profits the way that a store that has to pay rent on storefront space and gets all their money at the register does. For new kits, ebay is not cheaper in any way, shape, or form.
Mr.Church13 wrote:So basically cater to Gen Ys sense of entitlement and offer store breaking discounts and you will be successful, won't be able to put food on the table or afford a store bigger than a couple hundred square feet, but you can stay in business! Gotcha.
Must be great for all these people who live in a place with a ton of clubs ran out of houses, but us folks out here in the wide open southern states pretty much have to be supportive of people kind and gracious enough to run stores that offer space to game, or we just can't game.
Actually, he said nothing of the kind. From an actual "How to run a business" standpoint, he's got pretty good ideas. Sales (events) to draw people in, Cash Flow (cards & comics), stock on hand, giving the customer what they want, and marketing. Nothing in there said that sales or discounts have to be run constantly or on the same items. The Warstore and other big online marketers have less overhead and survive discounting by cash flow and inventory turnover. This same strategy works very well for B&M stores as well. Discounting obviously works as a sales technique or you'd never see a sale ad or a coupon. You can tie discounts to things like minimum purchase size, club/membership, or a 5% cash discount. Having a sales staff that actually knows how to talk to people and sell is good rather than being annoyed by the customer because they are in the middle of a game or painting something. Stores that want to push only minis are going to struggle since there's no consistent cash flows like there is in comics and cards.
The problem is that you have gamers running stores, not people who know how to run a business. This is actually a decent primer for doing it right. To the OP, the only things I'd add is adding comics to supplement cash flows and being able to properly capitalize the store (equity, debt, investors, etc.) as opposed to running it on a shoestring budget is also pretty important. That ties back to your points about inventory, paying staff, and marketing but those things require capital.
We have a problem around here when it comes to adding in comics to supplement the game store. We started competing with the local comic book stores, who then started stocking board games etc. If it wasnt for the fact that the owners of the two stores are friends they probably would have put one of them out of business.
We have a great store locally he just relocated in town, to add 1/3 more square foot. And a struggling competitor also closed around the same time. He offers a small discount of 9% on all GW, which is nice. He has a few big sales a year. He's been around for 13 years and from a business point of view (I have a B.S. in it) he is awesome at everything but marketing and figures word of mouth and a nice signage and store front on the busiest road in town is good enough.
Since when are business decisions made based on what your competitors (who may or may not be friends) are doing? You are competing for the same dollar with in the same marketspace with the same clientele. That's a good way to put yourself out of business, not the other guy. Is the other guy going to help you stay in business if you can't increase cash flow?
Since when are business decisions made based on what your competitors (who may or may not be friends) are doing? You are competing for the same dollar with in the same marketspace with the same clientele. That's a good way to put yourself out of business, not the other guy. Is the other guy going to help you stay in business if you can't increase cash flow?
Perhaps I was misunderstood? What I thought I said was that if your competitors are doing something (speaking of brick and mortar competitors in the region) then you have to offer something similar. You cannot expect to be competitive in a market when the other guys are offering better deals/space/stocklevels/etc. I believe that's the definition of being competitive. Ideally you should be trying to offer something better than the other guy so that you grow your customer base, but that's not always possible.
So basically cater to Gen Ys sense of entitlement and offer store breaking discounts and you will be successful, won't be able to put food on the table or afford a store bigger than a couple hundred square feet, but you can stay in business! Gotcha.
No, do not offer store breaking discounts. In a market where 40% margin is pretty well expected you have some room to move to offer some kind of incentive program or rotating discounts. You have to entice customers to purchase. Kinda a "Yes you can get that online @ 30% off... or you can have it now and play with your new toy for 10% off" type of deal.
Also, I just want to say that I wasn't really looking for an argument. I never said I had the perfect plan to save gaming. I had some ideas and I wanted to discuss them like adults in a polite and reasonable fashion with a minimum of sarcasm. : ) Also, this wasn't intended to be a "FLGS vs the Internet, which do you think is better" thread.
Mr.Church13 wrote:So basically cater to Gen Ys sense of entitlement and offer store breaking discounts and you will be successful, won't be able to put food on the table or afford a store bigger than a couple hundred square feet, but you can stay in business! Gotcha.
Must be great for all these people who live in a place with a ton of clubs ran out of houses, but us folks out here in the wide open southern states pretty much have to be supportive of people kind and gracious enough to run stores that offer space to game, or we just can't game.
I think his point is that the discounts are not breaking anything but end up making you more money even if it is less per item.
You have to remember that your average (American) FLGS makes most of it's money off of three things: Magic: The Gathering, Comic Book sales, impulse wargaming buys. In that order.
I used to co-own a small cards/comics/games store, and if you think that seasoned veteran 40k players buying off ebay hurts the FLGS, you don't really understand what their true money makers are.
Do they appreciate it when the veteran wargamers buy from their store? Absolutely, but the best service veteran war gamers in your store provide is painted army advertising. I can't tell you how many times I sold a starter set and two or three kits to an eager newbie because two fully painted armies belonging to store regulars were going at it on table 1.
The war gaming newbie buys from the store because he doesn't know to look for ebay, he doesn't know about online discounters, or aftermarket model/bitz companies.
The other thing is, that war gaming in general (at my store at least) really only accounted for maybe 20% of our gross intake. Magic: The Gathering and Yu Gi Oh! are the powerhouses. Why? 12 year olds. 12 year olds have more money than any 25 year old, hands down, and they've been given it with the expressed purpose of spending it. Stores act like remaining competetive on booster packs is hard (and sometimes it can be when your local 5&10 suddenly starts selling "fell off a truck" packs for 2$ each) but M:TG has been a rock solid foundation for many FLGS for the last 15+ years.
The last thing is comic books. Comic book enthusiasts are like meth addicts. They will be there, Friday morning, 9am every week for their new release fix. If Storm Talons sold like World War Hulk did, then maybe wargaming would have a serious impact on the financial health of your average gaming store, but they don't. As comic book geeks come in for issue after issue, they slowly accrue more and more "must have" series they fall in love with. Before long they're in on release day and you have a box with their name on it, full of their stuff waiting for them.
All in all, the best war gaming purchases are impulse buys and newbies. War Gaming supplies are high dollar with mediocre to medium profit margins, and rarely require replacement/update (compared to Magic:The Gathering where the Meta shifts quarterly). If you run a gaming/hobby store and War Gaming is the backbone of your business, you need to diversify, because making money on War Gaming is pretty tough. Only the really big regional players (some of them are dakkanauts) are able to make War Gaming their primary money maker (i.e. Mini War Gaming) and most of them have a heavy web presence (i.e. Mini War Gaming... lol)
Since when are business decisions made based on what your competitors (who may or may not be friends) are doing? You are competing for the same dollar with in the same marketspace with the same clientele. That's a good way to put yourself out of business, not the other guy. Is the other guy going to help you stay in business if you can't increase cash flow?
Perhaps I was misunderstood? What I thought I said was that if your competitors are doing something (speaking of brick and mortar competitors in the region) then you have to offer something similar. You cannot expect to be competitive in a market when the other guys are offering better deals/space/stocklevels/etc. I believe that's the definition of being competitive. Ideally you should be trying to offer something better than the other guy so that you grow your customer base, but that's not always possible.
You're fine. This was directed to the post about two stores where one started selling comics and the other started selling board games.
An online discounter with cheap warehouse space and no walk in traffic can and has to discount. Existing stores can't go to a landlord and have him knock the rent in half, because you want to become an online discounter.
Disount on regular GW product is 45%. Giving a 20% discount means you're giving away 4/9ths of your profit. The store needs to nearly double it's sale on GW products to keep profits even. If you have a local sales tax, it's even worse. Do you offer even more discount to account for the sales tax? Then you need even more sales. And more inventory on hand to make those sales.
Events, gaming space, inventory. Yes, those are all things that can drive sales in a FLGS. Inventory especially, can't sell what you don't have. Discounting is not necessarily the answer, and may just hasten the stores descent into a death spiral.
mikhaila wrote:Some of the article is good, some isn't.
An online discounter with cheap warehouse space and no walk in traffic can and has to discount. Existing stores can't go to a landlord and have him knock the rent in half, because you want to become an online discounter.
Disount on regular GW product is 45%. Giving a 20% discount means you're giving away 4/9ths of your profit. The store needs to nearly double it's sale on GW products to keep profits even. If you have a local sales tax, it's even worse. Do you offer even more discount to account for the sales tax? Then you need even more sales. And more inventory on hand to make those sales.
Events, gaming space, inventory. Yes, those are all things that can drive sales in a FLGS. Inventory especially, can't sell what you don't have. Discounting is not necessarily the answer, and may just hasten the stores descent into a death spiral.
Well said mikhaila. Listen to this man, he's one of the people I was referring to as far as nerdy game business success is concerned.
In the end, the FLGS and the online discounter are really only in indirect competition, since the FLGS has a slightly different target market than the online discounter. You're going to find most people talking about it online seem to prefer online discounters. Stand about in your FLGS, and you'll find the people there prefer to shop there, in general.
Mikhaila does seem to know what he's talking about.
The small town I live in is completing a huge shopping center project and so far maybe 3 out of nearly 20 spots has an occupant... Along with several older spots along main street. It's not just game stores that are a risky investment, it's any type of retail establishment.
I wonder if the trick is to turn from a retail store (that maybe offers some 'services' on the side (play space, snacks, etc.) to a 'service' location that does retail. Can stores find ways to make money off gaming space, hobby space, etc?
As I said, this isn't just a gaming industry problem. My other hobby, SCUBA, has similar problems as there's online retailers offering deep discounts but the industry needs shops as entry points and sources of information. So stores carry a lot less stock (especially of expensive items like regulators, BCDs, etc.) and are trying to increase their presence for training and organizing trips.
They're also similar in that they tend to be 'labor of love' businesses. (Game stores are generally run by gamers; Scuba shops by divers. Be concerned if a store isn't.)
I'm hopeful that retail will rebound, but will move to more small shops that offer services Amazon can't really compete with. I lvoe online shopping, but I also enjoy browsing for stuff I'd never think of looking for online sometimes.
If you play there, buy there. I was loyal to a shop for several years where I used to live and bought one army in full from him as well as a kit or two every month. More than worth the extra money to have a great place to play. I prefer to shake the hand of people I do business with whenever possible, even when buying toys. :-)
Good article, but everything is not so cut and dried, black and white. The subtlety of loyalty is hard to define but any good FLGS has the formula for loyalty for whatever their player base may be, an online shopping cart just makes your wallet feel good where being part of something as simple as a game shop makes you feel rewarded in many other ways. To each his own but I have always stuck by the "play here, buy here" motto in all the cities I have lived in.
In the area that I live now, we have several very good FLGS's.
One is almost to the point of McDonalds Successful, One is excellent, with a community that is not as good as it should be, and one that was once stocked, was top notch and is now living on borrowed time. THEN there is the several others that are almost there, but will never be top dog. I love them all, as only a gamer should.
I think your opinion might be based on your local market, not on mine.
As to what MY FLGS's could do to improve?
Thats easy-
One could open up a can of give a damn.
One could push a couple of tables together and open up some more minis gaming.
One could lighten up on the salesmenship, ever so slightly.
AND
One could get rid of the dead mouse, or whatever that was thats stinking up the place. (Your Reaper selection is top notch, but that dead mousling is distracting.)
I have a steller FLGS selection, and they all deserve some love, no matter how much of an unloved child they are.
The small town I live in is completing a huge shopping center project and so far maybe 3 out of nearly 20 spots has an occupant... Along with several older spots along main street. It's not just game stores that are a risky investment, it's any type of retail establishment.
This. It is twice as hard to be in business, and stay in business, in the current economy. Too many people out of work, or trying to save money. All businesses having problems.
-Discounting isn't the answer, neither is selling online. For every Neal, there are 10 other wannabees that can't make their online business work.
No magic bullets, just hard work. And every day someone tells you how easy it is, if you'd just "Evolve or Die". Guess what happened to the first 100 small, tasty mammals that told a T-rex to evolve? Please don't say this to people working 80 hours a week to stay in business. We may have to evolve and learn new tricks. We don't have to evolve along the path someone tells us to.
Things that have helped me stay in business:
-Adapting advertising away from Yellow Pages and newspapers and into grass roots support for small local events (charities, schools, etc), and into social marketing such as Facebook.
-Finding a way to make money off the internet. Not moving my store online, but looking for other niche markets. Selling some used miniatures or old store armies on Ebay, Buying and reselling armies for customers, either directly or as an agent. Holding quarterly auctions for used games. Vastly expanding inventory. Running a large number of different events for different game systems. Diversifying into more hobby supplies, board games, and historical wargames. In many cases we sell these to the same customers we sold our minis and comic books too.
I think the long term value of any reseller with brick and mortal fixings is pretty grim. The except to this would be a place that could add additional value that's not available online..i.e. "Bulk" (Costco, Walmart), or "Necessity" (Grocery Stores, drug stores...places that you need things immediately).
Obviously places that make and sell their own stuff are going to fare better with physical addresses...Apple, Harley Davidson Stores, GW...because they have a ton of margin and lower overhead since they haven't already paid profit to a company to obtain stock.
By long term...I mean in the next 20 years.
I don't think most FLGS make too much money, most probably break even and some extra to pay for the owners mortage/car/food at best. Businesses get alot of tax breaks (I know, I'm a business owner), so it's all tax free money for the most part.
,
FLGS really don't offer too much unless they have a ton of tables or a ton of discounts, neither which really helps the bottom line all that much...just keeps traffic going.
Hobby shops....20 years of life expectancy at the outside I think. After that, America may go the way of Europe...gaming clubs where you pay a monthly fee and they have lockers and tables and walls of terrain.
Balance wrote:
I wonder if the trick is to turn from a retail store (that maybe offers some 'services' on the side (play space, snacks, etc.) to a 'service' location that does retail. Can stores find ways to make money off gaming space, hobby space, etc?
My guess is that making money off of gaming space / hobby space just won't work for most stores. It would be interesting however to see someone give this a serious try and see what it really takes to make this work. My guess is it would take a large urban area and some really nice gaming tables.
Hobby shops....20 years of life expectancy at the outside I think. After that, America may go the way of Europe...gaming clubs where you pay a monthly fee and they have lockers and tables and walls of terrain.
And just where in Europe are things like that?? I lived there for around 3 years, mingled quite abit with the locals, and never ONCE came across any sort of club that was as you described.
Balance wrote:
I wonder if the trick is to turn from a retail store (that maybe offers some 'services' on the side (play space, snacks, etc.) to a 'service' location that does retail. Can stores find ways to make money off gaming space, hobby space, etc?
My guess is that making money off of gaming space / hobby space just won't work for most stores. It would be interesting however to see someone give this a serious try and see what it really takes to make this work. My guess is it would take a large urban area and some really nice gaming tables.
I think you'd need to offer a complete afternoon service. Coffee and biscuits/cakes, a reading/lounge area, excellent terrain and tables, nice ambient music, etc. No unsupervised children, painting and modelling tutorials from experienced staff, etc, etc. There's plenty that would encourage me to spend money in a local store, but I don't know if I'm representative of the local player base or not.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
carmachu wrote:FLGS have to provide me with something of worth. Just being a FLGS and having tables isnt enough. Been to stores that did that and they always turn on you in the end no matter how much support you give them.
They 'turn' on you? What do you mean?
Mr.Church13 wrote:So basically cater to Gen Ys sense of entitlement and offer store breaking discounts and you will be successful, won't be able to put food on the table or afford a store bigger than a couple hundred square feet, but you can stay in business! Gotcha.
Must be great for all these people who live in a place with a ton of clubs ran out of houses, but us folks out here in the wide open southern states pretty much have to be supportive of people kind and gracious enough to run stores that offer space to game, or we just can't game.
Maybe the business model of a games-store is fundamentally flawed? In this day and age, it's ludicrous to attempt to make a living by selling a product, when that same product can be had significantly cheaper from another source.
You need to offer something else for peoples money.
mikhaila wrote:
Things that have helped me stay in business:
-Adapting advertising away from Yellow Pages and newspapers and into grass roots support for small local events (charities, schools, etc), and into social marketing such as Facebook.
This also seems like a way of dealing with what I call the "Android's Dungeon" cliche for game stores. By supporting local events, you're part of the community, not that weird shop over on the side of town.
Along with, of course, stores moving from dimly-lit basements with bare-bones hand-built shelves made from uncoated 2x4s and plywood to well-lit stores with professional looking, albeit cheap, shelving. I shopped in the former when I was in the 12-16 range, but I'm much happier that most game stores have upgraded a bit.
An online discounter with cheap warehouse space and no walk in traffic can and has to discount. Existing stores can't go to a landlord and have him knock the rent in half, because you want to become an online discounter.
Disount on regular GW product is 45%. Giving a 20% discount means you're giving away 4/9ths of your profit. The store needs to nearly double it's sale on GW products to keep profits even. If you have a local sales tax, it's even worse. Do you offer even more discount to account for the sales tax? Then you need even more sales. And more inventory on hand to make those sales.
Discounting is only an option depending on your overhead. One of our local gaming stores is run out of an underground warehouse. Obviously a store like that has less overhead in terms of rent than a store that in the middle of the city in high priced retail space. The type of discount is up to each store as is how they are offered. I only used 20% in my example as that's what the Warstore does. I still firmly believe that discounting/sales/a reward system has to be part of the solution. I never said it was total solution, just a part.
Since people seem to agree to disagree on the discounting aspect of what I wrote, lets look at the rest of the article. How does the rest of it look to you all?
Balance wrote:
I wonder if the trick is to turn from a retail store (that maybe offers some 'services' on the side (play space, snacks, etc.) to a 'service' location that does retail. Can stores find ways to make money off gaming space, hobby space, etc?
My guess is that making money off of gaming space / hobby space just won't work for most stores. It would be interesting however to see someone give this a serious try and see what it really takes to make this work. My guess is it would take a large urban area and some really nice gaming tables.
I think you'd need to offer a complete afternoon service. Coffee and biscuits/cakes, a reading/lounge area, excellent terrain and tables, nice ambient music, etc. No unsupervised children, painting and modelling tutorials from experienced staff, etc, etc. There's plenty that would encourage me to spend money in a local store, but I don't know if I'm representative of the local player base or not.
Unfortunately, if you offer those types of services for free you'll just end up with the smelly freeloader types of gamers taking up all the space who would just end up buying their stuff online anyways to save a few bucks. I love the hobby but there are some really disgusting (both physically and emotionally/mentally) people in it if my experiences at various FLGS and conventions like Gencon are any indication. If you wanted something like that to work, you'd have to charge some kind of event or spa type fee.. and I don't think the hobby is big enough in most metro areas to support that business model.
warboss wrote:Unfortunately, if you offer those types of services for free you'll just end up with the smelly freeloader types of gamers taking up all the space who would just end up buying their stuff online anyways to save a few bucks. I love the hobby but there are some really disgusting (both physically and emotionally/mentally) people in it if my experiences at various FLGS and conventions like Gencon are any indication. If you wanted something like that to work, you'd have to charge some kind of event or spa type fee.. and I don't think the hobby is big enough in most metro areas to support that business model.
Yeah, that's what I had in mind. You'd supplement your sales income with coffee and food, table rental, etc. I'd definitely go for it, but I don't know if enough people would.
Things that have helped me stay in business:
-Adapting advertising away from Yellow Pages and newspapers and into grass roots support for small local events (charities, schools, etc), and into social marketing such as Facebook. -Finding a way to make money off the internet. Not moving my store online, but looking for other niche markets. Selling some used miniatures or old store armies on Ebay, Buying and reselling armies for customers, either directly or as an agent. Holding quarterly auctions for used games. Vastly expanding inventory. Running a large number of different events for different game systems. Diversifying into more hobby supplies, board games, and historical wargames. In many cases we sell these to the same customers we sold our minis and comic books too.
These are probably the two best ideas I've heard from a FLGS owner.
I tried advocating the social outreach approach at a now defunct FLGS years ago. I used to work at summer camps when I was doing my undergrad and experienced how much kids love games first hand. They don't read BGG and are completely uninformed about games but a kid who likes games will generally play anything that's put in front of them. They're basically waiting to be marketed to by someone and gaming provides a constructive activity that can be enjoyed either with friends or parents.
Selling online in a niche environment is an idea I hadn't considered myself. It's brilliant, it leverages the FLGS owner's contact with the community and ease of procuring used gaming goods to create a unique market. It's not something that can be easily duplicated by online stores and thus gives the advantage to the FLGS. Awesome!
edit: more substance
In terms of utilizing social media as a brick and mortar store, I think a lot of places I've looked at have the right idea but the wrong execution. My approach kinda spins off of the GW retail store idea of having people be able to come in and see games being played and want to participate themselves. I'd propose that brick and mortar stores should do more to cultivate hype about the activities going on at their store - pictures of games in action, session recaps, battle reports, modeling projects in the vein of "A Tale of 4 Gamers". Whatever the proprietor can do to make it look like super cool things are happening in the store every day gives them a leg up over online retailers. In existing communities this approach would breed camaraderie and incentivize further participation and ultimate purchasing.Potential customers would not only by enticed by the games themselves but also made aware of the schedule and what they can expect from the community, which would hopefully help to cement their decision to join. This idea also continues the theme of underscoring what a FLGS can provide that an online retailer or home gaming experience cannot.
I think more gaming stores could happily benefit from some of the more fringe MTG practices.
1st off, find a local painter. Pay this guy in store credit to paint models or units then list them for sale both in glass and online via ebay. It's silly how many packs of MTG combos we sold over the years and I'm just a guy ebaying stuff online. Years ago with was Thrall Pits and Lord of the Pit. Then it was Sliver Packs with Dream Halls.
Putting a little work outside of breaking a box open goes a long way. Mikhaila especially has the right of it in regards to moving armies back and forth for people. If you look at bartertown alone you can find people just giving away units or armies at 40-50% of retail. Buy them, assemble them, paint them, then move them. (Again, a faithful employee who paints or a deal with a local painter works well here.) Your shoppers will be amazed at the thought of getting an assembled army bigger than a battleforce either primed or prepainted for less than 90% of retail.
Honestly whenever a shop opens in my town it has been a running joke to see how long it lasts. I've seen hobby-shops come and go, card shops last only a couple seasons, and just vanish within the void of time.
Honestly, from what I see the main issue with FLGS are is that they do not want to move away from their comfort zone, ever. A lot of the time( from what I see) FLGS will tend to simply old onto the one big seller, and that is their primary seller, if not only. This tends to be Magic the Gathering, events and the such being ran for the town university, keeping interest and making money that way.
However...alll I can say is, what happens if MTG has a bad year?
Avrik_Shasla wrote:Honestly whenever a shop opens in my town it has been a running joke to see how long it lasts. I've seen hobby-shops come and go, card shops last only a couple seasons, and just vanish within the void of time.
Honestly, from what I see the main issue with FLGS are is that they do not want to move away from their comfort zone, ever. A lot of the time( from what I see) FLGS will tend to simply old onto the one big seller, and that is their primary seller, if not only. This tends to be Magic the Gathering, events and the such being ran for the town university, keeping interest and making money that way.
However...alll I can say is, what happens if MTG has a bad year?
Then your store closes.
Too many stores get opened by gamers, with no business experience. Look at all the posts on Dakka that are about "A store by gamers, for gamers" or "What do you guys want to see in a store?" So someone who likes MTG opens a store that is heavy into MTG. The boardgamer opens a store to cater to boardgamers. They remind me of the "Leftporium" on Simpsons.
Stores need depth, and diversity, along with a business plan, accounting, inventory control, a working vacuum, and location, location, location.
mikhaila wrote:
Stores need depth, and diversity, along with a business plan, accounting, inventory control, a working vacuum, and location, location, location.
And a plunger if some of the bathrooms I've walked into at FLGS after fellow gamer use are an indication.
The one I can think of that does alot of these things, they also cater to what the customers want and go out of thier way to make it happen for you.
Not so much of full on that customer is always right crap, but if you go in wanting a XYZ, hen they do thier level best to get that XYZ PDQ. (Pretty Darned Quick!)
Another thing that the one I think about is that they evolve. If something was a fad, then it goes into the back room, or away. They don't try to keep a dead dog around stinking up the place.
Gamers have excess stuff, as a matter of the real hobby. The store has a way for you to recycle, and recoupe it for newer or different systems stuff, and then turns it. Either online, or instore, ( to who in the store? Why to people that come into the store and look in and see whats in the area that came in this week, or yesterday.... (Such as that first edition copy of Gamma World, )
Just throwing this out there: table rental. Make sure your tables ARE worth renting (top-notch terrain, not just foam hills and quickly-painted foamboard ruins. Something you'll be proud to take a photo of.) and charge customers just a little bit to rent the tables. I'm sure people would be willing to pay a dollar or two to use a really nice wargaming table.
My question is, if you sale Magic TG, Yugioh and other ccg, wont it take more space along with miniature games? Dont you need to have tables and space for both business?
Can a business with no table space can be successful to?
Capt. Camping wrote:My question is, if you sale Magic TG, Yugioh and other ccg, wont it take more space along with miniature games? Dont you need to have tables and space for both business?
Can a business with no table space can be successful to?
Gamers Paradise was a chain in Chicago and was successful for a decade but they eventually went under. I'm not privy to the details of their financials but my friends and I stopped shopping there when their lava lamp and novelty gag gift selection exceeded that of traditional gaming (minis, rpgs, board games). During that time, they had no tables but also had NO competition within the city limits either (the next nearest game stores were all suburban).
Capt. Camping wrote:My question is, if you sale Magic TG, Yugioh and other ccg, wont it take more space along with miniature games? Dont you need to have tables and space for both business?
Can a business with no table space can be successful to?
most of the places I have been to have smaller tables (ie. a single standard folding table) for their CCGs, and make use of larger "gaming" tables (in 6x4 or larger, usually) to accommodate both crowds... If they are too small, or get extremely busy, they have a set "calendar" of what games are on tap for that day/evening... This is not to say that other games werent played on their 'off' nights, it was more a "if you dont play warhammer, and it's warhammer Wed. you should expect some trouble finding a game, or space for your game on Wed. night".
One store that I went to, but never had a chance to game there, only had a small 2x2 (i think) table in the front room... on this table, the employees would run starter or introductory games to various systems... I watched one day as they played a game involving ww2 aircraft and cards, with very little dice... all of the actual game tables were in the back room with all the terrain... and my was it a large space.. it had 12 standard tables of 6x4, but had previously arranged it for apoc games and whatnot to 4 tables.. though their standard daily set up was actually 16 tables, as a couple of them were separated for army "storage" during games, and/or magic and DnD, etc.
I have never been a fan of Table rental. It is not a way to make money from customers or pay for the lights, but a sure fire way to send them away from your store.
First things first people playing on the tables sell stuff. I cannot tell you the amount of people at my LGS who upon seeing someone play a game or two of somehting go up to the counter and pick up a starter or a model for the game.
Also have a good amount of what I like to call "Impulse buy" items. These include the afore mentioned chips and drinks, but also small under 5 dollar items. Our own LGS has the Gravity Feeds from Heroclix and they cannot keep the items on the counter long enough. At 3 bucks a pop it is cheap enough for someone to take the risk and buy a box hoping they can get the new Batman.
I really like my FLGS, the guys who run it are really cool guys and easy going. They also offer discounts to regulars, for example I was buying the eldar battlebox a week after the price increase and they still gave it to me for the "oringal" price of $95. Also when you get $100 in recepts from the store they give you 10% off a purchurse of your choice. But they are really nice and if it was not for them I would not be in this hobby. I support my FLGS but if you don't that's your choice.
carmachu wrote:FLGS have to provide me with something of worth. Just being a FLGS and having tables isnt enough. Been to stores that did that and they always turn on you in the end no matter how much support you give them.
Happened at least twice. Basement dweller now, and quite happy not to have to deal with FLGSBS. Playing with 6-12 different folks in someone's basement has given me alot in return that no FLGS has been able to duplicate thus far.
Doesnt mean I wouldnt in the future. But currently havent seen one worth its salt in my travels. There might be some given some of the ones here posting, but they arent by me.
I am a home dweller and I enjoy having the pc and the internet to my disposal. We can prepare armies in Battlescribe without having to carry Ipads or laptops to the stores. I think I have more terrain than my store without having to pay monthly for the use of the tables.
carmachu wrote:FLGS have to provide me with something of worth. Just being a FLGS and having tables isnt enough. Been to stores that did that and they always turn on you in the end no matter how much support you give them.
They 'turn' on you? What do you mean?
They want you around, they want your money. They start wanting you around to play and then......they shut down playing areas, they cut hours that you can play miniature games and eventually kick you to the curb.
Seen in twice in local FLGS. Was a good customer bought alot of stuff over the years. But store number 1 pretty much kicked out all the miniature gamers back in the late 90's early 2000's, had enough of them. Store number 2 we had the club there, many of us bought from them and not just miniature stuff. Then another day pretty much kick the miniature crowd to the curb and shut it down. WIlling to lose sales, didnt want miniature players around anymore. At this time in 2004 we had enough and formed our our paying club and paid for our own space, later on set up shop years after in someone's basement. Thats just some of many stories.
So for me, supporting FLGS is a losing proposition. Becasue in my experiences, no matter how loyal you are, they turn on you. So F'd them. I'm sure my opinion would be differnt if I had Mikilha's store around- he seems to have a head on his shoulders. But too many other stores dont, so I'm not willing to show any loyalty any more. If I ever start playing consistantlyin stores again, they'd have to show some loyalty first.
beowulfhunter wrote:I have never been a fan of Table rental. It is not a way to make money from customers or pay for the lights, but a sure fire way to send them away from your store.
Care to elaborate why? If given a choice of a free table with mediocre terrain pieces and a really nice table you can rent say, a dollar or two for a night of gaming will people always choose the free one?
It probably comes down to that fact that even if you rent 6 tables a night a 2 dollars a pop your making about 24 bucks a weekend. (Making the assumption that you wont have to fight off crowds from renting all your tables on weeknights)
That's an extra 1200 dollars a year.
The question is whether or not that is worth the potential loss in sales from new people turned away thinking your being a miser or a cheap ass. Not to mention fights over table space.
"Hey pal, I payed my two dollars. This table is mine tonight!"
"But your just leaning on it talking about your codex and eating a cheeseburger?!"
If drunk people at a bar can work out the system for getting charged to use a pool table, then a bunch of nerds should be able to figure out how to pay for a table at a FLGS.
An online discounter with cheap warehouse space and no walk in traffic can and has to discount. Existing stores can't go to a landlord and have him knock the rent in half, because you want to become an online discounter.
Disount on regular GW product is 45%. Giving a 20% discount means you're giving away 4/9ths of your profit. The store needs to nearly double it's sale on GW products to keep profits even. If you have a local sales tax, it's even worse. Do you offer even more discount to account for the sales tax? Then you need even more sales. And more inventory on hand to make those sales.
Discounting is only an option depending on your overhead. One of our local gaming stores is run out of an underground warehouse. Obviously a store like that has less overhead in terms of rent than a store that in the middle of the city in high priced retail space. The type of discount is up to each store as is how they are offered. I only used 20% in my example as that's what the Warstore does. I still firmly believe that discounting/sales/a reward system has to be part of the solution. I never said it was total solution, just a part.
Since people seem to agree to disagree on the discounting aspect of what I wrote, lets look at the rest of the article. How does the rest of it look to you all?
I think you are dead on in your article. This is how it feels at the LFGS in my region as I talk to the owners/managers of these stores and have certain insights on trends on what is selling and what is not. The important thing is that people Should be supporting their LFGS because once they are gone the access to the social interaction of people is gone as well.
The real selling point imo is tournaments. They provide exposure to the hobby for visitors, the need to quickly buy D model for a list, and consistant sale of product via entry fee/prize support. The success of magic is largely due to it's weekly tournaments and low entry fees. If every saturday was a $5-10 warhammer tournament with a couple of prizes, I'd be in buying stuff weekly and attend every tournament. A few local stores in my area are slowly realizing this formula and it's really awesome.
beowulfhunter wrote:I have never been a fan of Table rental. It is not a way to make money from customers or pay for the lights, but a sure fire way to send them away from your store.
Care to elaborate why? If given a choice of a free table with mediocre terrain pieces and a really nice table you can rent say, a dollar or two for a night of gaming will people always choose the free one?
Define Nice Table. The few stores I have been to that charged provided you with a felt covered table with a few styrofoam hills. Sorry not gonna pay to play on that. On the flit side I have been to stores (the noew defunct Challenge Games in Joliet that have awesome tables and never charged a dime.
lucasbuffalo wrote:The real selling point imo is tournaments. They provide exposure to the hobby for visitors, the need to quickly buy D model for a list, and consistant sale of product via entry fee/prize support. The success of magic is largely due to it's weekly tournaments and low entry fees. If every saturday was a $5-10 warhammer tournament with a couple of prizes, I'd be in buying stuff weekly and attend every tournament. A few local stores in my area are slowly realizing this formula and it's really awesome.
I concur to a point. If there is a sizable amount of player base in your region to take advantage of an weekly event then go for it.
I generally see a monthly or quarterly 40K event at my region, and myself runs and/or sponsors a quarterly event. A few hundred dollars out of my pocket book is not going to effect me as I will write it off as an business expense. I rather would see people enjoy themselves in a fun and yet competitive style of tournament at my LFGS than what is being ran in the Standard GW store in my region.
d-usa wrote:If drunk people at a bar can work out the system for getting charged to use a pool table, then a bunch of nerds should be able to figure out how to pay for a table at a FLGS.
I think the difference here, is that pool tables are mad expensive (I've been looking to buy one once I get my house) to purchase... And in a bar or other public setting, the pool table is often coin operated where you put your coins in, in order to release the cueball and the rest of the set. You then place each ball in the rack and play pool... Once each ball is shot into a hole, you can no longer even touch the thing til the game is done and you insert more coinage.
there are billiard halls which do not operate in this way, but they tend to be slightly nicer than your standard bar, and are more set up to run their tournaments as well.
heartserenade wrote:Just throwing this out there: table rental. Make sure your tables ARE worth renting (top-notch terrain, not just foam hills and quickly-painted foamboard ruins. Something you'll be proud to take a photo of.) and charge customers just a little bit to rent the tables. I'm sure people would be willing to pay a dollar or two to use a really nice wargaming table.
NO! I am adamantly against this.
1. It puts the store owner in a position of having to chase after his customers for a couple of bucks. It can be an agravating experience, that neither side needs.
2. The money gained is a pittance compared to your monthly bills.
3. It puts a barrier in the way of people coming into the shop and gaming. The more they are in the shop, the more they buy. Those purchases far outweigh the few dollars you get from renting tables.
Far better to offer those tables for free, and have a full house of gamers. Sure, you lose a few bucks a day in fees. But you gain far more in sales. Bottom line: More profitable, less agravation, better customer service, and the store is better appreciated by it's customers.
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heartserenade wrote:
beowulfhunter wrote:I have never been a fan of Table rental. It is not a way to make money from customers or pay for the lights, but a sure fire way to send them away from your store.
Care to elaborate why? If given a choice of a free table with mediocre terrain pieces and a really nice table you can rent say, a dollar or two for a night of gaming will people always choose the free one?
Or stores should do a minimum amount of work to make good scenery, and offer it for free. I'm biased in my opionion of course, having a love of making scenery and several hundred pieces of it in my store. But good scenery and tables is part of having a good store.
mikhaila wrote:
Or stores should do a minimum amount of work to make good scenery, and offer it for free. I'm biased in my opionion of course, having a love of making scenery and several hundred pieces of it in my store. But good scenery and tables is part of having a good store.
Would there be something to be said for doing the occasional terrain event?? Perhaps the store purchases terrain, and customers can assemble and paint it (if you were using the GW stuff) for a competition where the winner gets a gift card, or some other prize, etc.... and the store gets more terrain?
The one store I went to in Colorado had an abundance of terrain... most of it I would consider just above passable, it really wasn't the greatest terrain out there (if you look at places like terragenesis especially), but there were a few gems in there as well.
Adam LongWalker wrote:The important thing is that people Should be supporting their LFGS because once they are gone the access to the social interaction of people is gone as well.
But that isn't actually true. DakkaDakka is an example of why this isn't true. A person can come on here or any other site and find other players in their local area. In some ways a FLGS can make this easier but it isn't the only way in which clubs can be started or sustained.
That would be good and all except a majority of people who play this game do not use online forums.
If I had to rely on dakkadakka to find someone to play, I wouldn't be playing 40k. Period. Only a few people from my area on here, one of which plays at my store. The rest of them don't use DakkaDakka or any other forum.
sparkywtf wrote:That would be good and all except a majority of people who play this game do not use online forums.
If I had to rely on dakkadakka to find someone to play, I wouldn't be playing 40k. Period. Only a few people from my area on here, one of which plays at my store. The rest of them don't use DakkaDakka or any other forum.
No but someone in your area who just posted here would find you and that would open up other people in your area who you know. So with social media (including Facebook) it becomes a lot easier to find players and get a group going without an FLGS. Plenty of people do it and it really isn't that hard. It takes a little work but not an unreasonable amount. I'm not syaing the FLGS doesn't perform a nice service in this regard just that it isn't necessary.
sparkywtf wrote:That would be good and all except a majority of people who play this game do not use online forums.
If I had to rely on dakkadakka to find someone to play, I wouldn't be playing 40k. Period. Only a few people from my area on here, one of which plays at my store. The rest of them don't use DakkaDakka or any other forum.
No but someone in your area who just posted here would find you and that would open up other people in your area who you know. So with social media (including Facebook) it becomes a lot easier to find players and get a group going without an FLGS. Plenty of people do it and it really isn't that hard. It takes a little work but not an unreasonable amount. I'm not syaing the FLGS doesn't perform a nice service in this regard just that it isn't necessary.
Actually in some cases it is very necessary....take myself as an example... I recently PCSed from Germany, to Fort Campbell, KY. I did a thread here on dakka saying I was moving, and where people gamed here, to no real response. I searched GWs website for shops in my area (which was nearly as fruitless), but I drove around town, and walked into the only shop with a small GW/MTG sign on his window to find out that Friday night they stayed open late, and that 40k was played. On a Friday I went there and met a guy who it turns out I work with, as well as some other folks who I have played some, when I get the chance to go in.
Without actually going to the LGS where I am, I would most likely not be able to game at all (or at least not 40k), simply for the fact that there is apparently no one on Dakka from my current area, and not knowing anyone to look up on Fb, etc.
I love my FLGS.
It opened up last month and is close enough to walk to. The staff/owner is friendly the other players are cool. I get a game of 40k in then some thing ells is played.
Like last Wednesday after I tabled a SM foot list (sort of unfair as I was using my tank heavy list ), I had a smoke, chatted then the remanding 6 of us played a mad old game called The World of Munchkin until 11pm.
His selection of 40k stuff is limited but he does carry War Machine, Firestorm, the Lovecraft game and a crapton of comics.
I will be intending to buy a Firestorm starter (I like the look of the Terran ships) set from him as well as more dice (you can never have to many dice )
Actually in some cases it is very necessary....take myself as an example... I recently PCSed from Germany, to Fort Campbell, KY. I did a thread here on dakka saying I was moving, and where people gamed here, to no real response. I searched GWs website for shops in my area (which was nearly as fruitless), but I drove around town, and walked into the only shop with a small GW/MTG sign on his window to find out that Friday night they stayed open late, and that 40k was played. On a Friday I went there and met a guy who it turns out I work with, as well as some other folks who I have played some, when I get the chance to go in.
Without actually going to the LGS where I am, I would most likely not be able to game at all (or at least not 40k), simply for the fact that there is apparently no one on Dakka from my current area, and not knowing anyone to look up on Fb, etc.
I was in a similar situation, posted to CFB Gagetown here in New Brunswick. Atlantic Canada is not exactly know for its use of technology. The majority of the people I play with are not on site like dakka (or facebook for that matter) nor do they want to be. As well, some of the other people on here who identify themselves from the Atlantic region are up to a 6 hour drive away or in Maine.
I love my f L g s (big L because it is only 5 minutes from my house!) They do pack them in for MTG every Friday night, so no Warhammerin' that night, but they seem to have a good handle on how to run a store. Family owned. Friendly. Wide variety of product. There is a Magic crowd, Minis crowd, Boardgamers, Role players. There were some LARPs for a while - but they seemed to have moved on... (they always seems mildly embarassed, and would just sit around in costume and talk about work...)
They have a message board to set up games and organize leagues.
I am a big Trader/E-bayer collector, but I make an effort to spend money there. When I need a big-ticket thing, or I have some gift money, I blow it there. I spend $$ whenever I go there - even if it's just paints & pop.If there was a table fee I would pay it - treat it like a pooltable as someone else said...
I help with their tournies, and have organized a league. It's a great resource for me. You get out of it what you put in.
Actually in some cases it is very necessary....take myself as an example... I recently PCSed from Germany, to Fort Campbell, KY. I did a thread here on dakka saying I was moving, and where people gamed here, to no real response. I searched GWs website for shops in my area (which was nearly as fruitless), but I drove around town, and walked into the only shop with a small GW/MTG sign on his window to find out that Friday night they stayed open late, and that 40k was played. On a Friday I went there and met a guy who it turns out I work with, as well as some other folks who I have played some, when I get the chance to go in.
Without actually going to the LGS where I am, I would most likely not be able to game at all (or at least not 40k), simply for the fact that there is apparently no one on Dakka from my current area, and not knowing anyone to look up on Fb, etc.
I agree with this entirely. I can honestly say that I have never used the internet to find a place to play. It's always been by word of mouth or driving by and seeing a place.
Avrik_Shasla wrote:Honestly whenever a shop opens in my town it has been a running joke to see how long it lasts. I've seen hobby-shops come and go, card shops last only a couple seasons, and just vanish within the void of time.
Honestly, from what I see the main issue with FLGS are is that they do not want to move away from their comfort zone, ever. A lot of the time( from what I see) FLGS will tend to simply old onto the one big seller, and that is their primary seller, if not only. This tends to be Magic the Gathering, events and the such being ran for the town university, keeping interest and making money that way.
THIS.
The store I worked at about 12 years ago had RPGs, Miniature games, card games, Anime, comics, action figures. One of the biggest/best in central FL does all those as well. Good thing for my bank account its about 2 1/2 hours away.
Adam LongWalker wrote:The important thing is that people Should be supporting their LFGS because once they are gone the access to the social interaction of people is gone as well.
But that isn't actually true. DakkaDakka is an example of why this isn't true. A person can come on here or any other site and find other players in their local area. In some ways a FLGS can make this easier but it isn't the only way in which clubs can be started or sustained.
Dakka fills only a certain need. I also stated in the past that people post information that they know about their general region on where they live (or do business and so forth) There are no clubs in my region nor has there been in close to 6 years that deals with 40K. There are people in my region that do not use Dakka as well. Many to be exact.
There are however LFGS in my region. And they do provide a viable service to the hobby as well as social interaction experience that is important in any of the games/hobbies that are prominent in their region. What works in your region does not necessarily work in mine or somewhere else around the globe.
I can not state strongly enough to support your LFGS. If you don't then what will be left? Clubs in basements? GW Stores Dictating exactly what can be used on their table?. I heard a rumor over a year ago. At the time I was dubious at best but now I am not so sure.
I believe in the near future that unless your model is 100% scratch built or 100% GW product it will not be allowed in their store. It used to be 75% GW 25% other parts. I'm already seeing the subtle changes about customization of models with one of the GW managers at their store. Then what will you do? Because by the time if it does happen (a few years from now at least) there will be less and less LFGS that will be closing their doors or not deal with GW all together because of people being cheap Feths and not supporting the stores in anyway possible. This is a way for GW to increase revenue by forcing people to upgrade their models.
Maybe the corporation will also target old oop models and not allow them in the stores as well. Think how that will increase their revenue share as well as people who still want play will now have to once again buy newer models for replacement.
This could happen and I can not see why it won't happen in the future. They do have a past record of making models not usable in newer rule sets/codex (such a 13 company, Last Chancers, etc) so I believe that these actions could happen.
The reason I believe why these actions are not happening yet are because of the LFGS that are left are still providing a valuable service to their customer base as well as selling and promoting GW product. They will be viable to Games Workshop until a GW store will be in their sphere of influence. Then all bets are off as I have seen what they have done in the past and are currently doing in the present to those current LFGS that I go to in my region. GW wins in another way as when a LFGS closes it doors, its competition (such as WM, Infinity, board/card games ETC) loses a place to sell product.
A LFGS a place to have fun with what you have made, created, converted, and painted(or not) and have a game (any type game not just 40K) of with perhaps someone you never met before. But if those stores go away because of people's attitudes, then you will have to eventually deal with GW and their rules and mindset.
So support your LFGS in any way possible or the future of the hobby is Grim Dark indeed.
Just the Way Games Workshop would like this to happen. To control all forms of their revenue stream from top to bottom.
I spend money religiously at any place that I play. If I had to
rent table space, I'd probably spend less money and less time
at such a shop. I go to these places more often if they have
regular events for the game that I play and if they encourage
community for the game that I play.
I'd essentially be one of mikhaila's customers if I ever lived in his area
Actually in some cases it is very necessary....take myself as an example... I recently PCSed from Germany, to Fort Campbell, KY. I did a thread here on dakka saying I was moving, and where people gamed here, to no real response. I searched GWs website for shops in my area (which was nearly as fruitless), but I drove around town, and walked into the only shop with a small GW/MTG sign on his window to find out that Friday night they stayed open late, and that 40k was played. On a Friday I went there and met a guy who it turns out I work with, as well as some other folks who I have played some, when I get the chance to go in.
Without actually going to the LGS where I am, I would most likely not be able to game at all (or at least not 40k), simply for the fact that there is apparently no one on Dakka from my current area, and not knowing anyone to look up on Fb, etc.
I was in a similar situation, posted to CFB Gagetown here in New Brunswick. Atlantic Canada is not exactly know for its use of technology. The majority of the people I play with are not on site like dakka (or facebook for that matter) nor do they want to be. As well, some of the other people on here who identify themselves from the Atlantic region are up to a 6 hour drive away or in Maine.
May I suggest something since you're military? Let your geek flag fly high on base. My wife always finds me people to play with when we move to a new base because she spreads the word that I play.
The "hobby" thrived fine over here before GW opened up stores.
Even now, "garage" and "basement" 'clubs' STILL outnumber store based clubs (FLGS or GW). The hobby will not die out if GW stores all fold up here and die.
I support a games store by buying stuff from them.
I do not currently and will not (in future) play in a store.
I prefer to game outside of a store environment.
mikhaila wrote:
Or stores should do a minimum amount of work to make good scenery, and offer it for free. I'm biased in my opionion of course, having a love of making scenery and several hundred pieces of it in my store. But good scenery and tables is part of having a good store.
Would there be something to be said for doing the occasional terrain event?? Perhaps the store purchases terrain, and customers can assemble and paint it (if you were using the GW stuff) for a competition where the winner gets a gift card, or some other prize, etc.... and the store gets more terrain?
The one store I went to in Colorado had an abundance of terrain... most of it I would consider just above passable, it really wasn't the greatest terrain out there (if you look at places like terragenesis especially), but there were a few gems in there as well.
Terrain events can be a blast. I've done a ton of them. Used to do a weekly class until a lawyer friend pointed out handing razor knives to 10 year olds could have a bad affect on the store.) If taught like a class, where you focus on one type of terrain, and teaching people how to make it, you can get some pretty good results.
There are two factors that threaten the future of the FLGS: customers and the distributors.
I have seen two game stores go down simply because of the customers. "Place looks crap, and check out what I bought off www.cheapminis.com!" "Sure, let's play, lemme grab a warm soda out of my car" The mentality that an FLGS is simply afree place to loiter is getting ridiculous. I have heard a lot of whining about stores that charge for table time, but these stores aren't wasting all that floor space for you to lounge all day and contribute nothing. Sure, I picked up a hellova deal on two old rhinos, but I also bought a fair share of my first army at my FLGS. I always made sure to purchase something, if nothing for the fact that the store allowed me to use its decently appointed game tables. Without purchases, the store could cut its square footage (and its overhead cost) by being half its size and still sell items. At last year's Ard Boyz, I asked the host store owner about his one game table. He said he never really intended on a lot of gaming in the store, but when it started, he thought he had attracted customers. Instead, he created a freeloader's lounge. So he instituted a new rule: $5 table fee or $5 purchase. Most people balked at the idea of paying to ait, but a candy bar, bag of chips, and a drink? Ok. And, of course, once the proverbial seal was broken, a couple pots of paint, or a model walked out the door as well.
The distributors themselves are also strangling the stores. I heard from one store today, who has been a high-tier GW stockist for over 20 years that many of the new items he ordered days before the advance release may not come to him. Part of the reason is his refusal to order to their pars for his store, ignoring the fact that he knows his customer base and his stock levels. Also, considering he exceeds GW's strict rules on square footage and so on, he has been told several times to change his layout and stock levels or else (what?). Another store owner told me of a comic book company that would offer a special variant of a new comic series. The availability, however, was contingent on him ordering 50% more books than he would have normally sold. He refused, the company (who he has been a loyal customer of over 30 years) gave him attitude, and he still sold as many as he predicted. Why all the hassle? When a store owner orders an item, send it! However, the overly corporatized hobby industry has no concern for the wisdom of the store owners they sell to, rather using people with no interest in these niche markets to crunch numbers and criticize experience. If it is a good product, it will sell itself.
The combination of these factors has spawned a generation of frusteated FLGS owners. Irresponsible, ungrateful customers on one hand and uninterested, heavy handed sales reps on the other, where is the incentive to run a store at all? No one goes into a business expecting to make a million bucks overnight, but if money ins't coming in, should they stay open at a loss just so you have a place to park your ass? They can't give away everything, stuff like electricity, toilet water, ventilation, etc costs money. So contribute some or stop complaining.
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:There are two factors that threaten the future of the FLGS: customers and the distributors
*snip*
.
Completely ignores the third factor- STore owners themselves whom treat their customers like crap or take them for granted and still whine and complain we should support the local FLGS.
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:There are two factors that threaten the future of the FLGS: customers and the distributors
*snip*
.
Completely ignores the third factor- STore owners themselves whom treat their customers like crap or take them for granted and still whine and complain we should support the local FLGS.
At the risk of sounding like a hater:
I honestly don't care what kind of person the store owner is, if you are using the store then you need to support the store. If the owner is horrible then stay out of the store, simple as that.
Those are the two options in my opinion:
1) Support the store that is giving you free tables, free terrain, and a social environment where you can meet other players.
2) Don't go to a store that you are refusing to support financially.
Actually in some cases it is very necessary....take myself as an example... I recently PCSed from Germany, to Fort Campbell, KY. I did a thread here on dakka saying I was moving, and where people gamed here, to no real response. I searched GWs website for shops in my area (which was nearly as fruitless), but I drove around town, and walked into the only shop with a small GW/MTG sign on his window to find out that Friday night they stayed open late, and that 40k was played. On a Friday I went there and met a guy who it turns out I work with, as well as some other folks who I have played some, when I get the chance to go in.
Without actually going to the LGS where I am, I would most likely not be able to game at all (or at least not 40k), simply for the fact that there is apparently no one on Dakka from my current area, and not knowing anyone to look up on Fb, etc.
I was in a similar situation, posted to CFB Gagetown here in New Brunswick. Atlantic Canada is not exactly know for its use of technology. The majority of the people I play with are not on site like dakka (or facebook for that matter) nor do they want to be. As well, some of the other people on here who identify themselves from the Atlantic region are up to a 6 hour drive away or in Maine.
May I suggest something since you're military? Let your geek flag fly high on base. My wife always finds me people to play with when we move to a new base because she spreads the word that I play.
Oh I did, but it turned out to be the same people I met in the gaming store anyway.
Balance wrote: I wonder if the trick is to turn from a retail store (that maybe offers some 'services' on the side (play space, snacks, etc.) to a 'service' location that does retail. Can stores find ways to make money off gaming space, hobby space, etc?
My guess is that making money off of gaming space / hobby space just won't work for most stores. It would be interesting however to see someone give this a serious try and see what it really takes to make this work. My guess is it would take a large urban area and some really nice gaming tables.
I think you'd need to offer a complete afternoon service. Coffee and biscuits/cakes, a reading/lounge area, excellent terrain and tables, nice ambient music, etc. No unsupervised children, painting and modelling tutorials from experienced staff, etc, etc. There's plenty that would encourage me to spend money in a local store, but I don't know if I'm representative of the local player base or not.
My FLGS does this, and it's a fantastic place to game. They have about a dozen tables and cupboards crowded with terrain, both made and from various companies. They offer hot food (fries, burgers, etc), cold and hot drinks and have tables where you can eat, lounge chairs for reading, etc. Just makes it so good when you can get there at 11am, play a game, grab a burger and a drink, play another game with a coffee to keep you going, then grab a couple of figs on the way out. I'd guess some days they make more on food than they do on moving units, but still, income is income. If they didn't offer it, they wouldn't make money on it.
Though it's helped by the fact that the place used to be a restaurant, so it had a fully functioning kitchen for food service when they got the place. It would cost the average FLGS quite a bit to convert store space over to a kitchen.
Balance wrote:
I wonder if the trick is to turn from a retail store (that maybe offers some 'services' on the side (play space, snacks, etc.) to a 'service' location that does retail. Can stores find ways to make money off gaming space, hobby space, etc?
My guess is that making money off of gaming space / hobby space just won't work for most stores. It would be interesting however to see someone give this a serious try and see what it really takes to make this work. My guess is it would take a large urban area and some really nice gaming tables.
I think you'd need to offer a complete afternoon service. Coffee and biscuits/cakes, a reading/lounge area, excellent terrain and tables, nice ambient music, etc. No unsupervised children, painting and modelling tutorials from experienced staff, etc, etc. There's plenty that would encourage me to spend money in a local store, but I don't know if I'm representative of the local player base or not.
My FLGS does this, and it's a fantastic place to game. They have about a dozen tables and cupboards crowded with terrain, both made and from various companies. They offer hot food (fries, burgers, etc), cold and hot drinks and have tables where you can eat, lounge chairs for reading, etc. Just makes it so good when you can get there at 11am, play a game, grab a burger and a drink, play another game with a coffee to keep you going, then grab a couple of figs on the way out. I'd guess some days they make more on food than they do on moving units, but still, income is income. If they didn't offer it, they wouldn't make money on it.
Though it's helped by the fact that the place used to be a restaurant, so it had a fully functioning kitchen for food service when they got the place. It would cost the average FLGS quite a bit to convert store space over to a kitchen.
Hell, I would hang out there.
Maybe the trick is not for FLGS to convert to a place like this, instead it might be easier for a coffee shop to add tables and terrain.
We do pretty well here and don't have Magic as our main item. Mini's all the way
I find the secrets to keeping here (Been in business for 5 years) is to build the community. People know that they can get a deal elsewhere, but if you can build a community and a place that they can relate to and call home, they will support you - that's the biggie for me, I want people to feel comfortable and not feel like they are wasting their day at the store.
I honestly don't care what kind of person the store owner is, if you are using the store then you need to support the store. If the owner is horrible then stay out of the store, simple as that.
Those are the two options in my opinion:
1) Support the store that is giving you free tables, free terrain, and a social environment where you can meet other players.
2) Don't go to a store that you are refusing to support financially.
Unfortunately no its NOT as simple as that. For every good store like Mikilha here, there's 2-3 stores that suck balls and turn someone like me who USE TO support stores into the attitude "F'em, I can order online and play in a friends basement or start our own pay to pplay clubs. Which I have done both of which.
If you dont think bad stores set bad examples and turn paying customers off to FLGS in general, your missing the point completely. I can meet players online. I can set up play times online, I can buy models online.
Why the hell should I support a store? Especially having run into bad ones over and over again? There are far more then two options, many of which I have exercised. No I dont need to support the store. Its a two way frigging street, one many stores dont get.
Balance wrote:
I wonder if the trick is to turn from a retail store (that maybe offers some 'services' on the side (play space, snacks, etc.) to a 'service' location that does retail. Can stores find ways to make money off gaming space, hobby space, etc?
My guess is that making money off of gaming space / hobby space just won't work for most stores. It would be interesting however to see someone give this a serious try and see what it really takes to make this work. My guess is it would take a large urban area and some really nice gaming tables.
I think you'd need to offer a complete afternoon service. Coffee and biscuits/cakes, a reading/lounge area, excellent terrain and tables, nice ambient music, etc. No unsupervised children, painting and modelling tutorials from experienced staff, etc, etc. There's plenty that would encourage me to spend money in a local store, but I don't know if I'm representative of the local player base or not.
My FLGS does this, and it's a fantastic place to game. They have about a dozen tables and cupboards crowded with terrain, both made and from various companies. They offer hot food (fries, burgers, etc), cold and hot drinks and have tables where you can eat, lounge chairs for reading, etc. Just makes it so good when you can get there at 11am, play a game, grab a burger and a drink, play another game with a coffee to keep you going, then grab a couple of figs on the way out. I'd guess some days they make more on food than they do on moving units, but still, income is income. If they didn't offer it, they wouldn't make money on it.
Though it's helped by the fact that the place used to be a restaurant, so it had a fully functioning kitchen for food service when they got the place. It would cost the average FLGS quite a bit to convert store space over to a kitchen.
Hell, I would hang out there.
Maybe the trick is not for FLGS to convert to a place like this, instead it might be easier for a coffee shop to add tables and terrain.
That's what I'd like to see in a FLGS. Less a retail outlet, and more a pool-hall/coffee shop.
Balance wrote:
I wonder if the trick is to turn from a retail store (that maybe offers some 'services' on the side (play space, snacks, etc.) to a 'service' location that does retail. Can stores find ways to make money off gaming space, hobby space, etc?
My guess is that making money off of gaming space / hobby space just won't work for most stores. It would be interesting however to see someone give this a serious try and see what it really takes to make this work. My guess is it would take a large urban area and some really nice gaming tables.
I think you'd need to offer a complete afternoon service. Coffee and biscuits/cakes, a reading/lounge area, excellent terrain and tables, nice ambient music, etc. No unsupervised children, painting and modelling tutorials from experienced staff, etc, etc. There's plenty that would encourage me to spend money in a local store, but I don't know if I'm representative of the local player base or not.
My FLGS does this, and it's a fantastic place to game. They have about a dozen tables and cupboards crowded with terrain, both made and from various companies. They offer hot food (fries, burgers, etc), cold and hot drinks and have tables where you can eat, lounge chairs for reading, etc. Just makes it so good when you can get there at 11am, play a game, grab a burger and a drink, play another game with a coffee to keep you going, then grab a couple of figs on the way out. I'd guess some days they make more on food than they do on moving units, but still, income is income. If they didn't offer it, they wouldn't make money on it.
Though it's helped by the fact that the place used to be a restaurant, so it had a fully functioning kitchen for food service when they got the place. It would cost the average FLGS quite a bit to convert store space over to a kitchen.
Hell, I would hang out there.
Maybe the trick is not for FLGS to convert to a place like this, instead it might be easier for a coffee shop to add tables and terrain.
That's what I'd like to see in a FLGS. Less a retail outlet, and more a pool-hall/coffee shop.
Definitely makes it a better place to game. A 'game store' is basically a place to turn up, play a game, and leave. This keeps you in the shop, even for a meal between games. Reminds me of, IIRC, insaniaks point about the gaming area more of an marketing strategy than anything else - make a great gaming area where people will stay for a longer period of time, and you'll encourage them to buy more stuff. It seems like it's working in this case.
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:There are two factors that threaten the future of the FLGS: customers and the distributors
*snip*
.
Completely ignores the third factor- STore owners themselves whom treat their customers like crap or take them for granted and still whine and complain we should support the local FLGS.
Guess you stopped reading after the first sentrnce, huh?
Who in their right mind would walk into their business with a smile on their face knowing that if their customers aren't destroying the business then the suppliers will? The most motivated salesperson in the world will start to be a people-hating drone soon enough if treated as such, believe me, I've been there.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
carmachu wrote:
Why the hell should I support a store? Especially having run into bad ones over and over again? There are far more then two options, many of which I have exercised. No I dont need to support the store. Its a two way frigging street, one many stores dont get.
Hmmmm so many answers to this question.... support local business, support someone who is ultimatwly going to house your butt for 6-12 hours a weekend, encouraging them to carry what you'd like to buy... list goes on and on.
Lemme go out on a limb, you're in your early to mid 20s, right? Evetything's got to be free or cheap because you don't have cash?
I honestly don't care what kind of person the store owner is, if you are using the store then you need to support the store. If the owner is horrible then stay out of the store, simple as that.
Those are the two options in my opinion:
1) Support the store that is giving you free tables, free terrain, and a social environment where you can meet other players.
2) Don't go to a store that you are refusing to support financially.
Unfortunately no its NOT as simple as that. For every good store like Mikilha here, there's 2-3 stores that suck balls and turn someone like me who USE TO support stores into the attitude "F'em, I can order online and play in a friends basement or start our own pay to pplay clubs. Which I have done both of which.
If you dont think bad stores set bad examples and turn paying customers off to FLGS in general, your missing the point completely. I can meet players online. I can set up play times online, I can buy models online.
Why the hell should I support a store? Especially having run into bad ones over and over again? There are far more then two options, many of which I have exercised. No I dont need to support the store. Its a two way frigging street, one many stores dont get.
So don't play in the store.
But if you use the stores services, no matter how horrible the store may be, then you better be supporting it. Or else you are just a parasite.
I am all about letting a bad store suffer. If the owner is horrible and hostile, then don't go there and don't play there. Let the store fail and play in the basement. Nobody deserves your business.
But if your butt is inside a store, using their space and their tables, then your butt should be supporting it.
That's where I am getting to is just wanting to play in the comforts of my own home...then I choose who I play and invite over. Don't have to deal with guys with poor hygiene, bad attitudes...Yu-gi-oh tournaments being scheduled over top of previously scheduled wargaming tournaments...gakky store hours...
theQuanz wrote:That's where I am getting to is just wanting to play in the comforts of my own home...then I choose who I play and invite over. Don't have to deal with guys with poor hygiene, bad attitudes...Yu-gi-oh tournaments being scheduled over top of previously scheduled wargaming tournaments...gakky store hours...
I love my two FLGS, but I am building a table in my garage as well. Don't have to worry about store hours, don't have to watch language, play music or have the game on the radio/tv, and (most importantly) be able to crack open a beer while I am playing.
I will still go to my store to play, meet new guys, tournaments, etc...
Yeah I will probably still attend tournaments, we also have a really awesome Comic Expo every year that is starting to host a wicked gaming section. Had a decent time at the tourney...played a couple dicks from out of town that I won't be playing again any time soon though, but also met a couple players that we just those types of people that you don't mind losing to because you had such a fun game with them.
theQuanz wrote:That's where I am getting to is just wanting to play in the comforts of my own home...then I choose who I play and invite over. Don't have to deal with guys with poor hygiene, bad attitudes...Yu-gi-oh tournaments being scheduled over top of previously scheduled wargaming tournaments...gakky store hours...
I love my two FLGS, but I am building a table in my garage as well. Don't have to worry about store hours, don't have to watch language, play music or have the game on the radio/tv, and (most importantly) be able to crack open a beer while I am playing.
I will still go to my store to play, meet new guys, tournaments, etc...
A corollary to this is that quite often, a home or basement situated board is much larger than one in a store. For example, my local GW has a table or two but they are small affairs (maybe 3x3 foot? Never measured them but that's what it looks like by Mk1 eyeball). Conversely at home, I have room for a 6x4 board (and possibly larger if I had the time or inclination to build one).
This is especially prevalent in the UK where most GWs are the size of shoeboxes anyway - the store rents here are astronomical and only the large chain stores can afford to rent large premises.
theQuanz wrote:That's where I am getting to is just wanting to play in the comforts of my own home...then I choose who I play and invite over. Don't have to deal with guys with poor hygiene, bad attitudes...Yu-gi-oh tournaments being scheduled over top of previously scheduled wargaming tournaments...gakky store hours...
I love my two FLGS, but I am building a table in my garage as well. Don't have to worry about store hours, don't have to watch language, play music or have the game on the radio/tv, and (most importantly) be able to crack open a beer while I am playing.
I will still go to my store to play, meet new guys, tournaments, etc...
A corollary to this is that quite often, a home or basement situated board is much larger than one in a store. For example, my local GW has a table or two but they are small affairs (maybe 3x3 foot? Never measured them but that's what it looks like by Mk1 eyeball). Conversely at home, I have room for a 6x4 board (and possibly larger if I had the time or inclination to build one).
This is especially prevalent in the UK where most GWs are the size of shoeboxes anyway - the store rents here are astronomical and only the large chain stores can afford to rent large premises.
The table I have planned is going to be a modular 4x8 foot table. Basic plan is to have each 4 x 2 foot section be wood on one side, and green felt on the other. Play as a 6 foot table with a 2 foot section for books, dice, beer as needed. Play as a 4x4 (small FoW skirmishes, Warmahordes, etc..) and have two sections for stat-cards and dice and whatnot, or play a bit 8 foot table for big games.
Both my FLGS are lucky in that department though. Shop 1 has six 6x4 tables (three rows) so you could even use the two that are next to each other as a 12x4 table, or just do a little bit of pushing around for the big Apoc games and have an 8 foot by 12 foot table. Shop 2 has been around long enough where they now own 3 separate "stores" in the same strip mall (I am using stores as the room that 1 store usually occupies). The middle is the actual store, the unit on one side has 1 gaming table, 3 round tables, and about 12 regular long tables. This is usually the MtG and RPG side of the store, but you can push the tables together for more wargaming space. The other side has 4 gaming tables, and then about 12 regular tables again that can be pushed together for wargaming.
So I am lucky in that regard, only downside is that both stores are 30-45 minutes away from me. I had a store that was 10 minutes away, but they went belly up.
The FLGS was one of the reasons I got into FOW as they had a demo game. Because of my age, it's hard to convince people to collect goblins, but easy to convince them to collect German tanks or historical ranges.
Anyway, in my experience, FLGS tend to collapse because of cliques that develop in store, poor hygiene of customers stinking the place up, and my pet hate of metal music being played at loud volumes.
Before it went under, my local FLGS used to charge people 1 or 2 bucks a week. The store owner went to great pains to explain to people overheads and rent, and most people seemed quite happy to fork out, so it can work.
In my experience, MTG seems to suck the life out of stores and impacts on other games. MTG is a decent game, but if you want to play cards, get a bottle of southern you know what and go online And yes, 12 year olds should be banned!!!
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:There are two factors that threaten the future of the FLGS: customers and the distributors.
I have seen two game stores go down simply because of the customers. "Place looks crap, and check out what I bought off www.cheapminis.com!" "Sure, let's play, lemme grab a warm soda out of my car" The mentality that an FLGS is simply afree place to loiter is getting ridiculous. I have heard a lot of whining about stores that charge for table time, but these stores aren't wasting all that floor space for you to lounge all day and contribute nothing. Sure, I picked up a hellova deal on two old rhinos, but I also bought a fair share of my first army at my FLGS. I always made sure to purchase something, if nothing for the fact that the store allowed me to use its decently appointed game tables. Without purchases, the store could cut its square footage (and its overhead cost) by being half its size and still sell items. At last year's Ard Boyz, I asked the host store owner about his one game table. He said he never really intended on a lot of gaming in the store, but when it started, he thought he had attracted customers. Instead, he created a freeloader's lounge. So he instituted a new rule: $5 table fee or $5 purchase. Most people balked at the idea of paying to ait, but a candy bar, bag of chips, and a drink? Ok. And, of course, once the proverbial seal was broken, a couple pots of paint, or a model walked out the door as well.
The distributors themselves are also strangling the stores. I heard from one store today, who has been a high-tier GW stockist for over 20 years that many of the new items he ordered days before the advance release may not come to him. Part of the reason is his refusal to order to their pars for his store, ignoring the fact that he knows his customer base and his stock levels. Also, considering he exceeds GW's strict rules on square footage and so on, he has been told several times to change his layout and stock levels or else (what?). Another store owner told me of a comic book company that would offer a special variant of a new comic series. The availability, however, was contingent on him ordering 50% more books than he would have normally sold. He refused, the company (who he has been a loyal customer of over 30 years) gave him attitude, and he still sold as many as he predicted. Why all the hassle? When a store owner orders an item, send it! However, the overly corporatized hobby industry has no concern for the wisdom of the store owners they sell to, rather using people with no interest in these niche markets to crunch numbers and criticize experience. If it is a good product, it will sell itself.
The combination of these factors has spawned a generation of frusteated FLGS owners. Irresponsible, ungrateful customers on one hand and uninterested, heavy handed sales reps on the other, where is the incentive to run a store at all? No one goes into a business expecting to make a million bucks overnight, but if money ins't coming in, should they stay open at a loss just so you have a place to park your ass? They can't give away everything, stuff like electricity, toilet water, ventilation, etc costs money. So contribute some or stop complaining.
[/soapbox]
Ahhh.... No.
Thats incorrect. Your saying that there is a generation of Friendly Local Gamestore Owners, that are frustrated? How many are in this generation, by the way, and in what area are you speaking of?
And that "Heavy Handed" sales reps and Ungrateful customers are the cause for all of this frustration?
Where did this information come from? and in what capacity are you speaking from, as a customer, or one of the "Generation of frustrated FLGS owners?
Because in around 20 minutes or less, I could easily tell you how to not be frustrated, and how to make money.
Its a game store, you sell games. You have a few interactive get togethers, pimp out some products, have some contests and throw some games around and have fun.
You work hard, you get paid. You treat base like shill, you get slayed. its just like that.
You either know your products or you don't. Like was said, its not the "Gamer' whos making money here. its a business and a profession.
And that stuff about sitting around there hating customers?
Yeah, I want to see how long that store stays open. Its not about parking your seat in a store, its about playing some games, selling some hobby stuff, and making some bank.
I have only experienced one hobby store owner who was wildly ignorant of games, and that was because he had to have the games there, he really didn't want them.
Otherwise, if someone opens a game store, he is usually versed in at least a couple games systems. Now if you are complaining that they aren't experts in every game system, you are wildly unrealistic. When was the last time you asked for car parts from a guy who knew everything about every car?
My contention is simple: FLGSs are rarely opened by people who don't care about games and gamers. However, between indifferent companies and incessant whiners, a well-intentioned store owner can quickly become bitter.
As carmachu said, it is a two way street. The store owner started the street by opening the store. It is up to you to patronize the store.
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:
Guess you stopped reading after the first sentrnce, huh?
Well when you say their are only two factors that are the problem and dont address all the other ones, it becomes apparant one needs to inject number 3 and 4 and 5....
Who in their right mind would walk into their business with a smile on their face knowing that if their customers aren't destroying the business then the suppliers will? The most motivated salesperson in the world will start to be a people-hating drone soon enough if treated as such, believe me, I've been there.
Then either get out of the business or work to change those items. I wasnt always an anti-FLGS person. That got earned. By those very same FLGS folks keep trying to say support while I say F'em.
Oh I trust you.l Been there myself. Which is why I speak about bad stores. Alot.
Hmmmm so many answers to this question.... support local business, support someone who is ultimatwly going to house your butt for 6-12 hours a weekend, encouraging them to carry what you'd like to buy... list goes on and on.
Local businesses arent always worth supporting when their is no support in return. Encouragement doesnt always work when they want to be magic whores. and the list goes on and on.
Lemme go out on a limb, you're in your early to mid 20s, right? Evetything's got to be free or cheap because you don't have cash?
Oh look. Someone is not only wrong but monkey poo wrong.
No actaully. I'll turn 40 in a couple months. Been playing longer then some folks here have been alive. Have runa business for almost 20 of those years. Guess I might have shattered your poorly thought out logic and retoric right? Might know what I'm talking about?
Nothing has to be chear or free becaue I do or do not have cash. What has to happen is if FLGS want loyalty and support they have to return it. Thats been VERY lacking in my years of playing. Hell lacking is putting it mildly, betrayal comes to mind.
As carmachu said, it is a two way street. The store owner started the street by opening the store. It is up to you to patronize the store.
No. Thats NOT the start of the street. Just opening the store isnt the opening of the two way street relationship.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
heartserenade wrote:Magic whores, really?
Yes really. If you, as a store, are going to shove miniature playing times to wensday or thrusday from 6pm on to 9pm, and not allow it on saturday becuase of magic, dont expect nice terms from me.
I couldn't help but noticed the inherent hate towards the younger age group. I have to disagree. I think that if (say a 12 year old) can be mature and handle being at the FLGS by himself responsibly, than they can be there. Where I am at, a lot of the influx are the 12-17 range and honestly it isn't bad. Yes, there are a few here and there but the large majority are mature or the manager kindly tells them to tone it down. I kind of think that the few comments here about the younger ages are somewhat stereotypical...
riverhawks32 wrote:I couldn't help but noticed the inherent hate towards the younger age group. I have to disagree. I think that if (say a 12 year old) can be mature and handle being at the FLGS by himself responsibly, than they can be there. Where I am at, a lot of the influx are the 12-17 range and honestly it isn't bad. Yes, there are a few here and there but the large majority are mature or the manager kindly tells them to tone it down. I kind of think that the few comments here about the younger ages are somewhat stereotypical...
Almost as if a cranky old man made them, which is a very cranky old man thing to do.
carmachu wrote:
Yes really. If you, as a store, are going to shove miniature playing times to wensday or thrusday from 6pm on to 9pm, and not allow it on saturday becuase of magic, dont expect nice terms from me.
Yes one store has done that.
Call me crazy, but I don't know, maybe it's because M:tG sells? They're a business. Catering to what sells and the crowd who buys it keep them staying afloat.
Also with the hatred for young ones. If you are 12 years old and you want to play and you don't know other people who play, how would you feel if cranky old men in the store thinks you're a bother and you shouldn't be there?
riverhawks32 wrote:I couldn't help but noticed the inherent hate towards the younger age group. I have to disagree. I think that if (say a 12 year old) can be mature and handle being at the FLGS by himself responsibly, than they can be there. Where I am at, a lot of the influx are the 12-17 range and honestly it isn't bad. Yes, there are a few here and there but the large majority are mature or the manager kindly tells them to tone it down. I kind of think that the few comments here about the younger ages are somewhat stereotypical...
Younger age group has a more propensitity for less then tolerable behavior. Granted thats a blanket statement, but its been known to happen. Howeevr, back in the day when I was playing in a FLGS we took a bunch under our wing to show them how to play and they took to it. Turned out to be good players in the long run, and well behaved when we were around.
12-17 age range is like all the other older ages- some I didnt mind playing, others my minis stayed in the bag,much less dont want to play. But that happens all around, and isnt depended solely on age.
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d-usa wrote:MtG also does the same thing that people are hating on GW for now.
They change it up all the time, for the sole purpose of making you buy new cards.
Once you have your GW models, then you are done buying from the store.
Yes, but your buying something called Collectable card games. Its inherent in the title and set and changes much more frequently as the sets come fast. I remember playing way back when. My tactical marines stay tactical marines no matter what. Cards and combos and banned cards changed rather lot, if you followed tournment guidelines(which most people did around me).
But no, one isnt done buying onces you have your GW models. I'm sure you bought many many more after your army hit 2k. Conversions, you needed glue, all sorts of stuff. New list ideas....
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heartserenade wrote:
Call me crazy, but I don't know, maybe it's because M:tG sells? They're a business. Catering to what sells and the crowd who buys it keep them staying afloat.
Then dont whine to me about supporting you. Again, that two way street thing. Last PP tournment I went to at a FLGS had mroe players then the magic one.
Also with the hatred for young ones. If you are 12 years old and you want to play and you don't know other people who play, how would you feel if cranky old men in the store thinks you're a bother and you shouldn't be there?
And if you were an adult if had an afternoon free from work and wife and kids and went in a store for a game and it looked like a daycare center of horrors with screaming unsupervised kids? It be 10 times worse.
And if you were an adult if had an afternoon free from work and wife and kids and went in a store for a game and it looked like a daycare center of horrors with screaming unsupervised kids? It be 10 times worse.
Why would it be ten times worse? Aren't adults supposed to be more emotionally stable than kids? They look up to us, and how we treat them will shape who and what they are: they're the future gamers of their generation, and we're alienating them and treating them like crap that might make them get turned off from this hobby forever. How would it affect adults? Maybe just an afternoon of irritation but that's about it.
And don't support your FLGS if you don't want to, but don't call them names because they're making perfectly logical business decisions that helps them survive.
Why would it be ten times worse? Aren't adults supposed to be more emotionally stable than kids? They look up to us, and how we treat them will shape who and what they are: they're the future gamers of their generation, and we're alienating them and treating them like crap that might make them get turned off from this hobby forever. How would it affect adults? Maybe just an afternoon of irritation but that's about it.
Is this a trick question? My time is much more valuable then a 12 year old. Its more limited in my free time. I didnt find some time away from the family to be someone else's babysitter. You, their parents and the FLGS isnt paying me to entertain kids. Its more then just an afternoon irritaion.
And don't support your FLGS if you don't want to, but don't call them names because they're making perfectly logical business decisions that helps them survive.
i call spades a spade. I've in my hobby time, gone out of my way to hole in the wall stores an hour away with no playing spaces because they know how to treat customers. On the other hand, stores that suck.....well I have no problem calling them out on that or names. It may or may not be logical, but then we get folks like you and the rest saying you should support FLGS, seemingly blindly, because their FLGS.
either you treat them like any business or you dont. There are car dealerships I would NEVER go to, while folks that have the same line I;d go (and have) gone out of my way to buy from. Same with supermarkets, bookstores, and a host of other places.
In the end, it seems to me that almost all of it depends on the customer. Period. Ive been to FLGS in many diffrent places. And it all depends where you're at. Friendly, calm, laid-back, and mature gamers help create a great friendly place to patronize. The owner doesnt have to worry about the stresses of douchey customers, doesnt have to worry about wether he will make ends meet, and is glad to let gamers stay as long as they'd like in my opinion. But when a store owner is stuck with a whiney, douchey, bunch of self-entitled, ass whipes as gamers in his store, no, it isnt friendly. Hes crabby, hardly likely to offer a damn thing, and probably has a ton of gak on his mind. The simplest way to make a FLGS more successful and appealing to customers, while taking a weight off your shoulders, is to kick out the gamers that down everybody, or just want to cause you problems. Ive literally watched one or two douchey gamers ruin a shop owners whole life. But it seems like a quick way to also make extra money when running an FLGS is to make sure to carry a broad selection of things, not just minis. Board games, comics, and books all seem to work well beside wargames. But, I suppose all of that is just my observations and opinions, feel free to tramp upon them as you will.
Purifyingflame_7 wrote:.And it all depends where you're at. Friendly, calm, laid-back, and mature gamers help create a great friendly place to patronize. But when a store owner is stuck with a whiney, douchey, bunch of self-entitled, ass whipes as gamers in his store, no, it isnt friendly. Hes crabby, hardly likely to offer a damn thing, and probably has a ton of gak on his mind.
Unless of course, the store owner is a whiney, douchey, money grubbing bastard that will turn on you once they've made a buck on you.. Then hey, you should just smile and buy from them right? Not willing to have any real hours and drop you like a hot stone after getting any money from you.
No its not just about the customers. You could be sweet as pie and a pile of money in your pocket and it wont make a difference. Its all about YOU as the customer, not them as a store and service sor merchandice provided.....
Purifyingflame_7 wrote:.And it all depends where you're at. Friendly, calm, laid-back, and mature gamers help create a great friendly place to patronize. But when a store owner is stuck with a whiney, douchey, bunch of self-entitled, ass whipes as gamers in his store, no, it isnt friendly. Hes crabby, hardly likely to offer a damn thing, and probably has a ton of gak on his mind.
Unless of course, the store owner is a whiney, douchey, money grubbing bastard that will turn on you once they've made a buck on you.. Then hey, you should just smile and buy from them right? Not willing to have any real hours and drop you like a hot stone after getting any money from you.
No its not just about the customers. You could be sweet as pie and a pile of money in your pocket and it wont make a difference. Its all about YOU as the customer, not them as a store and service sor merchandice provided.....
I think it's been said over and over that a store has to provide good service. I think at this point everyone on Dakka understands you have some grudges about some store somewhere that did something or other to you, and your bitter about it.
I haven't seen anyone arguing that you should blindly support a store that gives bad service.
carmachu, I'm right with you when it comes to a badFLGS - feth 'em. Sooner they go under the better. But a good store, now, that is something not only worthy of your support... you'll actually want to support it.
Since your opinion seems to be that ALLFLGS' are bad, then it follows that you've obviously never been to a good one. I reccomend you not make such blanket statements until you HAVE experienced a good store.
My FLGS has 6 dedicated mini gaming tables and a dozen tables for other games - including the CCG you despise. The staff is friendly, the owner a really cool guy. If you want something not carried, ask and they will get it for you. They have bought a VERY large selection of terrain for us to use, and they only ask that we treat it carefully and put it back when we are done. The players are cool too - not just the mini gamers, but the card gamers too. Why? Because we all realize that this is a good store, and NONE of us - wargamer or cardgamer, WFB or WM/H, MtG or YGO or Pokemon - want the store to be inconvienenced by petty squabbles among us. If conflicts do arise we try to deal with it ourselves, and only appeal to the owner for a ban when someone refuses to 'play nice with others.' It's only happened once so far, because the guy took a swing at another player.
In short, ours is a GOOD FLGS. And we treat it well in return because it has EARNED it.
Vulcan wrote:My FLGS has 6 dedicated mini gaming tables and a dozen tables for other games - including the CCG you despise.
This is the key here carmachu. If CCGs are popular, there's no reason the store shouldn't have available space for them to play. But you're quite right to be pissed off that they take over all of the gaming space on prime gaming nights. They shouldn't. If anything, the store should have normal sit down tables for CCGs, and entirely separate tables for tabletop gaming. They should also try to organise time for each group of players in prime gaming times. My FLGS does Friday Night Magic. That's when the bulk of the Magic is played. Sure, on Saturdays, you see people at the sit down tables playing magic, but there's far more people at the tabletop tables playing wargames.
If you've encountered nothing but bad stores, it's obvious you have an axe to grind. But not all stores are bad.
I think it's been said over and over that a store has to provide good service. I think at this point everyone on Dakka understands you have some grudges about some store somewhere that did something or other to you, and your bitter about it.
I haven't seen anyone arguing that you should blindly support a store that gives bad service.
I've seen one hell of alot of blame the customers and practically everything else but the stores themselves for poor customer treatment by FLGS on here. And yet in the same breath its been support FLGS.
Having said that., wish your store was the ones around here. My opinion would most likely be very different.
Bam, right there, give and take. They like the store, so they treat it with respect and good will, then the store does its best to return all the same feelings. And I do agree that there are a few horrible stores out there. But comparatively, Ive seen more stores with tired, worn down, and troubled owners than I have with owners that were just horrible people. I mean, in all honesty, Carmachu, your arguement basically revolves around how people can be total douches to one another, which none of us deny. But at the same time, with the way you've thrust your opinion around, generally been unkind to people on here, and acted as though the chip on your shoulder is worth its weight in gold, its easy to see that you could easily ruin a good day for a shop owner. Might I inquire as to how a shop owner betrays you? Did they kick you out for violating the shop rules? Catch you stealing and report it to the cops? Kick you out for having rude behavior? Or was it that they didnt give you the discounts you were clearly 'entitled' to? In the end, unless they just kicked out the whole gaming community from their store, I dont see how they could have betrayed you. And if they had done that, they would no longer be a FLGS to begin with. Soooooo......might I recommend a tad speck of councilling, a little bit of respect for the people who do run great stores, not to mention kids and all the other people around you, and just a little bit of humility? Its not all about you. Sure there are crappy shops out there, but if they are a crappy shop, then they arent a friendly local gaming store. Jesus.......I mean, normally I dont get worked up like this, but dude, after reading this, you are one SERIOUS peice of work.
Purifyingflame_7 wrote:In the end, unless they just kicked out the whole gaming community from their store, I dont see how they could have betrayed you.
Going by his previous comments - by letting 'magic whores' steal all the gaming space during prime time. Though they're paying customers too (and in fact, bring much more income to the store than a wargamer). Still though, a good store will have wargaming area and CCG area, and not let them overlap unless there's an overabundance of one crowd and almost none of the other present.
carmachu wrote:
Is this a trick question? My time is much more valuable then a 12 year old. Its more limited in my free time. I didnt find some time away from the family to be someone else's babysitter. You, their parents and the FLGS isnt paying me to entertain kids. Its more then just an afternoon irritaion.
Not a trick question. When someone mistreats an adult the adult can brush it off. When someone mistreats a child that child can carry that his/her whole life. I don't know if it's just me but I view treating kids well, even kids you're not paid to "babysit" as you put it, is expected of a good adult.
i call spades a spade. I've in my hobby time, gone out of my way to hole in the wall stores an hour away with no playing spaces because they know how to treat customers. On the other hand, stores that suck.....well I have no problem calling them out on that or names. It may or may not be logical, but then we get folks like you and the rest saying you should support FLGS, seemingly blindly, because their FLGS.
And when did I say you should support your FLGS blindly, I wonder? Please don't put words in my mouth, it's in bad form.
What I was saying is don't judge them because they're *gasp* trying to make money. That's like calling a grocery store "cheese whores" because they have eleventy billion selections of cheese and only one or two brands of margarine. Or calling movie houses "blockbuster whores" because they show a lot of Hollywood blockbusters but none of your favorite independent films. As you have said, you treat FLGS like any other business, so wouldn't it make sense to also consider them from a business owner's point of view?
Exactly my point. "Sorry, Saturdays are for our Magic players" that is called scheduling. Maybe if you didn't walk in to a store with the attitude that the owner is out to screw you, he might try and be nice. When I have seen previously burned customers, I know it.
And again, this is a two way street. No shop owner ever opened a store of his own saying, " I hate this crap and I hope no one ever comes in here." They opened the store because they felt a need to share. Now if you happen to be butthurt that the owner doesn't cater to you specifically, look around. If there are 99% Magic players, guess where his financial attention is going to. Making an ass of yourself is only going to lessen his chances of opening a GW account or even purchasing from the myriad of re-distribitors.
Respect is earned, not given. You want your FLGS owner to address you by name? Be a good customer. Don't make him know it because you act like a jerk.
Erm, Friday Night is world-wide Magic Night, it is something that the owners of Magic set up so that no matter where you go, you can play Magic on a fixed day. This is further enforced by the prize support they hand out when you do this.
Back on topic, my current FLGS is one I frequent because of the staff. Their selection might be a bit limited, but as said, the staff more than makes up for it. Not to mention it is a well-lit store, with a first floor stocked with gaming tables, terrain and a dedicated painting area. They run FNM every week, a monthly 40k tourney, a monthly DnD encounter thingy and hold demo days about once every two weeks, all without asking a fee for most things, except FNM I think.
That said, I buy a lot of my stuff on-line, mostly Warmachine, which is either hard to get around here, or sold for insanely high prices. I do however purchase stuff at my FLGS, despite knowing that I can get it cheaper on-line. Not just paints, brushes and primers, but I also buy my RPG books there and this Friday I'll be getting 6th edition there, again something you can get cheaper elsewhere. But they can have my money because they've earned it.
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:I have heard a lot of whining about stores that charge for table time, but these stores aren't wasting all that floor space for you to lounge all day and contribute nothing.
Completely discounting previous posts such as :
Do they appreciate it when the veteran wargamers buy from their store? Absolutely, but the best service veteran war gamers in your store provide is painted army advertising. I can't tell you how many times I sold a starter set and two or three kits to an eager newbie because two fully painted armies belonging to store regulars were going at it on table 1.
It would be nice to read further than the title of a thread before writing a post. Eh, who am I kidding ? Good luck on your crusade against those entitled kids who need to get off your lawn.
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:No shop owner ever opened a store of his own saying, " I hate this crap and I hope no one ever comes in here." They opened the store because they felt a need to share.
"Because they felt a need to share" ? Unless I'm mistaken, we are talking about a business, not a charity. They run a store to earn a living.
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:Respect is earned, not given. You want your FLGS owner to address you by name? Be a good customer.
I think you have it backward. As a customer and a person I show respect until it seems undeserved, but because I choose to. A store owner has to do it because if nothing else his living depends on his doing so. Respect is earned, indeed, and that goes for loyalty as well.
Not a trick question. When someone mistreats an adult the adult can brush it off. When someone mistreats a child that child can carry that his/her whole life. I don't know if it's just me but I view treating kids well, even kids you're not paid to "babysit" as you put it, is expected of a good adult.
So...if I dont want to play a 12 year old in my free time its mistreatment? Kids get viewed as they behave. There was some I would play, but there were many more that were annoying as Heck.. Having taken my kids to a variety of places, while some kids its great to interact with, there are many kids I've had to either interceed or sternly talk to because thier behaving badly or acting in manners that is harmful to themselves or my kids(Mostly because their parents arent paying attention to anything but their chattng or their Ipad or their newspaper).
I do NOT want to be doing that in my free time with miniatures I have spent hours working on. NOT in my job description. You asked why its 10 times worse? Thats why. My time as an adult in in much smaller quanity then some 12 year olds free time, and much more valuable.
What I was saying is don't judge them because they're *gasp* trying to make money. That's like calling a grocery store "cheese whores" because they have eleventy billion selections of cheese and only one or two brands of margarine. Or calling movie houses "blockbuster whores" because they show a lot of Hollywood blockbusters but none of your favorite independent films. As you have said, you treat FLGS like any other business, so wouldn't it make sense to also consider them from a business owner's point of view?
Businesses are free to make money till their hearts desire. But dont ask for support for something thats not providing anything of use and catering to something else.
Not my problem to consider a business owners POV. Having run a business for decade or two, I can tell you flat out no customer cares for you POV on business. What they care about is price, convience and what service you can provide for their budget. Your POV is meaningless to them.
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SoloFalcon1138 wrote:Exactly my point. "Sorry, Saturdays are for our Magic players" that is called scheduling. Maybe if you didn't walk in to a store with the attitude that the owner is out to screw you, he might try and be nice.
.
Respect is earned, not given. You want your FLGS owner to address you by name? Be a good customer. Don't make him know it because you act like a jerk.
In that case, he too needs to earn that and loyalty. Be a good store and you might get it. So far havent seen it in decades. Stop making half assed schedules and such. Its a two way street.
carmachu wrote:
So...if I dont want to play a 12 year old in my free time its mistreatment?
Again, that I didn't say. Please stop putting words in my mouth. And stop using strawmen. What I did say is that children are much more susceptible to emotional damage to adults and much more easier to influence. That was my argument, I would appreciate it if you don't move it. If you're not going to reply to it without changing it, please do not bother.
I do NOT want to be doing that in my free time with miniatures I have spent hours working on. NOT in my job description. You asked why its 10 times worse? Thats why. My time as an adult in in much smaller quanity then some 12 year olds free time, and much more valuable.
I don't even want to touch the common fallacy "I'm an adult and I do bigger stuff, therefore my time is more valuable" until you stop misinterpreting my replies.
Businesses are free to make money till their hearts desire. But dont ask for support for something thats not providing anything of use and catering to something else.
Again, when did I say that you should support your FLGS blindly? (bold for emphasis) You seem to have a knack of interpreting things that the other person didn't say. It's quite curious, really.
Not my problem to consider a business owners POV. Having run a business for decade or two, I can tell you flat out no customer cares for you POV on business. What they care about is price, convience and what service you can provide for their budget. Your POV is meaningless to them.
So you as a customer know their point of view because you were a business owner yourself and the amount of empathy you can give is "feth that I'm a customer goddamit and you are horrible because you don't cater to my needs even if you will lose money if you cater more to my needs and less to Magic players (that you know, will pay the bills)."?
Nice to know.
Maybe this is just my opinion, but a rational person wouldn't curse a movie house and call it names like "Hollywood whores" because they want to actually be profitable. Sure, a rational person may not like it since he/she wants to watch independent films there, but he/she will understand. Me as a rational person wouldn't think my FLGS is horrible because they don't have a stock of Infinity and call them "WotC and GW whores".
As some of you mentioned playing with underage kids most of the times is not a good idea. The mayority of them like to steal things from others specially Yugioh cards. Because they are under age, its better for a store owner to let them be in the store with a responsible adult.
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:Exactly my point. "Sorry, Saturdays are for our Magic players" that is called scheduling.
There's a difference between scheduling(where you plan on having the majority of your space being used by it) and denying people the use of a table because your schedule says that "this is the game for the day". That's bad business. One of the FLGS' here has "schedules", but they're guidelines for what games are generally played that night so you can find a game, not some fascist determination that it's the ONLY game to be played that night. If people grab a table on Fantasy night and plays, say, Flames of War, the owner isn't going to tell them "Sorry, it's Fantasy night, you can't play that here." Yes, he'll tell them when FoW nights are so that, if they can make it, they can meet more players, but he won't make them quit.
GoodFLGS make sure to have tables set aside for their schedule as well as extras for both overflow and walk-ins that don't know about their scheduled days.
carmachu wrote:Businesses are free to make money till their hearts desire. But dont ask for support for something thats not providing anything of use and catering to something else.
So... your store has staff with a bad attitude, doesn't provide gaming tables for you to play on, carry product you're interested in, and in fact sells stuff you don't like instead?
Then why the is it your store in the first place? Go to a store that DOES provide what you are looking for. Nothing and noone - not even anyone responding to you in this thead - thinks you should shut up and stettle for being treated like garbage. I've kicked more than one LGS (note the lack of an 'F' there; they were anything but friendly) to the curb in my time and moved on to another.
But then, I suppose I'm lucky; the one good thing about this berg I'm stuck in is that there is a huge number of game stores (over a dozen I can think of offhand currently in business, with about that many having opened and/or closed in the past two decades) around here.
Not my problem to consider a business owners POV. Having run a business for decade or two, I can tell you flat out no customer cares for you POV on business. What they care about is price, convience and what service you can provide for their budget. Your POV is meaningless to them.
Attitudes like that are WHY I kicked the last several LGS' to the curb. Not a one is open today.
When I find a good store, I DO care about the health of the store and do what I can to help it stay in business. This includes buying there - even if I could get it cheaper elsewhere - and helping maintain good relations between gaming groups playing there. And I am NOT the exception around here, this attitude seems to be the RULE.
Which may have something to do with why we have so many game stores around here, and why the long-lived ones are the good ones.
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:Exactly my point. "Sorry, Saturdays are for our Magic players" that is called scheduling. Maybe if you didn't walk in to a store with the attitude that the owner is out to screw you, he might try and be nice.
Respect is earned, not given. You want your FLGS owner to address you by name? Be a good customer. Don't make him know it because you act like a jerk.
In that case, he too needs to earn that and loyalty. Be a good store and you might get it. So far havent seen it in decades. Stop making half assed schedules and such. Its a two way street.
Again, you miss the point. Yes, the store manager and crew need to show some respect to the customer. But it is EQUALLY IMPORTANT FOR A HEALTHY STORE for the customers to respect the store crew, especially when they are doing the right thing. Being hostile to the crew means they WILL be hostile right back, even if they are forced to conceal it because 'the customer is always right.' Having worked in various retail places, I can tell you 100% true that the customers who get the bare minimum from me are the ones with bad attitudes, and the ones who get me to go the extra mile are the ones who are polite.
With the attitude you've demonstrated here on this thread, I rather strongly suspect you rub people the wrong way in person just as thoroughly as you have here, and the store crew will reflect that bad attitude right back at you. Try not being so hostile, and maybe things will get better.
Vulcan wrote:
Then why the is it your store in the first place? Go to a store that DOES provide what you are looking for. Nothing and noone - not even anyone responding to you in this thead - thinks you should shut up and stettle for being treated like garbage. I've kicked more than one LGS (note the lack of an 'F' there; they were anything but friendly) to the curb in my time and moved on to another.
Here's a hint:
There is NONE around. Out of the 2-3 stores around the story was all the same monkey poo in various forms. Including betrayal. I live in the ass end of gaming deadzone. Its the same with RPG gaming. None around really.
This isnt "one bad store treated me wrong." This is "all the stores around its the same crap."
When I find a good store, I DO care about the health of the store and do what I can to help it stay in business. This includes buying there - even if I could get it cheaper elsewhere - and helping maintain good relations between gaming groups playing there. And I am NOT the exception around here, this attitude seems to be the RULE.
I use to, back in the early 90's, drive 45 minutes to an hour out of my way to a hole in the wall store that had absolutely no playing space. And kept coming back becuase he knew how to treat customers right. And price wasnt an issue(well granted, back then everything was cheaper by alot).
Again, you miss the point. Yes, the store manager and crew need to show some respect to the customer. But it is EQUALLY IMPORTANT FOR A HEALTHY STORE for the customers to respect the store crew, especially when they are doing the right thing. Being hostile to the crew means they WILL be hostile right back, even if they are forced to conceal it because 'the customer is always right.' Having worked in various retail places, I can tell you 100% true that the customers who get the bare minimum from me are the ones with bad attitudes, and the ones who get me to go the extra mile are the ones who are polite.
With the attitude you've demonstrated here on this thread, I rather strongly suspect you rub people the wrong way in person just as thoroughly as you have here, and the store crew will reflect that bad attitude right back at you. Try not being so hostile, and maybe things will get better.
You would of course be wrong. I'm quite pleasent to be around and play. What your getting now is decade of frustration at the attitude of "support your FLGS". And you'll keep getting that.
No Its not, respect the store. Their a business and jsut like any business THEY HAVE TO EARN IT. Just like the car dealership we go back to time and again inmy family- they know how to treat you right. Which is why we go back. But the first time in we didnt have to respect them (nor do we have to disrespect them)- they had to earn it.
And so do FLGS. Earn it you might get a customer- dont and you get the attitude you see in this thread- its well earn the bad attitude.
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Bakerofish wrote:
carmachu wrote:My time as an adult in in much smaller quanity then some 12 year olds free time, and much more valuable..
I really cant take anything you say seriously after this statement.
It's time spent playing with little plastic soldiers for crying out loud.
If your time really was valuable, you'd be doing something else. Otherwise, its just time spent playing with toy soldiers.
Its MY FREE Time. If I want to spend it playing with toy soldiers, RPGing with friends, playing golf or otherwise, its limited and I want to relax and enjoy myself. Of course its valuable to me. Inbetween work and home and kids and wife and life.
I cant take you very serious when you dont understand the difference between adults free time and kids. I can tell you dont have kids and have had to deal with other people's kids.
carmachu wrote:
Its MY FREE Time. If I want to spend it playing with toy soldiers, RPGing with friends, playing golf or otherwise, its limited and I want to relax and enjoy myself. Of course its valuable to me. Inbetween work and home and kids and wife and life.
I cant take you very serious when you dont understand the difference between adults free time and kids. I can tell you dont have kids and have had to deal with other people's kids.
There's no difference. Time is time. Thinking YOUR time is more valuable than anyone else's (even kids') just reeks of self entitlement and comes off as a-holish.
You're not the type to cut into lines using the "my time is more valuable then yours" excuse are you?
carmachu wrote:
Its MY FREE Time. If I want to spend it playing with toy soldiers, RPGing with friends, playing golf or otherwise, its limited and I want to relax and enjoy myself. Of course its valuable to me. Inbetween work and home and kids and wife and life.
I cant take you very serious when you dont understand the difference between adults free time and kids. I can tell you dont have kids and have had to deal with other people's kids.
There's no difference. Time is time. Thinking YOUR time is more valuable than anyone else's (even kids') just reeks of self entitlement and comes off as a-holish.
You're not the type to cut into lines using the "my time is more valuable then yours" excuse are you?
And because you know, learning how to deal with social interactions, building confidence and playing (much needed to have good brain development for kids) are not important in life, and you don't need to experience them as a child.
Children will have different priorities from you (i.e. figuring out how the world works, building social skills and contacts) and guess what, that time will impact them more throughout their life.
Just because you are older than someone doesn't mean your time is more valuable.
There is NONE around. Out of the 2-3 stores around the story was all the same monkey poo in various forms. Including betrayal. I live in the ass end of gaming deadzone. Its the same with RPG gaming. None around really.
This isnt "one bad store treated me wrong." This is "all the stores around its the same crap."
Here's a hint back. When you're getting poor treatment EVERYWHERE, maybe the problem doesn't lie in the game stores. Maybe the problem lies with the attitude of the customer...
But it could be I'm wrong, and all the stores around you are full of TFG and Fail, in which case you have every right to be frustrated. In that case, they're not FLGSs, are they?
And the whole point of this discussion is the fate of FLGSs. It's right there in the title. The common fate of UnFLGSs is ultimately bankruptcy and closing, because the players stop going there. This is understood by all participating in the thread and does not need discussion.
So your coming in here and arguing that NO store can EVER be an FLGS because all the stores around YOU suck moose, that's just plain trolling. And it's getting tiresome.
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heartserenade wrote:
Bakerofish wrote:
carmachu wrote:
Its MY FREE Time. If I want to spend it playing with toy soldiers, RPGing with friends, playing golf or otherwise, its limited and I want to relax and enjoy myself. Of course its valuable to me. Inbetween work and home and kids and wife and life.
I cant take you very serious when you dont understand the difference between adults free time and kids. I can tell you dont have kids and have had to deal with other people's kids.
There's no difference. Time is time. Thinking YOUR time is more valuable than anyone else's (even kids') just reeks of self entitlement and comes off as a-holish.
You're not the type to cut into lines using the "my time is more valuable then yours" excuse are you?
And because you know, learning how to deal with social interactions, building confidence and playing (much needed to have good brain development for kids) are not important in life, and you don't need to experience them as a child.
Children will have different priorities from you (i.e. figuring out how the world works, building social skills and contacts) and guess what, that time will impact them more throughout their life.
Just because you are older than someone doesn't mean your time is more valuable.
On this one point, carmachu and I see eye to eye. Right now, the average 12-year-old is in the middle of summer vacation and has, on the average, about an hour's worth of chores to do a day - and he can then spend the rest of the day as he chooses, parental permission pending. I, on the other hand, have to spend 8.5 hours at work (plus an hour in transit), cook dinner (another hour or two), do whatever housework needs doing (another hour) and spend time with family (2+ hours if everything goes well). On the weekends, it's a bit less hectic, probably only 6 hours or so of house and yardwork, but time with family doubles.
In short, the 12-year-old has MUCH more time to spend playing with plastic soldiers than I do.
Or to put it in economic terms, show me a 12-year-old making $50K a year and I'll allow that his time is as valuable as mine.
What can joe gamer do to infect a FLGS and perk up all of this generation of downtrodden game store owners?
As was said by someone, support is earned... So what does some of these downtrodden misers have to do to get some game on?
I find a douche store. What do I have to do to turn that around to make it a place that I'd want to come back to, aside from the obvious telling the oppressed owner to take a bath?
Key words "parental permission pending". A kid's day is pretty much doing what he/she is "allowed to do"
and if the kid has a saturday where their parents can take them to a mall to play a game with toy soldiers, id call that valuable too.
who says value has to be monetary anyway? the kid will only be 12 once. he has at most 5 years of childhood left and then its off to the mind-numbing 9-5 grind.
Time is time. It's pointless arguing who's time is more valuable as it all boils down to perspective anyway. No one can say theirs is more valuable.
well...i make exceptions for terminal patients and bomb squad guys on duty.
Vulcan wrote:
On this one point, carmachu and I see eye to eye. Right now, the average 12-year-old is in the middle of summer vacation and has, on the average, about an hour's worth of chores to do a day - and he can then spend the rest of the day as he chooses, parental permission pending. I, on the other hand, have to spend 8.5 hours at work (plus an hour in transit), cook dinner (another hour or two), do whatever housework needs doing (another hour) and spend time with family (2+ hours if everything goes well). On the weekends, it's a bit less hectic, probably only 6 hours or so of house and yardwork, but time with family doubles.
I guess this is really off-topic. If it goes too OT and you still want to discuss it, we can do so via PM or the mods can delete this for us.
I do agree that a child will have more unscheduled free time than a regular adult, but it does not necessarily translate that the adult's time is more valuable: it just makes it more valuable to you. Having limited time does not heighten its value.
Or to put it in economic terms, show me a 12-year-old making $50K a year and I'll allow that his time is as valuable as mine.
It can't be measured by how much you make: if for example I make less than you would that make my time less valuable than yours? Time value is not measured by how much you can make in a year or in an hour. It's a one-dimensional way of putting a value on to something. I guess it all boils down to what attribute would put value to time: how much you learned? How much you enjoyed that time? Or how productive you were? How many people's lives will be affected of how you use your time? Most of the time a child will trump you in the first two questions (children are more receptive to learning and enjoying things because everything is still new to them) and you will trump the child in the last two.
I'd rather not assume that my time is more valuable than a child's based on the fact that it is very difficult to quantify the value of time and I am not arrogant so as to declare that my time is more valuable than anyone else's.
But really, really OT. Just PM me if you want to discuss it more.
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Bakerofish wrote:
who says value has to be monetary anyway? the kid will only be 12 once. he has at most 5 years of childhood left and then its off to the mind-numbing 9-5 grind.
Time is time. It's pointless arguing who's time is more valuable as it all boils down to perspective anyway. No one can say theirs is more valuable.
)
As a 40+ year old gamer, I don't mind kids in the store but I don't babysit them either.. they're not my kids! That's a parent's job, not mine. I feel for the poor owner who has to deal with the rambunctious kiddos but hopefully he's making money from their purchases.
I go to stores that are friendly and have what I want to buy. If they're not friendly, I gladly take my money elsewhere.
If I'm treated poorly, I say "thank you" and don't return. Or if I do return it might be for a pot of paint that I can't wait for from the internet. My one time $5 sale isn't going to help a sinking store if the owner/employee is a jerk.
As much as I like "the customer is always right", I too am a business owner (not a game store owner). My customers come to me specifically through referrals and word of mouth. So I MUST be customer-service oriented 100% of the time, even if the customer is a jerk. I chose this line of business, so no one put a gun to my head and said "be nice all of the time to your customers." It's part of the deal and how I make my living.
People are not friendly all of the time. It's not possible! Customers are as varied as business owners. The business runs on cash, customers bring the cash but will only part with it if they feel they're getting their money's worth... which depends on the owner.
I remember Mikhaila stating once (correct me if I'm wrong) about gaming space and I'm paraphrasing "the game tables bring the customer into the store... It's my job to sell to the customer" which leads me to believe that he's the main influence in the transaction. As successful as he's been, he must be doing something right by being so positively involved!
Most of us gamers already have a game system in mind (Dust, 40k, Magic, Infinity, etc.). The game is exactly the same everywhere. So it's up to the person running the store to convince the customer to spend money there instead of elsewhere.
I find a douche store. What do I have to do to turn that around to make it a place that I'd want to come back to, aside from the obvious telling the oppressed owner to take a bath?
Supposidly, if you act with rainbows and puppies type attitude, it will get you in the good graces of the staff, and they will in turn treat you better. Or at least its been said in the thread here.
In store events, If I recall, are a good way to start the little 'uns on the road to either success or ruin.
One such event, the famed Paint and play is a good way to get them centered and introduce them to the basic of all games. That there is a winner and a loser, but its more about hard work is rewarded, and skill doesn't come cheap.
The kids have the time to paint up the guys, either one or five, then they play as a team, or against each other. then the next lession, you have the guys add in a heavy weapon. ( Yes, granted that the money is in the till, but posting a start up fee, or charging a five or ten bucks to the cause can get some cash, and the kiddos get to have some quality time.
Heaven forbid that you take a small part of the time to teach them to paint, or gab up a little with them. the little blighters!
Yeah, those dirty spawn are sometimes a pain, but if you groom them right, they are going to be your next generation and fill of up and coming gamers.
I've seen this go both ways, but all in all if the group in store is solid, they weed and groom thier own, and the players continue to fill, and the talent gets better.
Treating children like is not a good idea, seeing as they will more then likely turn on you and bite your knees or something.
Other things you could do is encourage parent kid things, where both of them learn the game. ( not nessesarily GW's, but any games work, or you would think.)
who says value has to be monetary anyway? the kid will only be 12 once. he has at most 5 years of childhood left and then its off to the mind-numbing 9-5 grind.
Time is time. It's pointless arguing who's time is more valuable as it all boils down to perspective anyway. No one can say theirs is more valuable.
Ah yes the moral eqivilancy type arguemnt, no one is right.
Yes, yes we can say our time is more valuable. We have less free time. That makes it more valuable.
carmachu wrote:
Supposidly, if you act with rainbows and puppies type attitude, it will get you in the good graces of the staff, and they will in turn treat you better.
I think the main service FLGS can do is provide a community focus point. However that essentially makes it a club. Anyone can get 15-25% off GW stuff on the internets, but its harder to actually find space, rent/hire it, set up some tables and attract people to play.
carmachu wrote:Yes, yes we can say our time is more valuable. We have less free time. That makes it more valuable.
It just makes it more valuable to you.
Bakerofish wrote:who says value has to be monetary anyway? the kid will only be 12 once. he has at most 5 years of childhood left and then its off to the mind-numbing 9-5 grind.
You have successfully turned this thread from discussing whats required to keep brick and mortar stores viable into a 5 page journal about your terrible fate as a gamer after all those bad bad men were mean to you in a store.
Seriously.. look at the myriad of doom and gloom woe is me emo kid stuff you've been saturating the thread with..
they always turn on you in the end no matter how much support you give them.
They want you around, they want your money. They start wanting you around to play and then......they shut down playing areas, they cut hours that you can play miniature games and eventually kick you to the curb
, no matter how loyal you are, they turn on you. So F'd them
Completely ignores the third factor- STore owners themselves whom treat their customers like crap or take them for granted and still whine and complain we should support the local FLGS
wasnt always an anti-FLGS person. That got earned. By those very same FLGS folks keep trying to say support while I say F'em.
Local businesses arent always worth supporting when their is no support in return. Encouragement doesnt always work when they want to be magic whores
What has to happen is if FLGS want loyalty and support they have to return it. Thats been VERY lacking in my years of playing. Hell lacking is putting it mildly, betrayal comes to mind.
Yes really. If you, as a store, are going to shove miniature playing times to wensday or thrusday from 6pm on to 9pm, and not allow it on saturday becuase of magic, dont expect nice terms from me.
heartserenade wrote:
Call me crazy, but I don't know, maybe it's because M:tG sells? They're a business. Catering to what sells and the crowd who buys it keep them staying afloat.
Then dont whine to me about supporting you. Again, that two way street thing. Last PP tournment I went to at a FLGS had mroe players then the magic one.
Unless of course, the store owner is a whiney, douchey, money grubbing bastard that will turn on you once they've made a buck on you.. Then hey, you should just smile and buy from them right? Not willing to have any real hours and drop you like a hot stone after getting any money from you.
There is NONE around. Out of the 2-3 stores around the story was all the same monkey poo in various forms. Including betrayal. I live in the ass end of gaming deadzone. Its the same with RPG gaming. None around really.
This isnt "one bad store treated me wrong." This is "all the stores around its the same crap."
1) People have gotten derailed time and time and time again to assure you they aren't talking about gakky stores deserving support, but you keep coming back to it. Were all sorry you seem to be a gakky-store seeking missile, but it isn't what this thread is about.
2) You mentioned you are a pleasure to be around, but to be honest, if 4 of 4 stores have turned on you, stabbed you in the back, decided you aren't worth the money you spend, decided to leave you be, then the issue may lie with you and not game store owners in general.
3) You mention a few times being disgusted by having to split store time with other game types or not having a schedule that benefits you being set in stone. I'm sure Mikhaila would agree, a store that puts all its eggs in one basket is a store that closes sooner rather than later. Especially the wargaming crowd, who usually have 1 or 2 big splurges followed by a long slowdown until they finish building and painting or need to expand. If a store can get money out of Magic, Yugi oh, Pokemon, Miniature Games, D&D, Board Games, and Cosplay your favorite carebear Dance Dance Revolution face offs, then so be it. Your owner is showing the ability to manage and nurture 7 communities instead of just one. Throwing a fit and quitting about store space being used for something other than your game makes you a 40 year old man with a bad case of entitlement and not the uber loyal customer you think you are.
4) A store owner only owes you a few things. A courteous demeanor, product knowledge, and a safe establishment if he allows in store gaming. Anything beyond that is icing on the cake. Interpreting anything more than that as lacking on his part is bogus on yours. It's true that the greatest of owners will allow little favors and be more like a friend from whom you buy things, but if you expect them to hurt their business to cater to you or to spend hours tweaking a schedule that makes you happy at the expense of other gaming communities and you are again acting like a very entitled 40 year old who had a mother that never told him no.
5) In regards to kids. It's absolutely cool that you don't want to spend your time with them. Play an adult or tell them you arent interested. That's fine. But it speaks volumes about your personality that you consider YOUR time worth more than anyone elses for any reason. If I have a higher paying job than yours and I work 10 more hours a week, should I feel like you are just in my way and I can bump you from a table because my time is worth more than yours? I mean hey, I make more money and have even less free time. That's the deciding factor, right? (Note: I know you didn't mention booting kids off tables, but your message is pretty similar.)
If the FLGS is going to survive it has to find a balance of being affordable while offering the amenities and atmosphere that makes it worth it to spend 10 dollars more in a store regularly. Hell, my FLGS owner came to my wedding, we call each other by first name, and I consider him a really good friend. And from time to time I still make an internet purchase. He didn't rip up my invite. He didn't kick me from the store. He didn't leave my Pathfinder group. If at least ONE owner exists like this, who isn't a backstabbing leech demon looking to hurt you with words and deed just to see your tears, then more must exist, right?
Keep this thread where it should be, talking about how to find both outstanding stores, how stores can stay alive, and how to nurture the customer/owner relationship. We don't need/want your sadness journal.
That is why game stores should offer snacks. Costs nearly nothing to stock a fridge with cans and a shelf with bags of chips, and the usual markup, even to less than convenience store prices, is big. Sell a gamer a can and some chips on a day they werent going to buy a fig, and you've made easy money you otherwise wouldn't have, kept them in the store instead of going across the street, and maybe made that sale on a fig because of it.
i've been in one of FLGS in Bangkok (I don't live there in the capitol!) and i've talked with the manager. he said that GW franchising doesn't work here. FLGS still has some way to prosper.
As a 99.9% (made up number) basement gamer, I realize my opinion of whether I'm obligated to buy my products from a chosen FLGS doesn't carry much weight, but here's my two cents anyway:
I'm a rather frugal person. If I can get discounts on things without a large loss of convenience, I will do so. I've never considered myself loyal enough to a business to go out of my way to give them money, especially if I don't see a valuable return on my investment. That said, I am fairly "loyal" to quite a few different businesses (both online and brick & mortar), because those businesses have treated me well and have provided consistently good service/products. Therefore, when I'm looking for a service/product, I will almost always seek out businesses that have my "loyalty."
I treat all FLGS the same way. If an FLGS has something that I want to buy, and provides me with quality service and a friendly atmosphere, I will continue to give that store my patronage when I want to buy that product/service. However, if I can get an overall better value for what I want by purchasing online, I will do so (unless there's a large enough inconvenience factor) - yet if the FLGS offers something else that I want (such as snacks/services while using their tables) that I cannot get online, I will of course continue to pay for such things.
As for "keeping the store open" being a factor in the value of the service I'm getting, I'll repeat that I'm mostly a basement gamer, so unfortunately keeping local independent retailers open is not that important to me. I certainly consider it, but doesn't have the sort of monolithic importance to me that it has to gamers whose primary gaming space is their FLGS.
-Loki- wrote:That is why game stores should offer snacks. Costs nearly nothing to stock a fridge with cans and a shelf with bags of chips, and the usual markup, even to less than convenience store prices, is big. Sell a gamer a can and some chips on a day they werent going to buy a fig, and you've made easy money you otherwise wouldn't have, kept them in the store instead of going across the street, and maybe made that sale on a fig because of it.
actually in most places it DOES cost to keep snacks. aside from power costs some countries and cities tax you differently and will need specific storage display guidelines followed if youre offering food. Dunno how it works in your country but in some places the taxes can be prohibitive.
The Instore campaign was a good way to garner interest in the game of choice. Map based, campaign based, planetary based, they all pretty much take alot of work, but when everyone pulls in, the game is pretty damn cool. Played one where we started from squad, then to platoon, then to company, then to full on planetary assult.
Was a great time to be had, and it wouldn't have happened if the store wasn't involved.
Bakerofish wrote:
Time is time. It's pointless arguing who's time is more valuable as it all boils down to perspective anyway. No one can say theirs is more valuable.
well...i make exceptions for terminal patients and bomb squad guys on duty.
I have to disagree if you have 10+ free hours a day and someone else only has 1 than it can be reasonably argued that the person with only 1 hour does have more valuable time. It is simply because they have less of it. Perhaps valuable is not the best way to put it but it does get the point across.
Another way to put it would be that it is far easier for someone with more free time to prioritize things into their schedule and accept a 20 minute wait for something.
I find a douche store. What do I have to do to turn that around to make it a place that I'd want to come back to, aside from the obvious telling the oppressed owner to take a bath?
Supposidly, if you act with rainbows and puppies type attitude, it will get you in the good graces of the staff, and they will in turn treat you better. Or at least its been said in the thread here.
I'm not a game-store employee - but I have worked in restaurants and retail for many a year. And... yeah, service workers are almost always going to go farther for a friendly customer than a grump, much less a screamin' mimi.
There are, of course, exceptions. Some employees can't be bothered no matter how nice you are, and some go all-out for everyone. But in general the customer attitude does impact the service given.
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Thunderfrog5 wrote: If I have a higher paying job than yours and I work 10 more hours a week, should I feel like you are just in my way and I can bump you from a table because my time is worth more than yours? I mean hey, I make more money and have even less free time. That's the deciding factor, right? (Note: I know you didn't mention booting kids off tables, but your message is pretty similar.)
Okay, I think you're reading a bit much into this. I don't bump kids off the table they're playing on (and I'll bet carmachu doesn't either); I simply will not join them for a game. I loathe kids with the fire of a thousand suns (which is why I went and married a woman who cannot have and does not want kids... but that's off the subject) and it takes a kid who is mature far beyond their years to not instantly set my temper on 'hair trigger' and cause me to walk away.
Hailey at our FLGS is one such kid, and do enjoy playing her.
Fortunately, there are others at our FLGS who are better with kids and I let them handle the ones I cannot stand. It's better that way all around.
I'll yield the point that my time is more valuable than a kids to me and probably not to anyone else.
I have only recently started attending a FLGS and I must say I've been really impressed with the entire experience.
I've usually only tabletop game with a group of 7 or so close mates in a garage but when I branched out into Warmachine on my own I had to look elsewhere for games. The owner of my FLGS went above and beyond to help intodruce me to the game, new players and events that I could participate in. Not once did he try push products on me, infact he laminated all my stat cards for free and gave me a couple of whiteboard markers along with it, even though I hadn't purchased those products in his store.
Since that day every warmachine product I order comes through his store, and although its a good 20% - 30% more than what I pay online I'm still willing to use him as I'd gladly pay that extra for the service he provides. I'm sure if all FLGS operated like this most people would feel the same way.
I also agree however that If the guy running the place is a bad owner, just don't use the store rather than sitting around mooching off him.
I find a douche store. What do I have to do to turn that around to make it a place that I'd want to come back to, aside from the obvious telling the oppressed owner to take a bath?
Supposidly, if you act with rainbows and puppies type attitude, it will get you in the good graces of the staff, and they will in turn treat you better. Or at least its been said in the thread here.
Añd acting like a pompous jerk has done so well for you?
SoloFalcon1138 wrote:
Añd acting like a pompous jerk has done so well for you?
You get what you give. Thats what I was given, so have it right back.
I think the problem is you're giving to much.)
I really don't have a problem with someone not liking a store that gives bad service or a store owner who acts badly. They reflect back on the entire industry when they do that. It makes me furious.
But aim it at them. Don't bring it up in every thread that mentions FLGS in general.
A bad store or store owner will put themselves out of business, which is reality getting revenge for not working harder. Especially on customer service
And you don't consider they gave what they got back to you?
I can tell you and solo falcon have never worked with the public. or retail.
It doesnt matter what the customer is- if your going to play tit for tat with the customer, you will fail as a store. I've had to deal with people in 20+ years that are happy, sad, PMSing, fighting with their spouse before they came in, mad at the last retailer they went to.....and it doesnt matter. MY job is to sell them, no matter what THEIR attitude is, Not give them attitude back. I've turned angry customers into happy ones. If I follow YOUR advise and solofalcons, they wouldnt be customers.
And mikhaila, frankly in 20 years I've only had one decent retailer and he didnt have playing space yet I still came back to him. I assume yours is as well. But frankly FLGs as far as I have seen are irrelevant to playing, especially nowadays. 22 years of playing, and FLGS havent come out on the positve side of the equation with me or our group. And no bad stores dont put themselves out of business. Some of them are still chugging along fine.
After reading the above post, you should really consider that the common denominator for all 22 years of woe was you. You should probably look into that.
People forget in general, and not just in the gaming industry, that people have bad days and that it's not all sunshine and rainbows. I'm sure there are days when even Mikhaila can't be bothered to open the store.
I bring this up because I know of one situation when people didn't go back to a store because the owner was grumpy with them (he was having trouble with his marriage) and despite explaining the situation and apologising, the store suffered for a while.
I think it's unrealistic to expect an all singing, all dancing, roll out the red carpet scenario, every time you go to a game store. That's not to excuse bad service, but people should be more realistic.
I first visited a hobby store in Macon, GA back before table top gaming really existed back around 1980 before I was even 10 years old. They had all these awesome balsa wood airplane models and model trains that I loved just walking around and looking at. The store was a couple of blocks away from my father's office in downtown. If I was ever at my dad's office after school, I would want to walk down and look at the stuff at the store. The owners were always really nice, and would usually buy me a Coca Cola out of the machine.
When I was 15, I had my first experience with a gaming store called Comix Castle in Macon (I think that's how they spelled it...might have used K's in stead). I played in a D&D role playing tournament. When I finally got my driver's license in 1988, I started spending just about every Saturday at the Castle. The owner's name was Monnie Robinson, and he was awesome. I remember starting to play Rogue Trader right when it first came out. During the summer, I'd go and have role-playing night on Monday night, and be there until two or three in the morning playing. Monnie even gave me a Tick (old comic book) T-shirt for my 18th birthday, right off the rack.
I spent my college years in Athens, GA, where I didn't game much because I couldn't afford it. There was a hobby store there that was a sister store to the Comix Castle in Macon, and the original owner ran that store. He wasn't quite as cool as Monnie was, but he was all right. I never really had a problem with him in the least, though he didn't really do that much gaming in his store. It was mostly a comic place.
When I moved to Savannah, I started playing at Morningstar Games. I met a lot of good people there and rekindled my love of Warhammer and 40K. That store and the customers there were some of the biggest things I missed when I had to move to Atlanta. The owner was awesome, and many times on Saturday evenings, a bunch of us (including the owner) would all drive somewhere and have dinner together. I remember Olive Garden being a really popular choice.
When I came to Atlanta, I discovered a humongous hobby store that had a big gaming area in NW Atlanta. I met a lot of people there that I am still friends with. It being a big type store, not a small business, there was a lot more turnover in management. That was the first gaming store that ticked me off. The son of the franchise owner would take the pre-release Codex/Army Books and the pre-release of the WHFB 8th edition book home for days at a time to read it instead of leaving it at the store for prospective customers to look at. I remember when the Blood Angels codex came out, that guy had the codex at his house for a week. Sigh.
Since then, I've found what is arguably my favorite game store of all time, considering the owner, the space, the variety of gaming that goes on, the ambiance and the clientele. I'm giving a shameless plug here, the place is called Giga-Bites Cafe, and the owner posts as Sergeant Horse on these forums. It's just a great place to play. They have a great community, the owner supports the club, makes space available for a wide variety of different gaming systems, stocks a wide variety of gaming material, and will always find a way to make time to play a newbie to the store. Even now that I live 20 miles away from the store, I still make a point of driving up there to spend an afternoon every weekend, even though there are closer stores.
You see, I've hardly had any real negative experiences with the FLGS, regardless of where I've lived. So, I actually feel sorry for Carmachu that his experiences have left him with such a negative impression of that type of store.
See my dream is opening a FLGS and really supporting the community of gamers around me. People like Carmachu make me question my dream. I wonder if I should open a store when you'll have people like him never being happy and scareing all the good players away.
Yes the FLGS should always give good customer service to the customers even on a bad day. But if you come in as a customer with a chip on your shoulder then what do you expect in return?
Yes the FLGS should always give good customer service to the customers even on a bad day. But if you come in as a customer with a chip on your shoulder then what do you expect in return?
Good polite customer service, no matter the mood I'm in. The store is selling goods, they don't have the option to be rude in return, not if they what are money. Thats how ALL stores work.
Yes the FLGS should always give good customer service to the customers even on a bad day. But if you come in as a customer with a chip on your shoulder then what do you expect in return?
Good polite customer service, no matter the mood I'm in. The store is selling goods, they don't have the option to be rude in return, not if they what are money. Thats how ALL stores work.
That would be great if they are automatons, but as humans with emotions we tend to reciprocate how we are treated. Most of the time we don't even catch we are doing it.
Noir wrote:Good polite customer service, no matter the mood I'm in. The store is selling goods, they don't have the option to be rude in return, not if they what are money. Thats how ALL stores work.
100% Wrong. Just because you are in a bad mood does not give you the right to treat someone badly. If you are rude they are quite within their rights to kick you out for being a jerk. God, what makes you think you have the right to go somewhere and be rude just because you have some money in your pocket and your day isn't going well.
Self-important Americans who think their piddly little bit of money in their back pocket some how makes them important are annoying.
You are not important as an single customer. Your little bit of money isn't that important. The other 99.999% of customers who can behave like functioning adults are important. Volume is important not individuals and providing you treat the 99.999% of customers nicely and provide good service to them the self-important jerks can take a hike. No big deal and no big loss.
Noir wrote:Good polite customer service, no matter the mood I'm in. The store is selling goods, they don't have the option to be rude in return, not if they what are money. Thats how ALL stores work.
100% Wrong. Just because you are in a bad mood does not give you the right to treat someone badly. If you are rude they are quite within their rights to kick you out for being a jerk. God, what makes you think you have the right to go somewhere and be rude just because you have some money in your pocket and your day isn't going well.
Self-important Americans who think their piddly little bit of money in their back pocket some how makes them important are annoying.
You are not important as an single customer. Your little bit of money isn't that important. The other 99.999% of customers who can behave like functioning adults are important. Volume is important not individuals and providing you treat the 99.999% of customers nicely and provide good service to them the self-important jerks can take a hike. No big deal and no big loss.
Go to any big store and I'm right,. Take safeway (a store that dosen't need to worry about that one guys money), it part of the rules to smile. It called customer service industry for a reason, no matter what you belive. It is the job of the staff to make to customer to want to spend there money, there no other reason for there to be there. If you can't make a rude person into a rude customer, find a differen t line of work. I deal with pissed parents on daily in my job, other can do the same, it what we are payed for.
Noir wrote:Good polite customer service, no matter the mood I'm in. The store is selling goods, they don't have the option to be rude in return, not if they what are money. Thats how ALL stores work.
100% Wrong. Just because you are in a bad mood does not give you the right to treat someone badly. If you are rude they are quite within their rights to kick you out for being a jerk. God, what makes you think you have the right to go somewhere and be rude just because you have some money in your pocket and your day isn't going well.
Self-important Americans who think their piddly little bit of money in their back pocket some how makes them important are annoying.
You are not important as an single customer. Your little bit of money isn't that important. The other 99.999% of customers who can behave like functioning adults are important. Volume is important not individuals and providing you treat the 99.999% of customers nicely and provide good service to them the self-important jerks can take a hike. No big deal and no big loss.
This.
It sort of goes along with point #4 I was making to Carmanchu.
4) A store owner only owes you a few things. A courteous demeanor, product knowledge, and a safe establishment if he allows in store gaming. Anything beyond that is icing on the cake. Interpreting anything more than that as lacking on his part is bogus on yours. It's true that the greatest of owners will allow little favors and be more like a friend from whom you buy things, but if you expect them to hurt their business to cater to you or to spend hours tweaking a schedule that makes you happy at the expense of other gaming communities and you are again acting like a very entitled 40 year old who had a mother that never told him no.
As I said before, no one opens any kind of business with the hopes that no one buys any of their stuff. A store owner becomes angry and bitter when distributors screw them around and when customers whine about products and the store. When a customer (example unnamed) enters with a combative attitude, of course a store employee will be leery of him.
When I find a good store, and I have two of them, I make sure my money goes to them first. They allow me to sit and use their tables, I don't make a nuisance of myself, and I converse with the owners when they have time. They opened these stores (one-way), so I am respectful of them (other way). It is a two way street where we both profit. Neither of them begged me to be there with needless discounts, that's not their jobs.
Now I remember we uso to have a card game store with a Magic TG as favorite game. The store owner hates Yugioh! so he use to crack-break expensive Yugioh! cards in front of customers to make them clear how he hates that game. Bad attitute in front of customers.
Our FLGS has just this week stopped its long-running weekly YuGiOh! tournaments. The reason? Unlike MtG and Pokemon players (and the rest of the boardgame/minigame crew), the recent YGO players bought most of their stuff online. The majority of the YGO cards to leave the shop over the last few months... have been prizes for the tournaments. Add in some ugly incidents with expensive decks gone missing (a phenomenon unknown amoung the other CCG players here) and the FLGS has decided to cut its losses on YGO.
A pity, I suppose, but if the local YGO players aren't profitable, then why would the FLGS continue to cater to them?
(As an aside, the YGO aren't banned from the store or anything, there just won't be any more organized tournaments. I also rather suspect that future orders of YGO stock will be much reduced.)
Vulcan wrote:
A pity, I suppose, but if the local YGO players aren't profitable, then why would the FLGS continue to cater to them?
And that is why I will continue to buy my 40k stuff online, I'm one of the few 40k players the store has left so any purchases I make aren't going to make them any significant profit and I can see them cutting down on 40k space shortly.
Vulcan wrote:Our FLGS has just this week stopped its long-running weekly YuGiOh! tournaments. The reason? Unlike MtG and Pokemon players (and the rest of the boardgame/minigame crew), the recent YGO players bought most of their stuff online. The majority of the YGO cards to leave the shop over the last few months... have been prizes for the tournaments. Add in some ugly incidents with expensive decks gone missing (a phenomenon unknown amoung the other CCG players here) and the FLGS has decided to cut its losses on YGO.
Figured I ought to chip in here, being an employee at the FLGS in question. While the above factors contributed slightly, the primary reason was the local board game meet-up group (who we are the sponsor of) lost its Thursday night slot at another location. Yu-Gi-Oh turn-outs have been flagging, and the meet-up group's are consistently 30+ and growing. Since we're primarily a board game store (yes, even above wargaming and cards), having a set weekly date for board game playing in store just makes sense. We're still carrying Yu-Gi-Oh, and are considering bringing back tournaments when the planned store expansion is finished and we have more gaming space.
-Alex
Automatically Appended Next Post:
jgehunter wrote:
Vulcan wrote: A pity, I suppose, but if the local YGO players aren't profitable, then why would the FLGS continue to cater to them?
And that is why I will continue to buy my 40k stuff online, I'm one of the few 40k players the store has left so any purchases I make aren't going to make them any significant profit and I can see them cutting down on 40k space shortly.
I'd argue that that sort of attitude is counter-productive. Every little bit of income is important for a small business like most LGSes, and stores certainly don't like to see their existing stock lingering on the shelves. On the business side, shrinking stock in anything is a great way to make players of that game feel unappreciated, and makes it far more unlikely that anyone new will pick up the game. Plus, playing a game in store that you refuse to buy there is a great way to make your LGS employees feel unappreciated.
Ahh, I frequent Fantasy Books and Games on the Illinois side of the river. 45 minute drives to the stores over there have never been worth it to me when we've got such a good store on this side.
Fair enough. I've been to Fantasy Books and Games for a FoodMachine event, it's a great store. If you ever find yourself in the neighborhood though, feel free to stop by.
Are tournies over there any good? We usually get pretty small showings over here and I've wanted to attend a tourney that's had more then 8 players for a while now.
The real trick is, we have an ENORMOUS number of game stores here in St. Louis. The competion is ferocious.
The Fantasy Shop has something like 6 locations, there's three or four Fantasy Books and Games locations, Fantasy II in the city, Game Nite, Miniature Market, Star Clipper has a couple locations, Ogre games in the city, and a buch more whose names I forget but I know the locations.
The population density of gamers around here is great!
To be fair, Miniature Market doesn't exactly count anymore, after they got rid of pretty much their entire retail space, and all but a single table of gaming space.
Correct, from a gaming locale standpoint MM has pretty much ceased to exist. But it still sells at a hefty discount, and does a healthy business, so it counts from a competitive business standpoint.
Yes the FLGS should always give good customer service to the customers even on a bad day. But if you come in as a customer with a chip on your shoulder then what do you expect in return?
Good polite customer service, no matter the mood I'm in. The store is selling goods, they don't have the option to be rude in return, not if they what are money. Thats how ALL stores work.
While a staff member should always be polite and courteous, this does not extend to accepting abusive, bullying or combative behaviour.
In my country, I heard stories of Yugioh players buying single cards online for cheap and selling them inside the FLGS without permission of the owner. This kind of practice hurt the store because players stop buying boosters. Then with the time, the store owner put rules that players should sell their cards outside the store.
Yes the FLGS should always give good customer service to the customers even on a bad day. But if you come in as a customer with a chip on your shoulder then what do you expect in return?
Good polite customer service, no matter the mood I'm in. The store is selling goods, they don't have the option to be rude in return, not if they what are money. Thats how ALL stores work.
While a staff member should always be polite and courteous, this does not extend to accepting abusive, bullying or combative behaviour.
Then you POLITELY yes POLITELY ask them to leave, and if the don't call the cop to have them removed. But, you never are rude too them, it reflects badly on store. People who can't handle that, should find a job there don't have to work with customer period.
The place I play warmahordes and the occasional game of magic and 40k at makes it's money in magic which doesn't really lose to online stores, so I feel they're safe.
As long as your FLGS have a means of making money (mine is a comic/magic/model/boardgame shop), they'll manage to stay open.
I enjoy shopping in GW stores the most, but frankly the prices are too high compared to my FLGS, so i shop there 95% of the time (20% off GW is good!), and they dont try and make me buy every single paintbrush modelling tool and a random model that has that colour on it
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