Got to thinking about this after an encounter today at an FLGS in a city I was passing through, I was itching to buy some hobby stuff and went in and had a look around. After a while I asked the owner if he had any AoS stuff. He said he didn't carry any GW because unfortunately the community was too small. Fair enough I thought, I'll buy something else. Unfortunately he didn't stop there, but went on to say how, due to GWs "behaviour" most players had abandoned them on flavour of WMH or Infinity. He hoped they would be bought by Hasbro soon, which apparently at least one higher-up in GW wanted but the other didn't (???). He also told me in detail how horrible GWs trade deals were and how retailers couldn't afford them anymore, and so on. I thanked him and left without buying anything. So here we have a supposed professional salesman who, when I express interest in a certain game, starts badmouthing them in front of me. He didn't try to show me how his store carries other stuff I could be interested in as a wargamer, like paints, glue, brushes, etc, which I would've been quite open to buying if he hadn't managed to make me feel uncomfortable and unwanted less than five minutes after walking in. Had I lived in this city I certainly wouldn't have returned, potentially becoming interested in games he does carry...

What is your experience with this type of behaviour from FLGS owners? Do they behave in this way or do they refrain from badmouthing certain games and instead try to offer alternatives, or simply keep their mouth shut? What do you think makes a successful FLGS manager?

I have my usual store which is run by a chap I know well enough now to consider a friend. He's quite professional and upfront, so he knows how to keep the customers returning and keeps any opinions regarding companies and their conduct mainly to himself and customers he knows through and through.

He did have someone else in the store fill in for him every now and again back in the day who would openly berate and complain about GW when people were looking to buy that sort of thing, which isn't the best of things to do when GW's ranges are the top-selling product lines for this store and quite a chunk of the income.

As for the second part, I think the main reason the store is successful is because the manager is involved with everything, not in a micro-management sort of way, but he keeps in touch with the latest developments, signs up for events from the bigger companies, isn't afraid to try new stuff and generally goes the extra mile to help people out, be it a hobby question or explaining how some of the more popular games and their mechanics work to potential customers.

Gw abused flgs across the world I know several that are done with gw held a sale and have since broken all content.

One guy was so angry he nearly punched out the sales rep when he came around the next time.

Also know an arts supply store owner that used to sell some gw stuff and dumped it due to their business practices, he can rant for hours.

You reap what you sow.

This isn't a GW bashing thread, don't make it one.

hobojebus wrote:
Gw abused flgs across the world I know several that are done with gw held a sale and have since broken all content.

One guy was so angry he nearly punched out the sales rep when he came around the next time.

Also know an arts supply store owner that used to sell some gw stuff and dumped it due to their business practices, he can rant for hours.

You reap what you sow.

That really isn't relevant, customers don't need to hear about a manager's problems with suppliers anymore than they need to hear about the fallout they had with their missus before coming to work. Offering an alternative if the first choice isn't available is best practice, pointing them in the right direction to a more suitable store if nothing you have is suitable comes next. Moaning should never happen.

I've been to many GW and independent stores around the world, and there are definitely a few store managers around that are quite the characters.

I've been ignored, stalked, invited to dinner with the manager and his mother, randomly quizzed on Star Wars, and out of the blue been explained how US sales tax works.

Good times.

So here we have a supposed professional salesman

There's your problem. He's likely not a professional salesman, he's likely a hobbyist who thought it would be fun to open his own shop.

The judicious use of little negativity can be a useful sales tool, it can help establish trust (you're willing to tell the customer the bad as well as the good) and can be useful in steering the customer, but all this guy did was have a moan by the sounds of it.

 Mymearan wrote:
This isn't a GW bashing thread, don't make it one.

That's hardly GW bashing, amigo. GW has a track record of business practices that rub small business owners the wrong way. You can argue about whether the FLGS are justified, but it's not a smear to say it happens--it's a fact. Trying to offer a reasonable explanation for your experience doesn't seem off topic or out of line.

As to my personal experience, I've had store owners (and was this a manager/owner, or just an employee?) that have some pretty contemptuous opinions of the companies they deal with for one reason or another. I've also had managers lie to my face about companies they despised in order to make a sale.

If the FLGS operator has a problem with a company, their service, or their product, I'd prefer they told me the truth. The FLGS should be a nexus for the community. If the operator there is just a shill trying to bilk me out of my money by foisting garbage off onto me, then they definitely don't deserve my business.

Most of the ones I've known were too busy watching youtube to rant about their problems to me. Or offer any kind of service beyond "I can order it for you".

So can I mate, for less money. Kthxbai.

-

The GW is great. The manager is enthusiastic about the product, and always eager to talk about what's upcoming, the rumors on the net, make suggestions with things he's knowledgable about, and today he even bust out the new AoS table to show it off, even though it doesn't come out until tomorrow. I haven't gotten the hard sell or anything like that yet. I personally consider it a boon to hobby, locally

Both of the local GW stores near me have very good reputations. The one closest to me is bright, very clean and the manager is super friendly. He's enthusiastic and seems to really enjoy the "community" part of the job. He's organizing leagues, monthly painting comps and is always ready to through tables together for games or painting. Consequently his store is busy and I've been buying the majority of my new stuff from him and playing there quite a bit.

In contrast the independent stores in the area have been and can be a mixed lot. I've seen 3 or 4 come and go and mostly they seemed clubby sorts of places the manager set up for him and his buddies to game. It's never good business when the manager of a store rolls his eyes at you when you ask if he has a certain product or can he get it.

I'm betting a lot of the difference comes down to training. GW is a big corporation and they've been doing the brick and motor thing for a while now. Their managers seem like well trained corporate brand reps, which of course includes encouraging a good environment (the more people game the more they buy, the more people seeming like they are having fun in your store the more foot traffic you see, etc)

Plus there is also a stress factor. The GW manager probably didn't sink his 401k into his store in a dream of escaping the rat race, vs the independent guy who is dependent on sales to put food on the table and is responsible for EVERYTHING.

 Azreal13 wrote:

So here we have a supposed professional salesman

There's your problem. He's likely not a professional salesman, he's likely a hobbyist who thought it would be fun to open his own shop.

Yeah, this happens a LOT. Fortunately I'm really lucky where I am locally at having 2 great independent gaming stores. However, at uni, the local independent store didn't badmouth the manufacturers, the few times I went, the manager proceeded to badmouth the customers the moment they left the store.

EG: "FFS, 30 minutes in my store and all they spent was 5 pounds of bloody magic singles."

Naturally, the store was completely deserted except for them, my mate and I.

 JamesY wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Gw abused flgs across the world I know several that are done with gw held a sale and have since broken all content.

One guy was so angry he nearly punched out the sales rep when he came around the next time.

Also know an arts supply store owner that used to sell some gw stuff and dumped it due to their business practices, he can rant for hours.

You reap what you sow.

That really isn't relevant, customers don't need to hear about a manager's problems with suppliers anymore than they need to hear about the fallout they had with their missus before coming to work. Offering an alternative if the first choice isn't available is best practice, pointing them in the right direction to a more suitable store if nothing you have is suitable comes next. Moaning should never happen.

It is entirely relevant - the game store owner has reason to kvetch about GW.

He is not kvetching despite them treating him well, he is kvetching because they are treating him poorly.

One might even say that GW is acting... unprofessionally. Treating the retailers that carry your products as competitors is not professional.

If I were a game store owner, I would have nothing to do with them.

The Auld Grump

I've had a wide range of interactions with FLGS's over the years.

The first FLGS I encountered back in the 80's stocked GW for a long time, was always positive and cheerful about promoting whatever games they carried or could get. However, after somewhere in the late 90's, they had a fallout with GW - stopped carrying anything related to them and were very vocal they would never do business with them again.

Most of the other FLGS's I have been to have been relatively positive about all their products. GW does often bring kvitching, ranging from being shorted product to facepalming over certain stock they are required to carry (and then get stuck with, like the FLGS that would like to put a good bit of WHFB models on clearance, but apparently is not allowed to do so).

Usually, even in those cases, the worst is a pained smile or a polite refusal to custom order certain items (sometimes, even with the offer to prepay for items). We have two stores near me, and one has refused to order Star Trek Attack Wing (or anything other than Heroclix from Wizkids; they did not want to undermine their X-Wing community), but nothing that has turned into a diatribe against any particular company for their practices.

Yeah mandatory buys they won't refund are a big bugbear for alot of stores.

I didn't know they wouldn't let them put their own stock on sale though.

I don't know of any other company so opposed to sales of their goods.

Again, I am going to try and keep this on track. I feel a store should keep any distributor drama out of the store away from patron ears. It creates an aura of negativity that will turn people off as shown by the OP. Every company has distribution issues but no one wants to know what goes into the sausage as it were


Speaking from my own experience, I just had a manager ban me from his store for an incident that happened over two years ago that he suddenly took offense to. This is not away to get people in your store as I do have a big mouthmAlso, when LGS managers stock what they like as opposed to what sells, there is an issue too.

Actually knowing a store owner dislikes GW as much as me gives us a connection and I'm more likely to go back and spend more.

 TheAuldGrump wrote:

 JamesY wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Gw abused flgs across the world I know several that are done with gw held a sale and have since broken all content.

One guy was so angry he nearly punched out the sales rep when he came around the next time.

Also know an arts supply store owner that used to sell some gw stuff and dumped it due to their business practices, he can rant for hours.

You reap what you sow.

That really isn't relevant, customers don't need to hear about a manager's problems with suppliers anymore than they need to hear about the fallout they had with their missus before coming to work. Offering an alternative if the first choice isn't available is best practice, pointing them in the right direction to a more suitable store if nothing you have is suitable comes next. Moaning should never happen.

It is entirely relevant - the game store owner has reason to kvetch about GW.

He is not kvetching despite them treating him well, he is kvetching because they are treating him poorly.

One might even say that GW is acting... unprofessionally. Treating the retailers that carry your products as competitors is not professional.

If I were a game store owner, I would have nothing to do with them.

The Auld Grump

It is irrelevant to the customer. Customers don't need to hear about gripes the manager is having with a supplier. If the customer asks about it and is interested, then fine, share the difficulties that the supplier is creating. There's absolutely no reason to divulge that information though just because you have been asked for a product, that isn't professionalism.

Never had any issues like that.


That said one of the highlights of life at my FLGS was the manager/owner vs the GW rep visits, he was alway polite but amusingly blunt with these tragically over-enthused puppies who didnt seem to grasp he wasn't twelve and was there to run a business.

I used to love my FLGS owner. His place was bright, smelled good, was well organized, had stock from many different games, has a decent playing area with lots of terrain. The best part was his attitude. He managed to balance how attentive he was. He'd be just close enough that you could ask him for help, or he'd ask if you looked like you needed it, but he was far enough away that it didn't seem like he was hovering over you.

Of course I then found his achilles heel. He hates kids. I had my son and daughter with me (3 and 5) when I stopped in. As I was being rung up by the cashier and my children strayed a few feet away and tried to get a cup of water from the water cooler. An angry voice boomed "Do these belong to anyone?"

I'm not a sales rep but if anyone ever expresses an interest in wargaming to me I try to give them realistic advice.

I advise them that GW is not the be all and end all of wargaming, that there are many more affordable games and ranges out there that are just as good as GW games (SAGA, This is Not a Test, Bolt Action etc) if not better. And if they're interested in GW games, then I advise them to not to be put off by the cost, that there are ways to save money on GW games (Ebay, FLGS discounts, small model count armies like monsters/hero armies in Lord of the Rings etc).

Its not my place to push a particular game on them or discourage them against picking up a game, I just try to inform them.

Which is what a sales rep should be doing really.

We had two open at roughly the same time.

One had a friendly approachable guy, happy to talk about the hobby, chat with gamers spouses and kids etc, always happy to get guys gaming with store stuff if needs be.

The other was socially awkward, never comfortable to talk unless it was with a friend, and let his douche bag mates use the place as an extension of their sneery clubhouse. Nice guy though.

Guess which one is still going.

GW have been pretty ace from what I understand as well, you get store credit each year for store armies and scenery, we've got some cool looking stuff because of that to game with

Most GW selling stores I know (GW and FLGS) are strange.

Normal stores just sell me stuff and interchange a few polite sentences in the process. This is how I like my shopping experience.
Some specialist stores try to educate me on the stuff I am buying, like I see you are buying oil paint and these brushes are not really suited for it are you sure you don't want the other ones. This can be all right if done correctly, and slightly annoying if done too proactive.
Some commercial stores phone stores, big tech stores etc. try to push stuff that I don't really need. I get it I jsut don't like it, so I either ignore the employees strolling around in the store or only ask them very direct questions.
I guess all the above options are accepted "professional" behaviour for those who work in a store.

Now we have the behaviour of anyone selling GW stuff to me.. They ask me a ton of personal questions, pretend to be my friend, know I don't like to be pushed into buying stuff but all have to find out by trail and error and some even tag me on facebook when I order stuff from them. WTF is this all about. I get the trying to push stuff. I don't like it but I get it, but the rest of it :\

So far I think there's only one FLGS owner who I would describe as "professional" in that he treats it entirely like a business, and tbh it's not that much fun to buy from him. Every other FLGS I've been to always had someone behind the counter that would chat up random topics.

In terms of directly relating to GW, most of them comment on their business practices, and it's almost universally negative experience, so I'm not surprised if an owner sometimes needs to get something off of his chest.

 cuda1179 wrote:
Of course I then found his achilles heel. He hates kids.

Kids and teens are important for stores -> Being new potential whales and all, but .... they also have the tendency to steel and break stuff. I get your store owner. Having free roaming kids in your store is not without risk.

 Mymearan wrote:
Got to thinking about this after an encounter today at an FLGS in a city I was passing through, I was itching to buy some hobby stuff and went in and had a look around. After a while I asked the owner if he had any AoS stuff. He said he didn't carry any GW because unfortunately the community was too small. Fair enough I thought, I'll buy something else. Unfortunately he didn't stop there, but went on to say how, due to GWs "behaviour" most players had abandoned them on flavour of WMH or Infinity. He hoped they would be bought by Hasbro soon, which apparently at least one higher-up in GW wanted but the other didn't (???). He also told me in detail how horrible GWs trade deals were and how retailers couldn't afford them anymore, and so on. I thanked him and left without buying anything. So here we have a supposed professional salesman who, when I express interest in a certain game, starts badmouthing them in front of me. He didn't try to show me how his store carries other stuff I could be interested in as a wargamer, like paints, glue, brushes, etc, which I would've been quite open to buying if he hadn't managed to make me feel uncomfortable and unwanted less than five minutes after walking in. Had I lived in this city I certainly wouldn't have returned, potentially becoming interested in games he does carry...

What is your experience with this type of behaviour from FLGS owners? Do they behave in this way or do they refrain from badmouthing certain games and instead try to offer alternatives, or simply keep their mouth shut? What do you think makes a successful FLGS manager?

That doesn't seem so bad what you wrote. So the manager had a bad day. We are human after all are we not? Something happened to him that day or week, wasn't feeling well and then when you asked something for GW it just made his day worse. As you know, us Europeans, (except Britons) we explode like a volcano. Once we spew we are fine. So you just set him off and he needed to vent. Was it professional? No. But then again are you any better? Am I any better? Is anyone any better? No we are all human. Now you should always give him a second chance if you lived in that town/city. Anyone can have a bad day.

As a one off, I would just say "he was human, had a bad day" If it's an ongoing thing, then that is a different story.

Davor wrote:

 Mymearan wrote:
Got to thinking about this after an encounter today at an FLGS in a city I was passing through, I was itching to buy some hobby stuff and went in and had a look around. After a while I asked the owner if he had any AoS stuff. He said he didn't carry any GW because unfortunately the community was too small. Fair enough I thought, I'll buy something else. Unfortunately he didn't stop there, but went on to say how, due to GWs "behaviour" most players had abandoned them on flavour of WMH or Infinity. He hoped they would be bought by Hasbro soon, which apparently at least one higher-up in GW wanted but the other didn't (???). He also told me in detail how horrible GWs trade deals were and how retailers couldn't afford them anymore, and so on. I thanked him and left without buying anything. So here we have a supposed professional salesman who, when I express interest in a certain game, starts badmouthing them in front of me. He didn't try to show me how his store carries other stuff I could be interested in as a wargamer, like paints, glue, brushes, etc, which I would've been quite open to buying if he hadn't managed to make me feel uncomfortable and unwanted less than five minutes after walking in. Had I lived in this city I certainly wouldn't have returned, potentially becoming interested in games he does carry...

What is your experience with this type of behaviour from FLGS owners? Do they behave in this way or do they refrain from badmouthing certain games and instead try to offer alternatives, or simply keep their mouth shut? What do you think makes a successful FLGS manager?

That doesn't seem so bad what you wrote. So the manager had a bad day. We are human after all are we not? Something happened to him that day or week, wasn't feeling well and then when you asked something for GW it just made his day worse. As you know, us Europeans, (except Britons) we explode like a volcano. Once we spew we are fine. So you just set him off and he needed to vent. Was it professional? No. But then again are you any better? Am I any better? Is anyone any better? No we are all human. Now you should always give him a second chance if you lived in that town/city. Anyone can have a bad day.

As a one off, I would just say "he was human, had a bad day" If it's an ongoing thing, then that is a different story.

Here is the issue, one bad day can turn off new customers.

As a customer, the last thing I need to hear from a business owner is how much they hate a certain company they sell products for and that I am interested in buying.

You find GW frustrating to deal with? I don't care, I'm here to purchase something, not listen to you whine.

GW prices are high? I agree. Nothing else I need to say.

GW sales reps and business practices annoy you? That's a shame, their customer service department has always treated me exceptionally well.

Give me a break.

 JamesY wrote:

 TheAuldGrump wrote:

 JamesY wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Gw abused flgs across the world I know several that are done with gw held a sale and have since broken all content.

One guy was so angry he nearly punched out the sales rep when he came around the next time.

Also know an arts supply store owner that used to sell some gw stuff and dumped it due to their business practices, he can rant for hours.

You reap what you sow.

That really isn't relevant, customers don't need to hear about a manager's problems with suppliers anymore than they need to hear about the fallout they had with their missus before coming to work. Offering an alternative if the first choice isn't available is best practice, pointing them in the right direction to a more suitable store if nothing you have is suitable comes next. Moaning should never happen.

It is entirely relevant - the game store owner has reason to kvetch about GW.

He is not kvetching despite them treating him well, he is kvetching because they are treating him poorly.

One might even say that GW is acting... unprofessionally. Treating the retailers that carry your products as competitors is not professional.

If I were a game store owner, I would have nothing to do with them.

The Auld Grump

It is irrelevant to the customer. Customers don't need to hear about gripes the manager is having with a supplier. If the customer asks about it and is interested, then fine, share the difficulties that the supplier is creating. There's absolutely no reason to divulge that information though just because you have been asked for a product, that isn't professionalism.

It is relevant to the customer.

Why can't I order 'X'?

Because GW does not sell those to the retailer - you will have to order it through GW.

So why would I buy stuff from you?

Like I said - if I were a retailer, I would tell GW to go pound sand, and, you betcha, I would complain about how crappy GW is.

The Auld Grump

 TheAuldGrump wrote:

 JamesY wrote:

 TheAuldGrump wrote:

 JamesY wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Gw abused flgs across the world I know several that are done with gw held a sale and have since broken all content.

One guy was so angry he nearly punched out the sales rep when he came around the next time.

Also know an arts supply store owner that used to sell some gw stuff and dumped it due to their business practices, he can rant for hours.

You reap what you sow.

That really isn't relevant, customers don't need to hear about a manager's problems with suppliers anymore than they need to hear about the fallout they had with their missus before coming to work. Offering an alternative if the first choice isn't available is best practice, pointing them in the right direction to a more suitable store if nothing you have is suitable comes next. Moaning should never happen.

It is entirely relevant - the game store owner has reason to kvetch about GW.

He is not kvetching despite them treating him well, he is kvetching because they are treating him poorly.

One might even say that GW is acting... unprofessionally. Treating the retailers that carry your products as competitors is not professional.

If I were a game store owner, I would have nothing to do with them.

The Auld Grump

It is irrelevant to the customer. Customers don't need to hear about gripes the manager is having with a supplier. If the customer asks about it and is interested, then fine, share the difficulties that the supplier is creating. There's absolutely no reason to divulge that information though just because you have been asked for a product, that isn't professionalism.

It is relevant to the customer.

Why can't I order 'X'?

Because GW does not sell those to the retailer - you will have to order it through GW.

So why would I buy stuff from you?

Like I said - if I were a retailer, I would tell GW to go pound sand, and, you betcha, I would complain about how crappy GW is.

The Auld Grump

Which is unprofessional, customers are not there to hear you complain about your supplier they are more likely to leave than anything else.

@theauldgrump then you'd loose customers. Negativity from a retailer, especially on a first encounter, is unlikely to generate repeat custom, as the op demonstrated.

A half way professional retailer who had chosen not to sell a specific brand would have offered an alternative that they do sell, and therefore given themselves an opportunity for a sale. Moaning isn't going to feed the till.

I guess he should try stocking empathy.

While yes it's unprofessional to do, how about people are human and make mistakes?

Heaven forbid you don't make a mistake and not get a chance to redemptive yourself.

Bottle wrote:Yeah it sounds like his emotions got the better of him rather than offering you impartial advice.

I only really go in a GW but I am surprised at how helpful they are to people who play different games/aren't in the hobby at all - I've seen the staff recommend which GW paints could be used for the Guildball paint scheme a customer wanted, which AoS/WHFB kits are best for D&D etc etc and the staff don't shy away that they play/are knowledgeable of these other games too.

If GW have treated FLGS badly in the past I hope they rectify it like they have done with their community interaction already. Yeah, unfortunately being an AoS enthusiast gets you all kinds of disapproving looks and passive negative comments - as the game picks up speed it seems less and less though.

I was worried that someone wasn't going to play the AOS victim card in a thread that had nothing to do with it. That was a close one...




When it comes to sales, I have yet to meet an unprofessional manager at one of my FLGS's. I did, however, have one guy who ran a store in Lafayette that had me run 2 round 1 games instead of someone getting a bye, and ruling in favor of one of his friends using the manager's army in a tourney CONTRARY to what a recent White Dwarf had FAQ'd. That single ruling wound up costing me the tourney and the two semifinalists, both friends with the manage, decided to call it a draw and split the prize money evenly instead of playing it out. I wouldn't have taken such exception to the dual first round if it hadn't been my little brother AND my best friend I was "randomly" chosen to play against.

Davor wrote:
While yes it's unprofessional to do, how about people are human and make mistakes?

Heaven forbid you don't make a mistake and not get a chance to redemptive yourself.

Thing is, for a professional, this is a mistake along the lines of trying to spear a piece of food with a fork and getting yourself in the eye i.e it's just about conceivable that it could happen on day one (assuming you learn cutlery as a toddler) but after more than a handful of attempts it shouldn't ever happen.

Overlooking a buying cue, forgetting to mention a specific recommendation that may well have worked - these things happen to a sales professional on a bad day, bemoaning the state of your business relationships to an uninterested customer is up there with remembering not to soil yourself and refraining from head-butting the clientele in the list of things you shouldn't do.

I've only ever encountered the GW negativity online.

If I wanted GW, I'd go to the local GW store. Since I'm not at all interested in their games (no hate, I just like other stuff), I go to the FLGS. I've never seen any GW games at the FLGS, but I've never heard any badmouthing either. The FLGS promotes the games they sell, whether it's Magic, DzC, board games, etc. It seems pointless to discuss a game that's not on the shelves regardless of the reason.

In my experience, people vote with their wallets. No sense in talking trash about another company. Just enjoy your game of choice with other like-minded people.

People keep posting that it's somehow unprofessional for the local game store guy to talk about their experience dealing with the game company. Where does that come from?

Around here, if you didn't want to deal with a human being, or find out how other human beings a doing with your hobby, you'd order the stuff online. Because you went to a local store, it's assumed that you want to know how the people involved are doing. That includes things like "How likely are you to find local players for that game?", "Are you going to be able to get those models from the game company in a reasonable time?", and "So what's popular around here?"

If you didn't want that, why are you going to a local game store in the first place?

 Mymearan wrote:
This isn't a GW bashing thread, don't make it one.

Hm, an FLGS owner being critical of an previous retailer, strange in the electronic business, if a retailer treats you badly you go to a different one.
And why are you buying GW stuff at an FLGS, you should buy it at their store or at their website not at some discount giving parasite!

The FLGS where i used to go to in the Netherlands was the opposite, me and a friend were always critical of GW's price increases and model reduction.
But the owner was always pro GW

 solkan wrote:
People keep posting that it's somehow unprofessional for the local game store guy to talk about their experience dealing with the game company. Where does that come from?

Around here, if you didn't want to deal with a human being, or find out how other human beings a doing with your hobby, you'd order the stuff online. Because you went to a local store, it's assumed that you want to know how the people involved are doing. That includes things like "How likely are you to find local players for that game?", "Are you going to be able to get those models from the game company in a reasonable time?", and "So what's popular around here?"

If you didn't want that, why are you going to a local game store in the first place?

Where do you get the notion that a game store should operate any differently to any other retailer? You wouldn't accept hearing the same problems from a green grocer or sportswear store. Yes you could argue that gaming stores are more personable, but asking for a product, then only getting a rant about why they don't sell it is hardly the happy human side you are painting.

Also, you go into a store if you want something immediately. You don't always want to have to wait a few days for something that you can grab there and then. Not every visit needs to be a 'social'.

I think the biggest issue with this is the type of store a FLGS is. Unlike a lot of retail stores, FLGS's get a lot of regular customers on a regular basis. As such the manager, or counter staff get friendly with them. Treat them not like a customer, but more of a friend who buys stuff (occasionally).

The real skill is if someone new comes in, to switch off the friend mentality and go back into sales mode. I think that's the sign of a good manager, stay friendly with the locals, but treat someone new as a brand new customer and turn off the casual mode. Bad managers always seem to stay in casual and that can put off new customers.

 JamesY wrote:


Where do you get the notion that a game store should operate any differently to any other retailer? You wouldn't accept hearing the same problems from a green grocer or sportswear store. Yes you could argue that gaming stores are more personable, but asking for a product, then only getting a rant about why they don't sell it is hardly the happy human side you are painting.

Also, you go into a store if you want something immediately. You don't always want to have to wait a few days for something that you can grab there and then. Not every visit needs to be a 'social'.

I hear similar complaints from lots of independent 1-man stores - but you can't expect them to be as "professional" as a multi-national chain.

Sure, they shouldn't be rude, but they can still allow some personality to show. Plus with the way GW screws it's retailers about, it's not as if most don't have some complaints.

Why wouldn't you expect the same level of professionalism? If anything I'd expect more as there are no hiding places when something goes wrong.

Because there's no formalised training or customer service or disciplinary procedures, and the cashier is likely the owner with about a thousand other things to take care of too.

You don't get good service in, say, Walmart because of hiding places, but there will be customer service departments, and managers, and staff training, and all sorts of procedures to follow. They'll probably also have lists of things not to talk about too.

Owner-operators tend not to be as organised or restricted.

I've mostly had good experiences with game store owners.

If a manager is a Negative Nancy with his customers, he's probably an unpleasant person to be around and I would shop elsewhere.

I only like cool people and chicks. Especially cool chicks.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Herzlos wrote:
Because there's no formalised training or customer service or disciplinary procedures, and the cashier is likely the owner with about a thousand other things to take care of too.

This is very true. I can be a patient person, and understand the demands that running a store has.

However, if you yell at children and allow Neck Beards to run off your actual paying customers, then you're doing it wrong.

 kronk wrote:

This is very true. I can be a patient person, and understand the demands that running a store has.

However, if you yell at children and allow Neck Beards to run off your actual paying customers, then you're doing it wrong.

Oh, definitely.

There's a line between moaning about crap service from a supplier and being rude to your customers. I expect small shop owners to be human, not monsters.

Herzlos wrote:
Because there's no formalised training or customer service or disciplinary procedures, and the cashier is likely the owner with about a thousand other things to take care of too.

You don't get good service in, say, Walmart because of hiding places, but there will be customer service departments, and managers, and staff training, and all sorts of procedures to follow. They'll probably also have lists of things not to talk about too.

Owner-operators tend not to be as organised or restricted.

You don't open a restaurant off the back of being able to make scrambled eggs on toast. If you are opening a shop and expect it to be successful, I'd expect at least some personal experience in retailing before just deciding to open a shop. Starting a business in a sector that you aren't experienced in is just asking for problems, such as a lack of professionalism, and results in closed shops.

I'm not trying to be argumentative, I was in retail for 14 years, the majority of which in management at varying levels. I was always very passionate about customer service and what it should look like. An unsolicited rant about a supplier, which resulted in a lost sales opportunity and a lost customer, is just unforgivable.

That's the thing, I (personally) give the small businesses a bit more leeway, and would forgive them of something like that, but I wouldn't if it was a larger chain.

In a larger chain, the sales person probably wouldn't have any knowledge about supplier issues. They also don't need to care as much about good service, they get paid their hourly rate whether you buy or not. A small business owner's income directly depends on the sales they generate. If they sell more, they will be personally better off. That's why I'd expect more from them, as essentially their own quality of life is affected by their performance.

Yeah when I worked retail I didn't give a fig, customers would return stuff they broke like phones they had clearly dropped but would like saying they screen just blew but I couldn't call them a liar I just refunded or replaced the item.

Nothing kills your faith in humanity like working retail.

 JamesY wrote:
@theauldgrump then you'd loose customers. Negativity from a retailer, especially on a first encounter, is unlikely to generate repeat custom, as the op demonstrated.

A half way professional retailer who had chosen not to sell a specific brand would have offered an alternative that they do sell, and therefore given themselves an opportunity for a sale. Moaning isn't going to feed the till.

It entirely depends on context. If the retailer turns in to a grumpy arse then obviously it's not great, but I think it's a valid response to a customer asking "do you carry X" for the retailer to say "no, unfortunately the supplier is difficult to work with".

I appreciate the honesty my local hobby store has when I ask him about a product and he says he doesn't carry it because the supplier is unreliable, or that his supplier won't sell it to him at a price that would be competitive, or whatever. One time I asked him if he could get a kit in and he just told me honestly that he could but he'd been waiting ages for back orders from that particular distributor.

My local wargaming store (different store) before they closed I ordered a few things off them from GW and they took weeks to come after being told time and again it would just be a few days, all he could say is apologise and say his GW distributor kept delaying the order.

A slightly less local store I went to recently did carry GW stock but was trying to edge customers away from 40k and AoS to other games. Hearing the shop keepers talking among themselves it was clear they didn't like GW, and I know a couple of the shop keepers are ex-GW employees from decades gone by.

I guess I don't really see it as unprofessional to *honestly* steer customers away from certain products if you think it'd be both in their best interest and your own best interest. I absolutely despise the retailers who'll happily throw me under the bus with a product they either don't know about or don't trust themselves, it's why I don't trust anyone at face value if they're trying to sell me something. There are precious few large retail chains that I trust the workers and don't just treat them as an annoyance.

Having burned veterans is a real problem for GW, not just because of veterans telling their friends but also because many (most?) independent shop keepers are themselves wargaming veterans. Not to mention fething around local stores is a great way to get them to spread the bad word about your company.

Azreal13 wrote:

Davor wrote:
While yes it's unprofessional to do, how about people are human and make mistakes?

Heaven forbid you don't make a mistake and not get a chance to redemptive yourself.

Thing is, for a professional, this is a mistake along the lines of trying to spear a piece of food with a fork and getting yourself in the eye i.e it's just about conceivable that it could happen on day one (assuming you learn cutlery as a toddler) but after more than a handful of attempts it shouldn't ever happen.

Overlooking a buying cue, forgetting to mention a specific recommendation that may well have worked - these things happen to a sales professional on a bad day, bemoaning the state of your business relationships to an uninterested customer is up there with remembering not to soil yourself and refraining from head-butting the clientele in the list of things you shouldn't do.

I just find it funny how we say GW is so inhuman and don't care and show no passion, and we deride GW for it (not saying Azreal13 derails GW but the internet does) and here we have someone who shows passion (even though he may be in the wrong) and gets derided for doing that.

So it seems we want GW to be more human and nice, but yet when someone shows to be human we can't forgive them. What a bunch of hypocrites we are here on the internet.

*edit*

TL;DR

So GW acts professional and we call them inhumane and we have someone who acts human but call them unprofessional. So what do we want then as customers? Hyporicts we are.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 JamesY wrote:
@theauldgrump then you'd loose customers. Negativity from a retailer, especially on a first encounter, is unlikely to generate repeat custom, as the op demonstrated.

A half way professional retailer who had chosen not to sell a specific brand would have offered an alternative that they do sell, and therefore given themselves an opportunity for a sale. Moaning isn't going to feed the till.

It entirely depends on context. If the retailer turns in to a grumpy arse then obviously it's not great, but I think it's a valid response to a customer asking "do you carry X" for the retailer to say "no, unfortunately the supplier is difficult to work with".

I appreciate the honesty my local hobby store has when I ask him about a product and he says he doesn't carry it because the supplier is unreliable, or that his supplier won't sell it to him at a price that would be competitive, or whatever. One time I asked him if he could get a kit in and he just told me honestly that he could but he'd been waiting ages for back orders from that particular distributor.

My local wargaming store (different store) before they closed I ordered a few things off them from GW and they took weeks to come after being told time and again it would just be a few days, all he could say is apologise and say his GW distributor kept delaying the order.

A slightly less local store I went to recently did carry GW stock but was trying to edge customers away from 40k and AoS to other games. Hearing the shop keepers talking among themselves it was clear they didn't like GW, and I know a couple of the shop keepers are ex-GW employees from decades gone by.

I guess I don't really see it as unprofessional to *honestly* steer customers away from certain products if you think it'd be both in their best interest and your own best interest. I absolutely despise the retailers who'll happily throw me under the bus with a product they either don't know about or don't trust themselves, it's why I don't trust anyone at face value if they're trying to sell me something. There are precious few large retail chains that I trust the workers and don't just treat them as an annoyance.

Having burned veterans is a real problem for GW, not just because of veterans telling their friends but also because many (most?) independent shop keepers are themselves wargaming veterans. Not to mention fething around local stores is a great way to get them to spread the bad word about your company.

To me it's absolutely not acceptable. I ask if they carry a product because I have researched it and want to purchase it, and I don't give a flying hoot about their retailer policies or the retailer's opinion of them. Some friendly banter is always welcome of course. In my case I was given a tirade about how horrible GW and their policies are right after I asked about GW minis. What he couldn't know (because he didn't ask) was that I already know that stuff. A professional approach would be to first try to ascertain if I am an informed customer or actually looking for opinions before giving them.

 Mymearan wrote:
To me it's absolutely not acceptable.

Well then I guess we have a different perspective on things.

As long as the shop keeper isn't rude or just simply moaning I'm happy to hear the why's and wherefores. If I hear he has low stock of a certain game because the supplier can't keep it in stock, that's something I want to hear because it will affect how hard it is for me to expand my army. If I hear the distributor still hasn't filled back orders from 6 months ago, it's going to affect my decision to purchase a game if I know my next purchase is going to require ordering items in. If I know the reason why my order took almost 2 months to come in despite being told it'd just be a few days was because the distributor kept lying to the shop keeper, it's going to influence future purchases. If I know long term veterans of a game are dissatisfied with said game, it's going to affect whether I want to trust the company that makes that game to keep me satisfied in the long run.

Honesty without being an arsehole is fine in my book. But maybe I'm an oddity.

Of course I want to know those things in addition to the nuts and bolts items of the product itself, but I'm not going to get my knickers all in a twist if the shop keeper tells me he doesn't stock something because it's not practical for him to stock it for whatever reasons.

The only "unacceptables" I have with retail staff is...

1. Being rude/obnoxious.

2. Lying to me.

3. Feigning knowledge.

4. Talking to me for the sake of talking to me because they think it'll make a sale.

I'm not naive to the fact the shop is only the last link in the chain of getting the product in to my hands, maybe that's why I typically like small shop keepers who are honest with me than the school/college kid working a summer job at a large chain who has no idea about anything acting like he's the fount of knowledge.

@skink I'd happily have such a conversation if I was an established customer and already had an ongoing dialogue with the person. On a first ever encounter though, I'd be unimpressed. Saying "sorry we don't stock gw because we had difficulties with them as a supplier. What game, faction do you collect?... Well if you like fantasy we have x,y, and z in store, let me show you them." would be perfectly fine. That would be much preferable to going into unnecessary specifics about those difficulties, and not even trying to make a positive from it.

Having some tact is obviously important and probably the one area where 95% of retailers fail regardless of what approach they take to sales.

It can be hard to know what a specific customer needs to hear to get them to purchase something and it's not going to be the same thing from one customer to the next, and there might be nothing you say can achieve a sale.

To me the greatest sin the FLGS mentioned in the OP committed was not guiding to alternatives. If you're going to bad mouth a product that you don't carry you want to make sure the customer still has your attention long enough to describe the products you do carry. But to me it's not automatically a bad thing for a shop keeper to talk about nuts and bolts things outside the realm of actual product details if it can help build an understanding between the customer and the shop keeper.

I see both sides of that point. On the one, I don't mind a store owner engaging in a conversation about a supplier. I wouldn't expect a rant about how they're the leading cause of cancer and have to import puppies to kick, but a "I stopped ordering from them because they kept shorting me on my orders and ticking off my customers" wouldn't be out of line. I've heard many a good rant about various suppliers, and more than a few veiled complaints, but these are stores that I'm reasonably well-known at sometimes having been a customer for almost multiple decades.

That brings me to the other side and why, in this circumstance, I side with the "unprofessional" camp and that is that Myrm was new to that store. If you want to commiserate with long-time customers that's fine; at some point you become more ersatz friends than straight vendor-consumer. When you don't know someone from Adam is the time to bite back on being "too" sociable and having a kvetch. I would say that extends to just having people in the store you don't know, as people who are new are usually not deaf and I've overhead some really unprofessional and simply cruel rants from store employees about non-present customers. That on/off switch can be tricky, but that's kind of the job; balancing the "I don't really want to know you" (which is...generally true of most humans when presented with any random member of society) with the "I really want your money" (again, true of most humans).

However, game stores are, in my limited experience, second only to hair stylists in the realm of unsolicited ranting and gossip. Not sure if stores for other hobbies (e.g. - a bike shop or golf store) have similar environments though.

I think that's a fair point. Like hair dressers or barbers, a typical customer is usually at a (relatively small) hobby store for an extended period of time. And you are usually in conversation distance of the store owner. It's a different environment from many other stores. And you probably would see the same thing in other stores with a similar environment. EG I could quite easily imagine a bike store owner ranting about how say, Rayleigh have screwed them over on repair parts ordering yet again to a new customer.

 Krinsath wrote:
However, game stores are, in my limited experience, second only to hair stylists in the realm of unsolicited ranting and gossip. Not sure if stores for other hobbies (e.g. - a bike shop or golf store) have similar environments though.

I think it tends to occur in any store where the person behind the counter is actually interested and knowledgeable about the product enough to want to talk about it beyond just wanting to sell it. Most other stores the person serving you probably only has a passing interest in the product or may have had an interest which got killed by trying to actually sell it. When it comes to hobby related stores, the person behind the counter are usually huge enthusiasts.

From what I understand many hobby distributors are pretty crappy as well, probably doesn't help, lol.

Davor wrote:

TL;DR

So GW acts professional and we call them inhumane and we have someone who acts human but call them unprofessional. So what do we want then as customers? Hyporicts we are.

Being human and professional are not mutually exclusive.

 JamesY wrote:
@skink I'd happily have such a conversation if I was an established customer and already had an ongoing dialogue with the person. On a first ever encounter though, I'd be unimpressed. Saying "sorry we don't stock gw because we had difficulties with them as a supplier. What game, faction do you collect?... Well if you like fantasy we have x,y, and z in store, let me show you them." would be perfectly fine. That would be much preferable to going into unnecessary specifics about those difficulties, and not even trying to make a positive from it.

This is key right here; it's one thing to have that conversation with your LGS owner if you're a regular and are on a first name basis with the owner/employee. The last thing I want as a first time customer in any store is to be treated to a rant on why X company is absolutely awful and why the store doesn't carry their products. "We have supply issues with that company and don't carry their products, but Y company produces similar items." is one thing, but it sounds like OP was stuck in a conversation that wasn't easy to disengage from while the owner vented his issues.

 Blacksails wrote:

Davor wrote:

TL;DR

So GW acts professional and we call them inhumane and we have someone who acts human but call them unprofessional. So what do we want then as customers? Hyporicts we are.

Being human and professional are not mutually exclusive.

Pfft you've clearly never worked in retail, dealing with people every day soon makes you hate your customers especially during sales and holidays.

People talk down to you just because your behind a till, lie to your face and in general act like aholes you can't work retail any amount of time in a shop without losing your humanity or your mind.

So yes you may get professional service but it's not from humans just soulless husks dead inside and filled with hate for the living.

And when you get home and your stuffs broken or damaged we did that and laughed about it.

Yours
Every retail worker ever.

 Mr. Grey wrote:
"We have supply issues with that company and don't carry their products, but Y company produces similar items." is one thing, but it sounds like OP was stuck in a conversation that wasn't easy to disengage from while the owner vented his issues.

Which is fair enough, I'd chalk that up as the salesperson being obnoxious which is one of my list of "unacceptables" on the previous page.

But I don't think it's automatically wrong to discuss things like crappy suppliers and personal dislikes of products with a customer, as long as you do it without being obnoxious and aren't just scaring customers off.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

hobojebus wrote:
Every retail worker ever.

If it wasn't for all the ignorant and annoying retail workers people wouldn't treat them so badly At this point I just assume the retail worker is going to know less about the product than me because it's true 90% of the time at which point interactions just get annoying.

hobojebus wrote:

 Blacksails wrote:

Davor wrote:

TL;DR

So GW acts professional and we call them inhumane and we have someone who acts human but call them unprofessional. So what do we want then as customers? Hyporicts we are.

Being human and professional are not mutually exclusive.

Pfft you've clearly never worked in retail, dealing with people every day soon makes you hate your customers especially during sales and holidays.

People talk down to you just because your behind a till, lie to your face and in general act like aholes you can't work retail any amount of time in a shop without losing your humanity or your mind.

So yes you may get professional service but it's not from humans just soulless husks dead inside and filled with hate for the living.

And when you get home and your stuffs broken or damaged we did that and laughed about it.

Yours
Every retail worker ever.

Absolute 14 years in retail right here. I'll admit to immaturity in the work place at 17-18, but apart from then I was always professional towards customers, regardless of their behaviour. You can be professional whilst showing a personality, it's just about knowing what is and isn't appropriate.

hobojebus wrote:
Yours
Every retail worker ever.

Please don't claim to speak for everybody out there, okay cupcake?

 BrookM wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Yours
Every retail worker ever.

Please don't claim to speak for everybody out there, okay cupcake?

As another person who worked years in retail, this.

hobojebus wrote:

And when you get home and your stuffs broken or damaged we did that and laughed about it.

Yours
Every retail worker ever.

So you damage customer's stuff and mock them because you have become so bitter from working in retail?

And when you get home and your stuffs broken or damaged we did that and laughed about it.

Yours
Every retail worker ever.

Wow Hobo...this explains so much about you and how you post on here...sorry, but you're just an all around offensive person. Going on the ignore option now.

hobojebus wrote:

 Blacksails wrote:

Davor wrote:

TL;DR

So GW acts professional and we call them inhumane and we have someone who acts human but call them unprofessional. So what do we want then as customers? Hyporicts we are.

Being human and professional are not mutually exclusive.

Pfft you've clearly never worked in retail, dealing with people every day soon makes you hate your customers especially during sales and holidays.

People talk down to you just because your behind a till, lie to your face and in general act like aholes you can't work retail any amount of time in a shop without losing your humanity or your mind.

So yes you may get professional service but it's not from humans just soulless husks dead inside and filled with hate for the living.

And when you get home and your stuffs broken or damaged we did that and laughed about it.

Yours
Every retail worker ever.

Woah this is post. I even work in retail, considering you said this I would not even want to work with you at all. wow...

Yikes.

hobojebus wrote:


So yes you may get professional service

And when you get home and your stuffs broken or damaged we did that and laughed about it.

I don't think you quite understand what the word professional means.

My experience with GW stores has been quite mixed and I don't think that a lack of professionalism is limited to the FLGS. When I first started collecting Dark Eldar, which was towards the end of 4th ed, I can remember a sales rep at the GW in Manchester trying to sell me Space Marines for some reason . I can remember he said something like "Are you sure you don't want some Space Marines?". It came across as pretty unprofessional to me because it was obvious that he wasn't listening to me when I said that I was starting to collect DARK ELDAR. On the other hand, my local GW now has a competent manager & employees who don't so blatantly try to push the hard sell.

Colin at the Austin GW store is very professional.

 MrDwhitey wrote:

 BrookM wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Yours
Every retail worker ever.

Please don't claim to speak for everybody out there, okay cupcake?

As another person who worked years in retail, this.

Retail customer service here. That post was so cringey, and then tries to sell it like it's how all retail workers feel. Nah, bruh, there are good customers and bad customers. Don't take their issues personally, ever.

Oh my. Did anyone get the joke Hobojebus did? I thought it was funny. Why are people taking this seriously?

Thing is with jokes, especially in text form, is that they sometimes have to be quite obvious to work. hobojebus is usually such a vitriolic and negative poster that if he's suddenly going to switch tack and try and be funny, he needs to telegraph it from the rooftops.

FWIW my joke detector is usually pretty good, certainly better than many on here judging by the dumb reactions posts that, to me, are obviously meant in jest get, and I got no such impression, I just toyed with the idea of putting him in ignore.

I am going to turn the tables a bit. I am a store owner, but not an FLGS. Here are some random things that test my professionalism daily:

1. People who come in and ask me to donate to their cause when they have never bought anything from me before and have no intention of buying anything now.

2. Randos who come in and tell me how my store should be run even when it is clear they have no expertise or knowledge on the subject.

3. Folks who come in and tell you all about their political and religious views because they assume since you own a business you must have the same views as them. hint: i don't.

4. People who complain to me about the price of stuff and think I operate a garage sale. I am not here to bargain with you and if you don't like paying sales tax take it up with your political representative.

5. Folks who walk in and think I am the store that was in the same location 5 years ago. That place has been gone half a decade now!

6. Orders where they tell me to do what I want, and then proceed to complain when I present them with the end product. If you had a preference, you should have told me when I asked you about it point blank.

As the owner, you have to stand there and treat all complaints, no matter how petulant and truculent as reasonable and appropriate. It can be real tough.

7. Walk in with an item purchased elsewhere, and expect a full level of support because a) the original store is populated with idiots who can't solve their issue or b) the store they bought it from is not as convenient to go to, unless they can save you a few % on price, in which case that's different or c) you sell the same product and therefore must somehow be connected/ obligated to help equally.

 Azreal13 wrote:
7. Walk in with an item purchased elsewhere, and expect a full level of support because a) the original store is populated with idiots who can't solve their issue or b) the store they bought it from is not as convenient to go to, unless they can save you a few % on price, in which case that's different or c) you sell the same product and therefore must somehow be connected/ obligated to help equally.

this sounds like the voice of bitter experience, surely none of the rest of the shire hobbits are this fudgewitted...

Davout wrote:

In contrast the independent stores in the area have been and can be a mixed lot. I've seen 3 or 4 come and go and mostly they seemed clubby sorts of places the manager set up for him and his buddies to game. It's never good business when the manager of a store rolls his eyes at you when you ask if he has a certain product or can he get it.

There was one store I walked into on a business trip a long time ago. Little place that I just spotted while I was out to lunch, so I just rolled in to check it out. Place was a mess. Open model boxes, with all sorts of parts, sprues, and junk on the counter and table. It looked like it was just being used for the owner/manager's personal hobby stuff. There was an employee (I figured the owner or something) and two other guys there, who stopped talking dead as I came in, and then just stared at me.

Maybe it was the button up shirt and tie? The only word I got out of him was 'Ok.' when I said, 'hey, was just walking by and saw the store, thought I'd check it out.'

I left after making a quick circuit, because they just kept staring. At least there was no crunk.

I've seen the whole gambit, from "how on earth do you own a business?" to guys who I'm pretty sure could sell ice to an Eskimo.

I've had a couple very chatty store owners/workers who would never leave me alone, who while not necessarily rude or anything, just tended to be bored and as I was the only in there during a slow period, wanted to talk to somebody. It wasn't that bad because I was a regular, but I'd imagine it would scare off a new guys, especially as they liked to talk politics and what their suppliers had screwed them on that week.

On the other hand, I've seen some places that were extremely professional. One that came to mind was a chain called "Game Haven" I believe in Utah. They looked nicer than most big name chain stores and carried a wide variety of stuff. The other, which remains one of my all time favorite FLGS's, was Little Big Wars in Fargo North Dakota. I've never seen a guy who could run a FLGS out of the attic of a machine shop and make it look like a real shop like that guy did. The owner was funny, super dependable, and made a point of making the store a welcoming place. The store was always clean, well lit, and comfortable, which is a heck of an accomplishment in what was essentially an offices pace with laminate wood floors and metal siding walls. He's the only FLGS owner I've ever met where he was getting so much business his problem was the space was too small. From what I've heard, he bought a true building recently and has a really awesome store now that puts his old location to shame. If I was to ever drive through Fargo again, I'd definitely make it a point to stop by and check it out. Was just about the only bright side I ever had to living and working next to North Dakota . Which reminds me, Fantasy Flight's store in Minneapolis is awesome as well. I stopped by once on my way through to Kentucky once and was very impressed.


In general though, FLGS's are much like music stores I've found. They're as much as a hangout as they are a business, and often employees/managers/owners can get away with a lot more lax behavior and dress code. It usually doesn't matter because their target customers are the same way, but it definitely contributes to the insular nature of the hobby with keeping "normal" people out. I've known several people who were quite interested in my hobbies, but immediately backed out when they found out that people normally played at the game stores. Even if the store was very professional, the stigma for the hobby as a whole could keep people out. Since the store owners don't see many average Joes come in to buy things, or perceive that they could even be a potential customer, they don't really make an effort to change. It becomes a self fulfilling prophecy so to speak.

 Turnip Jedi wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:
7. Walk in with an item purchased elsewhere, and expect a full level of support because a) the original store is populated with idiots who can't solve their issue or b) the store they bought it from is not as convenient to go to, unless they can save you a few % on price, in which case that's different or c) you sell the same product and therefore must somehow be connected/ obligated to help equally.

this sounds like the voice of bitter experience, surely none of the rest of the shire hobbits are this fudgewitted...

I can't be too bitter, as picking up sales off the back of problems created or not solved by the cretins in the competition was a rich seam of new business for me through the years.

The one guy who implied that I didn't know how to work his phone sufficently to solve his problem because it was the "latest model" notwithstanding. I simply explained to him that I knew an awful lot more about the phones that I sold, even if they happened to be the exact same one that he had...

Im not an avid hobbyist anymore and im really only interested in 40k. In my city of 140,000 people, in which there isn't really any local group of 40k, most of the tabletop community seems interested in x wing and warmahordes.

He regularly puts on mtg, yugioh and xwing nights and does stock gw stuff

That said I still try to support the guy and i reckon over the past 4 years since i moved here i spent about 500 bucks or so.

Guy has to know me by now and never gives me time of day...but he's never turned down my money.

 Easy E wrote:
4. People who complain to me about the price of stuff and think I operate a garage sale. I am not here to bargain with you and if you don't like paying sales tax take it up with your political representative.

This is an awkward one though, my local hobby store owner has told me the same thing (after I'd known him for a couple of years) that he hates it when people come in and try to bargain a price.

But the problem is, there are still many stores that price their stock to bargain and a customer isn't going to automatically know that you've priced your stuff is already at your bottom dollar.

This is one of those times where honesty is probably best, just tell them "sorry, I price things at my bottom dollar already, I can't go any lower" and if they press you can whip the "if you can find it somewhere else cheaper they probably got it from the supplier for less than I did".

One thing that the local store owner said was people will often come in wanting him to price match something from another store, only to find out the other store is on the other side of the country and out of stock I'm sure it can be hard to remain tactful in those situations.

Maybe I'm just weird, but unless a store specifically advertises that they price match, it would never occur to me to ask for a lower price to what's on the tag. I'm not interested in wasting my time bartering for a better price... If a store has what I want at a price I'm willing to pay, I'll pay it. If somewhere else that's not too hard to get to has it cheaper, I'll go there instead.


Although, to be honest, I've never really entirely understood the benefit of offering price matching, either... If the best you're going to do is the same price as this other guy is already selling it for, why wouldn't I just go to him in the first place?

Stores that offer to beat competitor's prices make slightly more sense... but even there, if you can afford to sell it cheaper than what you have on the pricetag, just put it at that price and stop wasting my time having to ask you to match someone else.





Ahem. Sorry, pet peeve... right up there with companies having product catalogues online with no prices. No, sir, I'm not going to send you an email to find out how much your stuff is. I'll just buy it from the guy who actually wants the sale, and has listed prices.





On the FLGS front... As with others, it's a mixed bag, due to so many games stores being set up by hobbyists with no actual retail experience, or who have a lot of experience with one specific games system and know nothing about anything else they sell...

hobojebus wrote:

Pfft you've clearly never worked in retail, dealing with people every day soon makes you hate your customers especially during sales and holidays.
People talk down to you just because your behind a till, lie to your face and in general act like aholes you can't work retail any amount of time in a shop without losing your humanity or your mind.
So yes you may get professional service but it's not from humans just soulless husks dead inside and filled with hate for the living.
And when you get home and your stuffs broken or damaged we did that and laughed about it.
Yours
Every retail worker ever.

I'm guessing you work for Sports Direct...

 insaniak wrote:
Maybe I'm just weird, but unless a store specifically advertises that they price match, it would never occur to me to ask for a lower price to what's on the tag. I'm not interested in wasting my time bartering for a better price... If a store has what I want at a price I'm willing to pay, I'll pay it. If somewhere else that's not too hard to get to has it cheaper, I'll go there instead.


Although, to be honest, I've never really entirely understood the benefit of offering price matching, either... If the best you're going to do is the same price as this other guy is already selling it for, why wouldn't I just go to him in the first place?

I don't really know the motivation of intentionally marking prices higher with the idea that you can barter them down, unless even your high price is similar or cheaper than other local competitors. Surely most consumers will just ignore you if your prices are artificially inflated. Buy hey, Harvey Norman here in Australia manages to stay open in spite of being overly expensive with the idea of haggling a bit.

Price matching makes sense to me, as long as you aren't overpricing to do it. You might be willing to take a hit below what you'd normally sell something for to win a customer from a competitor. You might be in a more convenient location for a customer, or a customer might be looking for other products you carry so instead of having to travel to 2 shops they can buy it all from you.

Though personally I never bother asking for a price match on model kits, I don't spend enough money on kits to really care if I get that $100 boxed set for $90. It seems the peripherals eat in to my bank account more than the actual kits do these days.

 insaniak wrote:


Although, to be honest, I've never really entirely understood the benefit of offering price matching, either... If the best you're going to do is the same price as this other guy is already selling it for, why wouldn't I just go to him in the first place?

Stores that offer to beat competitor's prices make slightly more sense... but even there, if you can afford to sell it cheaper than what you have on the pricetag, just put it at that price and stop wasting my time having to ask you to match someone else.

Price matching is a strategy to generate sales you would otherwise lose, and increase customer loyalty. If stores A and B both get item X from the supplier for the same price, and store A places it on sale, while store B offers price matching, it's because store B can still make just as much money on the item as store A at that time, but they've also generated a sale they wouldn't otherwise have, even if they're more convenient for the customer, because as you said, the customer would just go to Store A instead. It increases the chances that a customer will shop at store B again, and a lot of the time people will be buying more than the price matched item (accessories and such that won't need to be price matched, and still increase store revenue/margin).

Plus there's customer loyalty/reward programs that may make asking for a price match at a place you're a "member" much more appealing than driving somewhere you may not be just to get a lower price once in a while.

I don't know how all of this translates to the LGS level, but having worked big box retail (where pretty much everything is just marked at retail price) it makes a lot of sense to me.

Here are some examples that would be perfectly fine examples of a professional store manager in my opinion while they can still can be quite negatively about GW or their product.

1)
Customer: Can I buy A.

Store: I would love to sell it to you but the supplier does no longer allow me to sell A.

2)
Customer: Can I order B

Store: Yes you can but there is a high risk of the supplier not shipping it in time. They tend to do that the last few months / years.


3)
Customer: Whut you still have a stock of C the supplier claimed it was sold out in minutes.

Store: Well It doesn't sell that good at all, most other local stores also have a huge stock off it. I have no idea why hey claimed it was such a success really.

4)Customer: I would like to buy D

Store: You could buy that, I am obligated to sell it in the store by the supplier. But I also sell X that is a better product really [insert reasons why here], why not give it a try.

Price Matching is all about creating the IMAGE that you have the lowest price, not that you actually do have the lowest price. It is a marketing ploy, especially if your entire "strategy" is based on low prices.

Protip: Do not make your strategy about lowest price. There is always someone willing to sell it for less.

 oldzoggy wrote:

Spoiler:

Here are some examples that would be perfectly fine examples of a professional store manager in my opinion while they can still can be quite negatively about GW or their product.

1)
Customer: Can I buy A.

Store: I would love to sell it to you but the supplier does no longer allow me to sell A.

2)
Customer: Can I order B

Store: Yes you can but there is a high risk of the supplier not shipping it in time. They tend to do that the last few months / years.


3)
Customer: Whut you still have a stock of C the supplier claimed it was sold out in minutes.

Store: Well It doesn't sell that good at all, most other local stores also have a huge stock off it. I have no idea why hey claimed it was such a success really.

4)Customer: I would like to buy D

Store: You could buy that, I am obligated to sell it in the store by the supplier. But I also sell X that is a better product really [insert reasons why here], why not give it a try.

I'd steer clear of sales based jobs if I were you.

 Easy E wrote:
Price Matching is all about creating the IMAGE that you have the lowest price, not that you actually do have the lowest price. It is a marketing ploy, especially if your entire "strategy" is based on low prices.

Protip: Do not make your strategy about lowest price. There is always someone willing to sell it for less.

Price matching is pretty predominant and works if you're a white goods store, or some other place selling mostly big ticket items. On something the scale of model kits, it doesn't seem a sensible expectation.

Someone upthread mentioned the FLGS also being more of a social location and hangout place than a usual store, and that can be part of the problem, if the ones running it stay in the mindset of they're amongst like-minded friends, and not customers as well.

 JamesY wrote:

 TheAuldGrump wrote:

 JamesY wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Gw abused flgs across the world I know several that are done with gw held a sale and have since broken all content.

One guy was so angry he nearly punched out the sales rep when he came around the next time.

Also know an arts supply store owner that used to sell some gw stuff and dumped it due to their business practices, he can rant for hours.

You reap what you sow.

That really isn't relevant, customers don't need to hear about a manager's problems with suppliers anymore than they need to hear about the fallout they had with their missus before coming to work. Offering an alternative if the first choice isn't available is best practice, pointing them in the right direction to a more suitable store if nothing you have is suitable comes next. Moaning should never happen.

It is entirely relevant - the game store owner has reason to kvetch about GW.

He is not kvetching despite them treating him well, he is kvetching because they are treating him poorly.

One might even say that GW is acting... unprofessionally. Treating the retailers that carry your products as competitors is not professional.

If I were a game store owner, I would have nothing to do with them.

The Auld Grump

It is irrelevant to the customer. Customers don't need to hear about gripes the manager is having with a supplier. If the customer asks about it and is interested, then fine, share the difficulties that the supplier is creating. There's absolutely no reason to divulge that information though just because you have been asked for a product, that isn't professionalism.

It IS relevant to the customer. Letting the customer know about how GW treats small businesses is an important sales tactic, especially in areas where small businesses are a valued community asset. I know no less than 4 stores within 50 miles of me that have lost big money as a direct result of GWs policies. I play 40k not because I like GW and want to support them (I've only bought 3 boxes of models NIB, the rest I have bought from other players), but because it is simply the most successful wargame (and I want a "safe" investment in my hobby) in my area. If WMH picks up here, I will fore sure switch BECAUSE of how GW treats their retail partners. THAT IS relevant, and many small business enthusiasts would be happy to know about it.

Also- I think a former GW employee might have a slight bias against the "unprofessional" FLGS, eh?...


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Amendment:
The guy was a bad salesperson, and should have qualified/steered the customer first. I am not making a claim that he did "the right" thing, only that the information he provided is relevant to a good majority of customers.

JuicyPVP wrote:


It IS relevant to the customer. Letting the customer know about how GW treats small businesses is an important sales tactic

So, it's relevant to the store, but not the customer. The customer does not need to hear about problems with a supplier to be sold an alternative.

The words could simply be "I don't have X, but would you like to take a look at Y? They're very similar in design [or something like this]."

The customer doesn't "need" to hear anything, but it's as relevant as any other tangentially related thing a retailer might want to say to build a rapport.

If your goal is to steer people away from product X then letting people know the company or supplier of product X is terrible isn't the worst tactic in the world, as long as it doesn't come at the cost of losing the customer's interest or not letting the customer know about possible competing products.

I think hobbyists are probably more likely to be interested in such things anyway, it'd be less appropriate for someone working in a large chain store to speak of such things (but then the guys on the floor probably don't communicate with suppliers anyway).

We are talking about professionalism here. It is through that lense that I have been contributing to the discussion. Your goal as a retailer is to feed the till, that's it. I know very well that there are several ways to achieve this goal. There are many ways that work that might not be professional, and I'm not trying to say that they can't. However, you shouldn't be trying to "steer" customers too heavily. If you do, you may well make a sale, but you are unlikely to get repeat custom. Hobby stores need repeat custom to make a profit. It is too niche to exist on one off sales. Professionalism is the best way to ensure that a customer returns. On a first encounter, knowing nothing about a customer, you get as much information about what they are doing, what they want to do next, and what they'll need to do it as you can, and then show them what you have to meet those needs. If a salesmen started slating gw to me based off my request for their products, without finding out anything about my hobby first, they'd have absolutely no chance of a sale. They would have no idea how long I'd been in the hobby, what my hobby even is, why I was asking for the specific brand etc, and so would have no basis on which to sell me anything.

I have sold toy soldiers, I have sold £1000+ suits. The basics are the same, you ask questions, listen to the answers, and go from there as appropriate. If you can't sell your products from that alone, you can't sell. Slating anyone in some kind of back slapping conspiratorial way to try and sell something else is, to me, a desperate tactic, and a transparent one at that which only demonstrates a lack of confidence in the products they do sell.

 JamesY wrote:
We are talking about professionalism here. It is through that lense that I have been contributing to the discussion. Your goal as a retailer is to feed the till, that's it. I know very well that there are several ways to achieve this goal. There are many ways that work that might not be professional, and I'm not trying to say that they can't. However, you shouldn't be trying to "steer" customers too heavily. If you do, you may well make a sale, but you are unlikely to get repeat custom. Hobby stores need repeat custom to make a profit. It is too niche to exist on one off sales. Professionalism is the best way to ensure that a customer returns. On a first encounter, knowing nothing about a customer, you get as much information about what they are doing, what they want to do next, and what they'll need to do it as you can, and then show them what you have to meet those needs. If a salesmen started slating gw to me based off my request for their products, without finding out anything about my hobby first, they'd have absolutely no chance of a sale. They would have no idea how long I'd been in the hobby, what my hobby even is, why I was asking for the specific brand etc, and so would have no basis on which to sell me anything.

I have sold toy soldiers, I have sold £1000+ suits. The basics are the same, you ask questions, listen to the answers, and go from there as appropriate. If you can't sell your products from that alone, you can't sell. Slating anyone in some kind of back slapping conspiratorial way to try and sell something else is, to me, a desperate tactic, and a transparent one at that which only demonstrates a lack of confidence in the products they do sell.

Exalted.

The key is asking questions, listening to the answer, and then knowing what products fit those needs. That is a professional.

Maybe I'm biased by the fact I find 99% of salespeople an annoyance and a hindrance. Complaining about your suppliers ranks low (or even positive depending on the circumstances). The things I value in a salesperson are knowledge (rare) and honesty. If you can convey that everything else sinks in to being near meaningless.

 JamesY wrote:
We are talking about professionalism here. It is through that lense that I have been contributing to the discussion. Your goal as a retailer is to feed the till, that's it. I know very well that there are several ways to achieve this goal. There are many ways that work that might not be professional, and I'm not trying to say that they can't. However, you shouldn't be trying to "steer" customers too heavily. If you do, you may well make a sale, but you are unlikely to get repeat custom. Hobby stores need repeat custom to make a profit. It is too niche to exist on one off sales. Professionalism is the best way to ensure that a customer returns.

Too true.

Exalted post.

CB

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Maybe I'm biased by the fact I find 99% of salespeople an annoyance and a hindrance. Complaining about your suppliers ranks low (or even positive depending on the circumstances). The things I value in a salesperson are knowledge (rare) and honesty. If you can convey that everything else sinks in to being near meaningless.

I do get where you are coming from, and I completely respect that you, and many others, are more than happy to have that conversation. My point is that if one customer is, and another isn't, as you don't know on the first visit, caution on loosing custom should prevail. As I've said before, having that conversation with an established customer is one thing. Not worth loosing a potential customer by being too forward though.

 JamesY wrote:

JuicyPVP wrote:


It IS relevant to the customer. Letting the customer know about how GW treats small businesses is an important sales tactic

So, it's relevant to the store, but not the customer. The customer does not need to hear about problems with a supplier to be sold an alternative.

I am a customer.

And it is relevant to me.

You can say, with accuracy, that it may not be relevant to all or possibly even most customers - but as a blanket statement, it is wrong.

As for professionalism, where would you say management discussing selling off the lease to a GW store less than three months after it opened falls? While there are customers in the store?

The Auld Grump - who was one of those customers. (And has the bottle of liquid green stuff to show for it.)

 TheAuldGrump wrote:

 JamesY wrote:

JuicyPVP wrote:


It IS relevant to the customer. Letting the customer know about how GW treats small businesses is an important sales tactic

So, it's relevant to the store, but not the customer. The customer does not need to hear about problems with a supplier to be sold an alternative.

I am a customer.

And it is relevant to me.

You can say, with accuracy, that it may not be relevant to all or possibly even most customers - but as a blanket statement, it is wrong.

As for professionalism, where would you say management discussing selling off the lease to a GW store less than three months after it opened falls? While there are customers in the store?


The Auld Grump - who was one of those customers. (And has the bottle of liquid green stuff to show for it.)

It isn't relevant in an opening conversation with a new customer, which is what the topic has been about in essence. Whatever individuals might prefer isn't the same as what is professional conduct. It didn't get the op purchasing anything in the store, they lost a potential customer. I can't imagine such cheap honesty would engage many new customers either. Professionalism is similar to manners, it's about making sure everyone you talk to feels comfortable in the conversation, not just hoping that the person you are talking to enjoys and is entertained by your negativity towards the brand they came in to buy.

Any discussion on the shop floor of that nature, positive or negative, I would consider unprofessional.

Again, that you enjoy that kind of dialogue is great for you personally, but that doesn't make it appropriate to use with every new face that walks into a store for the first time.

Edit also, I think there is an important distinction between what information is relevant, and what information is interesting. You might be interested in the details behind the options available in a particular shop, or not. All that is relevant is whether what you asked for is available or not.

 JamesY wrote:

 TheAuldGrump wrote:

 JamesY wrote:

JuicyPVP wrote:


It IS relevant to the customer. Letting the customer know about how GW treats small businesses is an important sales tactic

So, it's relevant to the store, but not the customer. The customer does not need to hear about problems with a supplier to be sold an alternative.

I am a customer.

And it is relevant to me.

You can say, with accuracy, that it may not be relevant to all or possibly even most customers - but as a blanket statement, it is wrong.

As for professionalism, where would you say management discussing selling off the lease to a GW store less than three months after it opened falls? While there are customers in the store?


The Auld Grump - who was one of those customers. (And has the bottle of liquid green stuff to show for it.)

It isn't relevant in an opening conversation with a new customer, which is what the topic has been about in essence. Whatever individuals might prefer isn't the same as what is professional conduct. It didn't get the op purchasing anything in the store, they lost a potential customer. I can't imagine such cheap honesty would engage many new customers either. Professionalism is similar to manners, it's about making sure everyone you talk to feels comfortable in the conversation, not just hoping that the person you are talking to enjoys and is entertained by your negativity towards the brand they came in to buy.

Any discussion on the shop floor of that nature, positive or negative, I would consider unprofessional.

Again, that you enjoy that kind of dialogue is great for you personally, but that doesn't make it appropriate to use with every new face that walks into a store for the first time.

Edit also, I think there is an important distinction between what information is relevant, and what information is interesting. You might be interested in the details behind the options available in a particular shop, or not. All that is relevant is whether what you asked for is available or not.

It is relevant. I kind of want to know why a given store does not carry a given company's product.

Sometimes it will be a reason that I agree with - 'GW are jerks. They treat their supporting retailers like dirt and dictate unacceptable terms.'

Other times it will be a reason that I disagree with - 'Reaper supports Kickstarters, so I don't carry them.'

Knowing why is entirely relevant.

In the case of the discussion on whether to close up a Warhammer store - it was between the store manager (and only employee) and a higher up at GW.

Not a conversation between manager and customer - but store manager and his immediate superior in the chain.

The store had not done nearly as well as they had hoped in the first month of operations, and they were already talking of selling off the lease.

They made no effort to hide the conversation - one would think that they would, at the least, have hung a sign on the window 'Closed for 1 Hour, Come Back Then! ' or the like.

They were also not talking about letting the manager go for not hitting the numbers, instead they were talking about giving up on the store entirely.

The store manager was, unsurprisingly, arguing against closing the shop so soon after the opening.

For what it is worth, the store is still there, some three months later, so they have not sold the lease yet - whether because they decided against it, or could not find a buyer for the lease. (There are other empty shops in the plaza, so it could be either.)

It is in an expensive area - right across from the largest mall in town.

They could have found a less expensive storefront, and a larger space. Instead they have a tiny space in a high traffic area.

The Auld Grump - I find GW having that discussion in a store while it was open to be less professional that a store manager saying why he is not willing to deal with a company.

*EDIT* In support of your argument, the most professional, and most successful store in the greater area does not have such discussions with their customers, unless the customer initiates it. (And even then they try to keep it short.) On the other hand, they also went so far as to promote the Reaper Bones Kickstarter.

A store local to me is winding down. For the last few years the owner has only been present for a few hours in the morning and then all the busy times have been with a string of inconsistent part time employees. And if an employee couldn't make it instead of showing up, the store would just close and people showing up for a scheduled games night would arrived to a locked door.

I'd take "unprofessional" over absentee in a heart beat.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Actually, now that I think about it, I think it's possible the employees might have been just taking off and seeing just how much they could get payed for without the owner learning the store was locked up. I wonder if he knew his store was even closer early.

@theauldgrump I think you nailed it with your last comment, if the customer initiates the dialogue, it's an entirely different matter, as they are controlling the direction of the conversation. Answering questions (and like you said, being honest without giving too much away) is very different to ranting about the problems you have had on being asked for a brand.

GW is a niche market. If there's no niche, no market. If the LGS discredits the company good luck establishing a market.

I have one local store that hates on GW. My home store is pretty good, but sells at hard MSRP. O well.

 JamesY wrote:
We are talking about professionalism here.

It pretty much come down to this. Whether the rant was about GW or the price of tea in China is not really relevant, the issue was that the guy went off on a rant that the customer did not want to be involved in, and that's simply unprofessional.

 Bookwrack wrote:

 JamesY wrote:
We are talking about professionalism here.

It pretty much come down to this. Whether the rant was about GW or the price of tea in China is not really relevant, the issue was that the guy went off on a rant that the customer did not want to be involved in, and that's simply unprofessional.

And we are all human and make mistakes. Heaven forbid you ever make a mistake. Wouldn't you like to be a le to have redemption?

Davor wrote:

 Bookwrack wrote:

 JamesY wrote:
We are talking about professionalism here.

It pretty much come down to this. Whether the rant was about GW or the price of tea in China is not really relevant, the issue was that the guy went off on a rant that the customer did not want to be involved in, and that's simply unprofessional.

And we are all human and make mistakes. Heaven forbid you ever make a mistake. Wouldn't you like to be a le to have redemption?

You keep saying that Davour, but you are missing the point that, when you act professionally, you don't make mistakes of that kind. Yes we all make mistakes, but I'd be far more interested in whether the seller had learned from their mistake. No one is condemning him to hell for his error, just sympathizing with the op on a negative experience.

A new person walks into a store, asks specifically for a brand that the store doesn't carry.

Option #1: Act like a retail slave and try to sell the person something they didn't ask for.
Option #2: Address the "not (yet) a customer" like a person and tell them why they don't carry that brand.

I think there's just a fundamental disagreement concerning the role of the parties here.

Especially when the phrase is "friendly local game store", not "professional games supply sales point".

 solkan wrote:
A new person walks into a store, asks specifically for a brand that the store doesn't carry.

Option #1: Act like a retail slave and try to sell the person something they didn't ask for.
Option #2: Address the "not (yet) a customer" like a person and tell them why they don't carry that brand.

I think there's just a fundamental disagreement concerning the role of the parties here.

Especially when the phrase is "friendly local game store", not "professional games supply sales point".

Where is the friendliness in slating a company that some one enjoys the products of? There are many more options available than the two you have suggested. You can be friendly and professional at the same time. The guy in the op was neither.

Having spent many years in retail. There is a fine line between being helpful and professional in a bad situation, and being an arse.

Not everyone is cut out for serving people. It can be a literally hell, and I proudly say that retail turned me into the hateful nihilist that I am today. Mostly because people can be hell to work with, and plenty of customers believe that we operate on a bartering system and the price on the item is only a recommendation.

The retailer in the OP descended into Arse territory pretty quickly. He could have said many other things, but bitching to customers is never a good idea. Independant shops can't last that long if the person behind a till leaves a bad taste in their mouth. Because they will remember, and they will tell their friends, who also play, who will probably tell their friends too.

JamesY wrote:

Davor wrote:

 Bookwrack wrote:

 JamesY wrote:
We are talking about professionalism here.

It pretty much come down to this. Whether the rant was about GW or the price of tea in China is not really relevant, the issue was that the guy went off on a rant that the customer did not want to be involved in, and that's simply unprofessional.

And we are all human and make mistakes. Heaven forbid you ever make a mistake. Wouldn't you like to be a le to have redemption?

You keep saying that Davour, but you are missing the point that, when you act professionally, you don't make mistakes of that kind. Yes we all make mistakes, but I'd be far more interested in whether the seller had learned from their mistake. No one is condemning him to hell for his error, just sympathizing with the op on a negative experience.

I do, I really do understand the point. The thing is, this has been going on for what 4 pages now, and it's like the person committed murder or something.

No, you're categorising something so elementary for a professional to remember as a "mistake" when, as I said, it's equivalent to not soiling yourself or stabbing yourself in the face with your own cutlery.

Forgetting to not moan at a new customer isn't a mistake, no matter how understandable the retailer's reasons for doing so, it is simply unprofessional. It requires the deliberate disregard of a simple and fundamental rule, and anything done deliberately cannot be framed as a mistake.

All this thread is really doing is confirming my view that retail (as opposed to sales) is seen as a 'menial' job that anyone can do - which is *technically* correct, I guess - like cleaning, waiting, etc.

In reality, to be good at it it actually requires a skillset not all possess.

 Jimsolo wrote:

 Mymearan wrote:
This isn't a GW bashing thread, don't make it one.

That's hardly GW bashing, amigo. GW has a track record of business practices that rub small business owners the wrong way. You can argue about whether the FLGS are justified, but it's not a smear to say it happens--it's a fact. Trying to offer a reasonable explanation for your experience doesn't seem off topic or out of line.
....
If the FLGS operator has a problem with a company, their service, or their product, I'd prefer they told me the truth. The FLGS should be a nexus for the community. If the operator there is just a shill trying to bilk me out of my money by foisting garbage off onto me, then they definitely don't deserve my business.

That's really not relevant at all, unless you're actually interested in the "GW is bad" conversation with the store operator and have engaged with him for that purpose. If a store owner or employee joins in on a thread on a forum, then it can be enlightening to get their perspective and experience in a thread. If you go there specifically looking for AoS or 40k, then there really is no reason to carry on about GW or any other company to a customer who has specifically gone in there to purchase something.

An interesting topic. I honestly don't think that was too far out of line.

That said, one could just say: "We had issues with GW in the past, so unfortuantly we do not carry this range. However, we do carry x, y, z would you like me to give you an overview/rundown of these systems?" If the customer then asks what kind of problems you can elaborate.

I prefer this approach to just trying to sell me stuff no matter what. To go on for minutes is maybe a bit much.

It is also true that working in retail or any customer facing role is (emotionally) demanding. One does need peoples skills and should a customer be difficult deescalation techniques and the right combination of being understanding, but also not taking it personal is not easy to achieve.

Working in such a role made me aware of this and i adjusted my interactions with retail staff etc. accordingly and I am now trying to always be positive and calm should there be a problem,a fter all it is not the person I talk to that is at fault, rather the company they work for.

hobojebus wrote:
Pfft you've clearly never worked in retail, dealing with people every day soon makes you hate your customers especially during sales and holidays.

Not sure where you are located but I generally find independent game stores in the US are a bit different. Generally, store owners are Hobbyists that decide it would be fun to own a game store. Staff tend to be gamers who are working the shop part time to support their addiction hobby. This means I generally find the people in independent stores know more about the games and the hobby than they do about retail or customer service. That's generally where I encounter problems with the FLGS. I'll spend 20 minutes talking to a staff member about some new release, ask them to order me one, and then when I go into the store a week or two later find out they never put the order in. Or they put my order out on the shelf and someone else bought it. Or they don't know how to operate the store's inventory and ordering system and got me the wrong thing. Or they mismanaged the store finances so badly that the had to close up while I was waiting for my order.

hobojebus wrote:
Pfft you've clearly never worked in retail, dealing with people every day soon makes you hate your customers especially during sales and holidays.

People talk down to you just because your behind a till, lie to your face and in general act like aholes you can't work retail any amount of time in a shop without losing your humanity or your mind.

So yes you may get professional service but it's not from humans just soulless husks dead inside and filled with hate for the living.

And when you get home and your stuffs broken or damaged we did that and laughed about it.

Yours
Every retail worker ever.

Well, you're not wrong, the trick to working retail well is to keep in mind not to apply that deep hatred towards new customers and again to push it aside when dealing with the few... fun... customers. Save it for venting with co-workers afterwards when there's no customers around, every bad customer truly just becomes another fun story for retail workers to share amongst themselves. If more people realised that then maybe retail would be a better thing to work in. I wouldn't go as far as to make their shopping experience worse, no need to be a jerk back to someone being a jerk back to you cause that would only lead to more frustration making them be an even bigger jerk to someone else. Also in most cases if they're the loud annoying to deal with kind, if they got home and found their stuff broken even if it wasn't the fault of anyone at the store, they would come back and make a fuss about it.

It's not hard to keep your kindness, mean all retail does is help you realise that a vast majority of people are not so great thinkers, they act fast and let their brain catch up which is fairly normal for everyone when you don't have to focus on stuff like an exam or researching whatever. You're not thinking, rather just doing. Like just the other day I had to deal with one trying to convince me that the bottle of 180 vitamin pills they wanted only contained 60. The bottle says there's 180 in it; the bottle is the same size as another vitamin the same company makes but only holds 60 in them. Obviously the pills are different sizes and neither of which are clear allowing you to see the contents, but it was enough to convince them that this bottle that I, the shelf and the label had said contains 180 only had 60 in it. Possibly they hadn't read it and assumed from the size of the bottles, need to take that extra care to not make them feel like an idiot or talk down to anyone. Retail just needs patience really and honestly I can see a lot of parallels between retail and child care work; just the scary thought that quite a few of these people bashing into things with shopping carts are actually allowed to drive a car.

 n0t_u wrote:

It's not hard to keep your kindness,

How come we don't do this on the forums then?

Davor wrote:

 n0t_u wrote:

It's not hard to keep your kindness,

How come we don't do this on the forums then?

Anonymity is a mask people can easily wear online to allow themselves to be complete asses without consequence.

 TheAuldGrump wrote:

 JamesY wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
Gw abused flgs across the world I know several that are done with gw held a sale and have since broken all content.

One guy was so angry he nearly punched out the sales rep when he came around the next time.

Also know an arts supply store owner that used to sell some gw stuff and dumped it due to their business practices, he can rant for hours.

You reap what you sow.

That really isn't relevant, customers don't need to hear about a manager's problems with suppliers anymore than they need to hear about the fallout they had with their missus before coming to work. Offering an alternative if the first choice isn't available is best practice, pointing them in the right direction to a more suitable store if nothing you have is suitable comes next. Moaning should never happen.

It is entirely relevant - the game store owner has reason to kvetch about GW.

He is not kvetching despite them treating him well, he is kvetching because they are treating him poorly.

One might even say that GW is acting... unprofessionally. Treating the retailers that carry your products as competitors is not professional.

If I were a game store owner, I would have nothing to do with them.

The Auld Grump

Thats not a professional practice. A customer who asked about X, doesn't give a flying feth about your problems with X. if you don't sell X try to interest him in Y, and quickly before the customer leaves the store.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 cuda1179 wrote:
I used to love my FLGS owner. His place was bright, smelled good, was well organized, had stock from many different games, has a decent playing area with lots of terrain. The best part was his attitude. He managed to balance how attentive he was. He'd be just close enough that you could ask him for help, or he'd ask if you looked like you needed it, but he was far enough away that it didn't seem like he was hovering over you.

Of course I then found his achilles heel. He hates kids. I had my son and daughter with me (3 and 5) when I stopped in. As I was being rung up by the cashier and my children strayed a few feet away and tried to get a cup of water from the water cooler. An angry voice boomed "Do these belong to anyone?"

Yea, as a Dad, that following events after that would have been...bad.

I've seen FLGS be very hit or miss. Some were good/clean, some weren't. Its interesting that clean comes up often as a good store. One often thinks of that as a minimal requirement for an FLGS.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 DaggerAndBrush wrote:
An interesting topic. I honestly don't think that was too far out of line.

That said, one could just say: "We had issues with GW in the past, so unfortuantly we do not carry this range. However, we do carry x, y, z would you like me to give you an overview/rundown of these systems?" If the customer then asks what kind of problems you can elaborate.

I prefer this approach to just trying to sell me stuff no matter what. To go on for minutes is maybe a bit much.

It is also true that working in retail or any customer facing role is (emotionally) demanding. One does need peoples skills and should a customer be difficult deescalation techniques and the right combination of being understanding, but also not taking it personal is not easy to achieve.

Working in such a role made me aware of this and i adjusted my interactions with retail staff etc. accordingly and I am now trying to always be positive and calm should there be a problem,a fter all it is not the person I talk to that is at fault, rather the company they work for.

Now here's how to do it.