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The GW in the Phoenix Valley is having its grand opening this February and I am just wondering what should I expect and as a college student I always have to ask this question, can I get some free swag.

Does cake and drinks count as 'swag?'

Most "grand openings" for GW stores are after they have been open for a month. I would not expect anything expect maybe a few raffles for blisters or maybe a box or 2. Usually you would obtain tickets by playing in the large scale games in the store that day.

Truly what to expect:
-lots of little kids
-unpainted likely illegal army lists
-bad body order
-a headache

I'm not trying to be negative, but its kinda what i've encountered on the 2 grand openings of GW stores in the NJ / PA / DE area that i've attended in the last 10 years or so. I don't see why it would be different anywhere.

njpc wrote:Most "grand openings" for GW stores are after they have been open for a month. I would not expect anything expect maybe a few raffles for blisters or maybe a box or 2. Usually you would obtain tickets by playing in the large scale games in the store that day.

Truly what to expect:
-lots of little kids
-unpainted likely illegal army lists
-bad body order
-a headache

I'm not trying to be negative, but its kinda what i've encountered on the 2 grand openings of GW stores in the NJ / PA / DE area that i've attended in the last 10 years or so. I don't see why it would be different anywhere.

And free cake*

*Cake is standard from closest cake store and will cause said kids to fight as there is unfortunately only enough for half of them alone

The free stuff comes mostly with their store birthdays, not to be confused with the birthday parties at the store. Then likely the big ones like the 1st, 5th then even more unlikely the 10th.
They vary largely from store to store though so if you really want to, may as well check it out as they have had wallets, keychains, bottles and pens at times.

For the raffle tickets it seems almost standard to get them with purchases of a certain amount however.

10+ years ago, Grand Openings usually included a 20% off sale on instock products but I haven't seen that detail mentioned in many years. Other than that, they usually have a selection of opening-only stuff like the keychains mentioned above as well as the marine poster with all the different chapter paint schemes.

I wouldn't put too much weight into this. You can aquire 20% off and free shipping over the internet all the time. Show up for a free cake and drinks and STS for a while.

warboss wrote:10+ years ago, Grand Openings usually included a 20% off sale on instock products but I haven't seen that detail mentioned in many years.

I've seen it pretty frequently included as a flier or coupon in White Dwarf advertising store grand openings.

Ultimately, it just amounts to having to line up for longer to buy the same stuff you can buy any other day, at a higher price than you could buy it from somewhere else without the screaming hordes.

When the Mt Gravatt store in BrisVegas opened - they had a 2-for-1 Deal.

No Bull. A Mate went nuts - bought over $600 bucks worth of stuff - could barely fit in his Car.

*True story Ian!!!!!

DiRTWaL wrote:The GW in the Phoenix Valley is having its grand opening this February and I am just wondering what should I expect and as a college student I always have to ask this question, can I get some free swag.

Magic eightball says- not in this lifetime.

Back in the day, you would have gotten in on a free warhammer boxed set for the price of one.

akira5665 wrote:When the Mt Gravatt store in BrisVegas opened - they had a 2-for-1 Deal.

No Bull. A Mate went nuts - bought over $600 bucks worth of stuff - could barely fit in his Car.

*True story Ian!!!!!

Yeah, they used to do that sort of stuff. The original Brisbane store's grand opening had the (at that time) usual round of discounts and 2-for-1 or 3-for-2 pricing. A mate and I got there an hour early and the queue was still out the door of the mall. Along with the discounts, they were handing out freebies to randomg people in the line as well.


That sort of stuff seems to have fallen by the wayside, though.

aosol wrote:I wouldn't put too much weight into this. You can aquire 20% off and free shipping over the internet all the time. Show up for a free cake and drinks and STS for a while.

And ten years ago (the time reference I gave in my post mentioning the sale), you could get stuff routinely off the internet for 30% off with occasional 35-40% off sales. The OP was asking what to possibly expect and a sale hadn't been mentioned yet. If they had one locally, I'd consider showing up for a possible Space Marine poster freebie.

akira5665 wrote:When the Mt Gravatt store in BrisVegas opened - they had a 2-for-1 Deal.

No Bull. A Mate went nuts - bought over $600 bucks worth of stuff - could barely fit in his Car.

*True story Ian!!!!!

Yep. Sydney CBD, Wollongong and Chatswood all did this too. I had mates give me money to get stuff for them. Spent around $400 (90s AUD)

When the Sydney CBD moved into the "battle bunker", it changed to a lesser "buy three, cheapest is free" or "buy one, get 2nd for half price".

I want the old GW back.

chromedog wrote:

akira5665 wrote:When the Mt Gravatt store in BrisVegas opened - they had a 2-for-1 Deal.

No Bull. A Mate went nuts - bought over $600 bucks worth of stuff - could barely fit in his Car.

*True story Ian!!!!!

Yep. Sydney CBD, Wollongong and Chatswood all did this too. I had mates give me money to get stuff for them. Spent around $400 (90s AUD)

When the Sydney CBD moved into the "battle bunker", it changed to a lesser "buy three, cheapest is free" or "buy one, get 2nd for half price".

The Miranda store did it as well. I miss those sales.

Don't forget having far too few of the "collectable" items. When the GW "Baltimore" Battle Bunker opened in its new location, they had something like 10 *total* of the 40k and FB flags which, of course, were snapped up in no time at all.

That was the only reason I headed by the store and it was very disappointing that there was literally no chance I could get one at all...

GW grand openings used to be events that were at least somewhat worth making it for. Recently? Not so much...

Valete,

JohnS

insaniak wrote:

akira5665 wrote:When the Mt Gravatt store in BrisVegas opened - they had a 2-for-1 Deal.

No Bull. A Mate went nuts - bought over $600 bucks worth of stuff - could barely fit in his Car.

*True story Ian!!!!!

Yeah, they used to do that sort of stuff. The original Brisbane store's grand opening had the (at that time) usual round of discounts and 2-for-1 or 3-for-2 pricing. A mate and I got there an hour early and the queue was still out the door of the mall. Along with the discounts, they were handing out freebies to randomg people in the line as well.


That sort of stuff seems to have fallen by the wayside, though.

I remember when GW did stuff like this, 3 for 2, 2 for 1, I dropped around 300$ dollars on my birthday when they had a summer time sale to move the old SpaceMarine (the game) stock and they where switching over to the different backing cards on the blisters so they had a huge sale to move the old blisters. It was a very good way to get a few different armies.

Sadley those days are long gone never to be seen again. It is what it is. [insert various statments' here]

The old GW sounds pretty awesome. I've only known them since they've been jerks.

GW's retail face hasn't changed that much. Walking into a GW store is pretty much the same experience it has always been. The colour of the shirts changes from time to time, but that's about it.

It's just the corporate side of GW that's got progressively sillier over the years.

Cincinnati is about to get its first GW store so this is good to know. If I go to their grand opening and they're packed, I can always go to the game store that's less than a quarter mile away.

Off topic - how awesome is it to see Ghaz posting?

Dakka Legend.

The last Grand Opening I went to, I got Space Hulk with the Deathwing expansion, and got the other expansion for free!

I believe the offer was also open to blister packs and box sets as well. Oh, how times change.

The latest GW to open in my area yielded me a dogtag and a couple of the imperial eagle dice. Had to make a purchase though.

In addition to grand openings, GW stores also used to do periodic dint and ding sales events. They would hold auctions where they would sell off individual boxes to the highest bidder. Old blisters would get chucked out into the crowd at random. Decent percentage discounts during the event on many things. I even won a drawing for the boxed Necron army (when they first came out in plastic).

It has been less than 10 years since they went from the above-referenced philosophy to their current one.