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Reason I'm asking is that Kentucky (a state in the southeast USA for those foreigners) has up until now had 0 official GW stores to my knowledge. We have an insane amount of FLGS's in Lexington alone (Battleforge, Rusty Scabbard, Amazing Wonders, etc.) but GW hasn't ever seen fit to give us a store.

Until now apparently. A new one opened up in Lexington about a month or two ago, and next thing I know I'm hearing about a job offer for one in Georgetown. Then I'm looking online and I'm seeing no less than NINE job postings in Kentucky, all for the "one man store" type jobs. Frankfort, Winchester, Georgetown, Paris (Which is a small town near where I live. No way there's enough of a playerbase there to keep them going) etc. etc. Kentucky is not a very big state. We have a fairly rural population aside from Lexington and Louisville. So why on earth am I seeing all these job postings? Am I reading something wrong? Are they just sending out wanted adds to areas around where their stores are opening to increase the odds of finding a good employee? Because opening up NINE stores in Kentucky quite frankly sounds insane.

I'm pretty sure I'm just reading this wrong, but figured I'd ask and see if I missed something. Here's the link if you want to see what I was looking at (have been searching for jobs lately hence stumbling across this)

http://www.careerbuilder.com/EmployerProfile/CompanyJobs.aspx?sta=%22KY%22&companydid=C8H6826CK3QJ2WP0VHJ&pg=1&IPath=JEB

They opened two in NC last year. One in Raleigh and one in Winston-Salem.

We were lacking a store in the entire state for many years (they used t have one in Charlotte but it was in one of the super upscale mega malls and rent was probably a fortune).

So maybe they have gotten smart. Raleigh is a very upscale small city with an above average median income and a well educated workforce so putting a store there was a good idea.

I am hearing lots of good things about Kentucky ( I work with a lot of guys from there). I guess they are doing a lot to make it attractive for businesses there so hopefully this will be a good move for GW.

We wrote:
So maybe they have gotten smart. Raleigh is a very upscale small city with an above average median income and a well educated workforce so putting a store there was a good idea.

Of course it's also a city that has 2-3 existing independent stores to take all its customers, and it's located in a place where only people who already know it exists will ever go there so it doesn't even do its supposed job of attracting new players. So, not really all that smart.

They are on a big push to expand, and from what I can tell it's nearly all one person stores.

I don't think they factor "independent stockists" into their equations, and I know for certain they don't monitor pricing.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/494695.page

Become Legendary NA runs a thread on the topic. You could post there and ask.

 Peregrine wrote:

We wrote:
So maybe they have gotten smart. Raleigh is a very upscale small city with an above average median income and a well educated workforce so putting a store there was a good idea.

Of course it's also a city that has 2-3 existing independent stores to take all its customers, and it's located in a place where only people who already know it exists will ever go there so it doesn't even do its supposed job of attracting new players. So, not really all that smart.

Really?

Because I've been to the shop in Raleigh. I live three or four minutes away from it. It's not "in a place where only people who already know it exists will ever go there". It's in a pretty nice shopping center which is pretty constantly packed.

The "independent stores" in/around Raleigh? They're all over the bloody place.

GW does silly things sometimes. Best not to think on it too hard, therein lies the path to insanity.

Opening one in my town out of the blue as well.

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
Reason I'm asking is that Kentucky (a state in the southeast USA for those foreigners) has up until now had 0 official GW stores to my knowledge. We have an insane amount of FLGS's in Lexington alone (Battleforge, Rusty Scabbard, Amazing Wonders, etc.) but GW hasn't ever seen fit to give us a store.

Until now apparently.

This has been GW's approach to North America since the beginning. They court trade accounts and get local stores to carry and sell their product. And once those local small businesses build a community of gamers and a customer base, GW swoops in opens their own store, competing directly with their trade "partners."

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
I'm pretty sure I'm just reading this wrong, but figured I'd ask and see if I missed something. Here's the link if you want to see what I was looking at (have been searching for jobs lately hence stumbling across this)

http://www.careerbuilder.com/EmployerProfile/CompanyJobs.aspx?sta=%22KY%22&companydid=C8H6826CK3QJ2WP0VHJ&pg=1&IPath=JEB

If you look at the Ref ID - those are usually used to designate the specific opening (not always - but normally). In most cases, you will throw a broad net in order to get the qualified people - so, no I do not think they will be opening 9 GW stores in Kentucky.

Also, don't be surprised if you see a few stores open this year and then see them all close next year or the year after. If you look back through the history of openings and closings - they quite often end up closing just as many stores as they open each year in the US.

@petre, thanks, I'll check that out and see whats going on.

@Peregrine, that's a similar situation to here. We have two VERY established stores (the rusty scabbard and battleforge) have been here since the early 90's at least, perhaps even longer. Both stores have very established communities and make a good deal of business with GW product.

GW opened their store across town, in a pretty big shopping center area within about a 100 feet of a comic store, and they seem to have no intention with competing with us. Heck, the guy even mentions our stores on his store's facebook when people were asking what would happen if they wanted to play a game and the store was full. According to him, his only job is to get people into the hobby, where he will then send them along to one of the bigger stores so he can join a community.

It actually made sense... darn it GW just when I thought I understood you..

 MrMoustaffa wrote:


GW opened their store across town, in a pretty big shopping center area within about a 100 feet of a comic store, and they seem to have no intention with competing with us. Heck, the guy even mentions our stores on his store's facebook when people were asking what would happen if they wanted to play a game and the store was full. According to him, his only job is to get people into the hobby, where he will then send them along to one of the bigger stores so he can join a community.

It actually made sense... darn it GW just when I thought I understood you..

From talking to my local GW manager, he said the same thing- they like independants (as long as they're well run and positive places...)- that's where people go once they've discovered the hobby and been shown how to start and expand. Saves all those hoary old vets cluttering up the place and gives newer gamers somewhere to play when the GW doesn't (and isn't meant to) have room for them.

The local GW here won't send anyone to the independants because they carry and promote FoW and Warmachine in a bigger way than GW stuff. They have largely abandoned GW games to the one person GW operation that's hardly ever open. So people play in their houses, every now and again at local stores and then there's a once-a-year tournament that happens and people play there. Even back in the 1990s it was easier finding opponents than it is now.

Back during the LOTR boom though, everyone had big GW sections and then GW opened up their store in a big high traffic shopping mall. Then the local stores started getting new releases late and having other delays on their orders along with missing items and they eventually all moved away from GW. Half of them still have their GW trade accounts and will bring things in on special order, but beyond that, they keep a starter for both games in stock, a selection of army books and maybe a unit for each army.

I imagine this is the case in lots of places in North America.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Because I've been to the shop in Raleigh. I live three or four minutes away from it. It's not "in a place where only people who already know it exists will ever go there". It's in a pretty nice shopping center which is pretty constantly packed.

It might be a convenient shopping center if you live a few minutes away since it's the closest grocery store, but it's hardly a major shopping destination like one of the large malls in the area that attract a lot more traffic. And, worst of all, it's in the back around the corner where you can't see it from the road or from most of the parking lot, the worst possible place if you want people to walk by and take a look (and if you're a sensible business owner). It might in theory be possible for them to attract a new customer once in a while, but nowhere near as many as they could get if they put the store in a location that was chosen for something other than having the lowest possible rent.

Of course the real proof of how stupid a location it was? I was in there on two different weekends in december (IOW ideal christmas shopping time) playing for a few hours and not a single customer came in. The only people in the store over that entire time were people who already knew about GW and considered it their "home" store. A few of them bought things, but that's a complete failure to do the job of a retail store and attract new customers.

The "independent stores" in/around Raleigh? They're all over the bloody place.

Obviously no single location is ideal for everyone, but pretty much no matter where you are in the triangle area you're close enough to an independent store that you don't need a GW store. There was no major gap in store coverage that needed to be filled, they're just competing for business with their own independent retailers.

agustin wrote:
The local GW here won't send anyone to the independants because they carry and promote FoW and Warmachine in a bigger way than GW stuff. They have largely abandoned GW games to the one person GW operation that's hardly ever open. So people play in their houses, every now and again at local stores and then there's a once-a-year tournament that happens and people play there. Even back in the 1990s it was easier finding opponents than it is now.

Back during the LOTR boom though, everyone had big GW sections and then GW opened up their store in a big high traffic shopping mall. Then the local stores started getting new releases late and having other delays on their orders along with missing items and they eventually all moved away from GW. Half of them still have their GW trade accounts and will bring things in on special order, but beyond that, they keep a starter for both games in stock, a selection of army books and maybe a unit for each army.

I imagine this is the case in lots of places in North America.

I'm a little worried about this happening, but who knows, maybe it'll never happen.

Either way, GW is on the opposite side of Lexington from the independent stores (who are literally maybe a 5 minute drive from each other TOPS on a bad day) so hopefully GW won't feel a need to try and "sabotage" the independents.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
I'm pretty sure I'm just reading this wrong, but figured I'd ask and see if I missed something. Here's the link if you want to see what I was looking at (have been searching for jobs lately hence stumbling across this)

http://www.careerbuilder.com/EmployerProfile/CompanyJobs.aspx?sta=%22KY%22&companydid=C8H6826CK3QJ2WP0VHJ&pg=1&IPath=JEB

If you look at the Ref ID - those are usually used to designate the specific opening (not always - but normally). In most cases, you will throw a broad net in order to get the qualified people - so, no I do not think they will be opening 9 GW stores in Kentucky.

Also, don't be surprised if you see a few stores open this year and then see them all close next year or the year after. If you look back through the history of openings and closings - they quite often end up closing just as many stores as they open each year in the US.

This.

Those posting are not for unique stores. They are just trying to get more recruits.

The GW stores around these parts have been closing. It seems to go in cycles. It looks like your area may be getting another one or two.

A few thoughts-

GW is probably trying to push more stores out to the market in order to take advantage of the Hobbit merchandise they had.

Of course, the one man store concept is win-win for them because if your only paying for one employee, that is perhaps your biggest savings on overhead costs towards your business.

And if they are competing directly against LFGS's, then perhaps GW is getting aggressive trying to sell its product and undermine their trade partner base for a chance to make more money on their own products.

Getting more footprints out in the market is not a bad thing, especially since alot of chain stores are hedging their bets that the economy will now start to improve and therefore more people will want to start buying more goods rather than needs.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
Because I've been to the shop in Raleigh. I live three or four minutes away from it. It's not "in a place where only people who already know it exists will ever go there". It's in a pretty nice shopping center which is pretty constantly packed.

It might be a convenient shopping center if you live a few minutes away since it's the closest grocery store, but it's hardly a major shopping destination like one of the large malls in the area that attract a lot more traffic.And, worst of all, it's in the back around the corner where you can't see it from the road or from most of the parking lot, the worst possible place if you want people to walk by and take a look (and if you're a sensible business owner). It might in theory be possible for them to attract a new customer once in a while, but nowhere near as many as they could get if they put the store in a location that was chosen for something other than having the lowest possible rent.
Of course the real proof of how stupid a location it was? I was in there on two different weekends in december (IOW ideal christmas shopping time) playing for a few hours and not a single customer came in. The only people in the store over that entire time were people who already knew about GW and considered it their "home" store. A few of them bought things, but that's a complete failure to do the job of a retail store and attract new customers.

The "independent stores" in/around Raleigh? They're all over the bloody place.

Obviously no single location is ideal for everyone, but pretty much no matter where you are in the triangle area you're close enough to an independent store that you don't need a GW store. There was no major gap in store coverage that needed to be filled, they're just competing for business with their own independent retailers.

I've detailed this before about Raleigh.

If you're not in downtown or Cary/Durham, you're not near any shop which you can reasonably call your "home" shop.
I like the Pinecrest Pointe location. It's clean, the staff are friendly, and it is easy to get to with parking not being a problem like it can be at the malls.

I didn't say the GW store in Raleigh was in a good spot just that Raleigh is a good city to open a game store if one was going to do that due to demographics. Yes there are three good stores in Raleigh though so they have an up hill battle but I don't believe GW takes that into account. I think most of us are aware how GW has blinders when it comes to any sort of competition. GW expects the world to bend to their vision not the other way around.

My issue with the store was the one time I went there sometime around 2-3 in the afternoon in the middle of the week they were closed. I didn't know at the time they only open after 4 and are closed 2 days a week, which happened to be the day I decided to visit. I will not frequent a store that has unprofessional hours like that.

We wrote:
I didn't say the GW store in Raleigh was in a good spot just that Raleigh is a good city to open a game store if one was going to do that due to demographics. Yes there are three good stores in Raleigh though so they have an up hill battle but I don't believe GW takes that into account. I think most of us are aware how GW has blinders when it comes to any sort of competition. GW expects the world to bend to their vision not the other way around.

My issue with the store was the one time I went there sometime around 2-3 in the afternoon in the middle of the week they were closed. I didn't know at the time they only open after 4 and are closed 2 days a week, which happened to be the day I decided to visit. I will not frequent a store that has unprofessional hours like that.

We're talking about the Pinecrest Pointe store, right?
They are open from 1pm to 8pm on Wednesdays through Fridays and 12pm to 8pm on Saturdays and 12pm to 6pm on Sundays.

You can find this kind of information pretty readily on GW's "Store Finder". It even says the lunch hours (4pm to 4:30pm) and links to the shop's Facebook page--which the manager does a fairly good job updating and continually responding to people as he's using it via his smartphone.

So you southern folk get potentially a fist full of stores, and I could drive for an entire day and not get to one here in New England. Maine is not the place to put one, I'll admit that, but Boston? South Western Conn? Providence? You have to get all the way into New York City to find one. Just bizarre.

Southern New Hampshire is the place to put it. Nashua is the NH/MA border. You would have Boston and Manchester traffic and everyone inbetween.