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 Eggs wrote:
Jesus. Hope you're ok? I hope he is severely punished for being such a creep. It's scum like that give the rest of us a bad name.

I will be ok, only a bruise on my back, sore wrist and broken nails. Could have been worse >.<

Apple fox wrote:

 Eggs wrote:
Jesus. Hope you're ok? I hope he is severely punished for being such a creep. It's scum like that give the rest of us a bad name.

I will be ok, only a bruise on my back, sore wrist and broken nails. Could have been worse >.<

Wow. I'm glad the guy got taken away. I'm not familiar with Australian law but if he isn't incarcerated I hope you have a restraining order put on him.

Apple fox wrote:

 Eggs wrote:
Jesus. Hope you're ok? I hope he is severely punished for being such a creep. It's scum like that give the rest of us a bad name.

I will be ok, only a bruise on my back, sore wrist and broken nails. Could have been worse >.<

He attacked you??? Why? Did he find out you'd reported him or was it totally out of the blue?

What a fething bastard.

I sincerely hope your nails are still in his face. Glad you aren't too badly hurt. Sounds like he'll be spending some time staring at bars.

Sorry to hear that's happened to you apple fox, hope all is ok now. Think I have been lucky with my experiences at stores. I'm a girl and have been to many GW stores, and I've never experienced any kind of sexist treatment from staff or players etc so far.

But yeah this thread has been great to read through, a lot of interesting stories. But yeah no bad experiences from my side. I remember one of the first GW shops I went to in Ireland, was in Dublin, around 2005,one of the staff was introducing how to play a game to a bunch of kids, he was reenacting the different characters getting hit on the battlefield and everything, was great fun and was really getting everyone into it

 master of ordinance wrote:

As it is, there used to be a store in Preston, called Worthy Games. Now, this was a great store. However, the owner had, as it turned out, no actual interest in it, in fact he disliked it, and only used it to fuel his painting commission company (that was bleeding money like a slit artery). Any way, things where fine for the first few months. Until after Yule. Then the signs started. Little things, like orders not being fulfilled, and shelves being left un-stocked.
Anyway, that summer, 11 months after it had opened there was a massive sale, and the store closed. I was there on the last day, up to the final closing. I remember buying hundreds of pounds worth of stuff for around £20-£30 (90% reductions in some cases ).
But the real kicker was this: the store owed Red Steel, the club, money. Allot of money. And did he pay up? No. Instead, he pointed to some terrain that one of the floor staff had painted for us in good faith, and said that the job was equal to the value. It wasnt, not by a long chalk. Whats more, some of the terrain packs promised to the club where sold back to the suppliers. And there was nothing we could do about it.

I know at least one other person who got screwed big time by Worthy. Bunch of thieves.

Apple fox wrote:

 Eggs wrote:
Jesus. Hope you're ok? I hope he is severely punished for being such a creep. It's scum like that give the rest of us a bad name.

I will be ok, only a bruise on my back, sore wrist and broken nails. Could have been worse >.<

Glad to hear he was taken away. I was worried after hearing about what he did the first time you posted about him.

Apple fox wrote:
This is the first time I have been able to collect my thaghts and reply here.
He had turn up at my house day after I post. (Cut out part of the story)
Was the most scary thing in my life D: but he was taken away by police so for most part it's over >.<
Thanks for letting me write it out. Both times.

Apple fox wrote:

 Eggs wrote:
Jesus. Hope you're ok? I hope he is severely punished for being such a creep. It's scum like that give the rest of us a bad name.

I will be ok, only a bruise on my back, sore wrist and broken nails. Could have been worse >.<

Holy gak! Reading that post from before was jaw-dropping enough, but he showed up at your house?! The hell?

Don't know what the hell is wrong with some people.

While I'm in a GW store, I tend to use their paints (GW paints owned by me), sprays and tools. But, being a guy who likes to have his miniatures last, there's one thing gee dub doesn't provide to Queensland, Australia that I simply refuse to do without: spray on Matte varnish. I use a tamiya spray varnish that's served me admirably.

Anyway, so I finish painting some model or other, and I go outside to put on the matte varnish. The store's bloke, an old GW employee and the manger at that store, asks if he could use he spray. Being a helpful sort of guy, I agree and he goes out with his miniature and sprays it. He then comes into the store with his miniature (which was clearly oversprayed) and refuses to give me my spray can back on the basis that "it wasn't a GW product" and "I shouldn't be using it in his store." He then waxes idiotic about how I am not supporting the store, etc. when I protest that I do all my GW purchasing, even the online stuff in -that- store, he retorts with "but you didn't buy this here."

Needless to say, I'm pretty peeved by this point, I point out that he doesn't sell that product. He then has the gall to suggest to Me that I buy a GW brand airbrush, GW brand aerosol and GW brand varnish (a gloss, mind you.)

I didn't go back to that store until he stopped managing. The guys who work there now are a good lot, and are pretty easy going. They know I spend a lot so they excuse me if I don't use their cements or paintbrushes, where now I only use the paints.

@Scipio Africanus, would he complain about your shoes and your phone not being GW products too? What a moron.

ok, so once i walked into the store and as i walked in i notice the guy at the counter ogling my cleavage. i ignore him but then he starts trying to chat me up and is using all of these filthy pickup lines. finally, he overhears me requesting a heavy weapons team (i only now realize how many innuendos and double entandres can be made from warhammer terms) and starts telling me something stupid. i think what he said was "id like to stick my ion cannon in your fuel line" or something like that. i left right after that. turns out he didnt even play 40k or any other game, he just dropped in from the adult book/DVD store. a few days later met the same guy outside the hobby shop. he tried hitting on me (badly) until i bluntly explained that i am lesbian (he did not seem detered by that news) and that i have a can of pepperspray in my purse. that showed him.

 OnlyWar wrote:
i think what he said was "id like to stick my ion cannon in your fuel line"

That sounds dangerous.

It was just my words on a experience like others :( i just thaght to share.

spam deleted.


Reds8n

If you have nothing constructive to add to the thread or all you want to do is troll other users then it's best you don't post at all.

hotsauceman1 wrote:That same happened t my store when someone came in with drop zone commander. The Manager said "Why didnt you buy from me, That was money I could use for food" I said to him "You stopped stocking them weeks ago"

 MRPYM wrote:
My local GW manager tried to make me feel guilty about buying GW models from my FLGS and that I was responsible for making sure he has a job and is able to feed his family.

MrMoustaffa wrote:I've been guiltripped by a store that I had bought over $500 worth of models from because I bought $60 worth of stuff online that I knew would take them months to get.

And this is why I don't play in stores. (literally once in the last two decades)

Stuebi wrote:
I have stuff like this very often in the Tabletop scene. Im absolutely fine with people striking up a casual conversation, or introducing themselves if they're into the Hobby as well. But I cant stand people who just walk up to you and then dropping into a lecture and snarky comments "That Paintjob looks bad. That card sucks man. Wow, is that an unpainted Mini?". Usually, I just bark at them once and they leave me alone, but I completely agree that it kills the desire to play in Clubs or the like.

This is the advantage to a club - people like that either change their ways or they got asked not to return. At stores, this tends to happen much less often.

About 2 years ago I started a page on Facebook for gamers in the area to join so they could arrange to meet up and play and just generally chat about gaming. Basically just trying to help out my local gaming community. At this time there was only 1 store in my local area that did Warhammer and Warmachine. This store was about 20 minutes away from me and several other gamers in my town and we would all visit this store often. Eventually another store in my town that previously only stocked comics and RPG games started to carry Warhammer. This store is down the street from my house. So I started to frequent this store more than the one in the next city over. I told the owner of the newer store about my Facebook page and how he should feel free to post events and what not on there, which the owner of the store that is 20 minutes away had been posting his events in almost exclusively since I started the page. As soon as the newer shop owner started posting events in the page I got a nasty message on Facebook from the owner that was 20 minutes away basically telling me that me and my gaming club were not allowed to wear our gaming club logo shirts to his tourneys anymore and that I wasn't allowed to tell people I met while at his store about MY Facebook page. Needless to say I don't shop at that store anymore and last I heard he had to shut down shop. The store closer to home is actually moving into a bigger location. It just left a bad taste in my mouth, getting a nasty message like that on Facebook and being told what to do with my page after it had helped get the word out about his store and generated a lot of profits for him.

A lot of store operators don't get it. Treating regulars poorly like that is just asking to drive away business.

SBG wrote:
A lot of store operators don't get it. Treating regulars poorly like that is just asking to drive away business.

It's just immaturity and a lack of professionalism. Think about it; if you've ever worked in Retail before (I worked at a Starbucks in the middle of a busy mall for over a year), you tend to get thoughts like "man, that dude was a dick. If I were the owner, I'd kick him out" or something like that. But, when you think about it, you really can't do that. What some small business owners don't realize is that gak rolls downhill, so if you talk down to someone who previously liked your store, they'll tell friends all about their terrible experience and drive their money away from you. That's why so many large companies have those surveys, because they want to make sure they're constantly getting your money.

Can't believe how many accounts there are of shop owners complaining about the products their customers use, it's madness. Not sure if half of them even understand customer service or even just common politeness. It's like they are on a crusade to make sure no one ever sets foot near them unless everything they own has bee bought from their store alone, madness.

 McNinja wrote:

SBG wrote:
A lot of store operators don't get it. Treating regulars poorly like that is just asking to drive away business.

It's just immaturity and a lack of professionalism. Think about it; if you've ever worked in Retail before (I worked at a Starbucks in the middle of a busy mall for over a year), you tend to get thoughts like "man, that dude was a dick. If I were the owner, I'd kick him out" or something like that. But, when you think about it, you really can't do that. What some small business owners don't realize is that gak rolls downhill, so if you talk down to someone who previously liked your store, they'll tell friends all about their terrible experience and drive their money away from you. That's why so many large companies have those surveys, because they want to make sure they're constantly getting your money.

This is pretty much what happened. I still went to the store 20 minutes away on occasion as did the other guys just out of loyalty. Once I got that message I told the guys in my club about it and basically his warhammer events went from about 20 guys(which is a crazy good amount for a 1 day FLGS tourney)to about 8-10 guys.

 Glaiceana wrote:
Can't believe how many accounts there are of shop owners complaining about the products their customers use, it's madness. Not sure if half of them even understand customer service or even just common politeness. It's like they are on a crusade to make sure no one ever sets foot near them unless everything they own has bee bought from their store alone, madness.

If the store is your main source of income, in can make you act in strange ways to protect your livelihood. Not justifying the actions of over zealous owners, but it helps to understand their perspective on occassion.

On Topic: We had a bit of an uproar when a 'private gaming group' made up of regulars took over a specific night at an FLGS (with the FLGS's blessing) after they lost some of their regular space to RPG players. The store required you were of a certain rewards level standing to attend and the group wanted everyone to either be vouched in or pledge (or something, my memory is foggy).

The private group ended up being more trouble than it was worth, and as such has been disbanded. The regulars still play on the same night, it just took some time and perspective to realize that privatizing isn't often a superior options to inclusiveness.

When I owned a business, the only person I banned was some girl who said she hopes my dad dies a week after we found out about his cancer, she is also lucky my girlfriend at the time dived in the way as having a uterus isn't a valid reason not to get a slap and we had all kinds of scummy miscreants patronage.

When will independent businesses learn that you haven't got an endless stream of custom and you need to protect your assets because if you suck at what you do, there's damn sure someone better at it who just needs to get the money together, and one day, they will.

We've got some minor, and stupid drama forming at the store I play HeroClix at. Because it was New Years Day and most people had the day off, we were going to run 2 events today and just make a day of HeroClix, etc... First event was, "your collection is brand new?!" and you could only use figures made in the past year and a few other rules. Sounded like a fun event, and kept a lot of the cheese out of the event, by instituting a comp of sorts. I was really looking forward to that one. The second event was an arena where everyone had a figure of various points and we would all fight on a map and last man standing won that round. Whomever won the most rounds would win the event. That was supposed to be run after the first event, but the guy running that event had NYD dinner at like 3pm (this event was supposed to be at 6:30) So he moved it up to 12:30, and it would overlap the first event. Since he had to leave early, he moved it up so that when his event was finished everyone would basically leave, because his event would still be going on when the original first event was slated to start.

So the guy running the first event canceled and said, "No event, because I've been bumped from my time slot by so and so." I told the guy that moved his event up that I was really looking forward to the other event, and most likely wouldn't be showing up to his event.

Woo stupid drama >_<

But the upside to this was, I got to watch the NHL Winter Classic instead

 McNinja wrote:

SBG wrote:
A lot of store operators don't get it. Treating regulars poorly like that is just asking to drive away business.

It's just immaturity and a lack of professionalism. Think about it; if you've ever worked in Retail before (I worked at a Starbucks in the middle of a busy mall for over a year), you tend to get thoughts like "man, that dude was a dick. If I were the owner, I'd kick him out" or something like that. But, when you think about it, you really can't do that. What some small business owners don't realize is that gak rolls downhill, so if you talk down to someone who previously liked your store, they'll tell friends all about their terrible experience and drive their money away from you. That's why so many large companies have those surveys, because they want to make sure they're constantly getting your money.

Yep.

Which is why people that open stores as gamers first and businessmen second should probably just take the 100k-200k they are going to inevitably blow on it, and give it to a charity where it will do some good.


You explain the exact mentality, coupled with poor business knowledge / sense / experience as to why many stores end up shuttering - even past the statistical norm that most retail places close within the first 1-5 years anyway.

With a patron community as insular and cliquey as wargaming, if you screw one person over, the entire local community will hear about it. Might not impact you, but it might, and if it does, there's only so many customers in a 50 mile area that might be willing to regularly patron your store. Alienating any of them unless for extremely justifiable cause (theft, illegality of any kind, etc etc) is taking a gamble with your business.

The best store owners make every regular patron think, while they are there, that they are one of their good buddies. And certainly treat every patron, even non-regulars, with friendly respect. Even if when that patron leaves, the first words muttered under the owner's breath are "what a dick."

... that and some rudimentary business knowledge, ofc.

 cvtuttle wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:

As it is, there used to be a store in Preston, called Worthy Games. Now, this was a great store. However, the owner had, as it turned out, no actual interest in it, in fact he disliked it, and only used it to fuel his painting commission company (that was bleeding money like a slit artery). Any way, things where fine for the first few months. Until after Yule. Then the signs started. Little things, like orders not being fulfilled, and shelves being left un-stocked.
Anyway, that summer, 11 months after it had opened there was a massive sale, and the store closed. I was there on the last day, up to the final closing. I remember buying hundreds of pounds worth of stuff for around £20-£30 (90% reductions in some cases ).
But the real kicker was this: the store owed Red Steel, the club, money. Allot of money. And did he pay up? No. Instead, he pointed to some terrain that one of the floor staff had painted for us in good faith, and said that the job was equal to the value. It wasnt, not by a long chalk. Whats more, some of the terrain packs promised to the club where sold back to the suppliers. And there was nothing we could do about it.

I know at least one other person who got screwed big time by Worthy. Bunch of thieves.

The floor staff where excellent. It was actually one of them whom painted the terrain for us, as he just wanted to help us get it all done (there was a lot).
It was the owner/manager/suprme overlord who was the real problem.

@ Applefox-that is really screwed over and i hope that that sick fether gets put away for a good long time. That kind of person is a disgrace to all, not just the hobby.
I also hope that you are okay and that this incident has not put you off the hobby. There a precious few ladys as it is.

I hope that guy had his frag grenades. recede up back into him via the foot network.

 Scipio Africanus wrote:
... He then comes into the store with his miniature (which was clearly oversprayed) and refuses to give me my spray can back on the basis that "it wasn't a GW product" and "I shouldn't be using it in his store."

Ah, I think this is where I would snap that tiny bit.
A reply around the line of: "I loaned you the use of my property and you refuse to give it back... really? You have shown quite admirably that it IS mine, shall we discuss this with the police or will you be a chum and hand it over? I will assume you had lost your mind just for a moment."
The sense of entitlement is quite extraordinary.
I really wonder what people really imagine would happen acting like that.

I tend to not reward bad behavior so I do whatever it takes to gain some measure of justice in these matters so he thinks twice before he tries it again on anyone (don't care quite so much about me).

I think some of the issues from some store owners comes from the customers themselves. Note that Im not blaming people in this thread or anything, just customers in general.

For example, lets take customers bringing in models they didn't buy at the store. That in itself isn't a big deal. Most store owners wouldn't even notice. But I've seen players who come in to use the tables, set up their army, and then loudly brag that they bought their whole army online for far cheaper than they could have gotten it in the store, often times right in front of new customers or the owner. In this instance I'd imagine a store owner would quickly build a negative view of customers

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
I think some of the issues from some store owners comes from the customers themselves. Note that Im not blaming people in this thread or anything, just customers in general.

For example, lets take customers bringing in models they didn't buy at the store. That in itself isn't a big deal. Most store owners wouldn't even notice. But I've seen players who come in to use the tables, set up their army, and then loudly brag that they bought their whole army online for far cheaper than they could have gotten it in the store, often times right in front of new customers or the owner. In this instance I'd imagine a store owner would quickly build a negative view of customers

Jesus... that takes some brass balls to do. Wouldn't be surprised if someone who did that was warned, and if he kept doing it, banned from the establishment.

I mean that's someone who is actively trying to turn not only his own business away from the store, but others as well, and then has the balls to come in and flaunt it, and not just flaunt it - openly promulgate it to others in an encouraging manner.



... and yeah, store owners disliking customers isn't out of the norm. A smart businessman doesn't let it show though. You shouldn't bite the hand that feeds you. You should absolutely never bite the jerks hand that is holding money he intends to give you.

It can be hard to treat clients your lukewarm and out and out don't like in the same manner as those you genuinely like, but it's the best way to do business, unless a client honest and truly is just more pain and effort than they are worth.