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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