Dristram said:
So my question to you all is, when you walk into a game store, what products/games must it have in stock for you to consider the place as a legitimate game store? Feel free to give feedback on non-rpgs as well.
Bento's post is full of excellent advice, especially the marketing survey at local conventions. That should give you a lot of good advice.
Located where you are, I'm guessing you get a lot of through-traffic between the two cities? In my neck of the woods being surrounded by golf courses means you have a lot of rich people with lots of easily detached disposable income, who will leave the wife and kids to shop while they go golf. Find out where these people go and put up your advertising accordingly. Bored kids might = cash.
Go look at the games at boardgamegeek.com, and see which ones are consistantly the highest rated. You might want to start with those. Run demos, especially of fast card games or board games. Offer a discount on games you demo.
Do advertising. Apartment guides are a good place to start; young people moving into an area might be wondering where the local game store is. College kids will probably be looking at those as well, if you're a big college town.
Make sure the store is clean, well-maintained, well-lit and airy. Get advice from, frankly, the 'normalest' female friends you have, especially if they have kids. 'Is this a place you'd feel comfortable shopping in?' is a legit question.
Don't hire your friends. Don't hire the local cat-piss man to man your register. Make sure the guy managing your register is not playing Magic or Ticket to Ride or whatever and ignores the cashwrap. Hire clean-cut people, men and women, who look like they should be manning a professional store. Working at a game store shouldn't mean you get to come to work in your black t-shirt; business casual is good.
Pay attention to the guys and gals that frequent your store. I think you can go search for some of the gaming store horror stories here and on RPG.NET but in short when you identify the socially-marginal freaks that bother other people, suggest they find another place to hang out because they are costing you business.
Now, my personal preferences? Mine are sort of skewed, so you might not get that much in the way of good advice from them. I usually look right past the D&D and WoD stuff. I think you need to carry it, but I'm more likely drawn to the independent stuff. Unfortunately, ordering stuff like that is a total gamble. It all depends on your customer mix. If you guess wrong, it'll sit on your shelves forever. Me - like as not, I might glance at a D&D or WoD thing I have not seen before, and then order if off Amazon. Other things I won't, because Amazon won't offer a discount on them. If I see it at the store, I'll get it.
You haven't mentioned if you have play space.
Bottom-line: There needs to be something that makes people come to your store rather than order off Amazon.
Dragon Snack said:
I'm amazed at the old stock of dead games that some game stores are still carrying (and still trying to get full MSRP for).
Look at your bottom line and see if you can afford 'Discount Days' every quarter. This brings out the bargain hunters and clears your shelves of old crap. One store here used to have 60-70-80 sales. Friday was 60% off. Saturday was 70% off, etc, from things on these tables. You will lose a bit of money, depending on the item, but you get
something for it, which is better than
nothing. It also adds a hidden value to your store: when some people see lots of stuff that hasn't moved in a while, it bothers them. It makes them think less of your store, and some part of them thinks 'Do I really want to shop at this loser place'? Clearing out the dead wood helps.
