Every time I've been to a local gamestore in the last couple of years I've had a very mediocre experience. I'm really not fond of Amazon, but its convenience, speed and lack of trouble far outweights what the local game stores have offered me.
My latest issues was last summer. The Advanced Player's Guide for Pathfinder 2E was announced like three months in advance. I go to my local game store, I ask them to put one copy aside from me and I confirm with them the date it'll release.
Comes release date, I phone them and they tell me they haven't had any news from their distributor and have no idea when the books will come in. I phone every week for four weeks, and they just can't tell me. I even went to another store a little while away and they had the same issue (my guess is that they had the same distributor).
Six weeks after the release of the book, I get phoned and told that they have the book in store. I get there, and the only thing they have is the deluxe edition. I had clearly said I wanted the regular edition but they tell me they only have deluxe editions. I ask them to phone me when they get them.
Four weeks later, I still am without a phone call and I stop at the game store to buy a cheap hourglass and I see the book on the shelves. I ask the owner why I wasn't noticed and I'm being told that they probably checked out my reservation when I came for the deluxe edition and didn't reinstate it when I asked to be notified for the regular edition.
As opposed, one of my coworkers received the book on the date of release with Amazon.
I like the idea of encouraging local game stores, but right now the gap is too big in term of pricing, convenience, service and speed. I have no advantages in any way to shop there. Most books are almost 20% pricier than on Amazon.