Store owner complains about Kickstarter and Twitter and D&D

[Lanefan]

Keep in mind also there's still a fair-sized cadre of people out there for whom shopping online for anything is something they just won't do; be it due to lack of know-how and-or technology (uncommon these days), lack of trust around either privacy or transaction (very common), or having been ripped off or scammed online in the past (sadly, increasingly common).

Then there's also people like me, who simply prefer to have the thing we buy physically put in our hands at the same time we pay for it, having had a chance to look at it first with our own eyes rather than through the perhaps-distorted lens of an online presentation.

 

[Morrus]

Keep in mind also there's still a fair-sized cadre of people out there for whom shopping online for anything is something they just won't do; be it due to lack of know-how and-or technology (uncommon these days), lack of trust around either privacy or transaction (very common), or having been ripped off or scammed online in the past (sadly, increasingly common).

Then there's also people like me, who simply prefer to have the thing we buy physically put in our hands at the same time we pay for it, having had a chance to look at it first with our own eyes rather than through the perhaps-distorted lens of an online presentation.

That makes you an outlier. Companies don’t make decisions based on outliers.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

It's the same in traditional book publishing, only the publishers give the stores permission to strip the cover off the book and mail it back for a full refund on the cost of the book. It's barbaric and wasteful.

That system was built when printing costs were negligible compared to the gains from getting the book out there. Waste is easy when it costs very little. Waste is now extremely expensive (both because print costs are high, but even so is recycling/garbage fees).

I honestly am okay with waste being expensive. I think it should be more expensive (and more expensive for more things) so that business practices end that rely on waste for profit.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Keep in mind also there's still a fair-sized cadre of people out there for whom shopping online for anything is something they just won't do; be it due to lack of know-how and-or technology (uncommon these days), lack of trust around either privacy or transaction (very common), or having been ripped off or scammed online in the past (sadly, increasingly common).

Then there's also people like me, who simply prefer to have the thing we buy physically put in our hands at the same time we pay for it, having had a chance to look at it first with our own eyes rather than through the perhaps-distorted lens of an online presentation.

My comic and game store exists (and makes decent money) catering to us "outliers" (not as uncommon as people think we are, either).

 

[John Dallman]

As a small comic and game store owner myself, we bring in whatever our customers want to buy ...

You're trying harder than the last two game shops in my town.

The one that recently went out of business was simply too disorganised to order stuff reliably, not helped by the collapse in efficiency of the main UK distributor after they'd acquired an effective monopoly.

The one that went out of business over a decade ago simply lied about what was available through that same distributor, who were efficient at the time. This got to the point where I rang the distributor myself to check what they had, then went back to the shop and stood over them while they ordered the stuff.

At some point, you have to consider how hard you're prepared to work to "support" a retailer who doesn't seem to want the business. Buying PDFs online is just easier.

 

[Morrus]

The one that went out of business over a decade ago simply lied about what was available through that same distributor, who were efficient at the time. This got to the point where I rang the distributor myself to check what they had, then went back to the shop and stood over them while they ordered the stuff.

Thai happened to me at the Forbidden Planet in Southampton. They didn’t stock our Judge Dredd RPG. They stocked Judge Dredd comics and RPGs, but not our game. When asked why by one of my friends they claimed they’d tried to but the distributor didn’t stock it. I knew perfectly well that the distributor had thousands of copies in their warehouse.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

You're trying harder than the last two game shops in my town.

The one that recently went out of business was simply too disorganised to order stuff reliably, not helped by the collapse in efficiency of the main UK distributor after they'd acquired an effective monopoly.

The one that went out of business over a decade ago simply lied about what was available through that same distributor, who were efficient at the time. This got to the point where I rang the distributor myself to check what they had, then went back to the shop and stood over them while they ordered the stuff.

At some point, you have to consider how hard you're prepared to work to "support" a retailer who doesn't seem to want the business. Buying PDFs online is just easier.

Yeah, it's true. I can't speak for retailers who aren't any good at it.

It's not really rocket science. I started at the age of 19 with no business experience whatsoever and 28 years later, I support a family of 4, 5 employees (including paying them during COVID shutdowns), and even bought a house in one of the 10 most expensive cities in the world, on the income of the store. You gotta put in the work, though.

It's a simple formula (that's clearly hard for some people to grasp):
1) Learn what your customers want to buy.
2) Get it for them.
3) Profit.

Obviously there's a LOT of tricks and trip-ups in there that can get complicated, but the basic premise is simple!

 

[SAVeira]

Sorry, it is hard to feel sorry for my local gaming store when I asked them to order some Call of Cthulhu books for me and they refused. I had even offered to prepay. Only interested in D&D and Pathfinder, plus those books had to be from major publishers. I understanding not wanting to get stuck with inventory that you cannot sell, I was offering cash in advance for produce.

 

[Jer]

It's a simple formula (that's clearly hard for some people to grasp):
1) Learn what your customers want to buy.
2) Get it for them.
3) Profit.

Where's the steps where you tell your customers what they should be buying and then mock them for wanting things you don't think they should be playing?

(At least two game stores in different cities where I've lived seemed to operate on the "the owner knows what you should be playing and you should listen to him" model. Neither of them are in business anymore though they survived longer than you'd think. The 90s were weird.)

 

[Morrus]

It's a simple formula (that's clearly hard for some people to grasp):
1) Learn what your customers want to buy.
2) Get it for them.
3) Profit.

You missed out the first stage. The thing you presumably did 30 years ago.

0) Get some customers.

That's the hard bit. Once you have them, you can cater for them. But getting the word out these days is hard. Whether you're a publisher or a retailer.