Looking for advice on starting a store & initial inventory

[Eyes of Nine]

Keystone is when a retailer marks up products 100% instead of using the MSRP. For an FLGS (I'm not familiar with other retailers) we typically pay around 55-60% of a product's msrp, so the profit on each sale is around 40-45%. Keystone prices are marked up 100%, so the retailer gets 50% of the sale price. This isn't true for all distributors; I just set up an account with the Arcane Library to start carrying Shadowdark, and their discount is 50%, which is very generous. There are a couple of other publishers who do this (usually if you buy direct from small indie publishers); a lot of the zines I carry that I get direct from the publisher are sold at 50% of MSRP.

Oh I know what keystone means. I'm hard-headed, but I did learn some of the retail lingua franca during my 16 years in hobby retail...

I was responding to this quote:

In 45 years of gaming and living/shopping across America, I've never seen a gameshop charge keystone. I imagine I haven't because it's an excellent way to drive off customers.

I was wondering if the person who said he's never seen a game retailer charge keystone. Because to me that's just a ridiculous statement. Keystone is directly related to a retailer's cost of goods and has nothing to do with the Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Prices (aka MSRP) printed on some products. How can anyone even know what every retailer-ever-visited's cost on every good in their store is? "Oh, I'm visiting from out of town, thought I'd pop in. Can I have unlimited access to your point of sale/accounting system to see the cost of every single item on your shelves?"

Patently nonsensical.

Since sentence one seems so outrageously uninformed, I can't even engage with sentence two.

Unless the person who wrote that meant something else by "charge keystone". Which I think they did, but can't be sure, which is why I asked what they meant by "keystone" in their post. I literally meant just Elvish Lore - what did they mean by "keystone" in that one post.

Maybe they meant MSRP, which is a totally different thing. But one that I can argue with at least.

 

[TheSword]

A lot will depend on what country you are in? This advice is based on England, may not apply everywhere.

You probably have this covered already. But on the coffee side of things, there are some very good auto-grind push button espresso machines. You don’t want to be banging handles around and taking ages to make a coffee when you want to be chatting to customers and talking about products. They automatically dose the coffee and you heat the milk separately like you would with normally. Margins on coffee can be excellent 80%+ and there are options for upsell on syrups, milk alternatives etc. There are options for self serve but you miss out on upsell and the perceived value of a coffee you made yourself is lower. If you’re staffing anyway I’d get them to do it.

Regarding inventory Games Workshop is worth considering if there isn’t a store in your town. Not sure what country you are in but I’m pretty sure they have concession stands that hold a small amount of main-line stock. They are expensive but it has massive name recognition and will bring people in.

I would build high margin impulse product (ideally consumable) into your layout design. Around your tills and waiting area. Dice for example. But also snack consumables - market research to work out what products you want to sell.

Also don’t forget to invest in CCTV system. Don’t waste time on getting an expensive contractor to do it. The kits you can get are very good. You want it to be easily viewable but not by customers. Make sure you put clear signage up it’s a deterrent but also very useful to actually catch people, you’d be amazed how much credit card fraud and petty theft happens repeatedly if someone things security measures aren’t in place.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

I was visiting San Francisco this weekend, and my wife and I needed a quick espresso. We went into this place on a Sunday afternoon and IT WAS PACKED. Every indoor table full of people playing board games, and even on a chilly day, a few tables outside had some folks. 50%+ of people presented as not-dudes, my wife was amazed.

We ended up not getting anything there because we wanted something to go and the line was 7 customers deep.

If amount of customers and players is a metric, then this game cafe is winning...

So, I think you are onto a good idea in the OP @deadites89 . One thing they had going for them was a GREAT location. On one of the main streets in that neighborhood, very close to public transit (important in SF), and a large space - easily 3-4000 sq feet (275-375 sq meters).

The Game Parlour

www.thegameparlour.com

 

[Elvish Lore]

Oh I know what keystone means. I'm hard-headed, but I did learn some of the retail lingua franca during my 16 years in hobby retail...

I was responding to this quote:



I was wondering if the person who said he's never seen a game retailer charge keystone. Because to me that's just a ridiculous statement. Keystone is directly related to a retailer's cost of goods and has nothing to do with the Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Prices (aka MSRP) printed on some products. How can anyone even know what every retailer-ever-visited's cost on every good in their store is? "Oh, I'm visiting from out of town, thought I'd pop in. Can I have unlimited access to your point of sale/accounting system to see the cost of every single item on your shelves?"

Patently nonsensical.

Since sentence one seems so outrageously uninformed, I can't even engage with sentence two.

Unless the person who wrote that meant something else by "charge keystone". Which I think they did, but can't be sure, which is why I asked what they meant by "keystone" in their post. I literally meant just Elvish Lore - what did they mean by "keystone" in that one post.

Maybe they meant MSRP, which is a totally different thing. But one that I can argue with at least.

Overall, be less obnoxious and less arrogant in the future. It'll get you further in life.

I was referring to game stores charging above MSRP which are noted on the products that I've looked at. I've never seen it at a game store.

It's not nonsensical. It's not outrageously uninformed. IT'S MY EXPERIENCE.

 

[deadites89]

Hiya! I'm probably one of the folks you can talk to about this. I've owned a Comic and Game store for 31 years.

In my experience, you can expect your discount to be about 40% off - or to look at it another way, your cost is 60% of retail. This may not take into account shipping charges, which are insane at the moment. So, in the discussion above, you may have trouble matching MSRP even without charging "keystone". Or you can, but you just won't have very good margins. But then, so what else is new? You're in it for the love, right?

Right? Because it's a lot of work, and the money ain't great.

That said, it's awesome to do and you really can make a decent living, once your volume gets to the right place. For me, I now make enough to support a family of four, but it took me about ten years to get there. I never lost money doing it, but I didn't make much during my first decade. Luckily for me, I was young then, and didn't have much in the way of expenses either.

OTOH, perhaps you can make up for low margins on games, with your coffee sales. I have no idea how to run a coffee shop. If you have that in place, I can see the two sides of your business bouncing off each other in positive ways.

If you're lucky, you can get the business to the point (like I often do) where you can run games while your employees do the clerk-thing (or in your case, barista-thing). Treat the employees well. You'll want them to stick around.

Any questions?

Thank you so much for taking the time to write out a lengthy reply. I also appreciate the optimism. So far when asking questions all I hear are bad things so its nice to hear a success story. I won't be selling a ton of stuff as the main focus is the coffee side of things, but I still would like to have some inventory to sell. If you have any other advice for the planning stage of things let me know! Thank you for writing that though, it will help me finish filling out my financial plan for that side of the business.

 

[deadites89]

I was visiting San Francisco this weekend, and my wife and I needed a quick espresso. We went into this place on a Sunday afternoon and IT WAS PACKED. Every indoor table full of people playing board games, and even on a chilly day, a few tables outside had some folks. 50%+ of people presented as not-dudes, my wife was amazed.

We ended up not getting anything there because we wanted something to go and the line was 7 customers deep.

If amount of customers and players is a metric, then this game cafe is winning...

So, I think you are onto a good idea in the OP @deadites89 . One thing they had going for them was a GREAT location. On one of the main streets in that neighborhood, very close to public transit (important in SF), and a large space - easily 3-4000 sq feet (275-375 sq meters).

The Game Parlour

www.thegameparlour.com

Again thank you for the positivity! I've been so nervous to ask questions cause most times when I did on reddit I was met with an insane amount of negativity. I'm actually taking things a step further with my place. (I'm not sure if this will be good idea or just an extra expense) I'm actually having a couple tables made that have the tv in the center of the table to allow TTRPG players nice spot to run their games. I have one of the tables at my house and its made those games so much easier to run. Thank you for taking the time to post that!

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Again thank you for the positivity! I've been so nervous to ask questions cause most times when I did on reddit I was met with an insane amount of negativity. I'm actually taking things a step further with my place. (I'm not sure if this will be good idea or just an extra expense) I'm actually having a couple tables made that have the tv in the center of the table to allow TTRPG players nice spot to run their games. I have one of the tables at my house and its made those games so much easier to run. Thank you for taking the time to post that!

It's probably an expense that will pay off long term. Short term It's a gamble. It won't bring immediate money (which you should shoot for as much as possible), but it will probably help word of mouth ("Did you see the tables that they have at xyz?")

So I think your tables are a fine idea - you just can't do too much of that sort of stuff. Prioritize.

If you want, I could recommend some perennial board games that I would expect you to turn over regularly, but many of them are obvious. Also - your customer base will always have some trends that might differ from mine. Pay attention to what they are asking about.

Did you ever mention where you are?

 

[BookTenTiger]

I was visiting San Francisco this weekend, and my wife and I needed a quick espresso. We went into this place on a Sunday afternoon and IT WAS PACKED. Every indoor table full of people playing board games, and even on a chilly day, a few tables outside had some folks. 50%+ of people presented as not-dudes, my wife was amazed.

We ended up not getting anything there because we wanted something to go and the line was 7 customers deep.

If amount of customers and players is a metric, then this game cafe is winning...

So, I think you are onto a good idea in the OP @deadites89 . One thing they had going for them was a GREAT location. On one of the main streets in that neighborhood, very close to public transit (important in SF), and a large space - easily 3-4000 sq feet (275-375 sq meters).

The Game Parlour

www.thegameparlour.com

I used the live down the street from there!!! I loved it. Inner Sunset was a wonderful place to live.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

I used the live down the street from there!!! I loved it. Inner Sunset was a wonderful place to live.

Yup, my son lives in Inner Sunset - city enough to be city; but not so city to be overwhelming. He goes to SF State, she works downtown - so it's a perfect spot for them. and perfect for us his parents - we get to go visit him there!

 

[Eyes of Nine]

Thank you so much for taking the time to write out a lengthy reply. I also appreciate the optimism. So far when asking questions all I hear are bad things so its nice to hear a success story. I won't be selling a ton of stuff as the main focus is the coffee side of things, but I still would like to have some inventory to sell. If you have any other advice for the planning stage of things let me know! Thank you for writing that though, it will help me finish filling out my financial plan for that side of the business.

When I owned my store, I was able to live a middle class life, and my wife didn't have to work. I was very lucky however in that the first year I bought my store, Pokemon TCG came out in the US, and I had contacts in Japan, and I was able to gross a very surprising amount of money, enough I was able to buy a modest home in a medium area in Los Angeles. I was also privileged to buy an already existing business on an owner's loan with a bit of down from my folks.

BUT! don't let the nay-sayers get you down. There are 4 things that imho will lead you to success:
1. Location (mentioned above)
2. Focus on your customers and their wants. Ask them what they want, but also pay attention to what they actually do - it's a real thing that people say one thing and do another. But like Fitz said above - pay attention to what they are asking about.
3. make sure you pay attention to your cash flow (mentioned already also)
4. Figure out every single free and dirt cheap way to get your name out there. Dont' be afraid to abandon a marketing method that's not working; and if possible, avoid long-term subscriptions/contracts. Except for maybe your domain name.

Good luck, and feel free to DM me if you have specific questions...