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Message: <blockquote data-quote="gamersgambit" data-source="post: 4337269" data-attributes="member: 66022">Chiriton sez...Absolutely.  We offer wireless internet now for a yearly fee (which has made us money, & which I expect to be able to lower the price & do more volume when DDI is good to go).  I should clarify: my business offers many good services; I focus on them.  My customers who play in the store are loyal ones, who appreciate the space I devote to it.  I don't believe I am losing customers in any significant numbers to other stores due to my lack of customer service or services provided (I work hard to ensure that and part of that hard work is posting here, getting the suggestions from you folks that I haven't already heard about!)Also, my business is in no danger of failing.  D&D etc. is only a portion of my revenues.  My problem is, I *want* to keep supporting D&D, but the loss of business (explained perhaps better in the following paragraphs) makes the business side of me more tempted to rededicate the D&D space to other things that make more money...While I have loyal customers as mentioned above, RPG sales amongst those players who *don't* play in the store (and thus have little need for my services) are declining.  Perhaps 8 different groups of 6 players or more each play in the store; but a significantly larger number of gamers who are in different home-based groups used to come to my store to pick up their books, to support the store & the community.  Now those same people come to me to pick up dice, mats, minis, and other things they can't easily obtain online...but they buy their books online.  And the loss of their book business isn't made up by the business they do in accessories.As much as I appreciate the comments about how to improve my customer service--and believe me, I do, and would like to see them keep coming!--the problem that's causing the death of the FLGS isn't the people who would be affected by an improvement in customer service; it's the people who benefitted from the customer service when they started out gaming, then for some reason (usually age/marriage/kids) moved to home gaming and stopped buying their goods at an FLGS in favor of an online or big-box discount solution.In short, the veteran gamers....like myself. The story of my gaming store acquisition is perhaps the biggest illustration of what I'm getting at.  I grew up going to the store I would eventually purchase.  At this store, I met with my long-time GM of 20 years and another player in his game who will feature later in the tale.  Fast forward through a life of working in corporations and making good money doing so to 2007.   My friend above mentioned had worked as a manager in his (new) FLGS and then went on to buy it and turn it into a large success--but one which had to minimize its RPG space due to flagging sales.My former FLGS, having gone through two owners, was going out of business in '07.   I played there occasionally, often going to my friends' basement to play but also playing at the store from time to time.  I knew there was a large community of gamers that would basically dissipate if the store didn't change hands...so I bought it along with my friend above, who was looking to expand.We fixed the place up a great deal--removed the gamer funk, modernized the place so it looked like a real retail space instead of a 1970s throwback, put in flooring, improved customer service, added lots of add-on services and basically renovated both the place and its image.That's where I am today.  I don't expect everyone to do anything even close to what I did--give up a career doing something a lot more lucrative to do something that I am passionate about loving--but I don't think it's so much to ask to support local FLGSes.  Because as a retailer, all of my experiences are with the hundreds of folks in my local area who either remember the store from when they were kids or the people who still go there to play. If I gave the impression that I was relying on the handouts of people to keep my business alive, I apologize.  The business itself is quite successful for a year-old operation; we continue to innovate and expand, and part of that is an increased online presence such as posting here. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />No, what I want--as a gamer and a game store owner--is people to support their FLGSes not to keep them afloat because without your business they would go under, but because the FLGS is important to the entire gaming community. Without support they're not necessarily going to go out of business, but rather go out of the business of //selling RPGs//, which turns them into UNfriendly local gaming stores. (As a side note, I couldn't agree more with posters who say that it is the onus of the FLGS to serve the customer.  That's just good business sense.  The problem is that they need customers (of RPGs) to serve, or they'll stop supporting RPGs.)I am, perhaps, naive in appealing to the community.  I can only state that there are many out there from those I have spoken with who benefitted greatly from FLGSes, and many people are of similar opinions.Perhaps I am also unique in being a gaming store that keeps a large variety of out-of-print and non-D&D/White Wolf RPG materials in store, as well.  I should hope not, but that may be the case.</blockquote>

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