If you shopped at WalMart.com...

[Enceladus]

I feel a little guilty not buying from my local shop.

I don't.

But then I spend an obscene amount of money there on other stuff.

 

[CrusaderX]

That's right. Keep buying books from Amazon and Wal-Mart and when your local game store goes out of business you will only have those two to choose from.

Small comic and game shops are hurting nationwide because they can't compete with big chain stores or massive online retailers. But the one thing they do offer is variety. I just dare you to try and convince Wal-Mart to special order you some small press d20 supplement or a specific mini you want for your new character.

Support your local stores. Sure you may have to pay a little bit more, but by supporting their presence in the community you are contributing to the health of your hobby in general.

Which of course only applies if you actually have a local game store. Alot of us don't. So thank goodness for Amazon and Wal-Mart.

 

[Goobermunch]

My personal bitterness at Wal-mart comes from a different angle. I ordered from them because they had a good price and an early release date.

When the release date fell through, I went looking elsewhere and found a local shop that will actually beat their price, so I cancelled my order. I received a cancellation email.

Now, I've suddenly discovered that Wal-Mart won't guarantee they've cancelled the order! Even though my delivery date has been moved back to August 5-12, Wal-mart wants me to believe that they can't kill my order in their system.

There's that pesky customer service thing everyone talks about in relation to the FLGS.

--G

 

[Dark Psion]

Well, the Player's Handbook and DM Guide shipped today, so its a race between them and the Monster Manual to get here first.


As to the whole FLGS, I don't have a local shop and the few in OKC were not very friendly back when I used to shop there. I would usually have to go to several shops and book stores just to track down 4 or 5 books.

Now online, I have lots of places all offering the books I want to buy, so, yes I can now be price aware.

 

[drnuncheon]

My personal bitterness at Wal-mart comes from a different angle. I ordered from them because they had a good price and an early release date.

When the release date fell through, I went looking elsewhere and found a local shop that will actually beat their price, so I cancelled my order. I received a cancellation email.

Now, I've suddenly discovered that Wal-Mart won't guarantee they've cancelled the order! Even though my delivery date has been moved back to August 5-12, Wal-mart wants me to believe that they can't kill my order in their system.

I have had nothing but excellent customer service experience with Walmart. I am sure that if the item arrives after you tried to cancel it, they will be more than happy to handle your needs.

A couple of Christmases ago, just after returning from our honeymoon, I ordered an item for my wife from walmart.com that was on clearance. Well, it never arrived. I called them up, and lo! they were out of the item - so I substituted another item with no fuss whatsoever.

That never arrived. The tracking said it had, but when we contacted the delivery company, they said 'oh, we left it outside your door'. In an apartment building. Well, no wonder. And yet, despite it not being their fault, Walmart was willing to send me another replacement at no cost (which I had shipped to me at my workplace, and which arrived just fine).

To cap it off, it turns out that the second shipment had been rescued by a neighbor from some nosey kids, and it was in his apartment. And the first shipment hadn't arrived because the US Postal Service had gotten screwed up and was still holding some of our mail (but not all of it!) from after our honeymoon.

The most difficulty I had in that entire experience was trying to get them to take their stuff back because I hadn't paid for it.

So, for me, Walmart Customer Service = excellent.

J

 

[weiknarf]

My FLGS is sold out of the PHB 3e.

Still has MM and DMG!


[edit: tags]

 

[ninjajester]

treebore said:

I do not support my local store because I told him i would buy from him if he would give me a 20%. He said that wasn't enough of a profit to make it worth his time. I said,"I guess that means you will be happy with zero profit."

Since then I went back to him and asked him if he would change his mind. I did this after showing him my printed list of all the gaming products I have bought to date, which retailed for over $3,000.00. He still said no.

Taloncomics, can you give me any insight to why I shouldn't think this guy is cutting his own throat?

--
so basically you're telling us that this guy is cutting his own throat because he refused to lose money on a sale with a pushy customer?

i hate to tell you this, but zero profit is a much better deal than negative profit... he was right to tell you he wasn't going to cut you a deal that would cost him money, because then you would expect it everytime you came in. maybe not you in particular, but you as in "the general public".

and why are you keeping a printed list of all the gaming products you've bought so far? that sounds kind of anal retentive to me, but maybe i'm missing something.

here's the point: wal mart releases stuff before street date ALL THE TIME. they do it on music and movies, so why not do it with books too? no one slaps them down for this, because they are wal mart; they're too big to be slapped down by most people. wal mart and amazon will eventually force all the smaller stores to close, simply because they can afford to sell everything cheaper than the small stores. and when wal mart and amazon are the only ones left, their price cuts will be gone too...

 

[TalonComics]

Which of course only applies if you actually have a local game store. Alot of us don't. So thank goodness for Amazon and Wal-Mart.

And there are plenty of FLGSs who also maintain a website presence as well as an actual physical store. Heck, I'm one of those type of stores but there are plenty besides me.

Even EN World has a sponsored store by rpg shop. What's wrong with ordering from them?

As I've said before, I just want to see people support retailers that *really* support promoting gaming instead of retailers who are just taking advantage of it.

~D

 

[Kryndal Levik]

Checked my account status at Amazon.com today- mine are on their way...

 

[Olive]

There's that pesky customer service thing everyone talks about in relation to the FLGS.

Sure, but there's a LOT of people who don't suporter their 'f'lgs, precisely because the service is so bad. Derek is a good service person, but there are some morons and scum bags and all out patronising bastards who run gaming shops...