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Supporting RPGs: Company or Hobby Store?
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<blockquote data-quote="Mercule" data-source="post: 3006977" data-attributes="member: 5100"><p>My understanding of the standard argument for using the FLGS is that you are helping to support a place where it's possible for someone to "just happen" to wander in and pick up a game to play. I guess that extra $10 or so that you pay vs. Amazon is a donation toward perpetuating the hobby.</p><p></p><p>Under that thought process, one should rarely, if ever, buy from Amazon -- or any online dealer, since it's not bloody likely that anyone's going to be thumbing through books there and make an impulse purchase to get into gaming. It also means that, in a town w/o a FLGS, one should probably buy books from B&N, Borders, etc. (brick and mortar, not online) because that encourages those retailers to stock the product, which also increases the odds of someone stumbling across an RPG and getting involved. Again, that extra $10 goes toward sustaining the hobby.</p><p></p><p>I would think that the answer to your question would be that you should buy locally because that let's the profit go for what basically amounts to advertising. If the theory that you should buy locally vs. from Amazon holds true, then you're actually helping promote your designer more by buying locally than buying directly from them. After all, if you buy from them, they make more money today, but they don't have the exposure to build/maintain a market (because of the FLGS closing or not carrying their product).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Mercule, post: 3006977, member: 5100"] My understanding of the standard argument for using the FLGS is that you are helping to support a place where it's possible for someone to "just happen" to wander in and pick up a game to play. I guess that extra $10 or so that you pay vs. Amazon is a donation toward perpetuating the hobby. Under that thought process, one should rarely, if ever, buy from Amazon -- or any online dealer, since it's not bloody likely that anyone's going to be thumbing through books there and make an impulse purchase to get into gaming. It also means that, in a town w/o a FLGS, one should probably buy books from B&N, Borders, etc. (brick and mortar, not online) because that encourages those retailers to stock the product, which also increases the odds of someone stumbling across an RPG and getting involved. Again, that extra $10 goes toward sustaining the hobby. I would think that the answer to your question would be that you should buy locally because that let's the profit go for what basically amounts to advertising. If the theory that you should buy locally vs. from Amazon holds true, then you're actually helping promote your designer more by buying locally than buying directly from them. After all, if you buy from them, they make more money today, but they don't have the exposure to build/maintain a market (because of the FLGS closing or not carrying their product). [/QUOTE]
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