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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Imperialus" data-source="post: 1908461" data-attributes="member: 893">My own FLGS (The Sentry Box) has been in buisness for over 20 years now and is still doing really well.  As a matter of fact it recently became the only kid on the block precicely because it took the advice of almost everyone here.It's located in a  2 story wherehouse with about 22,000 sq feet of space, the top floor which you enter though is dedicated to gaming and it forms a sort of L shape overlooking the the lower floor that contains the store.  The upper floor also has the bathrooms, a handful of old arcade games (Dungons and Dragons, Joust, Bubble Bobble ext.) and used to have a separate room off of the entrance that had about a dozen LAN computers in it for gaming (the room was removed for profitability reasons).  Immidiately to the left of the door is a bulleten board which for a small fee (5 or 6 bucks I think) you can post a one page advertisement on it.  The board is also used to announce upcoming tournaments.  There is also a back room with a candy machine and a separate entrance that can be rented for use after hours.  The furature in the gaming area consists of a number of booths along the long part of the L designed for card players and small role playing groups while the bottom of the L which is wider has folding buffet style tables and chairs set up for the wargamers and roleplayers with larger groups.  The actual store has a large selection of sci fi and fantasy novels along the east wall.  Directly in front of the cash register at the bottom of the stairs are the Warhammer minis and a little further to the west are a selection of board games with some of the geekier versons of Monopoly along with Settlers of Catan Cathedral and a few others.  Not a huge selection but it seems to do pretty brisk buisness praticularly around christmas.  To the South and East there is another set of stairs going up which leads to a separate room containing historical wargames and scale models.  Directly under the door there is another counter that deals exclusively with CCG's.The rest of the store to the west streaching the entire length of the long part of the L above is dedicated to RPGs of every variaty.  There is a small used section mostly specializing in vintage stuff and is priced accordingly.  They carry everything from RoleMaster to GURPS to D20 and although D20 assumes most of the shelf space nearly every game immagineable is represented.  Directly under the short part of the L is the stores office and storage rooms.All and all what I would suggest is finding a wearhouse in a light commercial district bus routs tend to be pretty good around them and rent would be much cheeper per sq foot than a regular storefront.  Since it is unlikely to have may normal oppertunities for signage and the like I'd make really good friends with a local sign manufacturing company and get custom vinal on corplast signs to let passers by realize that you are an acutal store not a wearhouse.  Advertise like there's no tommorow, try and time your store's opening with a local con and pass out flyers like your life depends on it.Anyhow that's my advice I realize most of it has been said but everyones suggestions seem to jive with what I have seen work.</blockquote>

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