Why I refuse to support my FLGS

[GlassJaw]

The browsing and human contact count for a lot in my book.

I think browsing is overrated. The people that are going to buy material from smaller publishers are probably already aware of what the product is from message boards like EN World. You can also read reviews. Browsing isn't worth $10 in my book.

And as Mystery Man said, why not go browse and then by online? $10 more in my pocket is a half a tank of gas or a couple of meals.

Human contact? Yikes. My LGS is the last place I'd want to go if I'm in need of human contact.

 

[smootrk]

OK, I have not read every post in this thread, but I don't think people are really advocating supporting a lousy business. I think the idea is that price is not the only factor to consider.

I like to support some local restaurants in my area. They have good food, great service and a nice atmosphere. I prefer them over the large chains like TGIFridays or Outback even though I might get more food at a lower price. I won't put up with a restaurant that has crappy service, lousy atmosphere or charges exhorbitant prices for ordinary food just because I want to support the local restaurants, but if the cost is only slightly more and other things are equal, I will chose the local place over the chain. A bonus in my mind is that it is much more likely a larger portion of my money will stay in the local economy, and that is a good thing.

A restaraunt is a very good example of the type of things that small game stores need to do.

No, I do not mean food, but look at fancy restaraunts which charge a lot for their food. The ambiance is usually perfect for the occasion. They have many staff who are experts at what they do (Host/hostess, Servers, Chef's). The silverware is polished and perfectly set. And the food is served with excellent presentation.

Now, in my eyes, most games stores do not even come close to having good organization, expert staff, good manners, or even cleanliness enough to compare.... But we see why the excellent restaraunts charge so much... they are excellent in all areas that they can be.

Game stores obviously do not follow this approach, or even attempt to follow an approach that addresses enhancing the experience of visiting their stores. They generally wait behind the counter for you to pick up something to buy. Sure, they might have an answer for a question, but are they enhancing your experience of visiting them? I would say no in most cases.

 

[spectre72]

A new gamer is not going to make sure they buy their dice online. They will not look for the perfect mini for their character online.

I am going to start by saying that not everyone has a LGS to shop at and we have to rely on the internet and mailorder.

And you know what, the game still goes on.

People still show up with dice, miniatures, rulebooks, ...etc.

We get new players all the time, and have a game group in Southern Vermont which numbers over 25 gamers.

If a LGS was to open they would only get my business if they deserved it.

Decent pricing, good service, and none of the BS which seems to plague Games Shops.

I have been way too deeply involved with a couple of different game stores over the last several years either doing demo's for a couple of different companies or as a friend of the owners and I have seen too many of them slit their own wrists and go out of business.

I know that they cannot order at the same discounts as the big retailers but that is only the tip of the iceberg.

Many of the individuals who I have seen open game stores try to run them as clubs for their friends instead of businesses, and if you want to survive as a game store it has to be as a business.

Perhaps some of the people who opened stores in the Pokemon/Magic CCG craze days need to go back to school and figure out how to keep a business running without selling cardboard or plastic crack to their customers.

I am sure there are great LGS out there that deserve our patronage, but could everyone please get off of this crusade to save the LGS since alot of them don't deserve to be saved.

They are not a charity, and if they cannot figure out how to stay in business then they should not be in business.

Most of the individuals who I have been involved with who have run Gaming Stores opened them for the wrong reasons and in the end this is what caused the store to close. They were looking to take advantage of a trend (pokemon, magic, mageknight) or they were big time gamers who thought it would be neat to own a game store.

The problem with both types of stores is that they were rarely opened by someone who understood how to run a retail store.

I could write pages of stuff that I have watched which is just horrible business practice...

Taking money out of the register to take your wife to dinner and not having $$ to pay for your orders which are coming in.

Special ordering books for someone and then selling them to one of your friends after already calling the customer who ordered them and telling them they were in..

Scheduling a pokemon tournament at the same time you scheduled a product demo with someone who had to drive an hour and a half and didn't notify the demo person of the conflict (happened more than once)

Selling MTG cards to 2 people in line, same pack but 2 different prices depending upon how much you like them. And both people hear what the other paid

Ignoring customers while they play games or discuss their campaigns with their friends

And the list goes on and on...

So I will agree that supporting a FLGS is a good idea if you play there or they give you good service, pricing, ...etc.

Could everyone stop the crusade to support LGS because they should only get your support if they deserve it.

If you throw money at one of these bad stores all you are doing is putting a bandaid on a gushing wound, and you could be paying for the owner and his wife to go out to dinner while the store falls apart (like I did more than once :\ )

Been there, done that, not doing it again....

 

[Venport]

Virtually all the people I've gamed with, both casual and serious, I've met via some kind of online source. I would agree that casual gamers don't post on EN World but they certainly make use of the internet to find other players.

Again Belen, I think your view is slightly skewed by the fact that you've had very good experience with gaming stores in the past. I certainly haven't and I've heard more negative comments about people's LGS than positive.

I Started Gaming about a year and half ago, I was a casual gamer, however i still wanted to konw more, the internet is the only place you can ask questions 24\7 and is one of the easyest way to find more info. However i bleave the FLGS are critical to the hobby suviving.

I do also think that it all depends on the LGS, I can think of 4 Gaming stores in the area where i live (i think there are more but i would have to chekc) there is 1 THAT I WILL NOT GO TO, the people there are rude and bother me, 1 of the others i will only go to to get my RPG books (25% off of all RPG stuff is a deal, and that's all the time) other than that the owner dose not seem to like RPG players so i will not buy anything else there,

However The other two stores seem to encurage RPGS and are fun places to just stop by to 10-15 min when i have some free time, talk a little about Eberron or whatever the topic is that the time, (maybe the fantasitc 4 movie witch i saw in a pre showing last night GREAST STUFF sorry) and is a frendly envroment

I understand not supporting a store that has rude people and i'm sorry that some are like that.

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

I can guarantee that WOTC does not agree with you.

This would be the same WotC that closed all their game stores?

I have never seen a library, community center, or school run D&D events. I am sure that some may, but I will wager that most do not. Not to mention that these venues do not carry the supplies necessary to start gaming nor can you buy polyhedral dice at any Wal-Mart or bookstore that I have ever seen.

They may not run events, but they provide places to game. And one of the beautiful things about RPGs is you don't need much in the way of supplies. One set of books and a couple sets of dice to share and you are good to go.

I've seen more RPGs run at college game clubs and such lately than at game stores. Most of the game stores I've been in in the past decade have been far more interested in pimping CCGs and now the minis than the RPGs, and they'd rather not see CCGs as a gateway drug to RPGs, since the CCGs bring in more money.

You don't pick up hobbies retail. You pick them up through friends, or relatives. I got into D&D because my Dad knew I'd enjoyed reading the Hobbit and LotR. He saw the boxcover of the edition with the red dragon at a local bookstore (not gamestore) and got it for me for Christmas. A kid at school saw me reading it at lunch, and his Dad had gotten him into wargaming. The group grew from there, and 25 (Christ, I'm old) years later, I'm still interested in the hobby. The only gamestore where I grew up was a hobby-shop run by an ogre who was more interested in the models and RC stuff. He stocked the stuff cause it sold, but I'd say even in the early 80s 50% of our gaming purchases were mail-order, and that was a lot harder then than now.

Chances are that a significant percentage of fresh blood will choose not to enter the hobby without some sort of venue that supports it. A new gamer is not going to make sure they buy their dice online. They will not look for the perfect mini for their character online. They will not find a sense of community online.

To start? No. The first few times, they'll be using the stuff provided by their gamemaster. But if they get hooked, they will. Are you seriously telling me that a demographic that has changed the music and movie industries through their on-line activities is incapable of finding dice on-line, or ENWorld?

ENWorld is the exception, not the rule. For the most part, newbies do not find ENWorld, nor do they find RPGnet. They may find some friends in high school or college, but what happens to people once they are out of school and not meeting people so often any longer? The internet is not the place for a casual gamer. The net is the place that experienced gamers go to chat.

Newbies don't find game stores, either. Or hobby shops, sporting goods stores, or anything else. The stores can nurture, but they can't create. A kid with no knowledge of or interest in RPGs isn't going to go into a game store, any more than he's going to walk into a sporting goods store and discover baseball.

If we're counting on the FLGS to save the hobby, we're already doomed. They are too few, too unfocused, too mismanaged, and too customer-unfriendly. The good ones are outnumbered by the bad. The hobby needs us to teach our kids to game the way our dads taught us to throw a fastball. It needs to ditch the stigma of the unwashed geeks playing in the basement. It needs better marketing, better entry-level products, and better penetration of traditional retail establishments.

What it doesn't need is this attitude that customers should be grateful for the privilege of buying stuff at or above retail with nothing else offered in return, or guilt-trips that we're killing the hobby if we make informed decision as consumers. I would cheerfully support a FLGS if there was one. But it had better be friendly, local, and at least somewhat focused on the kind of gaming that I do.

 

[Zaukrie]

I agree with one of the messages here: if your LGS is not friendly, doesn't know how to run the store as a business....they don't deserve your business.

 

[Belen]

This would be the same WotC that closed all their game stores?

Yes. That would be the same WOTC. Wizards is quite active in supporting gamestores. They have an entire delegate program aimed at helping game stores.

What it doesn't need is this attitude that customers should be grateful for the privilege of buying stuff at or above retail with nothing else offered in return, or guilt-trips that we're killing the hobby if we make informed decision as consumers. I would cheerfully support a FLGS if there was one. But it had better be friendly, local, and at least somewhat focused on the kind of gaming that I do.

And when have I ever stated that people should support the unfriendly local game stores (ULGS)?

To me, it seems like there are a lot of people in this thread who feel the need to justify why they choose Amazon or Wal-mart for their gaming needs. Heck, I used to buy from those venues myself; however, I have since seen the light.

The only online vendor I use is the ENWorld store. This place deserves my support. I have found no other online store worth my money. However, my FLGS has always been there for me. I may pay higher prices than Amazon, but they provide a place to game if I need it, a friendly environment, and they even brew free coffee for their customers if they want it.

 

[farscapesg1]

This would be the same WotC that closed all their game stores?

This is something I had completely forgotten about (since there was never a WOTC store anywhere that I lived). If WOTC is so adamant about the LGS stores being important, you have have an excellent point.

 

[the black knight]

My FLGS applys no discount whatsoever to their merchandise and that's enough to turn me away right there. It doesn't have to be a big discount, mind you, just a little something to show that they're competitive and that they care about their customers. 5% would do it, and that's not a lot, people, but this largely symbolic gesture is one they are utterly indifferent to.

Now, keep in mind that not just a few of these guys OWN their own stores, so it doesn't matter if they're losing money one month and doing well the next; the rent is paid, if you know what I mean, which reemphasizes the fact that they really don't care all that much about gamers in the first place. Personally, I think they just want a place where they can hang out, play D&D, meet new gamers, and stay out of the sun.

It is the illusion of actually being a business that bothers me. And that's why I buy from Amazon.

 

[Glyfair]

This is something I had completely forgotten about (since there was never a WOTC store anywhere that I lived). If WOTC is so adamant about the LGS stores being important, you have have an excellent point.

Actually, the local game stores are glad they closed them. They don't want to compete with stores run by the company that produces a good percentage of the products (even if it was poor competition).

Besides, it wasn't a business they were suited for. That's why they closed them.

This is unlike at least one other gaming company that gained a reputation for requiring retailers to spend money upgrading displays of their products, only to open a store a few blocks away within a couple of months.