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Why I refuse to support my FLGS
- Thread starter Sebastian Francis
- Start date
HeapThaumaturgist
First Post
I've come to the conclusion that Star Wars as an RPG is an unholy wooly bugger if there ever was one.
I want to say that part of the reason the d20 line died is that they never got it "right enough". Nothing's ever perfect, but the "Revised" book was an entirely different game and even that needs to be heavily patched in most cases. Add to that expensive and ... dunno.
I think more FLGS need to be Non-Gamer Friendly, personally. I'm a gamer. I'm a geek. But I don't LIKE going into most game stores. It seems that the average gaming store is located in a low-rent shopping district about 30 years old, 20 years of which have been spent needing a paint job. The (usual) single plate window is so covered with advert posters and mural paintings that little to no light escapes into the store. The store footprint is small for a speciality shop to begin with, and then they try to pack 3-4 large tables in to give gamers a place to play. The glass counter/register area is where the minis/ccgs are and are usually clogged with shoppers, making checking out difficult. The cramped conditions make browsing difficult. The small quarters mean everybody in the store is talking over themselves and, on the whole, the situation comes across as a dirty little store full of yelling people blocking the way to whatever it is I might want to buy. That's about 5 out of 6 stores.
There's alot of REASONS for those conditions, but y'know where I spend more time reading RPG books and have BOUGHT more RPG books recently? Barnes and Noble. The 'local' B&N here has a VERY thriving fantasy atmosphere ... presentations, talks, and seminars by local authors and fantasy authors, a reading section in the middle of the sci-fi/fantasy area, a pretty hefty selection of books by about the top 6 or so RPG producers, including, last time I was there, RPGO's Blood and Space (which I ALMOST picked up, but had just bought movie tickets and was a little light in the back pocket).
I think the "gaming" store is dying ... but the "geek chic" store might be taking off. I've been in a few game stores that almost had it right. An okay shop in suburban Sacramento CA (forget the name) had one of the best selections of games, RPGs, collectibles, toys, comics, etc that I've run across. We spent at least 200 bucks in there over the last two vacations I've taken to visit my in-laws. The thing I'd most change in that place would be a little decor ... try to make the general appearance of the store more attractive ... and by the RPGs they had 2 old 6' tables and a collection of mismatched chairs, ostensibly for gaming, but I never saw anybody gaming there the times I was in there and mostly it was browsers stealing a spot to sit and read for a bit, including myself. If they moved the tables somewhere else and added some chairs ... no need for really expensive ones, just chairs that say: "We welcome you sitting and hanging out for a while." that would have probably sold me 2-3 more game books. As it was my wife was uncomfortable standing around twiddling her thumbs while I paged through books and I got drug out by the collar rather quickly. If she had somewhere that I could sit her down and put a comic in her hands for a while ... (got the wife hooked on comics, woo!), well, that would've allowed me the time I needed to spend more money there.
EDIT: Which is also what I do at B&N ... so B&N has sold us several trade paperbacks over the last few years as well, when I couldn't get her to relinquish her precious so I could buy my own.
--fje
I want to say that part of the reason the d20 line died is that they never got it "right enough". Nothing's ever perfect, but the "Revised" book was an entirely different game and even that needs to be heavily patched in most cases. Add to that expensive and ... dunno.
I think more FLGS need to be Non-Gamer Friendly, personally. I'm a gamer. I'm a geek. But I don't LIKE going into most game stores. It seems that the average gaming store is located in a low-rent shopping district about 30 years old, 20 years of which have been spent needing a paint job. The (usual) single plate window is so covered with advert posters and mural paintings that little to no light escapes into the store. The store footprint is small for a speciality shop to begin with, and then they try to pack 3-4 large tables in to give gamers a place to play. The glass counter/register area is where the minis/ccgs are and are usually clogged with shoppers, making checking out difficult. The cramped conditions make browsing difficult. The small quarters mean everybody in the store is talking over themselves and, on the whole, the situation comes across as a dirty little store full of yelling people blocking the way to whatever it is I might want to buy. That's about 5 out of 6 stores.
There's alot of REASONS for those conditions, but y'know where I spend more time reading RPG books and have BOUGHT more RPG books recently? Barnes and Noble. The 'local' B&N here has a VERY thriving fantasy atmosphere ... presentations, talks, and seminars by local authors and fantasy authors, a reading section in the middle of the sci-fi/fantasy area, a pretty hefty selection of books by about the top 6 or so RPG producers, including, last time I was there, RPGO's Blood and Space (which I ALMOST picked up, but had just bought movie tickets and was a little light in the back pocket).
I think the "gaming" store is dying ... but the "geek chic" store might be taking off. I've been in a few game stores that almost had it right. An okay shop in suburban Sacramento CA (forget the name) had one of the best selections of games, RPGs, collectibles, toys, comics, etc that I've run across. We spent at least 200 bucks in there over the last two vacations I've taken to visit my in-laws. The thing I'd most change in that place would be a little decor ... try to make the general appearance of the store more attractive ... and by the RPGs they had 2 old 6' tables and a collection of mismatched chairs, ostensibly for gaming, but I never saw anybody gaming there the times I was in there and mostly it was browsers stealing a spot to sit and read for a bit, including myself. If they moved the tables somewhere else and added some chairs ... no need for really expensive ones, just chairs that say: "We welcome you sitting and hanging out for a while." that would have probably sold me 2-3 more game books. As it was my wife was uncomfortable standing around twiddling her thumbs while I paged through books and I got drug out by the collar rather quickly. If she had somewhere that I could sit her down and put a comic in her hands for a while ... (got the wife hooked on comics, woo!), well, that would've allowed me the time I needed to spend more money there.
EDIT: Which is also what I do at B&N ... so B&N has sold us several trade paperbacks over the last few years as well, when I couldn't get her to relinquish her precious so I could buy my own.
--fje
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buzz
Adventurer
I'm still not seeing any clear connection here. One RPG line supposedly gets canceled, and that means D&D, the RPG that created a brand that makes millions of dollars in multiple media is suddenly doomed? And it's also Amazon's fault?BelenUmeria said:
Consumers are allowed to shop for price when the received/perceived value is the same. This whole idea that people "caring only about price" are doing something wrong is just nuts.
The market is changing. That's life. It doesn't mean RPGs are going to vanish into a black hole. The FLGS becomes the FOGS, the meatspace community becomes augmented by the cybespace community, printing and distributiuon technology evolves, etc. As long as humans have brains and continue to be social animals, gaming will exist.
Arashi Ravenblade
First Post
Star wars had insane prices, one of the game shops i go to cant move them and he cant lower them, so there they sit. i dont care if it is an expensive lisence, Mr. Lucas need to not be so greedy and try and gut his faithful fans (especially after 2 horrendous prequals and one fairly descent one).
WOTC books are too expensive as it is. alot of people i know (though not enough to put a dent in there sales) wont even touch a WOTC product bc of the price, so if they dont buy from Amazon or some similar store WOTC still doesnt get money, if they buy from discount online places WOTC still gets there money and games keep coming out as opposed to higher prices and no one buying and the product stopping outright.
Sorry but im not going to spend more money to keep someone in business, your not going to spend 5 bucks on gas because you know the people or like what the people offer who own the gas station when you can get if from joe smoe down the road for 2.50 or less.
Come thanksgiving your not going to spend 2.5 a lb on a turkey when you can get it for a 1 a lb at the major retail chain.
Your not going to spend 800 a month on rent in a tiny little apartment when you can rent one of the same quality accross town for 600.
Your not going to keep your phone provider that charges you a dollar for long distance when you can pay a solid 20 a month no matter your long distance.
Its all about competition and in this country if you cant compete you go out of business, i want to own my own game shop but realisticly i would go under in a year or less i realise that, i know i cant compete with 23 dollar book that i would have to sell for 40.
WOTC books are too expensive as it is. alot of people i know (though not enough to put a dent in there sales) wont even touch a WOTC product bc of the price, so if they dont buy from Amazon or some similar store WOTC still doesnt get money, if they buy from discount online places WOTC still gets there money and games keep coming out as opposed to higher prices and no one buying and the product stopping outright.
Sorry but im not going to spend more money to keep someone in business, your not going to spend 5 bucks on gas because you know the people or like what the people offer who own the gas station when you can get if from joe smoe down the road for 2.50 or less.
Come thanksgiving your not going to spend 2.5 a lb on a turkey when you can get it for a 1 a lb at the major retail chain.
Your not going to spend 800 a month on rent in a tiny little apartment when you can rent one of the same quality accross town for 600.
Your not going to keep your phone provider that charges you a dollar for long distance when you can pay a solid 20 a month no matter your long distance.
Its all about competition and in this country if you cant compete you go out of business, i want to own my own game shop but realisticly i would go under in a year or less i realise that, i know i cant compete with 23 dollar book that i would have to sell for 40.
GlassJaw
Hero
Wow, that's description was spot-on. I definitely agree about the 5 out 6 ratio as well.
Great post overall Heap. You have some good ideas about what gaming stores need to become to survive. Again, I've mentioned some ideas in this thread but complaining about things that aren't going to change in the industry seems to be the order of the day.
It's "you're" in this case. You did it a few times and I failed my Will save so I had to.
Rykion
Explorer
Arashi Ravenblade said:
Most of the things you list are living expenses for most people rather than luxuries. They are not good comparisons to buying games.
I do go to a turkey farm and spend more money on a quality turkey for Thanksgiving. I might pay 200 more for an apartment if the location were more convenient for work or closer to the places I shop.
Service is part of the purchase price of a good. If a store provides good service and a reasonable price, I will shop there. I have repeatedly had poor service from some major online retailers, and only choose those retailers as a last resort.
wingsandsword
Legend
Okay folks, the d20 Star Wars line is not officially dead. There has been no mysterious announcement, no press release of cancellation (for those who haven't checked the separate thread on it). At most was a brief statement to vendors saying nothing planned for the rest of the year (the next 5 months, which is about how far WotC already posts their schedules). They still do regular web columns (Jedi Counseling, series like Dark Forces Saga or Byss and the Deep Core, RPG stats for minis characters), Minis books are coming out with RPG stats (the Revenge of the Sith scenario book had about 6 pages of RPG stats for movie characters). It isn't exactly shining and happy, but it's not over.
With the SWRPG being, at least once, the #2 RPG in the industry, ahead of White Wolf, I really doubt it was not living up to any reasonable expectations of sales (look at what Vampire did for White Wolf, Star Wars was drawing more than that). Lucasfilm was no stranger to RPG licensing, they dealt with West End Games for a decade and knew how it sold (and they certainly knew the approval process and the material going into the games, when Timothy Zahn was writing the Thrawn trilogy, they literally delivered a crate of RPG books to him to use as background).
To keep this FLGS topical: as for saying they were overpriced and your FLGS couldn't move them, they cost only marginally more than comparable D&D books, and my local FLGS (The Rusty Scabbard, Lexington KY) can't keep them in stock. They regularly have to reorder/special order books for people, and sometimes the books are sold out at the distributor, leading people to go online and buy them, sometimes at inflated rates on eBay (a thread on the d20 board said people are paying over $50 for the Power of the Jedi book). I literally bump into new people starting SWRPG campaigns often now, including people who are upset they can't get ahold of books they want. Ever since Episode III came out, I've seen a huge upswing in interest in the RPG, and WotC really seems to have dropped the ball.
With the SWRPG being, at least once, the #2 RPG in the industry, ahead of White Wolf, I really doubt it was not living up to any reasonable expectations of sales (look at what Vampire did for White Wolf, Star Wars was drawing more than that). Lucasfilm was no stranger to RPG licensing, they dealt with West End Games for a decade and knew how it sold (and they certainly knew the approval process and the material going into the games, when Timothy Zahn was writing the Thrawn trilogy, they literally delivered a crate of RPG books to him to use as background).
To keep this FLGS topical: as for saying they were overpriced and your FLGS couldn't move them, they cost only marginally more than comparable D&D books, and my local FLGS (The Rusty Scabbard, Lexington KY) can't keep them in stock. They regularly have to reorder/special order books for people, and sometimes the books are sold out at the distributor, leading people to go online and buy them, sometimes at inflated rates on eBay (a thread on the d20 board said people are paying over $50 for the Power of the Jedi book). I literally bump into new people starting SWRPG campaigns often now, including people who are upset they can't get ahold of books they want. Ever since Episode III came out, I've seen a huge upswing in interest in the RPG, and WotC really seems to have dropped the ball.
was
Adventurer
BelenUmeria said:
-I'd have to disagree with you there. I'll be 32 next month and I am far more concerned about price now than when I was younger. I've found that as your financial obligations increase, you become more concerned with how you budget your money. Younger people with less debt, can afford to spend more on non-competitive local shops. I know that during college, I cared far more about how quickly I could acquire material than whether or not I could buy it cheaper elsewhere.
-My home town has two local shops, neither of which are friendly or competitive. They never have sales or markdowns of any sort. While I do appreciate the hidden costs businesses face, I find that very few of these local shops care about the financial situation of their customers. They're entirely concerned with profit, and from a business standpoint that's good for them. It does not, however, instill a sense of guilt in me for patronizing on-line merchants. As long as there is money to be made selling gaming material, some type of business will be around to sell it.
HeapThaumaturgist
First Post
Another note: The local hobby shop in Auburn, AL, where I was an undergrad, was reasonably non-Friendly, had poor selection, a layout that made it impossible to really browse or even see what they had in stock in the way of RPG books, and most of the floor space was taken up with giant storage units of comic back-issues. Few people seemed to browse the old comics, more were looking at the new stuff and more people were interested in the CCGs and the like ... but the guy made the main focus of the joint comic back-issues. That was "his" thing, I guess. I always felt sort of bad about the "struggling comic and hobby shop" ... until I started to hear from my comics-collector friends that the guy was always trying to buy their collections from them for 1/2 or 1/3 what they could get for them elsewhere or even on EBay, and would attempt to strong-arm people into buying or selling when they went in there just to buy something else. Then one day I saw a brand-new BMW Roadster come wheeling into the lot as I got there ... and out clambers the owner of the store. I'm pretty positive there's places he could have stuck 45k in the store to make it a better shopping experience. And if he could afford a new Beemer, well, I guess his business wasn't really suffering that much.
--fje
--fje
Dristram
First Post
GlassJaw said:
I seem to recall several things retailers are doing to try and win back customers like offering free game space or minor discounts. What do I provide? I provide a clean and organized game store decorated with cool swords that can be purchased
I have sodas and snacks for sale for $.50 each. I offer special orders and get the product in within 1-3 days (depending on when the order falls in my order cycle) What I mainly provide is $1,000/month rent in free gaming areas that a big portion is decorated in medieval style. I also have an in-store message board for gamers to find other gamers, and also YahooGroups for gamers. My store is the kind of place where gamers come to socialize in a way similar to sports fans going to their local sports bar to socialize. The difference is that gaming is the topic of discussion. And Dew and Doritos are consumed instead of beer and pretzles 
I estimate that over 1/2 of my customers are *new* gamers because of my store. I have worked hard at promoting this hobby.Even still, many local gamers would rather buy on-line and couldn't care less if I went under.
They think my store is great, but price is king. Fortunately, for me, I have a very loyal high number of customers who do want to see my store be around and have stopped buying on-line all together. It looks like that for some, the store I created has made a difference. But not to all.(-Brad
Owner, Gamer's Keepe
Vacaville, CA
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