Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Majoru Oakheart" data-source="post: 2408517" data-attributes="member: 5143">Yes, I've had a similar experience here with my LGS.  There are only 2 in the city.One is owned by a couple in their 60s.  The man is ex-military and has almost no personality.  Even when he thinks he is being funny and interesting, he just comes across as creepy.  In contrast, his wife if very personable and friendly.  I personally believe that they've only stayed in business this long because of her and being one of two stores in the whole city.Almost every trip to the store for the first couple of years I went there was the same.  You get watched the entire time you are there in case you are trying to steal things from him.  He makes you leave your bag at the front counter.  He then asks you "can I help you?" nearly every 5 minutes you are in the store.  His wife hangs around in the back, so you rarely see her.  When you ask him anything about the books in the store, he normally knows when he's getting in books and a little of whats in them, but he stopped actually playing games years ago.  I believe he hasn't played D&D since before 3rd Ed came out.  He has a weekly board game night he plays in, but the business of selling games seems to have replaced playing them for him.He charges above suggested retail price on ALL books and claims the cost of doing business as the reason he cannot charge the MSRP.  I've gotten a bad vibe from him due to the time at a Con where a local gaming group went bankrupt and auctioned off all of the gaming books in their "library" to pay their bills.  I was trying to bid on Alternity, which was still in print at the time and I got outbid for the Players book AND DM's book by the owner of the store.  I overheard him talking to someone when he was picking up his purchases.  They asked "So, you buying all this stuff for yourself?"  He said "No, most of it is just going to be resold in my store."  I know it's business and all, but it seems that outbidding gamers at a gaming auction so you can sell the same items back to gamers at higher price seems unethical to me.However, since the gaming commmunity is small here, and he helps to plan all the conventions and games days in the city, he is an icon here.  Nearly everyone hates him, but they deal with him anyways.  Also, a bunch of my gaming group members are friends of his.They do have gaming space, however.  It just can only be used when the store is open (normal business hours) and only if you let the owner know you need it way in advance so he can see if he'll let you use it.The other store in the city is entirely staffed by high school kids who don't know anything at all about any of the books on the shelf.  The owner is never around and until recently, I didn't even KNOW who owned it.  I now know because someone I know bought it.  I haven't been there since, so I don't know if it changed.  However, they generally had nothing in stock and still managed to charge MORE than the above mentioned store.  The store was sold because it was close to being bankrupt.  They have only 2 gaming tables and they are in the middle of the store.</blockquote>

Verification