I'm reprinting this piece (with permission), written by Mark Simmons, publisher of Games Quarterly and sponsor of Games Expo 2007 and National Games Week:
Please support your local brick-and-mortar retailer when and if you can. If you don't have one, ask local comic and hobby stores if they would consider carrying games as a sideline.
There are two key reasons to support local stores. One is that it's the best place to find new opponents (through a bulletin board or in the in-store gaming area). The other is that "games on the shelf" are the single best way for the publisher to get new customers, as people interested in the genre (or former customers who lost touch) see them.
Most game retailers are run by gamers who wanted to be in the game industry and decided to run a store instead of trying to design and publish games. They make less money than they could anywhere else (except maybe as game designers) but would not be happy anywhere but in the game business.
Game retailers are under assault as never before, and a third of them have gone out of business in the last two years. One attack comes from the chain stores and Walmart who have started carrying the most profitable (clicks and cards) of the "adventure games" (wargames and roleplaying games) at prices lower than the stores can buy them.These chains can undercut the game retailers, but provide no "instore gaming" and no "opponent meeting" services, and you just try to get a Warmart guy in a blue vest to explain a new game to you.
Another attack comes from the on-line discounters (again, gamers who wanted to get into the gaming industry). With low overhead and "we don't order it from Alliance until you pay us for it" service attitudes, the on-line discounters can offer lower prices but at the price of destroying your local store. The local stores try to fight back with "if you didn't buy it here, you don't get to play it here" policies, which sometimes drive gamers away. (Retailers tend to get used as baby-sitting services by parents who buy their kid's games at Walmart.)
So, Gamers, help your store. Buy it from them if they stock it, and order it from them if they promise to get a second copy and put that on the shelf. Play your games there and run demos and tutorial sessions. While you're there, pick up the trash so that a store employee can use the time to check in a new shipment or something. There are many gamers who volunteer one hour a week at their local stores, spending the time straighten shelves, stocking products, and other helpful things. (I know one store in the Midwest that would not be able to survive except that it replaced a fairly lazy paid employee with four one-hour-a-week volunteer stock boys.) Talk to the store manager. Make him aware that he can get signs and demo kits and other sales tools from retailers just for asking, and can get listed in manufacturer website store locators just for sending [the manufacturer] the information. And it works both ways. If you can get your store manager to talk to you about the challenges he faces, try to help him with them (or tell your favorite manufacturer what your local retailer wants and then report back to him what we can do to meet his needs).
Retail stores facing the assault by discounters and Walmart say, "We need the manfacturers to do more for us" without really defining what that is. It's tough, I know, as what they really want is every manufacturer whose games they stock to give them the same stuff that Wizkids and WOTC give them, and I'm sorry, 99% of the industry is NOT composed of $25,000,000 (sales per year) companies. But, we can do some things for little or no cost that will help them almost as much. Manufacturers sit around and complain that "shopkeepers" don't try to SELL our products or explain them to the gamers, they just want a gamer to walk in, pick up a game he already decided to buy, pay money for it, and then go play it in the store and convince others to buy it. A store manager cannot be an expert in every game and cannot explain the rules of every game to a customer who might be interested. YOU (the gamers who visit the store) CAN help by purchasing your games in the store (from the shelf, insist that they stock the game) and playing them in the store and showing other gamers how great your favorite game (one of ours or not) really is.
Please support your local brick-and-mortar retailer when and if you can. If you don't have one, ask local comic and hobby stores if they would consider carrying games as a sideline.
There are two key reasons to support local stores. One is that it's the best place to find new opponents (through a bulletin board or in the in-store gaming area). The other is that "games on the shelf" are the single best way for the publisher to get new customers, as people interested in the genre (or former customers who lost touch) see them.
Most game retailers are run by gamers who wanted to be in the game industry and decided to run a store instead of trying to design and publish games. They make less money than they could anywhere else (except maybe as game designers) but would not be happy anywhere but in the game business.
Game retailers are under assault as never before, and a third of them have gone out of business in the last two years. One attack comes from the chain stores and Walmart who have started carrying the most profitable (clicks and cards) of the "adventure games" (wargames and roleplaying games) at prices lower than the stores can buy them.These chains can undercut the game retailers, but provide no "instore gaming" and no "opponent meeting" services, and you just try to get a Warmart guy in a blue vest to explain a new game to you.
Another attack comes from the on-line discounters (again, gamers who wanted to get into the gaming industry). With low overhead and "we don't order it from Alliance until you pay us for it" service attitudes, the on-line discounters can offer lower prices but at the price of destroying your local store. The local stores try to fight back with "if you didn't buy it here, you don't get to play it here" policies, which sometimes drive gamers away. (Retailers tend to get used as baby-sitting services by parents who buy their kid's games at Walmart.)
So, Gamers, help your store. Buy it from them if they stock it, and order it from them if they promise to get a second copy and put that on the shelf. Play your games there and run demos and tutorial sessions. While you're there, pick up the trash so that a store employee can use the time to check in a new shipment or something. There are many gamers who volunteer one hour a week at their local stores, spending the time straighten shelves, stocking products, and other helpful things. (I know one store in the Midwest that would not be able to survive except that it replaced a fairly lazy paid employee with four one-hour-a-week volunteer stock boys.) Talk to the store manager. Make him aware that he can get signs and demo kits and other sales tools from retailers just for asking, and can get listed in manufacturer website store locators just for sending [the manufacturer] the information. And it works both ways. If you can get your store manager to talk to you about the challenges he faces, try to help him with them (or tell your favorite manufacturer what your local retailer wants and then report back to him what we can do to meet his needs).
Retail stores facing the assault by discounters and Walmart say, "We need the manfacturers to do more for us" without really defining what that is. It's tough, I know, as what they really want is every manufacturer whose games they stock to give them the same stuff that Wizkids and WOTC give them, and I'm sorry, 99% of the industry is NOT composed of $25,000,000 (sales per year) companies. But, we can do some things for little or no cost that will help them almost as much. Manufacturers sit around and complain that "shopkeepers" don't try to SELL our products or explain them to the gamers, they just want a gamer to walk in, pick up a game he already decided to buy, pay money for it, and then go play it in the store and convince others to buy it. A store manager cannot be an expert in every game and cannot explain the rules of every game to a customer who might be interested. YOU (the gamers who visit the store) CAN help by purchasing your games in the store (from the shelf, insist that they stock the game) and playing them in the store and showing other gamers how great your favorite game (one of ours or not) really is.
posted by Anonymous @ 10:02 AM
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