NEWS
Sharkey set for LGC address
Undertones star to speak at November event LEADER GRAINGER ENTERS A NEW ERA
IN TODAY’S market it’s amazing that a company like Grainger Games even exists, let alone continues to grow. It opens shops faster than everyone else is closing them.
GameStop? All about online and digital opportunities. GAME? Consolidating its store base. HMV? Just hoping for a good Christmas. Grainger, however, at one point opened seven shops in ten days. A remarkable story. Just three years ago it was a bunch of cheeky northerners with big ambitions. Today, an independent retail powerhouse, with some incredible retail talent behind it. If it continues to expand at this rate, in 12 months’ time it will have a store base to compete with the big guns. Of course, first it needs to leave the North of England. Grainger has slowly been moving further South, but there’s still a way to go before it reaches the streets of London. But the ambition is there.
by Michael French
INFLUENTIAL music industry figure Feargal Sharkey has joined the London Games Conference speaker roster. The former Undertones lead vocalist and current head of record industry trade body UK Music, will deliver an address on lessons that the music industry has learnt during the digital transition.
He will talk about the
mistakes and the triumphs that got the music industry to where it is today and the prerequisites that an industry likes games must have if it is going to be successful in talking to legislators, major corporations and the member companies themselves. He joins a list of luminaries set to talk in November. Other speakers include GameStop’s Mike Mauler, Valve’s Jason Holtman, Sega’s John Clark and digital security expert Prof Peter Sommer. London Games Conference
takes place at the Royal Society of Medicine and is organised by MCVand Developpublisher Intent Media. “Feargal grows a line-up of influential speakers that are experts in digital distribution and connectivity and will be at
www.mcvuk.com
LGC to help the trade improve its understanding of how games will evolve in the connected era,” said Intent Media MD Stuart Dinsey. “LGC is the only event that looks at how the industry is changing around online content and how everyone – publisher, retailer, developer and consumer – is affected.”
“
LGC will help the trade understand how games will evolve in the connected era. Stuart Dinsey, Intent Media
London Games Conference starts at 4pm on November 10th. The focused conference will be followed by networking and dinner. Passes cost £229 before the early bird deadline of September 30th. Contact
Hannah.Short@intentmedia
.co.uk or call 01992 535 646 to book your space.
Sponsorship opportunities are available – contact
Lucy.Hall@intentmedia.co.uk to find out more.
…BUT IS IT TOO LATE FOR THE HIGH STREET?
GRAINGER’s national ambition, however, is really just ‘local’ news compared to the shocking civil unrest that engulfed a number of UK High Streets this week. This isn’t the place to lecture or proselytise about a social crisis. But after a while, perhaps we can mull over this question: if criminals see bricks and mortar as fair game for attack, scaring customers away, how can retail survive such destruction?
It’s another barrier for games shops, which pride themselves on offering much-desired high value goods. I often bang on about retail still facing exciting times in this column. But it faces some very frightening ones, too. Michael French
VIP INVITE FOR GAMESCOM VISITORS
MCVis inviting readers to join us in the new UK Buyers Lounge at this year’s Gamescom show in Cologne. From Wednesday, August 17th to Friday, August 19th, an area will be free to use for all UK trade visitors. Come take a seat and grab a coffee in the relaxed seating area, which is situated in gangway J-043 near the UK Pavillion. For information on Gamescom registration go to
www.gamescom-cologne.com.
August 12th 2011 5
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