MCV and Koch Media continue Independent Retail Month with our third special feature. This week, we look at five innovators in the independent games retail sector which have adapted their stores to survive
Games Centre
How have the past 12 months been for Game On?
It’s been tough for video games. We’ve branched out into other things like LEGO which we took on a year and a half ago. We’ve increased our toy selection. We’re trying to broaden the base from just stocking games, because they don’t necessarily support you at the moment.
Have you broadened your product range? What do you offer? We offer an in-store repair service for scratched discs, and most games and DVDs can be restored to a workable condition for under £5. We also have off-site repairers who fix our consoles and laptops. We are increasing our toy and game selection. Currently we stock LEGO, Playmobil, Magic the Gathering, Dungeons & Dragons, jigsaws and board games. Game On also stocks the full Games Workshop range of miniature figurines and accessories, and has in-store gaming every Sunday. Here Warhammer gamers can learn to play and paint their models in a safe and friendly environment. Customers can also take advantage of the in-store gaming pods.
What about digital download cards? Yeah we stock a lot of cards for Xbox Live and PSN, but we find it hard to source the smaller amounts – the £5 or £10 ones. Although the £25 PSN cards are more readily available to stock.
18 May 18th 2012
The Saffron Walden indie has introduced a range of services in 15 years of business. Founder Matthew Brady explains why
Game On’s Matthew Brady stocks everything from Warhammer to trading cards, LEGO and board games
A lot of indies tell us this. They say kids don’t have £25 on them. Yep. We see the cards in GAME but we can’t seem to get hold of them. Stocking these smaller cards would really help. Customers don’t always have £25 on them. The Xbox cards come in 800 and 1,200 guises but for PSN it’s difficult.
It’ll be difficult in the future and you do need to diversify. Give customers more reasons to come back to your store.
Will you continue to look for different products, or do you think margins for games will improve? With digital it makes it difficult, especially with the new consoles going that way. We’re looking forward to Wii U, certainly, but that isn’t due until later in the year. Hopefully we’ll see a resurgence in 3DS and PS Vita. The PS Vita did better than expected for us so we’re really pleased with that.
How did GAME entering administration affect you? Well none of the GAME stores around us actually closed. But we noticed an upsurge of new release sales during the period, but only a ten or 20 per cent increase, not a mammoth one. We’ve got about three or four GAME and
Gamestation stores around us, but they’re ten or 12 miles away, so we don’t have any direct competition in
our town. Though we do have competition from Tesco, Blockbusters and more. If GAME didn’t exist then I think
you’d still get the same amount of games being sold. I think Mass Effect 3proved that really. It was an increase on Mass Effect 2and that’s without a major retailer taking them. The slack would be taken up elsewhere. I think if someone is after a game, they’ll travel to get it or they’ll find other sources. We have picked up extra customers from GAME. I think some of them felt let down as they placed their orders well in advance only to be told a week beforehand they wouldn’t get their game.”
What do you think of offshore retailers like Amazon, who were up until recently, able to sell certain low-cost goods VAT-free? I don’t like it. I prefer a level playing field on price. They do bully discounting and that’s understandable. I’d like a level playing field between price and stock availability as well.
How is independent retail changing? It’ll be difficult in the future and you do need to diversify. Give customers more reasons to keep coming back to your store as opposed to others.