Theres a shop near me that I used to go to a lot. My friend and I were playing Guns of Gettysburg (which takes a while to set up). We were a few turns in when the manager on duty tells us that we need to wrap it up because he wants us to pack up our game in progress for two guys who want to play MTG, and they want our seats. I told him 'No'. And I gave my reasons. He insisted. Again I told him 'NO'. Eventually I told him to call the owner. Owner backed his employee and the MTG turds. So now I have a different store I play at because I'm sick of entitled MTG asshats.
farpointgamingdirect Yeah, similar sort of attitude at the store I’m talking about. All their gaming tables were about 4 foot by 2 foot which is great for cards, I guess. He had one larger table but I was normally covered in board games, which he would reluctantly clear off for roleplaying. I even spent time trying to be a hobby hero for him running demos and trying to organize events. Attendance started to lessen once the summer hit. I had a tournament organized one sunny weekend. Three people showed up, myself included. The store owner told me that he was reluctant to start with less than four. About 15 minutes before start time, the store owner took a call and I heard him say something about the tournament but I couldn’t catch it. Then he came over and told me that he was cancelling the tournament. One guy left and the other one stayed to play a game with me. 10 minutes later a guy came in and walked up to the table. He exclaimed surprise that people were playing X-Wing. Then he told us that he had been coming for the tournament but was running late due to traffic. He called the store and told the owner he was running late. The owner told him the tournament was cancelled. And yes, this guy was the phone call the owner took 15 minutes before the tournament start time. I stopped spending my money there that day.
I wanted to share my story about my local game store. A bit before 8th edition of 40k came out my GF's teenager showed interest in learning the game. So, we picked up some models for him and I dusted off mine. When we went to the store all of the patrons and most of the staff were a bit cliquish and stand off ish. So, basically being gamers. Every Friday we went to the store picked out a table played a game and went home. After about a month and a half of just going in and playing each other, the teenager could not come with me. So, I went by myself. One of the regulars noticed my regular play partner was not with me and came up to me. He asked where the teenager was I said he could not make it . . . then the guy who had never said much to me before asked if I wanted a game. Now after playing at that store for 2 years I have noticed that many of the regulars there do not like to approach new players, because they themselves are not very social. But if you show yourself to be a regular just by showing up for a month or two, then you might find your self naturally part of the in group. I suggest if the crowd is not very welcoming to just show up every week on the same night at the same time and hang out for a few hours. Bring your army, some paints, maybe some models to put together. And once the people at the store see you as a regular and not a one time visitor you may feel more welcome. Just my two cents. Gamers are traditionally not the most socially skilled people out there. So, give them time.
%100 agree with this. But also would acknowledge the many stories of true jerk behavior recorded in this comment thread. There is a difference between being shy and being toxic.
@@HamboneWilson Although not a Tabletop Gamer (I'm only into 40K for the Lore and PC games, RIP DoW) I have many experiences in many other groups that frequently get the Toxic accusation thrown around. The above advice IMO is spot on for most cases, but I think there is something else to add. In addition to being Shy, Social Ineptness can also come in the form of what most people would consider Rude, and this is where I have seen a lot of accusations of Toxicity come from. I should also point out that I myself am known in my various circles for not shying away from the Truth and giving blunt, up-front responses to questions. This can manifest in many forms, from being blunt about someone's efforts on say painting a Model, often times this critique is not done from a point of Malice, more a case that they can see it's not right/perfect and so offer a correction. In their mind, this is not meant to hurt, but to help. When it comes to actual gameplay and 'discussions' about the Rules - from their point of view, the Rules ARE important, getting them right is what helps get the Game right. I could go on and this is not to say that there aren't assholes (because I've seen and dealt with many of them) but I often see that the accusation of 'toxicity' is unfounded, it's more that some people don't have social graces, they aren't trying to be mean. they are just being them.
Here's the thing...that all may even be true, but if you're the odd one out--*you* are the one paying the price while these "shy guys" sort if out. You're banging your head against a wall until you get included. I understand making an investment, but why do you want to just sit there and spend your days watching and spinning the wheel for what "may" become an inclusive experience? You're investing what little personal time you may have into a day that will probably be disappointing, for the hope of being on equal footing. That's exhausting. I agree that it's rarely going to be exclusive out of malice, especially when the owner isn't involved. I agree that after enough people form a nucleus at a store, it really becomes about "the devil you know", because in the end, they're gambling their free time on you as well. I get it. But as someone that hasn't really been part of an inclusive gaming community, it's disheartening. After a while you really don't want to try after you bang your head on the wall for weeks on end. It honestly does hurt.
The bigger store in my town has some very abrasive employees. There is a second, much smaller store with very talkative, friendly employees. The smaller store tends to not carry as much product, but will offer to order you anything they don't have. I'll go back to them every time even if it takes them a little longer to get product.
years ago I befriended my FLGS owner who was a former history teacher. I realized quickly he was only running his store to support his hobby because he was constantly opening brand new mini's during his weekly in store D&D game each time the GM needed a specific creature or npc. His store was completely disorganized. It was only because of the loyalty of his customers that he was able to stay in business as there were several other stores nearby. He was an example of a store who had a lot of "Friendly". Sadly he passed away from bladder cancer. Miss that guy.
A hero to behold, share his stories in the mead halls we call FLGS. A man or honor to befall the most dangerous of beasts. I salute you, good sir, keep regaling the old warrior's triumphs.
Got to admit - I love living in MKE. Easily 5+ shops I can think off off the top of my head that are great to play in. It always wierds me out to hear of unfriendly stores
I hate the cliquey elitist stores...thankful for my home store it was my first store I ever went to and has been nothing but welcoming if you're ever in rochester, mn
Dude my local game store charges an extra $30-$40 on the base price on every product so I have to go to the next town over that has a store that sells Warhammer and 40k for $10 less then what GW stores sell it for
My FLGS owner was a fantastic crack dealer in another life. He knows exactly what to say, mention or offer to get me to drop $100 more than I was planning to on any given day. He's also largely responsible for my Shelf of Shame.
Psh, shelf of shame. F777 that. I proudly display my super-customized Grey Knights (definitely not allowed in most games) and also my favorite Lego space ships, tanks, Knex tanks, wooden sculpture of a stealth tank I designed, etc. B17ches love toys!
@@manictiger No, Shelf of Shame is where you keep all the models you've bought but never built/painted. The shame isn't owning them, it's not finishing them.
As an owner of a FLGS I can say that everything Adam says in this video is spot on correct. I would CERTAINLY want to know if one of my employees wasn't welcoming to anyone. I want everyone in our store to feel welcome and comfortable in our place because as a customer I've always HATED that "record store snob" mentality you get in some game/comic shops because what you're into isn't what that stores staff personally like. I would also add that IF you game at an unfriendly store because it's the largest community for your game in town, don't be afraid to move stores. Sure your play group may be smaller but if the new location is welcoming then in time new folks will join your group at the new store because of a more positive atmosphere.
But what happen when this is the owner who are the manager . I got to a store like that for buying comics. And the owner/manager and is employe are not welcoming or good a retail . I stop going a this place. There are annoyed about the custumers who dont play game.
Jason K, I honestly know how that feels I had to content with a L"G"S that is Part Comic shop/Restaurant, and its owned and managed by an Idiot, who unfortunately did not make the gaming space downstairs safe and comfortable for pretty much anyone. Not to mention that he and his rather incompetent staff, are kinda bad at maintaining any Miniature gaming stuff as they are all experts on Magic the Gathering.
My first FLGS was not local or friendly. I went there once when I was in high school after convincing my mom to take a detour while we were on a trip. I had never been in a dedicated game store before, so I was gawking, and the guy at the counter decided that this, and the fact that my mom was with me, meant I was unworthy to shop in his store. I went up, asked if they had a particular Magic card in their singles catalogue, and the guy informed me they did not sell singles while standing in front of their display case of singles. I asked him if he was sure, and he got angry. I bought a booster pack and left. The rare in the pack was the card I was looking for, and the store went out of business a few years later.
I remember walking into a FLGS in a city I just moved to. They invited me to a 40k tournament the following Sunday. I'm no expert but through sheer determination and focus I managed to win with my Chaos Daemons. They weren't happy that I, an outsider of their clique, had won their grand tournament. They spent months passing me between owners, managers and retail assistants trying their damned hardest not to present me with the trophy and prize money. Safe to say I never returned there again and have found other friendly places to wargame.
You freaking pub stomped them mate. It sucks that you didn't get the accolades but I think the fact that they got so mad at you for wrecking house is its own reward.
@@spongemanicecone4440 I did. I think I must have gone there a dozen times or more, many broken promises later and they finally relented. So glad I've found far better gaming communities since!
I had my pc go through a town filled with wild animals that had formed a society. With every new npc i introduced i was bombarded with 'can i make it my pet?'
We had a problem like this for almost 20 years in my area. We had one game store for years that had poor customer service, messed up orders, and wasnt very helpful. The problem was it was the only gaming store within a 2 to 3 hour drive. He never had to get better because there was no competition. Eventually a group of folks from the store who had the money decided they were going to open their own store. It took it about 6 months to decend into chaos. None of then wanted to actually work at the store or pay someone to do it Finally a retired guy decided to open his own store a little over a year ago, and its awesome. Hes extremely helpful and on the ball with preorders. Lets hope it lasts.
So, I don't usually comment on videos, prefer to lurk, but I'm going to chime in this time. It might be a bit winded but stay with me. TL:DR You do you, have fun, start your own club. I understand this problem on a couple of different fronts. First, for quite a long time in my tabletop gaming career (roughly 10-15 years) the "FLGS" wasn't super friendly. Now, When I started I was excited and wanted to play and didn't really understand the rules as well as i probably could've (3rd ed. 40k) and whenever I went to the game store and wanted to see what was happening on game nights, or view other people playing. I usually got the vibe of "You're irritating, you don't know anything, get out of here you're annoying." This happened basically every time I went into the store. Second, "local" I live in a particularly remote location where local means approximately a 4 hour drive (398 km, 247 miles) in one of two directions from my town. Now this wasn't an issue as my post secondary education was near the store, so I had an opportunity to frequent it, but see the above reason why I don't go there. Both of these issues would compound into a particularly shitty situation of horrible human beings roughly 5-6 years ago when I was trying to get my wife interested in my hobby, and in TTG in general. We went to the store where I had been ushered out because I was annoying and new to the hobby and my wife expressed the same things to me that I had felt about the store. Now, I'm screwed, with the wife being my constant possible opponent/teammate there was no FLGS to go to that was welcoming enough. However she had expressed interest in MTG and so we got started on that and would grow into Shadespire just a couple years ago (more on that later). We did this via the internet, bought some decks for MTG, and just had fun. Which is the keyword here, fun. Now, fast forward 3 or 4 years and upon returning to one of the two FLGS, ONE of the stores had been taken over by a business savvy individual and turned it into a proper FLGS. They were welcoming, fun, helpful, encouraging and etc. This is the game store that helped get my wife into Shadespire that we now play frequently. This Store, gets my business every time I go through. Additionally. (because if you hadn't gathered I have 2 "FLGS" in different cities approx 4 hours away.) The store that was helpful, grew, and got big enough to expand, and did expand to the not-so-friendly-game-store city. Whats it all mean basil? Well, ultimately, sooner or later business will change, someone may get ballsy and make another store, that person might be you. OR another game store from a city over may get big in a hurry and see an opportunity in the market same as my example. However, I still don't really have a local shop so, an option may be make your own club with like minded people. My friends and I used to run a weekly painting session at the local library where we could share our hobby. Most towns/cities/districts/regional municipalities usually have a space where this sort of thing can go down. Look around locally for a small space where you can host a small group of people, share your hobby, perhaps get a starter set with two armies/factions/crews/teams paint them up an run a workshop. Gateway games are great for this. Bottom Line: Have fun. If you're local game store isn't fun, don't go there. Doesn't mean you have to give up on it. You don't have to be elitist. just have fun. Maybe you want to be elitist, maybe you see that as fun, I don't know. You do you. There is a way, it's just a bit more work. Just don't become the FLGS clique, but your clique, not theirs. Be the group you want to play with coming from the outside. You do you, have fun, start your own club. Thanks if you read the whole thing. JT
I'm very fortunate in that Brian, the amazing owner of one of the only gaming stores in my little southern state, is incredibly polite and more than willing to accommodate players from either Warhammer, to Star Wars, to Magic. He understands that the prices are better online, he knows that better deals are out there. So his service and the welcoming air he has about him is always a nice thing. You rock Brian. Thank you for being cool.
the last time i was in my local gw buying a new brush i tried to make some smalltalk about age of sigmar, the manager, who im not overly familiar with essentially scoffed at me and my misunderstandings of the system, suffice to say im not going back, its not difficult to not be an arse.
Mostly truth, sadly. BUT! You could lurk in the back corner for a bit, see who else is rejected, and then go chat them up to try to find those alternatives Mr. Atom mentioned.
@@TechmarineArkantos I would say yes, but only if you bring it up to the management first. Give them a bit of time to correct the issue, if they still don't address it then leave the negative review.
A new store opened near me and I was thrilled went in there and grabbed a few pots of paint and an easy to build kit. The lady running the store at the time asked me seven times if I was ready to cash out and asked me to set the pots of paint I had in my hand on the counter. I set everything down and left, I’m not a thief and that’s what she was implying. I spend 100-200$ on this hobby sometimes every single month.... they lost my business and will just keep driving an hour to my regular store in the future.
Yeah. The closest store to me has cameras. Every time I go in, if the owners there he just watches the camera stream the whole time I'm in there. Even though I spent $800 in one hit at his store. Last time I was there he commented where he thought I lived, "your from x aren't you"? Which is an extremely poor and troubled area. I said, "No". I'm dark skinned. His attitude is obviously racist towards me. I buy online and have my own gaming group anyway. So fuck him & his store.
@Connor Szabo Thanks for your advice. Never really thought that it could be how I present myself. Since being an adult I don't care how I look or what people think of me. I think you could be right. Hopefully you are.
@Cletus Anfernee Jackson Yeah but why assume me?? The guy who spent $800+ in one visit.... btw I love the chicken and egg saying! My answer: single cell organism that evolved into a sea creature which evolved into various species. One of which became a land walker which had different species evolve off of it. One of which eventually became a raptor dinosaur which laid eggs. Which would eventually evolve into the birds one of which was a chicken. So I suppose something evolved into a chicken. Therefore.... a chicken imo.
@Cletus Anfernee Jackson painting everyone with the same brush is not the way to live as a human. if he has been ripped off maybe instead he could arrange the store in a way to control theft like every other company on the planet.
If you don't have a Friendly LGS, you might have the local library as an option! Many libraries will let people occupy designated rooms, so long as you talk to them about it first! 😁
This is honestly the best advice I've ever gotten, the area I now live in has only one game store for an hour and a half radius or so...for the longest time there were only two owners and one of the two of them worked every single day. For the longest time I thought they were very rude and didn't want to help....then I watched this and the next time I went in I asked them about the paints I was looking at and they both started talking to me and didn't stop giving me advice and resources for almost an hour, now whenever I come in they show me new things theyve ordered or showing me stuff online
My brother and I used to go to this shop called "Monstore". They were incredibly unfriendly and would ignore customers. They went out of business. We ended up driving 30 minutes to another shop called "The Realm". Super friendly and quite the opposite experience. Mentioned our bad experience at the other shop and they said "Oh that's where we bought our shelves from!"
I was lucky, I feel... I'm was out of town for work, going a little stir crazy, and got a wild hare/hair and decided to delve into 40k, finally. While looking for a store... I found a GW store. I was apprehensive walking in, knowing the staff would either be friendly or elitist (the only 2 personalities I've experienced in gaming/comic/music stores)... but the staff and clientele blew me away. They were very friendly and super excited someone knew was finding their way into the universe. They helped me find what grabbed my eye, helped recommend necessities (yes, GW stuff is pricey, but bought the basics purely because of appreciation of their customer service) and even talked me out of some frivolous add ons that weren't needed. I've been back about once or twice a week for the last month to build and paint. It's been an awesome experience.
That's the thing about franchise stores like GW, they are run by people who answer to a much higher power. Consistent negative feedback to the God-emperor will result in a store's management being declared hereticical and subjected to Inquisitorial purging.
Something related to this happens a couple months ago in a GW store clear to where I live: the new store manager was a _ick... with a capital D. It was a matter few weeks: all the long time users just moved to another shop in the closest town and the sales plummeted. That store manager "quit" the job shortly after. So, yes: if the problem is the manager then there's a solution but sometimes there's a problem with the metà in the store and in that case you can only go look elsewhere.
“Friendly local game store” man, I wish i had any of the above. I have to drive over an hour to get to the nearest game store. It sucks hard living in the literal middle of nowhere.
Meanwhile here I am getting into tabletop gaming after realizing I've been living literally 100m from the local game store. Sadly I don't have much time to play
Lmao in my country there are no FLGSs at all. Keep in mind this is in montenegro which has 620.000 citizens and is in balkans where the most popular games are shooters. Table top games are seen as old and unfashionable. Thats why there was only one club but it closed down becouse of corona but hopefully it will re-open. Heard they are changing their location
Cjor Dillman maybe you could start a thing in your town I’m sure you could set up a weekly get together somewhere and it could snowball! you might wanna open your own store!
I was in this same situation. Me and one friend played. And no store even close. We slowly grew the hobby locally by just talking to ppl. And in less then a year we're at 6 players
God I'm so happy with my game store. It's literally like a family and everyone is accepting of everything. We all work together, we got ourselves 3 more tables than out store was allowed to have, the worker there goes out of his way to get us stuff that's already sold out, such a great guy
I can sympathy. Most the lot here is ITC focused, so the original draft of Killteam in all it's flawed early state didn't last long,. and it's pretty much only 2k matched play ITC missions all the time here. A part of me is debating getting a demo setup of Necromunda, or waiting for the Chapter Approveds to launch and see what it does for KT.
I find campaigns to be a great way to please both sides throwing a few curve balls into the mix. If that doesn't work go for the narrative your army really likes winning at all cost 😅
@@labtec514 There's been leaked release info, there's apparently going to be the original CA, and some sort of book release for both Killteam and Blackstone Fortress of all things alongside it. Thus my pondering.
@@gratuitouslurking8610, the leak is for Annuals, which I suspect will be the collected White Dwarf articles and .pdf releases, hopefully with the numerous mistakes corrected. There may be a few pages of new stuff, but I wouldn't bet on it.
One of the main reasons I've decided to call Olympia, WA home now is my FLGS - Olympia Card and Comic... Gabi's place is probably one of the best in the country and welcoming to all types and games, weather it's role playing, wargaming, MTG, or other. Part of that is she has the square footage to house everyone, but the community is vibrant and they are ALWAYS busy. They're also open 7 days a week and open late.
Here is one thing I did in my city. I wanted to share it with you, on this topic. So, over here were I live we have two very popular gaming stores. Althought both of them are in very amicable terms at present, there was a long time a couple of years back in which both owners were in very bad terms. This, due to one owner having broken up his business relationship with his store partner over bad business practices, that partner going over to the other store with a different version of things, and this leading to the community at large engaging in a serious conflict of rumors and back alley comments, with veritable sides forming up around both stores to (in essence) attack each other. This made it hard for someone who wanted nothing to do with the whole deal to find a game. We were all constantly being reminded of the issues between both stores, as each store had a large number of players at the stores themselves and at social media, making the issue bigger and bigger. So, eventually what I did was take a page out of the 8th Ed. launch online tounament for WH40k, and tried my hand at it. I wrote up a whole set of scenarios along a narrative, made a campaign book with custom scenarios, narrative and art, and then I put a registry sheet online. With that, I started calling all the players I could in my city who wanted to play, to try their hands at this online campaign. A whole "play where you want, with who you want, whenever you want, and just report the results back to me" affair. With the catch that you could not play with the same player more than once. As the campaign moved along, you HAD to go out of your way to get opponents. In my first try, this online campaign got around 30 players, and by the 4th campaign I had over 60 players from all across my country. Small groups of players in other cities getting together to play the campaign amongst themselves. People managed to put aside some of their problems, and get together to play. Be it at their homes, or at either store. In fact, whole new gaming groups came about the whole thing, and I look back on it as one of the best experiences I've had in the hobby. So much so that I am now planning to pick it up again, now in narrative tournament format, since at present the issue of the battle between both stores is a thing of the past. Thank you for sharing your advice on how to deal with an unfriendly store. Dealing with one is tough. Having the only two stores in your city engage in actual conflict with each other, is even worse. But, in the end, people want to play. They want to have fun. And, if you are lucky that will shine through the conflicts and petty arguments, and you will find a way to play and enjoy the hobby.
I had this. I was an older black guy walking into a Games Workshop Store a couple decades ago in the area where I worked. I went in because it was odd to me that there was rarely much traffic near that store. I was a Space Wolf player and I one day decided to just get some bikes to add to my (at the time) 1500 point army. I went in and the conversation stopped and I was instantly watched. Any question was answered yes or No and after a couple minutes I just asked if there was a problem. They looked at me and said “so why are you really here”. The tone was in mistakable. I was invited to leave. And I did. I worked where I could see them and I was unsurprised when the store was closed. Another store (unaffiliated with GW) opened and I was friends with this owner having seen him in and off at various events and places from when we both were much younger. We were cool and I was there when he opened and wouldn’t you know it I saw each of those in the GW group. Amazingly they did not realize I was in the place but one at a time I would se them try to bust out of the place and I would stop them by saying see you to my friend and they would stay and I came back later after they got comfortable. Took a week of them seeing me and me not acting like I hated them before they got comfortable. (Remember this is a Friends’ store and I was not going to torpedo it!) Eventually the entire group began meeting there. Then after a month, they started talking to me. They had totally “forgotten” what had happened before and I was just there. It was a year after that when one of them (one of the two actually employed by GW) actually put it together. He was shocked when he realized that I was that guy they had run off. He did admit that it was not my age that made them really freak and honestly apologized. He was mortified when we realized what they had done and what so had done for them. In the end they did apologize with one or two exceptions (hey they are younger adults so it was easier for them to pretend and not look bad among the others customers - and it was my friend’s store so I was not running them off for ego) And these many year later I still remember what that first one to put it together said, “I didn’t know you were cool”. I told him, “hey you never gave yourself a chance to find that out”. FYI - GW shut them down for poor sales and poor customer service. They guys were young and so was there manager. The manager was too interested in being a friend and did not do his job according to what I heard. Games Workshop wanted ANY gamer coming in to be welcome because that leads to good sales (and they really did not like what they had been hearing on GP). I say all this to say, don’t take it personally if the local shop sucks. Break the ice yourself. Talk to them. Walk in by a die or two and leave. Come back in same time next week. It may take three weeks but that often will open things up. If you can’t do that (or honesty don’t want to) Write a letter to the owner and let them know that when you were there and that you did not feel comfortable. Explain exactly what happened and as close As you can play by play what you saw and what you like to see improved as a SUGGESTION. It it does not work, there is on line to get suggestions for your area. Good luck. 👍
Funny enough I started working at a local store a few years ago and I’m not the friendliest guy around but I would always great all my customers ask if they needed help and explain any game they were interested in. I even had to learn games I had no interest in like Malifaux. I’ve been gone from that town for a year and a half now but go back to visit every month for work reasons and people still approach me about stuff in the store because they think I still work there and am just at a different branch in a different city, crazy what good customer service will get you.
My local store is very unwelcoming....the moment I walk in, everyone stops talking and I am stared at till I leave and then they make a very obvious display of resuming their game. You cannot enter any competitions (I mean the GW ones) unless you are a "member/gamer" at the store. Unfortunately, the manager is the owner and seems to only be in it for himself and his friends. I buy online.
My local warhammer store is friendly but it's way to pushy On the sales.. I'll go in there for a few paint pots and I'm being persuaded in buying so much more when I dont want it. Once I bought an item and returned it the next day just because I was cohersed into buying it, I was told at the time it would go great with my army.. night goke had a look at one of my codexs and realised it didn't suit my play style. These days I'm fully aware of what there like now and I am just very adamant about what I'm after. As for my local warhammer store being approachable yes they are.. they're very good but if you step out of line oh wow they really make a point.. 5x guys standing around a table and 1x grabs a chair.. store manager approaches guy sitting and says if your not painting please put the chair back.. these chairs are for painters. you all know how long 40k games take.. theres slot of chairs.. same thing goes with bringing in non g.w glues.. or assembling forgeworld models in there.. hot drinks cold drinks everything needs to be in a sealable bottle and no coursing with customers when there trying to make sales.
Crazy_Lew 90 I feel bad for any new person coming into my local warhammer. They are all over you the whole time you’re there. There’s trying to be helpful and then there is jamming stuff down people’s throats. They do the latter all of the time. Even to me a somewhat regular of the store.
Manchester GW is absolutely horrific for this! Completely puts me off going, sooner go to one of the smaller stores where the manager is the only employee.
I just recently got into painting Warhammer 40K minis but I do not play it, I just was looking for something different than canvas to paint. I didn't even know we had a local shop before this new venture. In the last two months the LS owner/manager has been very helpful learning the ins and outs of miniature painting and picking out paint. This week I was there and decided to buy a larger model that I knew I could get online for $10-15 less. When we were talking I decided to thank him for all the help over the months and told him that I want my money to go to his shop and not an online store as much as I can. My experiences with the LS is why I was ok with paying more than the online price. I want this store to survive. How you treat your customers matter; especially in a world were I can just order everything online.
As a store owner, I agree 100%. I have to earn business. There are cheaper places to buy games. I have to bring value to the transaction or there is no logical reason for people to buy from me. I have to create something so good that people buy from me because they want my store to exist. Nobody owes me anything. I have to earn it. In my experience it’s not a problem once people join our community. People want part of us to take home with them. The games, t-shirts, dice or whatever are the things they can take home with them.
I have a few options for gaming stores within an hr of home so I consider myself lucky. I remember first getting into magic and attending my first FNM alone. It was rather daunting to sit amongst a group of ppl who obviously knew each other well while i just sat quiet wondering what the hell I was doing there. Once paired though I found my opponents anywhere from neutral to friendly but none unwelcoming. So i turned up again next week to be greeted by the staff member doing the sign ups with a "Mitch right?, good to see you back, did you enjoy last week" This eased my anxiety about being on the outer immediately. I have had similar experiences with all stores I frequent, like most social situations someone just needs to break the ice and ppl become comfortable.
I'm going through this right now. I bought a house within a mile of a local game store, and I thought it was a dream come true. It's been there for almost 40 years, everybody in the neighborhood has heard of it, but you can't really play there. They only have room for one table, it's always being used by the owner's son and his friends who play MMOs on their laptops together. I met a group online that all play 40k, and it turns out that we all live in the same neighborhood, but we have to drive 20 minutes away to get a table at the next closest shop. I'm looking into converting my garage into a gaming space.
My LGS is a 4 hour round trip away but I always make time in the month to visit and spend $50-$100. They aren't particularly large or overly nice but in the occasion that I would want to play a game outside of my personal friend group, the option is there. Plus, once in a while I find something special I wouldn't be able to find online without insane price hikes.
I don't disagree. I just wish more employees at such stores could help folks like myself, who very much would like to get involved, but don't even know what's out there, how it works, or even how to find out.
@@bordenfleetwood5773 Then ask. Unless someone looks visibly lost, or asks for help, it should be assumed they want to be left alone. If you ask for help and then they're rude, that's when you have a problem.
@@TheLukemcdaniel Sadly, I did. It really wasn't anyone's fault, just a failure of communication. I didn't have a game at the time, and the store owner/manager/local uber gamer wasn't really sure how to answer my awkward questions. He's a great guy, very welcoming, but (at the time) just had no experience with someone who had no idea what gaming is about. I found a game a few years later and after a move, but I still feel really awkward every time I go to that particular store now. Bad imposter syndrome, I guess.
go in to my lgs for some warcry stuff. i ask the guy working if the battlepack cards are the same ones that come in the starter set. pretty basic question if you ask me. he gives me huge attitude and just says "how am i supposed to know, I don't play that stupid game".
When I was starting to play warhammer 40k I didn't want to go to the local GW store because I wanted to support an indipendent wargaming club/store, and it turned out that the club owner was a very rude guy who didn't care about customers at all, moking me for playing warhammer and especially the imperial guards. Never came back ever again, luckily there were more places to play around with more polite and welcoming people.
Good for you man! I know the feeling I've been badgered for playing first Ultramarines then Cadians. Both for being "basic" and "wimpy" respectively. Well sorry man but unlike you I can't afford to pay 1.2k for Warhound titans like you, spending $90 is more than enough for me unless I go 2 or more weeks without buying anything extra then I may splurge and get a start collecting box or something. I will admit that imperial guard is starting to make a comeback but Tau and Chaos players just tend to shred us unless we specialise in tanks and knights.
@@thomas4092 Yeah I know the feeling, in the store were I play now just me and another guy are loyalist and both of us play guards and, if it wasn't for the store's staff who makes some nice narrative capaign we'd always get stomped against all of the chaos/necron/tau players unless we bring some cheesy with all leman russ list.
Nothing cheesy about lots of Leman Russes. That's mainly what the guard brings to battles in the lore. If you refuse to use scissors, you will never beat paper.
Game stores are often run and staffed by Gamers and lets be real, a certain type of person "Socially" is often very drawn to Gaming. I've often found going into gamestores a awkward experience for this reason, you can't actually tell if the staff are trying to be friendly with banter that's just not really professionally appropriate with new customers (Go into GW store and say you play Eldar and get ready for the stream of mockery from everyone) or they're actually just dicks. I think that a lot of Socially awkward people work at game stores also creates a few more issues, like the common one of them just hovering over you and trying to be TOO friendly and pushy and not realising the blatant social cues of "leave me alone". I think Game stores actually could benefit from hiring/poaching sales people from other stores and or/non nerds and then just train them up. It's rare to fine game stores with actually great customer service.
One thing i would like to add: Tabletop Clubs are a thing. Look for them on the internet, they'll often have a facebook page etc. In my town for example, we have just set one up, where we basically meet every other week in a restaurant to eat and play tabletop. Might be a solution if your store manager sucks.
This is what saved me to be honest. I really hate our local game store. used to work there been there since i was a kid so a lot of history.... unfortunately the guy who owns the place is insane.
My FLGS is great. They just recently moved to a bigger location because they didnt have enough space for all the players who patron the store. The owner is almost always there, but doesnt get to play much that I can see. The TO is great too. He runs a great tournament scene and works hard to keep even the serious tournaments friendly.
I think it's pretty simple. I have an affection for my local shop and owner. If a competitor moved in, I would no buy from them. Nor meet up for a game there. In the first case, it would be money that I'm personally not giving to local guy who's worked his butt off to make it happen, and in the second case because it would affect the dollars the other guy is spending
I remember walking into a store that sold ccgs with my fiance. Someone had pointed it out as a magic store (I do stage magic and that person misunderstood) but we are big on rpgs and board games so we thought "lets check it out anyway." From the moment we walked in the guy working and all the like 3-4 other guys just glared daggers and were very "no we just have magic" to questions so we walked out and never went back. I'm not really a magic player but yeah they would have driven me off for good without ever knowing that. Its like "ok if you don't want my money I'll take it to someone who does."
Sometimes it just takes a bit of warming up to the store. It's essentially going into a local bar where everyone knows each other and once you've popped in a few times you find it much easier to talk to people. Entering local tournaments really helps too it essentially forces you to get talking.
The staff shouldn't cultivate that culture, though. My local GW store will go out of his way to welcome newcomers to his store and make sure their questions are answered.
The only game store in my neck of the woods is a GW store. It stopped being friendly, for me at least, when they openly and loudly complained to me in front of customers, because I "dared" to order a set of contrast paints in the webstore instead locally. It was also the last straw, which made my decision to completely transition away from GW all the more easier.
Unfortunately GW is a bottom-line company that COMPELS store managers to pump up their sales each and every quarter. Managers with poor sales figures will be replaced. My local GW shop is on its third manager in, IDK, about 5 years? I'm not defending individuals who are needlessly dismissive or abrasive, I'm just saying they're probably trying to save their jobs. But it totally sucks if you're the customer they take out their frustrations on. :(
I don't understand how stores can be that way, we want more people to get into this fun hobby not push them away. Im good friends with the owner of my FLGS and the other regulars so I guess we would be considered the "clique" but we are very welcoming to new players and new people coming in. Hell we often pull people into our games we are playing that are interested in the hobby/game and we also have no issues running demos for people if they wish to learn. Stores and Cliques that Uncle Atom mentioned only harm this awesome hobby.
ya know, Atom. It's videos like this that make me glad I live in a town with an abundance of game stores. and the one closest to me is ALSO probably the friendliest.
Experienced something VERY similar to this at a place in my area where the owner, a gamer and a successful businessman, along with his buddies, tossed a ton of $ at their own shop, made a wonderful place at first glance with extensive terrain and a huge space, but their business practices are horrid. Unapologetically they treat anyone not in their click as if they are doing them a favor. If you reserve or pre-order things that might be limited quantity at a big release, forget being certain that you will get it because someone in the 'club' will just scoop your stuff, even if they advertise a midnight launch or similar event. Ordering anything is a crap shoot and their customer service is atrocious. However in the interest of growing their club/store, they give huge discounts and run events with major giveaways and prizes, even at their own expense, to out-do other legit stores. Its sad since it hurts the legitimate gaming stores that truly have earned the F in the FLGS acronym, as those struggle to survive but they get their customers bled off with shiny enticements and spending that the sometimes struggling stores cannot match. Yes, that IS how business works, and often those with the deepest warchest will win, but this isn't as much a store as it is a club that uses their propped up customer base to support their personal gaming space. Best thing I can say to anyone who encounters a toxic situation at a shop is to find another. I'm lucky in that there's an abundance in my area but some people have perhaps only one choice. In that case, you need to find other players as best you can and avoid stores with terrible reputations. Plenty of discount online ordering options for product and meetup methods. I order direct at the FLGS but if they aren't friendly...why support them?
Hey! This video really helped! (Obviously a few months back because COVID-19). Went to this game store that was fantastic! Had all the newest d&d miniatures and books and paints and a large area to play. The manager was so dismissive of me when I was asking about how to jump into the painting hobby. This manager was there everytime I went and was obviously very dismissive of me, but not some of my female friends. Flash forward several months and my friend wanted to make a quick run to this store. Someone I haven't seen before is working, and he's really nice and helping with paints and all these cool techniques. I let him know about my previous experiences and he let me know that he was one of the owners and that particular manager was fired. Started running a weekly d&d session there and my players used to buy snacks and miniatures and paints every week. Glad they're still in business for curbside pickup for covid, and hope it remains that way. Before that, I was driving about 15 miles (35 minutes in light traffic) to run d&d.
Luckily have a really good FLGS, if anything, the main issue I have is the L part is a bit of a stretch! If the local store is trash, buy online and see if there are gaming groups (or start one) in any community type spaces (or game at home, if viable).
usually it's the exact opposite, they sales staff come and try talk to you the entire time you're in there and hover over your shoulder not really letting you browse. (see 90s and 00s GW stores).
The biggest ones in my area ironically are great and friendly up front, there’s a couple little shops that come off as cringey at times, some are cool, I’m fortunate to have choices
Aaron Ibn Mocha it is nice to have options i have about 5 different stores around for the hobby. Mainly go to my local GW as one of my best buds is the on call manager and fortunately he gets a 50% discount that he subsequently hooks me up with when i need it lol
We haven't had a store in town in quite some time, the last one was ok but the owner ran into some financial issues. What somebody in my area ended up doing was creating a facebook group. Searching for groups like that online is also pretty good, lots of people have their own tables and are very welcoming to new comers. If a person is just looking to find some people to play the game with and it's tough to find or get to a store, I would suggest that
My "local" (its 30mins away byt is the nearest one) games workshop makes me feel uncomfortable every time I go in just to have a look around at what models there are and what people are doing. The employees there sort of linger around u passively trying to get u to buy something. Once I had to leave when they weren't looking because I was so uncomfortable.
I'm fortunate that I'm from Chicago. If a gaming store is bad, I have options. There are 3 FLGS in Chicago alone. Along with 5 or more in the surrounding suburbs. And there are several actual GWs in the area as well. It has to be tough for people who live in more isolated areas with few, or no, options. It always blows my mind when I see shops and/or communities with bad attitudes or act like closed cliques. This is a hobby BUILT on being socially inclusive. The worse you treat people, the smaller a shop or community is going to get.
my local gamestore / club is very friendly and welcoming, they like casual gaming, pretty much all of them are very good painters which motivates to become a better painter yourself, people from other town come over here so thats saying something,
Im a BattleTech player from Canada, and I honest know how it feels to have a bad game store, as most of the stores in my area seems rather ignorant of the games existence (and yes there big on Magic the Gathering.)
My non-friendly local game store is in the next town over (1 hour away). Instead, I spoke to my friendly café owner, and run my weekly games in a reserved table there. Service is great, and we get lots of friendly questions about what we're doing with the maps and miniatures. Eventually I hope to recruit more players from the local community, just based on exposure. It's a great alternative.
There's always those stores that feel like old Wild West films where the new guy walks into the bar and everyone stops and stares. It can feel very awkward and difficult to break into the "cliques".. Maybe the hobby attracts a lot of introverts?
TL;DR: Sometimes (albeit rarely) the problem is you. All of this is true, but sometimes the customer is the cause of the issue so it is worth double checking your behavior as well. Leaving a mess, hitting on the staff, monopolizing the staff's time to the exclusion of other customers, being a Karen, negatively talking about the store/staff/customers while you're there, and other such issues are all things I've experienced that make it really hard to offer a positive shopping experience to a customer (book store, not game store).
Unfortunately my only local game store (a warhammer store) is very cliquey as well. I don't think the owner wants it to be cliquey but he is kind of hostage to his regulars who are his big spenders. I think he thinks it is out of his hands. I'm just trying to earn enough to get a car so I can try a gamestore in another town.
Do you have a local library that will/can let you play in unused rooms? or set up community game days? As a Vermonter I found this tends to be the best way to find people and game regularly(We used to have only a single LGS in the state).
A good way to voice your feeling is leaving a google maps review, it’s not only good to have communication between the store and yourself to express your opinions but if the store really is that bad it’s good to let others know what to expect
I'm not a mini person - more of an RPG and board gamer - but this advice is spot on. Years back I had an acquaintance tell me about a bad encounter at an FLGS where I was a long time regular and how he would not be going back because of how he was treated. I got details from him and mentioned the incident to the owner. The owner thanked me and spoke to the worker, who it turned out just had that expectation of how to act from other stores he had gone to.
I have never gamed at a store because I don't play the big commercial systems. Find a club or start one yourself. With social media and apps like Gamefor it's much easier to find people of a like mind to game with.
Excellent advice, sir! If I may add my own humble experience: Conventions or similar gatherings are also very helpful for meeting new, like-minded gamers and forming new groups. That's what I had to do when I entered the hobby. (My FLGS wasn't *bad,* but they just didn't know what to do with some rando flatfoot who'd never really gamed before.)
this reminded me of the time about 2 or 3 years ago when i was getting interested in DnD and tabletop in general, i went to a FLGS and asked around if there was a DnD game starting soon, they said yes (the person i asked was part of the session) and asked if i could just observe the game to see how it flowed, this was back in a time where i worked 12 hours a day and cherished my day off . Well the last person to get to the table was the DM and he was taking count, saw me and said "could you scoot back about 3 feet from the table at that moment i felt a little confused and upset considering i told him i just wanted to observe but he still persisted to tell me to not come any closer to the table, didnt want to make a scene so I just left and never went back there.
dont watch dnd, just play yo As a long time dm i get this request. I have delt with it ever way, some good some bad. But everytime someone watchs the game they ruin it for the other players playing, and they never come back. When I hand them a character sheet instead when they show up to "watch" they always stick around. If your interested in playing... play. watching baseball isnt playing baseball. Watching dnd isnt playing dnd Do it
I think it's about being watched by some outsider rather than having an involved group of people. I would on the other hand act differently if it's mtg or 40k, since it's games with rules and a definitive goal, it's easier to have someone watch that on the side compared to a game revolving around story telling
I had a similar experience in my (not so) FLGS over the past couple of months for board games. I buy board games and snacks when I come to play, but the owner (loudly) talked about how he wants to end people bringing their own bag of board games for game night and specifically pointed at me as the example of someone doing it when I was two tables away. I was embarrassed because I hadn't come in a while, and I was being singled out despite me buying food and games from them while being respectful in their store. He mentioned people are stealing stuff from the wall games (which I don't touch because I bring my own games). He didn't call me a thief, but he pointed me out as someone who brings games to the store and he hated that. A couple of months before that incident, the owner complained how he hated hosting a free game night because people came in to play but didn't buy games. He loudly said this to his compatriots as I walked by to put my stuff down to play games. Again, I felt embarrassed. If this is how he feels, then he should say that loudly as people come into the store. I bought hundreds of dollars of games and expansions at that store while only living in the city and state for a little over a year and yet his complaints (whether he intended to or not) hit me and made me feel guilty in the moment - despite there being no reason for the guilt. I haven't gone back to that store for about a month now since the board game bag situation, and I don't plan on buy games at full MSRP at that store. There is a new board game cafe that opened up that sounds good. Even if they charge to play games, I would rather go to a store with better aesthetics, better tables, cleaner bathrooms, more abundant food, and friendlier staff to play my games. Luckily there are a few options and I am starting to know people in the city to play games with. I spend thousands of dollars on games a year; none of that money is going to that store anymore.
I've got no local gaming store. Not within a mile or so of my house, and accessible by public transport, which is my definition of local. I do have two GW, 16 and 11 miles away. In the past I've visited one of them and the staff there jump on you and start trying to sell you stuff as soon as you walk in the door. Probably doesn't help that it's quite a small shop, like most GW shops in the UK. Conversely I went in the other one, the other week, and the guy running it was as Atom describes, very "stand off-ish", There were a few other people in the store, painting models, and I guess they were his mates/cronies, and he continued a conversation with them. I didn't feel particularly unwelcome, but I did get the feeling, that as a customer, I was interrupting their day... I prefer something in between. But I also prefer the first store I mentioned, because the staff have been, in the past, more engaging. But it's the one that is 16 miles away and I don't go to that town all that often...
@@vincemincevince my gaming club is run by an actual Spanish nazi (yes really) and we had a confrontation with him when he interrupted our game for the n'th time after several weeks of doing this complaining about things that were nothing to do with us and accusing us of stuff. His facebook page is littered with him dressed up in 1940s facist uniforms and he has friends which on his page which are party promoters and members of really far right political parties. You think you've got problems !!
@@leeharveydarke the word 'nazi' is banded around too easily these days via leftists and antifa types etc but I tell you if you ever needed a reason to never go full extreme right wing it's this fella who is the president of the games club; the dude is a lunatic; if he ever got into power outside of his little world of that club it would be hell on earth for people under him. it has been an eye opener. Thankfully we have 3 other gaming clubs in my city and I'm a member of another one wich is more open minded, younger and the president is a cool guy; slowly moving to the other club and forging friendships there but the bad club made me pay for a locker with 3 years worth up front so I got to stick it out for at least a year to make it worth while.
The problem with my LGS is it's a struggling store. The owner doesn't have money to bring in stock for it to sit there so we have to order everything but when we do that he takes all the money and has to put it into rent and can't afford to order our stuff. It means we have to wait months for anything we want. I really like the owner he's a great guy and I want to support him but I also don't want to wait 3+ months for models.
What was said above; the owner isn't a 'great guy,' he's a thief. You put in money to order stuff, he has to order the stuff, and can't use your money for other things. You and the others in the store should confront him about this, and not go there if he doesn't change his ways. Just order directly from the companies.
@@skulltakertheflamingswordo5792 He uses the money just to be able to pay rent. It really really sucks that it takes us so long to get our stuff but at least the store stays open and we can keep using the tables.
I was never one to set and play at my local FLGS, but I would hang around buying packs of MTG and going through there loose bins. They received a good bit of business from me, one evening my friend and I were wanting to play some MTG and I suggested my FLGS. We walked in and noticed a decent amount of folks, but we ended up finding a table in the back. When we went to sit down, we saw that there were coats all over the chairs from the folks sitting at the table next to it. I asked politely if we could play, and they said and i quote "Clearly those chairs are for our apparel, so probably not." Never went back
This video and the comments make me thankful for my flgs that is amazing place to go to for almost everything they always try to make sure there is time for everyone regardless of the hobby from d&d, minis to MTG and etc
Like the insights. Recently went into new store and was discussing building a nighthaunt army. As the conversation went on, I received the comment oh you only want to paint them. The reality was yes initially,however I did want to go gaming in time. I was playing D&D in my early years and napoleonic as well. When this guy was a twinkle in his father's eye.I believe communication is a skill and sometimes people are easily offended. So I just let it roll due to age difference and bought some nighthaunt. Will I support my local stores. Yes, am I inclined to game there no. But I see a lot of young children go there, so that's a major positive. Creative skills are more important these days with so much electronic gaming going on.
I do scale models,and I enjoy just painting figures, my local game shop gave me a similar experience, until he saw how much I spend. wait a while then go in and drop a wad of cash on him, his tune will change.
@@kevinoswald4136Thanks, it never occured to me. I think I will. Atom convinced me on the AOS route. To be fair love the figures and lore. Couple of clubs forming, so I wont be stuck.
luckily 90% of the stores have been similar in response. I did have one store in my travels that has left a bad taste in my mouth and ill never forget it. Thankfully the guy sold it and nicer folks picked it up. I live in a rural area so I am not afraid to travel to get to a store, but I am usually only in there to resupply or get something specific, some people are more curious or browsing and need that guiding hand.
This makes me so glad about how amazing my FLGS is. The manager/owner, Anders, was a huge push in the hobby for me, and if it weren't for him, i wouldn't be wasting insane amounts of money on plastic... love the guy
Used to be lucky enough to live near to Glasgow when the Dragon & George was open, and Tom the owner was amazing. You could wander in and talk games with him all day if you wanted, and he'd read every game on his shelves (in many ways the shop was his personal library) so was an amazing source of knowledge. Sadly he retired a couple of years ago, and while there's still a few decent game stores, we miss having Tom, an absolute local legend.
My "Friendly local game store" is so awful that when I tried coming to them with issues Ive noticed and asked them to improve, their response was to ban me from the store for a year, and got the local 40k group to harass me online for awhile. The owner and the store seemingly only care about their Magic The Gathering crowd, as theyve kicked out the D&D group before a few times in order to make room for more Magic people, and permabanned the entire Yugioh group from playing in the store because they were taking up Magic space as well. They take over a month to get any minis in if you ask them to order something so you can buy it, and thats if they actually order it at all. Frequently they just dont order things I ask them to get so I can buy from them. Their prices on minis are actually higher than buying directly from Games Workshop and they told me to get a job when I asked if theyd do anything cheaper (I have a job btw) So after 3 years of this I finally left a negative review for the store online to warn others, and as a result Ive been physically threatened by the owner and some of the wargamers there. Its the only store for many hours cause I'm in rural Alabama, and all the gamers there are super competitive tournement people while I'm a narrative guy. So all I do is buy models online and paint them. Id love to play but this is my situation sadly.
Well it was the only thing I got out of the house to go to. I dont have any friends so going out to play 40k or D&D was my only social interaction in the week. Sadly, now that the owner of the store banned me, I cant find any games of 40k or anyone to play RPG's with, because I assume others are afraid that if they game with me, they get banned too. And apparently I'm not the only one whose had this happen, I went to the stores Yelp page and a couple people said things along the lines of the owner harassing them and threatening legal action for "slander" if they said anything.
Sounds more like the fucking mafia than a games store! Better off playing online than with those douchebags, I'd say! I doubt you'd get away with such bullshit here in Australia. Unfriendly is one thing, but borderline criminal threats and unfair business practices are more than that.
If you can, be the change you want to see in that store! All you need is 1 other person who agrees with you to be friendly to others and start a good group. Eventually, unless they are idiots/best friends with the bad players, the store managers and owners will see you are bringing in business and will support you. Had a store from a bit ago flip because we had a couple of good guys around that brought a lot of people in and changed the store for the better.
Teeeeell me about it, Northern Norway here, 1653km to the closest Games Workshop, and 1009km to the closest non-GW games store with a table. There is no such thing as "maybe you don't want to invite strangers to your house" here.
This makes me so much more grateful for my LGS! They're the only store in town, and run by a group of amazing/welcoming/knowledgeable folks! Thanks Comic Boom!!!
Watching on a bus Literally 5 minutes ago walked past my local game store and chose not to go in because the manager isn't friendly Wanted to go in and look at ork vehicles
There's so many problems with this locally, that the local players formed 'guilds' and rent offices to play at. You can lease small office's for a couple hundred a month. They pay a small membership fee to lease the office and have key-holders to schedule open hours. One of them has ended up opening a coffee shop for games, and another one is actually running a prohibition bar lounge that only sells virgin drinks.
For the longest time the only game store in my neighborhood was a hole-in the wall in the back of a strip mall. It was the only shop front back there and it was kind of a creepy space. The store is always dirty and claustrophobic stuffed. Every time I've been in the regulars just stare at me like they've never seen a customer. The staff is vaguely interested in helping me but it's pretty clear that they're not looking to win new customers. When I asked about a board game one of their customer snerked derisively at me. I don't particularly care if they were gate keeping or just thought board games were gay. It just makes me not want to go through their doors. Because the store is so isolated they eyeball people who just drive through their part of the parking lot like the children of the corn. Like you'd expect for a hole-in-the-wall store their shelves are covered in decades-old games that they can't sell and they're basically offerring to Amazon shop games for you. Recently a new game store opened up in the same strip mall, front-facing space and it's a huge store. They have a wide variety of stock and they close stuff out quickly when they see it's not moving. The owner is very conversational and he responsively creates space in his store for folks who want to play games. He has an active social media presence and promotes events that fill his store. Somehow that hole-in-the-wall is still going for two years now. I have no idea how they make money.
I've been frequent team gaming stores for maybe 20 years now and what has worked for me is I walk into the store take a look around at the Weirs take a look at the games that people play then I introduced myself to whoever's behind the counter and tell them it is my first time there and if they would be so kind to show me where and I named what I'm interested in that day.
I had the same experience. There's a shop 20 min from my house but unless you know someone to directly set up a game, people are pretty insulated. I'll now drive 45 min to a shop but the people there are amazing. I don't get to play that often, so it's worth it to me to have a good experience.
One bit of advice to remember is, sometimes people don't realise what they're doing. My FLGS used to be a LGS missing the F. The staff all seemed very stand-offish and a little short. (NOTE: race, gender, and orientation were not a factor, the store had a pretty diverse staff) I talked to the regulars and customers who were all great, and they explained that the staff had recently lost someone, and several staff members were socially awkward. After that was explained to me, I found the store to be a great place. Always try to find more info to put context to situations like these.
I became a solo gamer for many years because my game store wasn't friendly. I bought everything from Wargames West. Now I have several stores near me but only one i like. They now get a lot of my business, although there are different stores in several states that I make a point of going to when I'm passing through.
I'm kind of sad because the guy who owns my local game store is such a huge arse, going on rants to players about their entitlement (paying a lot for events and expecting a prize) and hes super creepy towards women to the point where he was doing it to a female employee and someone complained to him and he made it the female employees fault? I don't go to this store now after the creepy stuff, but we don't have any other options so now I've not played games in physical form for a good few years We are getting a new games workshop in my city though so I'm looking forward to going there as I think a proper company would just not do these things. Thanks for the videos x
@@kyngwzrd3334 a little global pandemic packed that in lol, we got a beautiful new store over two floors, one for browsing and one for playing - i picked up some stuff but it'll be a while before they reopen sadly!
Really wish we had a local game store - friendly or otherwise. Local drug store just started stocking small selection of Reaper minis and paints though, so that's exciting. For an actual game store we're looking at about a 50 mile drive (one way). EDIT: at least here, the local library does check out meeting rooms for people to play games if you can do what you want to do in an hour or two without food or drink. Not ideal, but still an option.
The only gaming store in my home town was unfriendly to anyone who wasn’t a Magic player. Now there is no local gaming store in my home town.
Sad state of affairs, sir. Hopefully you'll see a better one pop up soon!
Sounds like a opportunity.
Theres a shop near me that I used to go to a lot. My friend and I were playing Guns of Gettysburg (which takes a while to set up). We were a few turns in when the manager on duty tells us that we need to wrap it up because he wants us to pack up our game in progress for two guys who want to play MTG, and they want our seats. I told him 'No'. And I gave my reasons. He insisted. Again I told him 'NO'. Eventually I told him to call the owner. Owner backed his employee and the MTG turds. So now I have a different store I play at because I'm sick of entitled MTG asshats.
farpointgamingdirect Yeah, similar sort of attitude at the store I’m talking about. All their gaming tables were about 4 foot by 2 foot which is great for cards, I guess. He had one larger table but I was normally covered in board games, which he would reluctantly clear off for roleplaying.
I even spent time trying to be a hobby hero for him running demos and trying to organize events. Attendance started to lessen once the summer hit.
I had a tournament organized one sunny weekend. Three people showed up, myself included. The store owner told me that he was reluctant to start with less than four. About 15 minutes before start time, the store owner took a call and I heard him say something about the tournament but I couldn’t catch it. Then he came over and told me that he was cancelling the tournament. One guy left and the other one stayed to play a game with me. 10 minutes later a guy came in and walked up to the table.
He exclaimed surprise that people were playing X-Wing. Then he told us that he had been coming for the tournament but was running late due to traffic. He called the store and told the owner he was running late. The owner told him the tournament was cancelled.
And yes, this guy was the phone call the owner took 15 minutes before the tournament start time. I stopped spending my money there that day.
I love it when the market plays its role the right way 😏
I wanted to share my story about my local game store.
A bit before 8th edition of 40k came out my GF's teenager showed interest in learning the game. So, we picked up some models for him and I dusted off mine. When we went to the store all of the patrons and most of the staff were a bit cliquish and stand off ish. So, basically being gamers. Every Friday we went to the store picked out a table played a game and went home. After about a month and a half of just going in and playing each other, the teenager could not come with me. So, I went by myself. One of the regulars noticed my regular play partner was not with me and came up to me. He asked where the teenager was I said he could not make it . . . then the guy who had never said much to me before asked if I wanted a game.
Now after playing at that store for 2 years I have noticed that many of the regulars there do not like to approach new players, because they themselves are not very social. But if you show yourself to be a regular just by showing up for a month or two, then you might find your self naturally part of the in group. I suggest if the crowd is not very welcoming to just show up every week on the same night at the same time and hang out for a few hours. Bring your army, some paints, maybe some models to put together. And once the people at the store see you as a regular and not a one time visitor you may feel more welcome.
Just my two cents.
Gamers are traditionally not the most socially skilled people out there. So, give them time.
%100 agree with this. But also would acknowledge the many stories of true jerk behavior recorded in this comment thread. There is a difference between being shy and being toxic.
@@HamboneWilson Although not a Tabletop Gamer (I'm only into 40K for the Lore and PC games, RIP DoW) I have many experiences in many other groups that frequently get the Toxic accusation thrown around.
The above advice IMO is spot on for most cases, but I think there is something else to add. In addition to being Shy, Social Ineptness can also come in the form of what most people would consider Rude, and this is where I have seen a lot of accusations of Toxicity come from. I should also point out that I myself am known in my various circles for not shying away from the Truth and giving blunt, up-front responses to questions.
This can manifest in many forms, from being blunt about someone's efforts on say painting a Model, often times this critique is not done from a point of Malice, more a case that they can see it's not right/perfect and so offer a correction. In their mind, this is not meant to hurt, but to help. When it comes to actual gameplay and 'discussions' about the Rules - from their point of view, the Rules ARE important, getting them right is what helps get the Game right.
I could go on and this is not to say that there aren't assholes (because I've seen and dealt with many of them) but I often see that the accusation of 'toxicity' is unfounded, it's more that some people don't have social graces, they aren't trying to be mean. they are just being them.
@@MajesticDemonLord I wish they would finish DoW3 at least
''my gf's teenager'' oh man, you got hadd.
Here's the thing...that all may even be true, but if you're the odd one out--*you* are the one paying the price while these "shy guys" sort if out. You're banging your head against a wall until you get included. I understand making an investment, but why do you want to just sit there and spend your days watching and spinning the wheel for what "may" become an inclusive experience? You're investing what little personal time you may have into a day that will probably be disappointing, for the hope of being on equal footing. That's exhausting.
I agree that it's rarely going to be exclusive out of malice, especially when the owner isn't involved. I agree that after enough people form a nucleus at a store, it really becomes about "the devil you know", because in the end, they're gambling their free time on you as well. I get it. But as someone that hasn't really been part of an inclusive gaming community, it's disheartening. After a while you really don't want to try after you bang your head on the wall for weeks on end.
It honestly does hurt.
The bigger store in my town has some very abrasive employees. There is a second, much smaller store with very talkative, friendly employees. The smaller store tends to not carry as much product, but will offer to order you anything they don't have. I'll go back to them every time even if it takes them a little longer to get product.
years ago I befriended my FLGS owner who was a former history teacher. I realized quickly he was only running his store to support his hobby because he was constantly opening brand new mini's during his weekly in store D&D game each time the GM needed a specific creature or npc. His store was completely disorganized. It was only because of the loyalty of his customers that he was able to stay in business as there were several other stores nearby. He was an example of a store who had a lot of "Friendly". Sadly he passed away from bladder cancer. Miss that guy.
Oh, thats sad. Sounds like a pretty cool (if unorganized) guy
A hero to behold, share his stories in the mead halls we call FLGS. A man or honor to befall the most dangerous of beasts. I salute you, good sir, keep regaling the old warrior's triumphs.
F
Really makes you realise how lucky you are to have a friendly local game shop.
I'm spoiled, I have 2.
@@MrSJPowell I've got 3.
@@hobbiesinasmallroom1850 Same here.
Got to admit - I love living in MKE. Easily 5+ shops I can think off off the top of my head that are great to play in. It always wierds me out to hear of unfriendly stores
I hate the cliquey elitist stores...thankful for my home store it was my first store I ever went to and has been nothing but welcoming if you're ever in rochester, mn
Like a month ago I was at a library in the city and I saw one of your videos being played on a big screen in the arts section
Pa-chow! 😀
That’s just plain awesome
That’s pretty cool! I’m glad to hear it. Thanks for watching!
Short answer:
Inform the Inquisiton.
There is Heresy afoot.
Better Business bureau: EXTERMINATUS
No wonder all the players at my local gaming shop plays genestealer cults.
The spanish inquisition?
@@badmoose01 the Warhammer inquisition
Dude my local game store charges an extra $30-$40 on the base price on every product so I have to go to the next town over that has a store that sells Warhammer and 40k for $10 less then what GW stores sell it for
My FLGS owner was a fantastic crack dealer in another life. He knows exactly what to say, mention or offer to get me to drop $100 more than I was planning to on any given day. He's also largely responsible for my Shelf of Shame.
Wait miniatures only cost you £100 each time? Pff I always end up spending far too much. When I start spending I just see so much I 'need'.
Psh, shelf of shame. F777 that. I proudly display my super-customized Grey Knights (definitely not allowed in most games) and also my favorite Lego space ships, tanks, Knex tanks, wooden sculpture of a stealth tank I designed, etc. B17ches love toys!
@@manictiger No, Shelf of Shame is where you keep all the models you've bought but never built/painted. The shame isn't owning them, it's not finishing them.
@@manictiger Bitches love cannons*
As an owner of a FLGS I can say that everything Adam says in this video is spot on correct. I would CERTAINLY want to know if one of my employees wasn't welcoming to anyone. I want everyone in our store to feel welcome and comfortable in our place because as a customer I've always HATED that "record store snob" mentality you get in some game/comic shops because what you're into isn't what that stores staff personally like. I would also add that IF you game at an unfriendly store because it's the largest community for your game in town, don't be afraid to move stores. Sure your play group may be smaller but if the new location is welcoming then in time new folks will join your group at the new store because of a more positive atmosphere.
Definitely! There is always another spot, whether or not it's a store doesn't matter, that would love to have people coming in!
But what happen when this is the owner who are the manager . I got to a store like that for buying comics. And the owner/manager and is employe are not welcoming or good a retail . I stop going a this place. There are annoyed about the custumers who dont play game.
Too bad you do not own a store in my area. I emailed the owner at his email listed on the website, let him know and never heard anything back.
Jason K, I honestly know how that feels I had to content with a L"G"S that is Part Comic shop/Restaurant, and its owned and managed by an Idiot, who unfortunately did not make the gaming space downstairs safe and comfortable for pretty much anyone. Not to mention that he and his rather incompetent staff, are kinda bad at maintaining any Miniature gaming stuff as they are all experts on Magic the Gathering.
My first FLGS was not local or friendly. I went there once when I was in high school after convincing my mom to take a detour while we were on a trip. I had never been in a dedicated game store before, so I was gawking, and the guy at the counter decided that this, and the fact that my mom was with me, meant I was unworthy to shop in his store.
I went up, asked if they had a particular Magic card in their singles catalogue, and the guy informed me they did not sell singles while standing in front of their display case of singles. I asked him if he was sure, and he got angry. I bought a booster pack and left.
The rare in the pack was the card I was looking for, and the store went out of business a few years later.
Which card was it?
@@usererror2572 Debtor's Knell
I remember walking into a FLGS in a city I just moved to. They invited me to a 40k tournament the following Sunday. I'm no expert but through sheer determination and focus I managed to win with my Chaos Daemons. They weren't happy that I, an outsider of their clique, had won their grand tournament. They spent months passing me between owners, managers and retail assistants trying their damned hardest not to present me with the trophy and prize money.
Safe to say I never returned there again and have found other friendly places to wargame.
wwow thats terrible. Hope you get more respect where you go
You freaking pub stomped them mate. It sucks that you didn't get the accolades but I think the fact that they got so mad at you for wrecking house is its own reward.
Did you ever get the prize?
@@spongemanicecone4440 I did. I think I must have gone there a dozen times or more, many broken promises later and they finally relented. So glad I've found far better gaming communities since!
@@memuskhan9976 definitely a great way of looking at it! Thanks!
That whole "Store Run by Bears" Gave me a terrific idea for a shop in a Role Playing Game. That be so funny.
Bandits try to rob the general store in a small backwoods town and are surprised to see all the locals shift into werebear form...:P
Fat gay guys? HA HA
Lol 😛
thatd make cool tshirt merch
I had my pc go through a town filled with wild animals that had formed a society. With every new npc i introduced i was bombarded with 'can i make it my pet?'
We had a problem like this for almost 20 years in my area. We had one game store for years that had poor customer service, messed up orders, and wasnt very helpful. The problem was it was the only gaming store within a 2 to 3 hour drive. He never had to get better because there was no competition.
Eventually a group of folks from the store who had the money decided they were going to open their own store. It took it about 6 months to decend into chaos. None of then wanted to actually work at the store or pay someone to do it
Finally a retired guy decided to open his own store a little over a year ago, and its awesome. Hes extremely helpful and on the ball with preorders. Lets hope it lasts.
PopeJones Wang prayers to that bud. I was facing a similar problem until another store opened up about a couple 3 years ago
"unfriendly store".........Brother Tobias......get the flamer.....the HEAVY flamer.....
To quote Chesty Puller, "Where the hell do you put the damn bayonet?"
@@farpointgamingdirect Ideally, between the third and fourth rib, but if that's inconvenient anywhere soft will do.
Pointy bit goes in the other guy.
"Front towards enemy"
So, I don't usually comment on videos, prefer to lurk, but I'm going to chime in this time. It might be a bit winded but stay with me. TL:DR You do you, have fun, start your own club.
I understand this problem on a couple of different fronts. First, for quite a long time in my tabletop gaming career (roughly 10-15 years) the "FLGS" wasn't super friendly. Now, When I started I was excited and wanted to play and didn't really understand the rules as well as i probably could've (3rd ed. 40k) and whenever I went to the game store and wanted to see what was happening on game nights, or view other people playing. I usually got the vibe of "You're irritating, you don't know anything, get out of here you're annoying." This happened basically every time I went into the store.
Second, "local" I live in a particularly remote location where local means approximately a 4 hour drive (398 km, 247 miles) in one of two directions from my town. Now this wasn't an issue as my post secondary education was near the store, so I had an opportunity to frequent it, but see the above reason why I don't go there.
Both of these issues would compound into a particularly shitty situation of horrible human beings roughly 5-6 years ago when I was trying to get my wife interested in my hobby, and in TTG in general. We went to the store where I had been ushered out because I was annoying and new to the hobby and my wife expressed the same things to me that I had felt about the store. Now, I'm screwed, with the wife being my constant possible opponent/teammate there was no FLGS to go to that was welcoming enough. However she had expressed interest in MTG and so we got started on that and would grow into Shadespire just a couple years ago (more on that later). We did this via the internet, bought some decks for MTG, and just had fun. Which is the keyword here, fun.
Now, fast forward 3 or 4 years and upon returning to one of the two FLGS, ONE of the stores had been taken over by a business savvy individual and turned it into a proper FLGS. They were welcoming, fun, helpful, encouraging and etc. This is the game store that helped get my wife into Shadespire that we now play frequently. This Store, gets my business every time I go through. Additionally. (because if you hadn't gathered I have 2 "FLGS" in different cities approx 4 hours away.) The store that was helpful, grew, and got big enough to expand, and did expand to the not-so-friendly-game-store city.
Whats it all mean basil? Well, ultimately, sooner or later business will change, someone may get ballsy and make another store, that person might be you. OR another game store from a city over may get big in a hurry and see an opportunity in the market same as my example. However, I still don't really have a local shop so, an option may be make your own club with like minded people. My friends and I used to run a weekly painting session at the local library where we could share our hobby. Most towns/cities/districts/regional municipalities usually have a space where this sort of thing can go down. Look around locally for a small space where you can host a small group of people, share your hobby, perhaps get a starter set with two armies/factions/crews/teams paint them up an run a workshop. Gateway games are great for this.
Bottom Line: Have fun. If you're local game store isn't fun, don't go there. Doesn't mean you have to give up on it. You don't have to be elitist. just have fun. Maybe you want to be elitist, maybe you see that as fun, I don't know. You do you. There is a way, it's just a bit more work. Just don't become the FLGS clique, but your clique, not theirs. Be the group you want to play with coming from the outside.
You do you, have fun, start your own club.
Thanks if you read the whole thing.
JT
I'm very fortunate in that Brian, the amazing owner of one of the only gaming stores in my little southern state, is incredibly polite and more than willing to accommodate players from either Warhammer, to Star Wars, to Magic. He understands that the prices are better online, he knows that better deals are out there. So his service and the welcoming air he has about him is always a nice thing.
You rock Brian. Thank you for being cool.
the last time i was in my local gw buying a new brush i tried to make some smalltalk about age of sigmar, the manager, who im not overly familiar with essentially scoffed at me and my misunderstandings of the system, suffice to say im not going back, its not difficult to not be an arse.
As a FLGS owner I appreciate comments about myself and employees so that we can improve.
I’m glad to hear it. Thanks for watching!
When the owner is the manager well you're screwed lol
Mostly truth, sadly. BUT! You could lurk in the back corner for a bit, see who else is rejected, and then go chat them up to try to find those alternatives Mr. Atom mentioned.
Drop mad heat on Yelp.
@@TechmarineArkantos I would say yes, but only if you bring it up to the management first. Give them a bit of time to correct the issue, if they still don't address it then leave the negative review.
@@TechmarineArkantos most know yelpers are pretty petty already. Use Google reviews.
A new store opened near me and I was thrilled went in there and grabbed a few pots of paint and an easy to build kit. The lady running the store at the time asked me seven times if I was ready to cash out and asked me to set the pots of paint I had in my hand on the counter. I set everything down and left, I’m not a thief and that’s what she was implying. I spend 100-200$ on this hobby sometimes every single month.... they lost my business and will just keep driving an hour to my regular store in the future.
Yeah. The closest store to me has cameras. Every time I go in, if the owners there he just watches the camera stream the whole time I'm in there. Even though I spent $800 in one hit at his store. Last time I was there he commented where he thought I lived, "your from x aren't you"? Which is an extremely poor and troubled area. I said, "No". I'm dark skinned. His attitude is obviously racist towards me. I buy online and have my own gaming group anyway. So fuck him & his store.
@Connor Szabo Thanks for your advice. Never really thought that it could be how I present myself. Since being an adult I don't care how I look or what people think of me. I think you could be right. Hopefully you are.
@Connor Szabo you to mate
@Cletus Anfernee Jackson Yeah but why assume me?? The guy who spent $800+ in one visit.... btw I love the chicken and egg saying! My answer: single cell organism that evolved into a sea creature which evolved into various species. One of which became a land walker which had different species evolve off of it. One of which eventually became a raptor dinosaur which laid eggs. Which would eventually evolve into the birds one of which was a chicken. So I suppose something evolved into a chicken. Therefore.... a chicken imo.
@Cletus Anfernee Jackson painting everyone with the same brush is not the way to live as a human. if he has been ripped off maybe instead he could arrange the store in a way to control theft like every other company on the planet.
If you don't have a Friendly LGS, you might have the local library as an option! Many libraries will let people occupy designated rooms, so long as you talk to them about it first! 😁
Great idea!
Our library keeps a set of D&D 5e core books to check out along with some rooms for playing. It's pretty great!
you cannot meet new people and buy new games at a library. You cannot have a magic tournament, you cannot paint 40k, you cannot you cannot you cannot.
@@ultralurker7579 learn to read hes talking about if you already DONT have the option of LGS geez
Bruh, librarians are fucking nerds.
Give 'em a cut, and they'll...
...ah fuck me.
This is honestly the best advice I've ever gotten, the area I now live in has only one game store for an hour and a half radius or so...for the longest time there were only two owners and one of the two of them worked every single day. For the longest time I thought they were very rude and didn't want to help....then I watched this and the next time I went in I asked them about the paints I was looking at and they both started talking to me and didn't stop giving me advice and resources for almost an hour, now whenever I come in they show me new things theyve ordered or showing me stuff online
My brother and I used to go to this shop called "Monstore". They were incredibly unfriendly and would ignore customers. They went out of business. We ended up driving 30 minutes to another shop called "The Realm". Super friendly and quite the opposite experience. Mentioned our bad experience at the other shop and they said "Oh that's where we bought our shelves from!"
I was lucky, I feel...
I'm was out of town for work, going a little stir crazy, and got a wild hare/hair and decided to delve into 40k, finally. While looking for a store... I found a GW store.
I was apprehensive walking in, knowing the staff would either be friendly or elitist (the only 2 personalities I've experienced in gaming/comic/music stores)... but the staff and clientele blew me away. They were very friendly and super excited someone knew was finding their way into the universe. They helped me find what grabbed my eye, helped recommend necessities (yes, GW stuff is pricey, but bought the basics purely because of appreciation of their customer service) and even talked me out of some frivolous add ons that weren't needed. I've been back about once or twice a week for the last month to build and paint. It's been an awesome experience.
That's the thing about franchise stores like GW, they are run by people who answer to a much higher power.
Consistent negative feedback to the God-emperor will result in a store's management being declared hereticical and subjected to Inquisitorial purging.
Something related to this happens a couple months ago in a GW store clear to where I live: the new store manager was a _ick... with a capital D. It was a matter few weeks: all the long time users just moved to another shop in the closest town and the sales plummeted. That store manager "quit" the job shortly after.
So, yes: if the problem is the manager then there's a solution but sometimes there's a problem with the metà in the store and in that case you can only go look elsewhere.
“Friendly local game store” man, I wish i had any of the above. I have to drive over an hour to get to the nearest game store. It sucks hard living in the literal middle of nowhere.
I have to drive 1 Hour to the next game Store and its not Friendly. And the next next Game Store is 3-4 Hours away. Depending on the Traffic.
Golvic same situation here
Meanwhile here I am getting into tabletop gaming after realizing I've been living literally 100m from the local game store. Sadly I don't have much time to play
Lmao in my country there are no FLGSs at all. Keep in mind this is in montenegro which has 620.000 citizens and is in balkans where the most popular games are shooters. Table top games are seen as old and unfashionable. Thats why there was only one club but it closed down becouse of corona but hopefully it will re-open. Heard they are changing their location
Love the coda "eventually the problem might fix itself". Keep 'em coming Uncle Atom.
Lol my "next town over" is a minimum 4 hour drive away, so i guess im just buggered.
Cjor Dillman maybe you could start a thing in your town I’m sure you could set up a weekly get together somewhere and it could snowball! you might wanna open your own store!
I was in this same situation. Me and one friend played. And no store even close. We slowly grew the hobby locally by just talking to ppl. And in less then a year we're at 6 players
Where do you live, Alaska?
@@VorpalDerringer northern ontario close to Sudbury so not far off m8
Cjor Dillman
, same situation here... I have to play boardgame alone, because people here more into playing cardgame...
God I'm so happy with my game store. It's literally like a family and everyone is accepting of everything. We all work together, we got ourselves 3 more tables than out store was allowed to have, the worker there goes out of his way to get us stuff that's already sold out, such a great guy
Mine is over the top friendly it's crazy. Can't fathom the opposite.
Same
My problem isn't so much the stores, it's my local meta. 99% competitive while I'm solely narrative. :/
I can sympathy. Most the lot here is ITC focused, so the original draft of Killteam in all it's flawed early state didn't last long,. and it's pretty much only 2k matched play ITC missions all the time here. A part of me is debating getting a demo setup of Necromunda, or waiting for the Chapter Approveds to launch and see what it does for KT.
I find campaigns to be a great way to please both sides throwing a few curve balls into the mix.
If that doesn't work go for the narrative your army really likes winning at all cost 😅
@@gratuitouslurking8610 CA won't do anything for KT, it's not full scale 40k so the most would be errata
@@labtec514 There's been leaked release info, there's apparently going to be the original CA, and some sort of book release for both Killteam and Blackstone Fortress of all things alongside it. Thus my pondering.
@@gratuitouslurking8610, the leak is for Annuals, which I suspect will be the collected White Dwarf articles and .pdf releases, hopefully with the numerous mistakes corrected. There may be a few pages of new stuff, but I wouldn't bet on it.
One of the main reasons I've decided to call Olympia, WA home now is my FLGS - Olympia Card and Comic... Gabi's place is probably one of the best in the country and welcoming to all types and games, weather it's role playing, wargaming, MTG, or other. Part of that is she has the square footage to house everyone, but the community is vibrant and they are ALWAYS busy. They're also open 7 days a week and open late.
Here is one thing I did in my city. I wanted to share it with you, on this topic.
So, over here were I live we have two very popular gaming stores. Althought both of them are in very amicable terms at present, there was a long time a couple of years back in which both owners were in very bad terms. This, due to one owner having broken up his business relationship with his store partner over bad business practices, that partner going over to the other store with a different version of things, and this leading to the community at large engaging in a serious conflict of rumors and back alley comments, with veritable sides forming up around both stores to (in essence) attack each other.
This made it hard for someone who wanted nothing to do with the whole deal to find a game. We were all constantly being reminded of the issues between both stores, as each store had a large number of players at the stores themselves and at social media, making the issue bigger and bigger.
So, eventually what I did was take a page out of the 8th Ed. launch online tounament for WH40k, and tried my hand at it.
I wrote up a whole set of scenarios along a narrative, made a campaign book with custom scenarios, narrative and art, and then I put a registry sheet online. With that, I started calling all the players I could in my city who wanted to play, to try their hands at this online campaign. A whole "play where you want, with who you want, whenever you want, and just report the results back to me" affair. With the catch that you could not play with the same player more than once. As the campaign moved along, you HAD to go out of your way to get opponents.
In my first try, this online campaign got around 30 players, and by the 4th campaign I had over 60 players from all across my country. Small groups of players in other cities getting together to play the campaign amongst themselves. People managed to put aside some of their problems, and get together to play. Be it at their homes, or at either store. In fact, whole new gaming groups came about the whole thing, and I look back on it as one of the best experiences I've had in the hobby. So much so that I am now planning to pick it up again, now in narrative tournament format, since at present the issue of the battle between both stores is a thing of the past.
Thank you for sharing your advice on how to deal with an unfriendly store.
Dealing with one is tough. Having the only two stores in your city engage in actual conflict with each other, is even worse. But, in the end, people want to play. They want to have fun. And, if you are lucky that will shine through the conflicts and petty arguments, and you will find a way to play and enjoy the hobby.
I had this. I was an older black guy walking into a Games Workshop Store a couple decades ago in the area where I worked. I went in because it was odd to me that there was rarely much traffic near that store. I was a Space Wolf player and I one day decided to just get some bikes to add to my (at the time) 1500 point army. I went in and the conversation stopped and I was instantly watched. Any question was answered yes or No and after a couple minutes I just asked if there was a problem. They looked at
me and said “so why are you really here”. The tone was in mistakable. I was invited to leave. And I did. I worked where I could see them and I was unsurprised when the store was closed.
Another store (unaffiliated with GW) opened and I was friends with this owner having seen him in and off at various events and places from when we both were much younger. We were cool and I was there when he opened and wouldn’t you know it I saw each of those in the GW group. Amazingly they did not realize I was in the place but one at a time I would se them try to bust out of the place and I would stop them by saying see you to my friend and they would stay and I came back later after they got comfortable. Took a week of them seeing me and me not acting like I hated them before they got comfortable. (Remember this is a Friends’ store and I was not going to torpedo it!) Eventually the entire group began meeting there. Then after a month, they started talking to me. They had totally “forgotten” what had happened before and I was just there. It was a year after that when one of them (one of the two actually employed by GW) actually put it together. He was shocked when he realized that I was that guy they had run off. He did admit that it was not my age that made them really freak and honestly apologized. He was mortified when we realized what they had done and what so had done for them. In the end they did apologize with one or two exceptions (hey they are younger adults so it was easier for them to pretend and not look bad among the others customers - and it was my friend’s store so I was not running them off for ego) And these many year later I still remember what that first one to put it together said, “I didn’t know you were cool”. I told him, “hey you never gave yourself a chance to find that out”.
FYI - GW shut them down for poor sales and poor customer service. They guys were young and so was there manager. The manager was too interested in being a friend and did not do his job according to what I heard. Games Workshop wanted ANY gamer coming in to be welcome because that leads to good sales (and they really did not like what they had been hearing on GP).
I say all this to say, don’t take it personally if the local shop sucks. Break the ice yourself. Talk to them. Walk in by a die or two and leave. Come back in same time next week. It may take three weeks but that often will open things up. If you can’t do that (or honesty don’t want to) Write a letter to the owner and let them know that when you were there and that you did not feel comfortable. Explain exactly what happened and as close
As you can play by play what you saw and what you like to see improved as a SUGGESTION. It it does not work, there is on line to get suggestions for your area. Good luck. 👍
Funny enough I started working at a local store a few years ago and I’m not the friendliest guy around but I would always great all my customers ask if they needed help and explain any game they were interested in. I even had to learn games I had no interest in like Malifaux. I’ve been gone from that town for a year and a half now but go back to visit every month for work reasons and people still approach me about stuff in the store because they think I still work there and am just at a different branch in a different city, crazy what good customer service will get you.
My local store is very unwelcoming....the moment I walk in, everyone stops talking and I am stared at till I leave and then they make a very obvious display of resuming their game. You cannot enter any competitions (I mean the GW ones) unless you are a "member/gamer" at the store. Unfortunately, the manager is the owner and seems to only be in it for himself and his friends. I buy online.
Let me guess... you are a girl. That kinda shit is sad whether it’s video games or board games. Too many dungeon trolls.
My local warhammer store is friendly but it's way to pushy
On the sales.. I'll go in there for a few paint pots and I'm being persuaded in buying so much more when I dont want it. Once I bought an item and returned it the next day just because I was cohersed into buying it, I was told at the time it would go great with my army.. night goke had a look at one of my codexs and realised it didn't suit my play style. These days I'm fully aware of what there like now and I am just very adamant about what I'm after. As for my local warhammer store being approachable yes they are.. they're very good but if you step out of line oh wow they really make a point.. 5x guys standing around a table and 1x grabs a chair.. store manager approaches guy sitting and says if your not painting please put the chair back.. these chairs are for painters. you all know how long 40k games take.. theres slot of chairs.. same thing goes with bringing in non g.w glues.. or assembling forgeworld models in there.. hot drinks cold drinks everything needs to be in a sealable bottle and no coursing with customers when there trying to make sales.
Crazy_Lew 90 I feel bad for any new person coming into my local warhammer. They are all over you the whole time you’re there. There’s trying to be helpful and then there is jamming stuff down people’s throats. They do the latter all of the time. Even to me a somewhat regular of the store.
Manchester GW is absolutely horrific for this! Completely puts me off going, sooner go to one of the smaller stores where the manager is the only employee.
I just recently got into painting Warhammer 40K minis but I do not play it, I just was looking for something different than canvas to paint. I didn't even know we had a local shop before this new venture. In the last two months the LS owner/manager has been very helpful learning the ins and outs of miniature painting and picking out paint. This week I was there and decided to buy a larger model that I knew I could get online for $10-15 less. When we were talking I decided to thank him for all the help over the months and told him that I want my money to go to his shop and not an online store as much as I can. My experiences with the LS is why I was ok with paying more than the online price. I want this store to survive. How you treat your customers matter; especially in a world were I can just order everything online.
As a store owner, I agree 100%. I have to earn business. There are cheaper places to buy games. I have to bring value to the transaction or there is no logical reason for people to buy from me. I have to create something so good that people buy from me because they want my store to exist. Nobody owes me anything. I have to earn it. In my experience it’s not a problem once people join our community. People want part of us to take home with them. The games, t-shirts, dice or whatever are the things they can take home with them.
I have a few options for gaming stores within an hr of home so I consider myself lucky.
I remember first getting into magic and attending my first FNM alone. It was rather daunting to sit amongst a group of ppl who obviously knew each other well while i just sat quiet wondering what the hell I was doing there. Once paired though I found my opponents anywhere from neutral to friendly but none unwelcoming. So i turned up again next week to be greeted by the staff member doing the sign ups with a "Mitch right?, good to see you back, did you enjoy last week"
This eased my anxiety about being on the outer immediately.
I have had similar experiences with all stores I frequent, like most social situations someone just needs to break the ice and ppl become comfortable.
I'm going through this right now. I bought a house within a mile of a local game store, and I thought it was a dream come true. It's been there for almost 40 years, everybody in the neighborhood has heard of it, but you can't really play there. They only have room for one table, it's always being used by the owner's son and his friends who play MMOs on their laptops together. I met a group online that all play 40k, and it turns out that we all live in the same neighborhood, but we have to drive 20 minutes away to get a table at the next closest shop. I'm looking into converting my garage into a gaming space.
My LGS is a 4 hour round trip away but I always make time in the month to visit and spend $50-$100. They aren't particularly large or overly nice but in the occasion that I would want to play a game outside of my personal friend group, the option is there. Plus, once in a while I find something special I wouldn't be able to find online without insane price hikes.
What you described with "gamer first" store owners/operators ... _THAT'S_ how I wish _ALL_ stores were.
I don't disagree. I just wish more employees at such stores could help folks like myself, who very much would like to get involved, but don't even know what's out there, how it works, or even how to find out.
@@bordenfleetwood5773 Then ask. Unless someone looks visibly lost, or asks for help, it should be assumed they want to be left alone. If you ask for help and then they're rude, that's when you have a problem.
@@TheLukemcdaniel Sadly, I did. It really wasn't anyone's fault, just a failure of communication. I didn't have a game at the time, and the store owner/manager/local uber gamer wasn't really sure how to answer my awkward questions. He's a great guy, very welcoming, but (at the time) just had no experience with someone who had no idea what gaming is about.
I found a game a few years later and after a move, but I still feel really awkward every time I go to that particular store now. Bad imposter syndrome, I guess.
I don't agree, you assume they'll be interested in what you play. Gamer owners usually have a narrow focus and only tend to cater to a specific niche
go in to my lgs for some warcry stuff. i ask the guy working if the battlepack cards are the same ones that come in the starter set. pretty basic question if you ask me. he gives me huge attitude and just says "how am i supposed to know, I don't play that stupid game".
When I was starting to play warhammer 40k I didn't want to go to the local GW store because I wanted to support an indipendent wargaming club/store, and it turned out that the club owner was a very rude guy who didn't care about customers at all, moking me for playing warhammer and especially the imperial guards. Never came back ever again, luckily there were more places to play around with more polite and welcoming people.
Good for you man! I know the feeling I've been badgered for playing first Ultramarines then Cadians. Both for being "basic" and "wimpy" respectively. Well sorry man but unlike you I can't afford to pay 1.2k for Warhound titans like you, spending $90 is more than enough for me unless I go 2 or more weeks without buying anything extra then I may splurge and get a start collecting box or something. I will admit that imperial guard is starting to make a comeback but Tau and Chaos players just tend to shred us unless we specialise in tanks and knights.
@@thomas4092 Yeah I know the feeling, in the store were I play now just me and another guy are loyalist and both of us play guards and, if it wasn't for the store's staff who makes some nice narrative capaign we'd always get stomped against all of the chaos/necron/tau players unless we bring some cheesy with all leman russ list.
That guy sounds like his club/store isn’t Going to do too well, over time. Glad you found a better place to play. Thanks for watching!
Nothing cheesy about lots of Leman Russes. That's mainly what the guard brings to battles in the lore. If you refuse to use scissors, you will never beat paper.
Game stores are often run and staffed by Gamers and lets be real, a certain type of person "Socially" is often very drawn to Gaming.
I've often found going into gamestores a awkward experience for this reason, you can't actually tell if the staff are trying to be friendly with banter that's just not really professionally appropriate with new customers (Go into GW store and say you play Eldar and get ready for the stream of mockery from everyone) or they're actually just dicks.
I think that a lot of Socially awkward people work at game stores also creates a few more issues, like the common one of them just hovering over you and trying to be TOO friendly and pushy and not realising the blatant social cues of "leave me alone".
I think Game stores actually could benefit from hiring/poaching sales people from other stores and or/non nerds and then just train them up. It's rare to fine game stores with actually great customer service.
One thing i would like to add: Tabletop Clubs are a thing. Look for them on the internet, they'll often have a facebook page etc.
In my town for example, we have just set one up, where we basically meet every other week in a restaurant to eat and play tabletop. Might be a solution if your store manager sucks.
This is what saved me to be honest.
I really hate our local game store. used to work there been there since i was a kid so a lot of history.... unfortunately the guy who owns the place is insane.
My FLGS is great. They just recently moved to a bigger location because they didnt have enough space for all the players who patron the store. The owner is almost always there, but doesnt get to play much that I can see. The TO is great too. He runs a great tournament scene and works hard to keep even the serious tournaments friendly.
We have a couple of shops that have a weird vibe where players won't play/buy from the other.
That happens a lot in gaming, for some reason. I’m not sure why. Thanks for watching!
I think it's pretty simple. I have an affection for my local shop and owner.
If a competitor moved in, I would no buy from them. Nor meet up for a game there. In the first case, it would be money that I'm personally not giving to local guy who's worked his butt off to make it happen, and in the second case because it would affect the dollars the other guy is spending
I remember walking into a store that sold ccgs with my fiance. Someone had pointed it out as a magic store (I do stage magic and that person misunderstood) but we are big on rpgs and board games so we thought "lets check it out anyway." From the moment we walked in the guy working and all the like 3-4 other guys just glared daggers and were very "no we just have magic" to questions so we walked out and never went back. I'm not really a magic player but yeah they would have driven me off for good without ever knowing that. Its like "ok if you don't want my money I'll take it to someone who does."
This is absolutely true - I ran a shop for books and I appreciated every oppinion wanting to do business. ;)
Sometimes it just takes a bit of warming up to the store. It's essentially going into a local bar where everyone knows each other and once you've popped in a few times you find it much easier to talk to people. Entering local tournaments really helps too it essentially forces you to get talking.
The staff shouldn't cultivate that culture, though. My local GW store will go out of his way to welcome newcomers to his store and make sure their questions are answered.
The only game store in my neck of the woods is a GW store. It stopped being friendly, for me at least, when they openly and loudly complained to me in front of customers, because I "dared" to order a set of contrast paints in the webstore instead locally.
It was also the last straw, which made my decision to completely transition away from GW all the more easier.
Unfortunately GW is a bottom-line company that COMPELS store managers to pump up their sales each and every quarter. Managers with poor sales figures will be replaced. My local GW shop is on its third manager in, IDK, about 5 years? I'm not defending individuals who are needlessly dismissive or abrasive, I'm just saying they're probably trying to save their jobs. But it totally sucks if you're the customer they take out their frustrations on. :(
I don't understand how stores can be that way, we want more people to get into this fun hobby not push them away. Im good friends with the owner of my FLGS and the other regulars so I guess we would be considered the "clique" but we are very welcoming to new players and new people coming in. Hell we often pull people into our games we are playing that are interested in the hobby/game and we also have no issues running demos for people if they wish to learn. Stores and Cliques that Uncle Atom mentioned only harm this awesome hobby.
ya know, Atom. It's videos like this that make me glad I live in a town with an abundance of game stores. and the one closest to me is ALSO probably the friendliest.
Great luck! Thanks for watching.
Experienced something VERY similar to this at a place in my area where the owner, a gamer and a successful businessman, along with his buddies, tossed a ton of $ at their own shop, made a wonderful place at first glance with extensive terrain and a huge space, but their business practices are horrid. Unapologetically they treat anyone not in their click as if they are doing them a favor. If you reserve or pre-order things that might be limited quantity at a big release, forget being certain that you will get it because someone in the 'club' will just scoop your stuff, even if they advertise a midnight launch or similar event. Ordering anything is a crap shoot and their customer service is atrocious. However in the interest of growing their club/store, they give huge discounts and run events with major giveaways and prizes, even at their own expense, to out-do other legit stores. Its sad since it hurts the legitimate gaming stores that truly have earned the F in the FLGS acronym, as those struggle to survive but they get their customers bled off with shiny enticements and spending that the sometimes struggling stores cannot match. Yes, that IS how business works, and often those with the deepest warchest will win, but this isn't as much a store as it is a club that uses their propped up customer base to support their personal gaming space. Best thing I can say to anyone who encounters a toxic situation at a shop is to find another. I'm lucky in that there's an abundance in my area but some people have perhaps only one choice. In that case, you need to find other players as best you can and avoid stores with terrible reputations. Plenty of discount online ordering options for product and meetup methods. I order direct at the FLGS but if they aren't friendly...why support them?
Hey! This video really helped! (Obviously a few months back because COVID-19). Went to this game store that was fantastic! Had all the newest d&d miniatures and books and paints and a large area to play. The manager was so dismissive of me when I was asking about how to jump into the painting hobby. This manager was there everytime I went and was obviously very dismissive of me, but not some of my female friends. Flash forward several months and my friend wanted to make a quick run to this store. Someone I haven't seen before is working, and he's really nice and helping with paints and all these cool techniques. I let him know about my previous experiences and he let me know that he was one of the owners and that particular manager was fired. Started running a weekly d&d session there and my players used to buy snacks and miniatures and paints every week. Glad they're still in business for curbside pickup for covid, and hope it remains that way. Before that, I was driving about 15 miles (35 minutes in light traffic) to run d&d.
Luckily have a really good FLGS, if anything, the main issue I have is the L part is a bit of a stretch!
If the local store is trash, buy online and see if there are gaming groups (or start one) in any community type spaces (or game at home, if viable).
usually it's the exact opposite, they sales staff come and try talk to you the entire time you're in there and hover over your shoulder not really letting you browse. (see 90s and 00s GW stores).
The biggest ones in my area ironically are great and friendly up front, there’s a couple little shops that come off as cringey at times, some are cool, I’m fortunate to have choices
Aaron Ibn Mocha it is nice to have options i have about 5 different stores around for the hobby. Mainly go to my local GW as one of my best buds is the on call manager and fortunately he gets a 50% discount that he subsequently hooks me up with when i need it lol
We haven't had a store in town in quite some time, the last one was ok but the owner ran into some financial issues. What somebody in my area ended up doing was creating a facebook group. Searching for groups like that online is also pretty good, lots of people have their own tables and are very welcoming to new comers. If a person is just looking to find some people to play the game with and it's tough to find or get to a store, I would suggest that
My "local" (its 30mins away byt is the nearest one) games workshop makes me feel uncomfortable every time I go in just to have a look around at what models there are and what people are doing. The employees there sort of linger around u passively trying to get u to buy something. Once I had to leave when they weren't looking because I was so uncomfortable.
This is my exact experience with every gw store lol
I'm fortunate that I'm from Chicago. If a gaming store is bad, I have options. There are 3 FLGS in Chicago alone. Along with 5 or more in the surrounding suburbs. And there are several actual GWs in the area as well. It has to be tough for people who live in more isolated areas with few, or no, options.
It always blows my mind when I see shops and/or communities with bad attitudes or act like closed cliques. This is a hobby BUILT on being socially inclusive. The worse you treat people, the smaller a shop or community is going to get.
Went into a licensed GW store about a decade ago. that was a scary experience. The staff felt like cult members, who wanted to recruit me...
Joooooin ussssssss
@@onedeadchicken2489 aaaargh!
my local gamestore / club is very friendly and welcoming, they like casual gaming, pretty much all of them are very good painters which motivates to become a better painter yourself, people from other town come over here so thats saying something,
Im a BattleTech player from Canada, and I honest know how it feels to have a bad game store, as most of the stores in my area seems rather ignorant of the games existence (and yes there big on Magic the Gathering.)
lmfao
battletech?
what year is this 92'?
mind you i still play the card game...from 95' lol
Well...Better make that the year 2020 with the recent Clan Invasion Kickstarter stuff from Catalyst Game Labs.
My non-friendly local game store is in the next town over (1 hour away). Instead, I spoke to my friendly café owner, and run my weekly games in a reserved table there. Service is great, and we get lots of friendly questions about what we're doing with the maps and miniatures. Eventually I hope to recruit more players from the local community, just based on exposure. It's a great alternative.
There's always those stores that feel like old Wild West films where the new guy walks into the bar and everyone stops and stares. It can feel very awkward and difficult to break into the "cliques".. Maybe the hobby attracts a lot of introverts?
TL;DR: Sometimes (albeit rarely) the problem is you.
All of this is true, but sometimes the customer is the cause of the issue so it is worth double checking your behavior as well.
Leaving a mess, hitting on the staff, monopolizing the staff's time to the exclusion of other customers, being a Karen, negatively talking about the store/staff/customers while you're there, and other such issues are all things I've experienced that make it really hard to offer a positive shopping experience to a customer (book store, not game store).
Unfortunately my only local game store (a warhammer store) is very cliquey as well. I don't think the owner wants it to be cliquey but he is kind of hostage to his regulars who are his big spenders. I think he thinks it is out of his hands.
I'm just trying to earn enough to get a car so I can try a gamestore in another town.
Do you have a local library that will/can let you play in unused rooms? or set up community game days? As a Vermonter I found this tends to be the best way to find people and game regularly(We used to have only a single LGS in the state).
A good way to voice your feeling is leaving a google maps review, it’s not only good to have communication between the store and yourself to express your opinions but if the store really is that bad it’s good to let others know what to expect
Thank God, my local game store is super friendly
I'm not a mini person - more of an RPG and board gamer - but this advice is spot on. Years back I had an acquaintance tell me about a bad encounter at an FLGS where I was a long time regular and how he would not be going back because of how he was treated. I got details from him and mentioned the incident to the owner. The owner thanked me and spoke to the worker, who it turned out just had that expectation of how to act from other stores he had gone to.
I have never gamed at a store because I don't play the big commercial systems. Find a club or start one yourself. With social media and apps like Gamefor it's much easier to find people of a like mind to game with.
Excellent advice, sir!
If I may add my own humble experience: Conventions or similar gatherings are also very helpful for meeting new, like-minded gamers and forming new groups. That's what I had to do when I entered the hobby. (My FLGS wasn't *bad,* but they just didn't know what to do with some rando flatfoot who'd never really gamed before.)
this reminded me of the time about 2 or 3 years ago when i was getting interested in DnD and tabletop in general, i went to a FLGS and asked around if there was a DnD game starting soon, they said yes (the person i asked was part of the session) and asked if i could just observe the game to see how it flowed, this was back in a time where i worked 12 hours a day and cherished my day off . Well the last person to get to the table was the DM and he was taking count, saw me and said "could you scoot back about 3 feet from the table at that moment i felt a little confused and upset considering i told him i just wanted to observe but he still persisted to tell me to not come any closer to the table, didnt want to make a scene so I just left and never went back there.
dont watch dnd, just play yo
As a long time dm i get this request. I have delt with it ever way, some good some bad.
But everytime someone watchs the game they ruin it for the other players playing, and they never come back.
When I hand them a character sheet instead when they show up to "watch" they always stick around.
If your interested in playing... play. watching baseball isnt playing baseball. Watching dnd isnt playing dnd
Do it
I think it's about being watched by some outsider rather than having an involved group of people.
I would on the other hand act differently if it's mtg or 40k, since it's games with rules and a definitive goal, it's easier to have someone watch that on the side compared to a game revolving around story telling
I had a similar experience in my (not so) FLGS over the past couple of months for board games. I buy board games and snacks when I come to play, but the owner (loudly) talked about how he wants to end people bringing their own bag of board games for game night and specifically pointed at me as the example of someone doing it when I was two tables away. I was embarrassed because I hadn't come in a while, and I was being singled out despite me buying food and games from them while being respectful in their store. He mentioned people are stealing stuff from the wall games (which I don't touch because I bring my own games). He didn't call me a thief, but he pointed me out as someone who brings games to the store and he hated that. A couple of months before that incident, the owner complained how he hated hosting a free game night because people came in to play but didn't buy games. He loudly said this to his compatriots as I walked by to put my stuff down to play games. Again, I felt embarrassed. If this is how he feels, then he should say that loudly as people come into the store. I bought hundreds of dollars of games and expansions at that store while only living in the city and state for a little over a year and yet his complaints (whether he intended to or not) hit me and made me feel guilty in the moment - despite there being no reason for the guilt.
I haven't gone back to that store for about a month now since the board game bag situation, and I don't plan on buy games at full MSRP at that store. There is a new board game cafe that opened up that sounds good. Even if they charge to play games, I would rather go to a store with better aesthetics, better tables, cleaner bathrooms, more abundant food, and friendlier staff to play my games. Luckily there are a few options and I am starting to know people in the city to play games with. I spend thousands of dollars on games a year; none of that money is going to that store anymore.
I've got no local gaming store. Not within a mile or so of my house, and accessible by public transport, which is my definition of local. I do have two GW, 16 and 11 miles away.
In the past I've visited one of them and the staff there jump on you and start trying to sell you stuff as soon as you walk in the door. Probably doesn't help that it's quite a small shop, like most GW shops in the UK.
Conversely I went in the other one, the other week, and the guy running it was as Atom describes, very "stand off-ish", There were a few other people in the store, painting models, and I guess they were his mates/cronies, and he continued a conversation with them. I didn't feel particularly unwelcome, but I did get the feeling, that as a customer, I was interrupting their day...
I prefer something in between. But I also prefer the first store I mentioned, because the staff have been, in the past, more engaging. But it's the one that is 16 miles away and I don't go to that town all that often...
I guess "local" is subjective, because my lgs is 24 miles away
gaming clubs seem on the up though which is good
@@vincemincevince my gaming club is run by an actual Spanish nazi (yes really) and we had a confrontation with him when he interrupted our game for the n'th time after several weeks of doing this complaining about things that were nothing to do with us and accusing us of stuff. His facebook page is littered with him dressed up in 1940s facist uniforms and he has friends which on his page which are party promoters and members of really far right political parties. You think you've got problems !!
@@leeharveydarke the word 'nazi' is banded around too easily these days via leftists and antifa types etc but I tell you if you ever needed a reason to never go full extreme right wing it's this fella who is the president of the games club; the dude is a lunatic; if he ever got into power outside of his little world of that club it would be hell on earth for people under him. it has been an eye opener. Thankfully we have 3 other gaming clubs in my city and I'm a member of another one wich is more open minded, younger and the president is a cool guy; slowly moving to the other club and forging friendships there but the bad club made me pay for a locker with 3 years worth up front so I got to stick it out for at least a year to make it worth while.
Dave Dogge i don’t think i have problems
The problem with my LGS is it's a struggling store. The owner doesn't have money to bring in stock for it to sit there so we have to order everything but when we do that he takes all the money and has to put it into rent and can't afford to order our stuff. It means we have to wait months for anything we want. I really like the owner he's a great guy and I want to support him but I also don't want to wait 3+ months for models.
And illegal
What was said above; the owner isn't a 'great guy,' he's a thief. You put in money to order stuff, he has to order the stuff, and can't use your money for other things. You and the others in the store should confront him about this, and not go there if he doesn't change his ways. Just order directly from the companies.
@@skulltakertheflamingswordo5792 He uses the money just to be able to pay rent. It really really sucks that it takes us so long to get our stuff but at least the store stays open and we can keep using the tables.
Thankfully my local Games Workshop store is run by one of the friendliest guys I know. Fantastic place to play.
I was never one to set and play at my local FLGS, but I would hang around buying packs of MTG and going through there loose bins. They received a good bit of business from me, one evening my friend and I were wanting to play some MTG and I suggested my FLGS. We walked in and noticed a decent amount of folks, but we ended up finding a table in the back. When we went to sit down, we saw that there were coats all over the chairs from the folks sitting at the table next to it. I asked politely if we could play, and they said and i quote "Clearly those chairs are for our apparel, so probably not." Never went back
You're so friendly Atom! Love your videos.
I generally prefer it to the alternative. Thanks for watching!
This video and the comments make me thankful for my flgs that is amazing place to go to for almost everything they always try to make sure there is time for everyone regardless of the hobby from d&d, minis to MTG and etc
Like the insights. Recently went into new store and was discussing building a nighthaunt army. As the conversation went on, I received the comment oh you only want to paint them. The reality was yes initially,however I did want to go gaming in time. I was playing D&D in my early years and napoleonic as well. When this guy was a twinkle in his father's eye.I believe communication is a skill and sometimes people are easily offended. So I just let it roll due to age difference and bought some nighthaunt. Will I support my local stores. Yes, am I inclined to game there no. But I see a lot of young children go there, so that's a major positive. Creative skills are more important these days with so much electronic gaming going on.
I do scale models,and I enjoy just painting figures, my local game shop gave me a similar experience, until he saw how much I spend. wait a while then go in and drop a wad of cash on him, his tune will change.
@@kevinoswald4136Thanks, it never occured to me. I think I will. Atom convinced me on the AOS route. To be fair love the figures and lore. Couple of clubs forming, so I wont be stuck.
luckily 90% of the stores have been similar in response. I did have one store in my travels that has left a bad taste in my mouth and ill never forget it. Thankfully the guy sold it and nicer folks picked it up. I live in a rural area so I am not afraid to travel to get to a store, but I am usually only in there to resupply or get something specific, some people are more curious or browsing and need that guiding hand.
This reminds me of being treated poorly at a few (F)LGS as a enthusiastic and innocent youngster. It sadly can turn people off the hobby all-together.
This makes me so glad about how amazing my FLGS is. The manager/owner, Anders, was a huge push in the hobby for me, and if it weren't for him, i wouldn't be wasting insane amounts of money on plastic...
love the guy
Sadly you see a lot of this in the model RR and RC aircraft hobbies too. Then they wonder "why are no young people entering the hobby?"
Used to be lucky enough to live near to Glasgow when the Dragon & George was open, and Tom the owner was amazing. You could wander in and talk games with him all day if you wanted, and he'd read every game on his shelves (in many ways the shop was his personal library) so was an amazing source of knowledge.
Sadly he retired a couple of years ago, and while there's still a few decent game stores, we miss having Tom, an absolute local legend.
My "Friendly local game store" is so awful that when I tried coming to them with issues Ive noticed and asked them to improve, their response was to ban me from the store for a year, and got the local 40k group to harass me online for awhile.
The owner and the store seemingly only care about their Magic The Gathering crowd, as theyve kicked out the D&D group before a few times in order to make room for more Magic people, and permabanned the entire Yugioh group from playing in the store because they were taking up Magic space as well.
They take over a month to get any minis in if you ask them to order something so you can buy it, and thats if they actually order it at all. Frequently they just dont order things I ask them to get so I can buy from them.
Their prices on minis are actually higher than buying directly from Games Workshop and they told me to get a job when I asked if theyd do anything cheaper (I have a job btw)
So after 3 years of this I finally left a negative review for the store online to warn others, and as a result Ive been physically threatened by the owner and some of the wargamers there. Its the only store for many hours cause I'm in rural Alabama, and all the gamers there are super competitive tournement people while I'm a narrative guy.
So all I do is buy models online and paint them. Id love to play but this is my situation sadly.
Sorry to hear about your experience. You put up with this shit for three years??? Wow.
Well it was the only thing I got out of the house to go to. I dont have any friends so going out to play 40k or D&D was my only social interaction in the week.
Sadly, now that the owner of the store banned me, I cant find any games of 40k or anyone to play RPG's with, because I assume others are afraid that if they game with me, they get banned too.
And apparently I'm not the only one whose had this happen, I went to the stores Yelp page and a couple people said things along the lines of the owner harassing them and threatening legal action for "slander" if they said anything.
Sounds more like the fucking mafia than a games store! Better off playing online than with those douchebags, I'd say! I doubt you'd get away with such bullshit here in Australia. Unfriendly is one thing, but borderline criminal threats and unfair business practices are more than that.
@@SongplayGamingCartel I suggest waiting late at night and burning down the store. He wants to threaten you, bring the pain!
@@Akihito007 I hope your joking, or are you a Democrat?
If you can, be the change you want to see in that store! All you need is 1 other person who agrees with you to be friendly to others and start a good group. Eventually, unless they are idiots/best friends with the bad players, the store managers and owners will see you are bringing in business and will support you. Had a store from a bit ago flip because we had a couple of good guys around that brought a lot of people in and changed the store for the better.
I just wish mine was actually "local".
Teeeeell me about it, Northern Norway here, 1653km to the closest Games Workshop, and 1009km to the closest non-GW games store with a table. There is no such thing as "maybe you don't want to invite strangers to your house" here.
@@BloodpactORG Wow, I thought it was bad that I have to travel 10 miles without a direct route.
This makes me so much more grateful for my LGS! They're the only store in town, and run by a group of amazing/welcoming/knowledgeable folks! Thanks Comic Boom!!!
Watching on a bus
Literally 5 minutes ago walked past my local game store and chose not to go in because the manager isn't friendly
Wanted to go in and look at ork vehicles
The guy who discriminates against xeno players like me and cheated in kill team by not counting his wounds and faking rolls
There's so many problems with this locally, that the local players formed 'guilds' and rent offices to play at. You can lease small office's for a couple hundred a month. They pay a small membership fee to lease the office and have key-holders to schedule open hours. One of them has ended up opening a coffee shop for games, and another one is actually running a prohibition bar lounge that only sells virgin drinks.
You know what I like best about you? Your "pachow" never fails to link to the topic about which you're speaking.
For the longest time the only game store in my neighborhood was a hole-in the wall in the back of a strip mall. It was the only shop front back there and it was kind of a creepy space. The store is always dirty and claustrophobic stuffed. Every time I've been in the regulars just stare at me like they've never seen a customer. The staff is vaguely interested in helping me but it's pretty clear that they're not looking to win new customers. When I asked about a board game one of their customer snerked derisively at me. I don't particularly care if they were gate keeping or just thought board games were gay. It just makes me not want to go through their doors. Because the store is so isolated they eyeball people who just drive through their part of the parking lot like the children of the corn. Like you'd expect for a hole-in-the-wall store their shelves are covered in decades-old games that they can't sell and they're basically offerring to Amazon shop games for you.
Recently a new game store opened up in the same strip mall, front-facing space and it's a huge store. They have a wide variety of stock and they close stuff out quickly when they see it's not moving. The owner is very conversational and he responsively creates space in his store for folks who want to play games. He has an active social media presence and promotes events that fill his store. Somehow that hole-in-the-wall is still going for two years now. I have no idea how they make money.
That hole in the wall makes money because they have enough 'regulars' who spend money through them that it barely pays the bills.
My "Unfriendly" lgs very quickly became a "non-existant" lgs and was replaced by a general toy store.
I've been frequent team gaming stores for maybe 20 years now and what has worked for me is I walk into the store take a look around at the Weirs take a look at the games that people play then I introduced myself to whoever's behind the counter and tell them it is my first time there and if they would be so kind to show me where and I named what I'm interested in that day.
Jesus thanks walking into my "local" gw store is so uncomfortable way to make me use your website guys...
I had the same experience. There's a shop 20 min from my house but unless you know someone to directly set up a game, people are pretty insulated. I'll now drive 45 min to a shop but the people there are amazing. I don't get to play that often, so it's worth it to me to have a good experience.
One bit of advice to remember is, sometimes people don't realise what they're doing. My FLGS used to be a LGS missing the F. The staff all seemed very stand-offish and a little short. (NOTE: race, gender, and orientation were not a factor, the store had a pretty diverse staff) I talked to the regulars and customers who were all great, and they explained that the staff had recently lost someone, and several staff members were socially awkward. After that was explained to me, I found the store to be a great place. Always try to find more info to put context to situations like these.
I became a solo gamer for many years because my game store wasn't friendly. I bought everything from Wargames West. Now I have several stores near me but only one i like. They now get a lot of my business, although there are different stores in several states that I make a point of going to when I'm passing through.
I'm kind of sad because the guy who owns my local game store is such a huge arse, going on rants to players about their entitlement (paying a lot for events and expecting a prize) and hes super creepy towards women to the point where he was doing it to a female employee and someone complained to him and he made it the female employees fault?
I don't go to this store now after the creepy stuff, but we don't have any other options so now I've not played games in physical form for a good few years
We are getting a new games workshop in my city though so I'm looking forward to going there as I think a proper company would just not do these things.
Thanks for the videos x
howd things work out
@@kyngwzrd3334 a little global pandemic packed that in lol,
we got a beautiful new store over two floors, one for browsing and one for playing - i picked up some stuff but it'll be a while before they reopen sadly!
Really wish we had a local game store - friendly or otherwise. Local drug store just started stocking small selection of Reaper minis and paints though, so that's exciting. For an actual game store we're looking at about a 50 mile drive (one way).
EDIT: at least here, the local library does check out meeting rooms for people to play games if you can do what you want to do in an hour or two without food or drink. Not ideal, but still an option.