Originally Posted by
Pantechnicon
Today I went to visit one of my local-owned game shops here in Albuquerque. This particular store is probably my least favorite of the local ones, but they were having a 50-cent blowout sale on Genesis carts so I thought I'd check it out.
Pulling in to the strip mall I was surprised to see that construction had recently begun on yet another EB Games (last year we had six Gamestops in town all open up literally overnight. EB has been playing catch-up ever since). This store was actually a stand-alone, which suggests a pretty heavy corporate investment. Right away I thought this could not be good for the locally-owned store I was about to visit.
So I bought about a dozen or so Genny games and as I was getting rung up I remarked to the owner that he couldn't be terribly happy about the EB being built pretty much in his own parking lot. Suffice to say he was not pleased, and seemed pretty resigned to the idea that he was probably going to be out of business in a matter of months. To make matters worse, he explained how, upon hearing rumors that this was going to happen, the strip mall owners utterly denied there were any plans for an EB...and then quietly nullified the non-competitor clause in his lease shortly before breaking ground for the EB. This, after ten years at the same location.
Well I drove away from the store more pissed: in general, at the ruthlessness of the free market system and in particular at EB Games. Even though, this store, as I said, is my least favorite of the local ones, it will still suck to lose them. And I can't help but wonder how long it will be until EB or Gamestop buy a “strategic location” near my other two local shops and start squeezing them out as well.
My point, as in the title of my thread, is that we retrogamers have got to support local stores whenever we can.
I think perhaps the biggest reason to shop local is variety – Local stores may specialize in one thing over another, but that's what makes them all worth visiting. This store I mentioned that's about to tank, for example, has the biggest selection of Dreamcast stuff in town, including a ton of imports. Can you even buy imports at EB? Even if you could, I can't imagine they come at a reasonable rate. Also, local stores may branch out into other specialty collectibles such as sports cards, anime or comics or whatever. They give you the chance to fill all your geek needs in one stop.If you're a primarily a cartridge game collector (like me) you know that local shops and thrifts are your only local opportunities for games. Yes I know EB and Gamestop carry some cartridge games still, but good luck finding something rare, let alone pre-NES.
Perhaps this rant has already been done in another thread, by someone more articulate than I, but I really felt I had to implore you all again to please support your local shops. Shop local first, Web 2nd. . Then and only then go line the coffers of these homogenous game dealers.
Support Your Local Game Stores...Now More Than Ever.
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well eventually he got net savvy and his prices rose to match ebay so i was prepared to let everybody know about his place and invited to a trademeet...sure enough i get an email from the guy saying he had to close up due to slow business, i felt sorta bad.
