General and Gaming > General
GameStop Stock Plummets After A 27.5% Decrease In Holiday Sales
hoshichiri:
Regional differences seem to be a bigger thing for gaming than other areas- I have friends who moved here from the East Coast and spent the first year or so flipping out over the 'crazy rare' games that just turned up secondhand in our game stores. They've since figured out this stuff isn't rare around here becuase the Puget Sound is a tech nerd paradise.
Where I live, if I pop up the Gamestop store locator and set it to the 15 mile search (smallest area possible), I get 17 hits- 18 if you count the ThinkGeek store. If I reset to where my grandmother lives, I have to bump up to 30 miles to get one hit. If I move to where my grandfather lived, I have to go up to 50. This absolutely changes how people shop. If you can only access one location, then something like a B2G1 sale might not matter to you- you might not find 3 games you want. But me? I can hit up 3 different stores if I need to, doing a big return/rebuy at the last one to get the sale. Heck, I used to be able to do that on foot becuase I had multiple stores within walking distance. I was sad when I found out one of those closed, but not surprised.
Gamestop could get away with a lot of their crappier policies back in the day, becuase it was your only choice for getting all but the most mainstream titles. Nowadays though, with big chains taking their gaming business more seriously, and the rise of e-commerce, as well as digital in the areas that handle it best... Gamestop is hardly the big player it once was. And it's not doing a great job trying to compete.
Flashback2012:
--- Quote from: shawndude82 on January 15, 2020, 06:40:15 pm ---Things were better back when they were Funcoland.
--- End quote ---
I REALLY wish this notion would die off already, it's the "vaccines cause autism" of the video game world at this point. :o
FuncoLand was a SHIT company and the originator of a lot of the stuff people grief GameStop for now. All that upselling/pushing/pitching of things like products and subscriptions? That was FuncoLand. They treated their employees like shit and put your working hours/employment in jeopardy if you didn't hit enough cleaning kits and/or Game Informer subscriptions sold. I should know because I put up with that shit for two years before jumping ship to GameStop when Babbage's first created it. GameStop had some metrics (all companies will) but your job wasn't threatened if you didn't hit your percentages on the upselling nonsense. There was literally NO pressure and up until the merger with FuncoLand, working at GS was a dream job.
Maybe from the perspective as a customer, I could kind of see FU Land's allure but my time at FU Land and my time with GS before the merger were markedly different. Constant grief over upselling and a shit 10% discount at FU Land versus no pressure and a nice 35% discount at GameStop. Hmmmm....no give me the torturous hell of the former please! ;)
--- Quote from: shawndude82 on January 15, 2020, 06:40:15 pm ---Gamestop has been digging their own grave for a long time. We had a Gamestop within walking distance of my parents house and I have never had someone who worked there tell me it's worth it. And the constantly changing policies on Used and Returned games just so they can make a few extra bucks. Maybe now some other more-deserving game stores will get more business.
--- End quote ---
AFAIK the return policy has largely been the same even from when I was there. New, unopened has 30 days to return. Opened is trade-in, used has 7-days for full refund/30-day exchange on defective. I'm going to avoid the whole open box/sold as new nonsense as it has been beat to death enough already (I never agreed with gutting when I was there anyway). As for other game stores...WHO are you referring to? In my area there are no other chain stores besides Half Price Books. I have to travel to Indy/Cbus/Cleveland before I start seeing smaller chains like Disc Replay or The Exchange (I'm honestly surprised neither chain is here). The Blockbuster/Game Rush and Game Crazy locations are all gone and that franchise based one called Play N Trade or something is defunct. The chain Video Game Exchange is ancient, Ancient history in these parts. :P
--- Quote from: shawndude82 on January 15, 2020, 06:40:15 pm ---I wouldn't say physical media is declining. I predict digital is going to collapse eventually. People want to own what they buy, digital games don't work that way. You can pay a lot of money for something digital, and it's only yours until the company behind it decides to cancel it's availability (ex: Scott Pilgrim, TMNT: Turtles in Time Reshelled, P.T.). Physical copies will always be preferable.
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Physical media is declining but it would be foolhardy to say it'll go away completely. Like Hoshichiri pointed out, vinyl made a comeback from the brink. I'm not holding my breath waiting on cassettes, 8-track, LaserDiscs, or Betamax to come back but I think chip/cart media and high-capacity disc storage like Blu-Ray to be around in ten years time. Digital certainly isn't going to collapse but it will be interesting to see how "ownership" is handled in the future. As it is now, Nintendo makes zero qualms about how you actually don't anything digital with them, you merely own the license to access that digital content. I don't know what kind of blowback about that will occur if at all in the future but I know once all of these companies decide to stop with physical releases, I'm effectively done. :P
--- Quote from: seether on January 17, 2020, 02:47:03 am ---Lol @ thinking GameStop will still be around for another 9 years.
--- End quote ---
I doubt they will be in their current state but as some kind of boutique, they might be. I'm not putting any money on that and at the rate they've been going, it'd be safer to bet they won't be.
bikingjahuty:
--- Quote from: seether on January 17, 2020, 02:47:03 am ---Lol @ thinking GameStop will still be around for another 9 years.
--- End quote ---
I think this next generation of consoles will carry them at least 6 or 7 years, and then I can see them doing everything they can a year or two into the next generation to remain a viable company. That's not to say they'll probably close a bunch of stores in that time period, but yes, they will be around for close to a decade longer.
mark1982:
I’ve already accepted the fact that physical games will be dead after this upcoming gen, so I’m just gonna enjoy it while it lasts. This is the only forum that I visit with its few active members that still love to collect physical games..
All the other major gaming forums that I visit with a high volume of members pretty much loathe physical games and clutter. The modern gamer finds discs a hassle and takes up too much space, and to be honest I don’t blame them. Not everyone is a collector. My only gripe with it is the removal of options for us to choose physical or digital versions for our games.
I read plenty of threads where users say they haven’t bought a disc in a decade. Or imagine buying a disc based game in 2020...
We’re in the minority here guys. Gamepass numbers keep rising, the percentage gap for digital purchases is closing in dramatically, Disc less consoles have been introduced to the market. Streaming and ease of play is a hot topic currently (even though I’m glad Stadia is dead)... We’re all gonna have to go digital soon.
Warmsignal:
I personally think their demise is more imminent. I think it might be a wise move for them to proactively begin a process of transition into a purely online retailer, rather than milking the physical store model until the company is bankrupt from all the overhead and loss of sales. Hell, maybe even go into a joint venture with Walmart's electronics department, in a similar way Sprint has done in the cell phone department, to bolster both companies selling power of games and hardware. Walmart has kind of become lackluster in selection over the past several years. They could double a store's inventory. Probably wouldn't work as Walmart doesn't want anything to do with the nasty condition trade-ins GS depends on.
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