Our FLGS had a deep dark secret (negative cashflow). They would order anything for you at the regular price, if you knew to ask, but the ‘display books’ were marked-up 80%. This was to ‘keep them in stock’, but he seems not to have a very good background in Maths. He went into the Yugi Joes and cards big-time. He got an ID maker so that kids who ‘had an account’ could just bill kids’ visit (table fees) and purchases to their moms’ credit card.
Unknown to us writers, runners and players, the owner was broke. The store was bankrupting him. The rent was too high. He decided to take on more space. His ‘expansion’ into a card-game tournament location ($10 for three hours of babysitting) didn’t pan out. He threw money at a problem and lost. The expansion brought in half his assumptions. (We didn’t know this, he was a very positive used-car salesman personality, we got the impression that he ‘saved the store’ with brilliance)
We had unpaid DMs running ‘adult’ games in the back for a decade on Tues-Thur ($5) or Fri-Sun ($8). We built 4×8 wargame tables for him with a carpenter. He installed microphones and cameras with a media streaming ‘server’. Everything was more more more with him. But war tables sat, set up in-game, with thousands of dollars of other people’s toys (miniatures, terrain, books) for weeks for only $15/wk. The public could inspect the games. There were thefts.
Cliques formed amongst the various groups: Cardbois, Grogs, and Hammers. Card kids would wander out of Cardland, play with Star Wars and Warhammer gameboards, and enter a private game room to listen to the succubi/vampyr stories (rated RX); Grogs shouted at everyone that we were doing it wrong, everything was wrong; Hammers threatened RPG’ers with various forms of fire if we didn’t leave their precious troops set exactly where they left them
We needed an ombudsman, not a salesman. Someone who followed-up on his initiatives and modified them, keeping a calendar and group contacts. From my perspective, he increased foot traffic, but not income.
This was just straight income to him. 12 card tables – 30 kids every m-f afternoon. A dozen adults every evening on the ‘big tables’. A livestream. A Facebook. An interactive touchscreen. A Twitch. Discord. Online scheduling. We DMs weren’t ‘paid’, we paid him, we were ‘approved’ (interviewed) and ‘rated’ (I, PG, R, X). A clear case of renting a table if you behaved. (minimum charge $15)…
Doom.
Fall 2020, full epidemic, government starts closing businesses.
Right in the middle of our DnD game (Thursdays), he approached us to say this was our last night. If we wanted to play the campaign we were in, we would have to take it elsewhere. The table fees, the $2 sodas, the $1 chips – weren’t enough. He was bankrupt without the kids, and the store was closing to inventory for the bank. (I can’t imagine how his babysitting card gamers felt).
I get that he’s a businessman and I’m the client, but instead of ‘being an anxious ghost*’ wandering around our tables the last three months, he could have said, “this table needs to produce more income” and we could have worked with him on it. (I would have gladly dropped a $20 just for 4 hours on that 50″ VTT table.) In the ensuing years, I have thought of a dozen ways to make square footage convert for him.**
Gloom.
…
{Epilogue: two years later, the kids card games are in a formal location m-th, two campaigns choked without a table, SciFi meets at my place, and Eberron at V’s; our hero has cleared his debts after three years and wants to re-open}
*he listened for cursing, as this is a sign of poor sportsmanship. ** multiple tops for one set of legs to get 6 games into 1 space. Airbrush class. Modeling station. Move the online stuff into one location and play/stream in that room. Make that giant touch-screen an income, not a wall-hanging. Treat it like three businesses – game store retail, internet cafe rental, activity based childcare and separate them.