Video game retailer GameStop appears to be continuing its ongoing struggle, according to the company's latest financial report. The third quarter of the year brought in a loss of $488.6 million dollars, which in turn caused company stocks to plummet by 13%. Despite what could be considered a record year for the gaming industry, GameStop saw lower than expected sales for major releases, as well as weak performance for pre-owned purchases. Rob Lloyd, chief operating and financial officer, claimed that though Black Friday/Cyber Monday did well to increase sales performance, he has lowered investor expectations for the following holiday season, stating that software sales will not be very high, compared to hardware, likely resulting in further losses during an important season.

While our Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales were strong, we anticipate that our fourth quarter sales will skew more towards hardware than initially planned which, along with underperformance of certain titles, weakness in pre-owned and recent sales promotions, will result in fourth quarter earnings that are below our previous expectations,

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[Chary]

@Chary maybe you can tell us who took their customers?
Walmart? Best buy?

While I don't know any bit more than the regular consumer, I'd say it's a mix of best buy and amazon. Both have/had pre order bonuses, taking away Gamestop's one trick pony of offering pre order knickknacks. Why pre order at gamestop for a toy or poster, when you get 20% and get it on your doorstep day of with amazon/BB?

 

[Glyptofane]

Really!? Did they arrest the guy?

No, but it's less shocking when you learn the incident involved Fallout 76.

 

[Deleted User]

I agree!

 

[kuwanger]

Thinking about it a bit more, I throw in another of my 2 cents opinions. I think Gamestop's best move would probably to stop selling new games, still possibly offer pre-orders with some system to deny people to keep pre-ordering if they repeatedly fail to follow through, and work to better balance their sell/buy used prices. For a lot of people, even knowing/believing things like Steam or online-console-game-store won't be around forever doesn't mean a lot if they know Gamestop sell price minus Gamestop used price is greater than the sale price on said online store. There's a death spiral involved in trying to juice more money out of your main economic scheme if it's precisely that which is drawing away customers. You have to give value to consumers because it's more the repeated sales, not the one-off sell/used price differences that allow for a sustainable business in the used market space.

And of course, I still say the other major thing is to diversify because I really don't know if a used brick and mortar store is actually a doable long-term proposal.

 

[orangy57]

I feel like gamestop's inevitable death could all be solved if they just decided to do a lot more retro gaming stuff. That's all getting so popular and yet they still try to cling on to this dying medium of current-gen disk games. They sell retro games online, but that's not really enough. What's the point of buying them from an online gamestop when you could just get it faster and cheaper from ebay? If they sold retro games in every store that stuff would sell like hotcakes. People still love to shop at stores, and the convenience of a brick and mortar shop is usually better than an online one. They're so unaware of what people that play games like nowadays. Nobody cares about all the damn nerf guns and toys in the store, they could go to thinkgeek for that because they literally OWN THINKGEEK like just sell gaMES I DONT CARE ABOUT FIVE NIGHTS AT FREDDYS TOYS CLOGGING MY PATH WHILE IM TRYING TO BUY USED XBOX GAMES

 

[Noctosphere]

Really!? Did they arrest the guy?

That... idk...
They simply showed the video...

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While I don't know any bit more than the regular consumer, I'd say it's a mix of best buy and amazon. Both have/had pre order bonuses, taking away Gamestop's one trick pony of offering pre order knickknacks. Why pre order at gamestop for a toy or poster, when you get 20% and get it on your doorstep day of with amazon/BB?

BB doesnt offer preorder reduction in quebec
As for amazon, its only for prime users

 

[raxadian]

Maybe they should have better prices/sales and give more for the stuff you turn in. When you get a couple bucks of store credit for a game they turn around and sell for 10 times the amount they gave you it's BS.

This is the Toys 'r' us of game stores.

Is because online sales are a thing.

I still buy on shops but I also check prices online.

 

[Rahkeesh]

Genuine retro (old physical games) isn't anywhere near as popular as current gen games. Yeah they might be able to remain a viable chain with all that used profit, but with like 1/10th or less of the stores.

 

[Noctosphere]

there was that promotion at ebgames once (gamestop quebec)
exchange a ps3/xb360 game and like 10$
and get the same game for ps4/xbo

 

[Vipertongn]

We need something better than this I'm kinda bummed we don't have other gaming stores competing with gs

 

[PalomPorom]

Well what do you expect. They rip off customers on used games to maximize profits. Gamestop is a fucking joke

Sent from my toaster running Rebug

 

[Silent_Gunner]

Gamestop's trade-in policy is like Pawn Stars...

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct...aw2E33smmVqiKT8cs6Q5Rh9v&ust=1543806425973859

 

[the_randomizer]

No, but it's less shocking when you learn the incident involved Fallout 76.

Guy was still an idiot.

 

[raxadian]

We need something better than this I'm kinda bummed we don't have other gaming stores competing with gs

We have the Internet.

I mean is good enough for games for me.

When it comes to videogame consoles I still prefer a store. Maybe I hate waiting for the delivery? Like being able to give it back right away if something is wrong?

 

[Vipertongn]

We have the Internet.

I mean is good enough for games for me.

When it comes to videogame consoles I still prefer a store. Maybe I hate waiting for the delivery? Like being able to give it back right away if something is wrong?

I enjoy being able to browse games. For used and otherwise. It's fun to kinda browse and find gem of games you use to play...but gamestop kind of womped hard on that. I've been to Starland in DC and boy they have it good. Like gamestop can't even be bothered to print out the correct cover art for the used games they have. Plus they try to get rid of everything that's not current.

 

[chaoskagami]

At Gamestop, when you buy a "new" game they take the game case off the shelf and put the disk in from under the cabinet. I dunno about you, but after running into that multiple times, I got sick of dealing with their shit. "New" means that shrink wrap is intact.

Color me not surprised.

 

[Jayro]

Finally, some good news! Bye bye, gameflop!

 

[TailsPrower07]

It's amazing how a game store that was once great (at best) basically turns into a laughing stock of gaming. Sure, they may have what you need, but it's been a complete joke. I remember attempting to return a PS3 with like 10+ games and they would only give $7 because it didn't have a controller (mine was in bad shape), and even then they probably would've given me like $18 for it. I understand they have to make profits, but only offering that much for an entire console that has nothing wrong with it along with several games is fucking criminal. Same thing happened when I sold my 360 a few years ago, only offered like $21. Immediately went to our local gamestore and got so much more out of it. I'd take my game purchases there if the store didn't close down because the employees were douchebags. Not to mention they've seemed to have shifted way from gaming by selling phones and all other merch and shit, which isn't bad, but most of it is poorly designed (they used a damn image from DeviantArt for a shirt). I'll be sad if they do eventually go bankrupt, but I won't be surprised at all.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

Yikes. I mean we all knew this kinda thing was coming. If you have been to their stores in the last few years you have seen them move into a merch kinda place too, but nothing too impressive.

Not to mention their merch (mostly their shirts) are poorly made and use random png images they found online for them for them. They don't even try to make it look like they put effort into them.

 

[TehCupcakes]

At Gamestop, when you buy a "new" game they take the game case off the shelf and put the disk in from under the cabinet. I dunno about you, but after running into that multiple times, I got sick of dealing with their shit. "New" means that shrink wrap is intact.

Color me not surprised.

Shrink wrap doesn't look pretty on shelves and they have to remove the games from the shelf in order to protect them from theft.

That being said, I have had Gamestop employees ask me if I want a sealed copy of the game that they had behind the counter. Might be worth a shot asking? Obviously depends on their supply situation.

 

[Thesolcity]

AMAZON RULEZ! GS sucks! wonder how long before GS ceases the last breath?

I'm assuming you love Amazon because of the discount you get on Pre-Orders if you have Prime and/or release day delivery but....If competition goes away, you realize there's nothing stopping them from ending that program right? Its a common tactic to undercut the competition and bleed money for a bit because you can afford it and when competition goes away things start disappearing that once brought people to buy from you because why not? Who's gonna compete against you? Its been done many many times and Amazon is valued so high that unless they were forced by pressure from investors to drop a promotion they can afford to bleed money for a bit to gain a majority market share. Maybe you've heard about this tactic being used by Walmart towards mom and pop shops? Obviously they are different scenarios both being rather large companies, but its the same principle.

EDIT: There are still other gaming retailers like Target, Walmart, and others but at least in my case the stores nearby both don't carry too many new releases and are very slow with discounting games. The idea I was trying to convey is....I dunno, I went on a tangent. Just don't rely too much on only ONE company, even if they offer some decent deals. You do not want an item with already razor thin margins being essentially controlled by one giant entity. Keep in mind if one company controls too much of the market they would get control over what they choose to carry and overall accessibility since publishers don't exactly sell direct. Imagine some of the possible censorship issues that would impact developers including smaller devs. It could even reach the point where the one entity is calling the shots on the development of a title, otherwise the title wouldn't be carried by that entity which would obliterate sales and really any chance of anything. Maybe I'm just fear-mongering. Fuck my rant. I'm not even upset or anything, I just started writing things down.