My Job

I am the owner.

My job is to say no. I say it to handicapped children in need of a donation, to vendors with games who hope to feed their families, to staff with demands, to customers who push constantly for more, better and free for nothing.

My job is to swallow the blame, and spread the praise. Staff shall blame me for any policy or decision that they wish. Push the blame upwards. I will praise them for all successes that can be reasonably attributed to them, pushing credit downwards.

My job is to play bad cop. No, you may not return your opened and played board game two months after you purchased it. The boss said so, sorry, nothing I can do. What a jackass.

My job is to maximize shareholder value, to quote Neal Stephenson in Cryptonomicon. That includes everything from choosing the quality of the toilet paper in the bathroom (I've heard criticism), telling you that you can't play your AD&D game on Friday night in my game center, to deciding how clean, how safe, how everything the store can be ... to maximize shareholder value.

My job is to view the money as my money.  It is to resent it just a bit when I must part with it. I don't have to take it personal, but I have to take it seriously.

Alright, I have to take it personal.

The empty husks of dead businesses with loved owners litter our shopping centers. Their past customers can't remember their names, perhaps only remembering the bargains.

The staff wish to please the customer, bend policy to accommodate them, and generally bring them happiness. My job is to place limits on this.

I often feel like the pirate ship captain, one bad decision away from open mutiny and a short life of being dragged behind the ship I command. I know because I've seen it happen.

For all this, I am disliked by some. My job is to be ok with that. If you want to be liked, get a dog.

I do this job every, single, day.

I love my job.

I am the owner.

Are you Gamer Geek Enough?

White Dwarf had an interesting article a couple years ago about how people engage with their miniatures hobby. Some paint, some model, some play the game, some just like to read the stories. There's overlap, but we all have our way of engaging with our hobby. That method of engagement is determined by interest, time available, and the period we are in life. I mention this because of the ongoing geek challenge of whether someone or another is geek enough, gamer enough. The judgment is continual, harmful, and quite unnecessary.

Like most realms of geekery, gamers constantly engage in the authenticity debate. They wish to weed out posers, put others on pedestals and place themselves somewhere in the hierarchy in their mind. Geekery was hard won for older gamers, unlike nowadays, where learning and engaging requires time and an Internet connection. Regardless, geekery comes with yardsticks for measuring and tests of purity. Perhaps it's the ease of information that makes people grasp so hard at their hard earned geekery. You can't just know it, you must own it. You have to have a take.

If you're focused on one game or type of game, you lament your lack of well rounded geekery. If you flit from one game to another, you wish you could focus in depth on just one thing. I had that exact conversation a few years back with another game store owner. Me, wishing I had more time and interest in more games; him, wishing he could focus on one thing as I did. And me again, wishing I could go farther, deeper. Even right now, I'm not sure I'm worthy to talk about these things.

There's a love for games, so there's a desire to do it all, but there's also the darker, underlying, nebulous worthiness that we're all trying to live up to. As if we're caretakers of a precious treasure that requires a higher calling, a stronger dedication to The Cause. So many games, but only one lifetime? So unfair.

Criticism is one way we see gamers flaunt their stuff. The daily conversations I have about minutiae, such as art in role-playing books, or the purity of dice with rounded corners, is exasperating. Nobody is getting rich on these games. Many of these games are produced by a guy who does it because he loves it. It's time taken from his friends and kids and his lonely dog. You're going to bust his balls over one piece of artwork, or a feat in a book of feats? Or a miniature pose? Really, a pose? I've seen people denounce entire games because of one card.

Add on that the moaning of the height of the prices and it's a bit too much to bear sometimes. Do you think guys go to sporting goods stores and moan about the price of golf clubs or skis?  Does this happen? It's part of the uneasiness of the lifestyle justification. I know I'm buying a $60 box of army men or a book on how to make my imaginary wizard more powerful, but I just want you to know I'm on to your scam to satisfy my needs. I see what you did there. I am a discerning individual, now hand me six shiny packs and that unicorn deck box; pronto mister.

Nowadays, gamer culture has gone so mainstream that you can arrange your life completely and exclusively within it. You've got conventions and shows of not just games but celebrations of pop culture and costuming. The pervasive Internet contains every conceivable interest, and everyone with that interest available for you to follow and interact with. If you choose where you live, you can even have fantastic game stores and game communities. I moved to the Bay Area for similar reasons. In this modern cocoon of personal interest, you might never leave the confines of gamerness, never have to hold a conversation with those who don't hold your interests. It's probably at the expense of the larger community, the country at large, but that's another debate. This is a bit unusual for those of us who grew up pre-Internet.

Back in the day.... here we go ... geekness was hard earned, it required finding odd zines or cork board notices where you would send away for your next bit of potentially interesting geekery, dollar bills hidden in first class envelopes or money orders issued by the many locally owned banks found on every corner. It was a crap shoot. Often things didn't come, or they came in battered boxes from foreign countries that were so intriguing that your family would gather round the kitchen table while you opened your exotic package. Perhaps it's how you started collecting stamps. Remember stamps?

Or perhaps you found your gamer goodness in a store, like the cookware store I rode my bike to (without a helmet) that had a corner of forbidden lore because the owners son played Dungeons & Dragons. The smell of a cookware store still floods back memories of those wonder years. They should make incense with that smell.

You would take your forbidden lore to school to show your friends, but secretly, not because your teacher would confiscate it, like today with fistfights over Yugioh cards, but because that guy who shook you down for your lunch money might beat the crap out of you, for being you. Geekery took some guts. Meanwhile, we  still had little league practice, learned musical instruments, and went on dates (I'm told). Geekery was smaller, I think, a closet interest, rather than a lifestyle choice as it tends to be viewed today.

My point is, it's all good. We engage at the level we can, like all things in life. We're hardest on ourselves, but we needn't be. We definitely don't need to judge others in this area. We need more hobby gamer geeks, not fewer. The herd is no longer big enough for such indiscriminate culling. Give yourself and everyone else a break (but especially yourself) and enjoy your geekery without so much judgment. As we move into game convention season, let the old guy talk about how his first hobby board game came in a plastic bag (Car Wars), or how it took him five years to get his fighter to 10th level (Jerlea the Third -- don't ask about the first and second). Be thankful for the rich geek culture we live in today. Geeks have won, and you are gamer geek enough.

It Just Works

In my last life, I was a network engineer and architect. Among my certifications was the MCSE, Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (now referred to as Solutions Expert). As a solutions expert, I was expected to come up with technology that solved business cases, usually in a Microsoft environment.

As a business owner, my priorities are different. I don't really care about the environment, the infrastructure, or whether the solution has a certain technological purity to it. It started with phones, the iPhone being my gateway into the Apple world. It was the most revolutionary bit of technology I had ever encountered, allowing me to keep in touch with my business anywhere in the world. I recall the wonder in logging into my server at work while my wife was driving down the 101. Plus it naturally fit with my marketing efforts, sharing photos and status updates on our Facebook store page, now one of the top game store fan pages in the world, by fan count.

I'm not concerned with rooting my phone and running alternate operating systems like my tech friends with Android phones. Nor am I interested in the various arguments over the evils of Apple. I want to be socially responsible, but there's plenty of evil to go around. I have a business to run, not a team of geeks to impress (although I suppose I still have that).

Then there are laptops. My first lesson in large store security occurred in 2007 at our new (current) location, when a homeless guy with gold teeth snuck into my office and stole my creaky old Thinkpad T40. I had neglected to secure the area, faith in humanity still existing somewhere within me. The Thinkpad had been my trusty companion for seven years, and the replacement laptop was already on order. The Thinkpad was solid, worked perfectly, but had grown painfully slow over the years, despite reinstalling the operating system multiple times. Seven years is a good run, and back then, speed was the main driver for laptop replacement, not durability.

My next two laptops demonstrated what the PC laptop industry had devolved into. I had carefully researched them, but they were tragically flawed and unreliable. They each lasted a couple years before dying, the last one, a high end Samsung, would send an electrical short through the system if you touched it without being grounded. I had a little ritual at the store where I would rub the metal band on the display case before touching the laptop. I still find myself doing it with the new one. I'm convinced the PC laptop industry is beyond redemption, shown by my willingness to spend anything to get a good laptop, with serious disappointment following.

Then there's Windows 8, an operating system nobody wanted configured for a device that doesn't really exist. Gah. If I had to learn a new, frustrating operating system, it sure wasn't going to be that. If I wanted a PC laptop, that was likely what was going to be pre-installed. It doesn't help productivity, but instead focuses on media consumption. Did I mention I also just bought an iPad?

So last month, following the success I had with the iPhone, and happiness with my iPad, I bought a MacBook Pro. It's mostly about hardware, which is how I justify the price tag that's at least twice as much as my last laptop. The theory here, according to my friends with Apple products, is while the PC industry was dumbing itself down with cheap, commoditized hardware, Apple continued to use high quality gear. So although you pay twice as much for a laptop, a 4-5 year run is expected. It's essentially the old Thinkpad model. You spend more; it last longer.

As for the operating system itself, it's not the Mac of my youth, with the hidden architecture, minimum configurability and no available software. My MacBook is essentially a Linux box (BSD to be more accurate) running a very slick, highly supported shell. It's easily as complex, rich and configurable as a Windows machine. I can pull up a system window and mess around with the command line, if it pleases me. It generally does not. I really don't care about any of the technical bits. I have work to do and the MacBook just works. There are no compromises, no applications that I can't run on it. Even with third party PC emulation software running Windows 7 installed, I prefer not to use it. 

And now I get to see how it is on the other side of the Mac debate. The ridiculous criticisms of Apple and Apple users has always been part of IT culture. There have been the accusations of "drinking the Cool Aid" or "dumbing down." I feel I owe my old Mac friends an apology, although many of my IT colleagues have since gone to the Mac, at home at least.

Today was the first time I saw the debate put into a political context, with someone accusing Apple users of ceding control to others. Huh. Bottom line though: Mac people don't have these discussions. They're busy creating stuff, or building their businesses. They don't have time to discuss how oppressed or conformist you think they may be for the tools they use. Nobody discusses the political ramifications of the hammer or the screwdriver.

As for the future, I still have a Windows server at the store, which will one day be replaced by a $300 box the size of my hand. The POS is the most annoying bit of tech at the store. It runs Microsoft Retail Dynamics, a stable system that Microsoft would like me to pay expensive maintenance fees if I would like their consultants to work with me. Perhaps there's an Apple solution for that as well.

What I got: Refurbished 15" MacBook Pro 2.6GHz Quad-core Intel i7, 

Retina Display, 8GB RAM, 512GB flash storage, along with a 2TB Apple Time Capsule.

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How We Did in 2012

Black Diamond Games did very well in 2012, with sales up 13% from the year before. We continue to see collectible card games boom, our CCG sales up 30% from 2011. Magic accounts for a frighteningly high level of our sales, something we're hoping to leverage in 2013 with a new online singles catalog using Crystal Commerce. Still, the big fear is we let other areas atrophy. We're also seeing stores featuring Magic pop up all over to take advantage.

Yugioh and Cardfight Vanguard are heating up as well. Vanguard, especially, will see more support as Bushiroad implements a stronger organized play structure, including upcoming pre-releases of new sets. Many Pokemon and Yugioh players play Vanguard as their second game, and between Pokemon sets, our Pokemon nights see mostly Vanguard sales. We're done carrying Kaijudo and we gave up on World of Warcraft CCG in 2011.

Collectible miniatures are up 37%, thanks almost entirely to Pathfinder miniatures. They haven't quite stepped into the space left behind by Dungeons & Dragons miniatures, but they're a welcome addition nevertheless. We do sales in Heroclix, but they're honestly more trouble than their worth, with our local community playing at other venues. We'll probably stop carrying them this year, something we've done twice before. 

Also hot right now, board and card games saw a 16% increase in sales. I think a lot of credit can go towards these games getting some love, especially programs like Tabletop, which reach customers we don't normally encounter. As for individual companies, Fantasy Flight Games has been doing exceedingly well for us, with licensed Star Wars and Game of Thrones products doing great. Our Euro style games also selling fast, with Settlers of Catan remaining on top and most Days of Wonders games selling strongly when in stock, thanks in part to Tabletop. Despite all the hemming and hawing over Kickstarter, it doesn't effect the bottom line much, at least not with board games.

I'm afraid that's the end of the good news though, as we've seen declines of around 10% in areas like role-playing games. D&D is dormant, which in most years accounts for half to two thirds of RPG sales. Kickstarter likely plays a larger part in the decline of RPG sales, since so much of what we carry tends to be "fringe." Accessories like paint and dice are also down about 10%. 

Classic games and puzzles are down 10% as well, categories that haven't aged well with the population. We'll be shrinking those departments down, rather than expanding them.

Tactical miniature games are down 10%. Although Warmachine and Hordes are on fire, it doesn't make up for the steep decline in interest in Warhammer 40K and Fantasy. When it comes to Games Workshop, they've jumped the price shark for us. It's hard to justify price increases that far outstrip inflation or cost of materials. These things are thankfully cyclical, but at the moment, if we were worried about non-CCG areas atrophying, there might be some evidence available for that.

Core

With Wizards of the Coast releasing old school D&D supplements via PDF this week, I thought I would take a look at our D&D core rulebook sales for 2012. This is a bit different in that it includes the reprints of AD&D (1st edition those just joining us) and 3.5. Our sales numbers include just the PHB, along with any bundles we sold that included that book.

For Pathfinder, the data includes the core rulebook and the starter box, two gateways to entry that may overlap. For D&D 4, it includes the Player's Handbook, the Heroes of X books, and the Red Box starter set, again with some potential overlap.

My general feelings are that there is more interest in AD&D than 3.5, with 3.5 close enough to Pathfinder to migrate those players down the road to the New Thing. Thus, we have Unearthed Arcana for AD&D getting a reprint soon and no word about 3.5 reprints, which I think, beyond the core books, aren't necessary. So please, go right ahead with AD&D reprints, but I may have to pass on 3.5.

Events

A few years ago I wrote about how our Game Center was like a hotel suite. It needs to bring in $128 on weeknights and around $200 on the weekends. There are many things in business we ignore when it comes to money. The bathrooms are a good example; something you do because you care and because you wouldn't want to work in a place that demoralized you with dirty bathrooms. Small business also gives a lot to charity, usually to local community groups, something we did last year. But events are not these things.

Events are revenue producing. You can't even hide events in the mother of all business lies, the marketing expense. If you're paying for event space, and you're not making money on events, either directly (CCGs) or a very clear indirect route that you understand (RPGs and miniatures), then you're simply doing it wrong and you'll probably fail. Stores that can't find their event formula struggle. I mention this because most game manufacturers don't understand this.

A big factor in marketing games is getting them played in stores like mine. Publishers know this, but the complexity and expense of designing such a program is daunting. The project is almost always given to the marketers to create. After all, from the game companies perspective, it's a promotional issue, rather than a profit center for them.The result is many of these organized play programs aren't designed with "event as profit center" in mind.

Sometimes that's fine, if the event is casual, there's no cost, and it drives one of those game categories with indirect, rather than direct sales. Pathfinder Society Organized Play is an excellent program by Paizo that costs us nothing, engages customers and drives sales indirectly. You don't need to buy something to play, but it results in sales of that product not required for the event. Wizards of the Coast is the best at organized play and provides free materials for both Magic and D&D (alright, and Kaijudo). They're by far the most generous of all game companies in this respect, with actual print materials arriving on a regular basis.

Also, look at Star City Games as the king of organized play for profit. I pay a fee. I provide the bulk of the prize value. Customers pay cash to play. Star City promise to drive dozens of people to my store. It's clean and effective and puts a lot of pressure on us to generate buzz and maximize attendance. I lose money if I screw it up. People drive hours to play in these events.

The two problem examples in the last week come from Fantasy Flight Games and Pokemon USA. Pokemon requires a background check and hoops to jump through to run sanctioned events in the store. They're the only company to do this, which is commendable, if not annoying to get through. However, unlike other game publishers, they set the price and parameters of their events to cut out retailers from making money. The organizers, not store employees. handle event fees. No need to get your hands dirty with that filthy cash, retailer, we'll take care of things on our end. So they really don't trust us to do anything right. They don't trust us with their customers and they don't trust us with their money.

Our Saturday Pokemon City Championships saw over 80 people attending, none of whom paid us anything to use our facility, and sales showed that. We were understaffed, it turned out, but it's hard to justify why we would do anything about it, why we should care, which is a bad feeling to have. It's like saying, why should I have a clean bathroom for you, what are you doing for me? Ouch. Would you stay in a relationship like that? Of course, the big question Monday morning was "Why the hell are we doing this at all?" This is not the 90's Pokemon. There are at least three other more popular card games at the moment, although Pokemon would be ranked higher in my book if it didn't have such an anemic margin.

Fantasy Flight is doing a great job with their league kits but their new regional championship program doesn't quite grasp what we need to accomplish. A $175 kit supports 16 people. First, any event with 16 people is a failed event in my book. Events should have enough product for open ended attendance or kits broken down so I can buy more of them at a reasonable price. We try to buy five  kits from Konami for our Yugioh sneak peak events, for example, and we pay $175 for each. Even if I over order, the kit is essentially product I'm going to sell later anyway.

When it comes to attendance, motivate me to fill the store. I should get stars in my eyes and want to announce your event to my friends and relatives, not laser focus on 16 guests I would like to invite. This is a for profit event, not a dinner party.

Events need a clear revenue path. Do customers pay $20 to play? That's what I'll be charging for my Yugioh event. The FFG kit comes out to around $11 per person in kit expense, so that would be reasonable. What if we get 15 people and not 16? Perhaps I'm expected to pay $175 just to generate buzz, you know, a marketing expense. I suppose I could buy more kits, like with Yugioh, but the path to profitability hasn't been defined properly.

I don't want to pick on these guys too much  (alright, maybe Pokemon), but publishers need to understand the retail business model. Both of these companies have reduced margins on their products, Pokemon being the lowest in the entire store. Nothing makes me less money per dollar than a pack of Pokemon. In other words, if you come in looking to start playing a game, the worst thing I could do is get you started with Pokemon. Game companies often justify lower margins by claiming marketing expense for stores, yet few follow through. Step up. Use those dollars wisely. Make better events. Talk to retailers.

Flippity Flop (The D&D)

End of year analysis often comes down to updating old charts and watching trends. This one is looking at the story of Pathfinder and Dungeons & Dragons and the how they've defied conventional marketing. In just two years (comparing 2010 and 2012 numbers), they've switched places in my store, something that should be impossible by old standards. Next year I expect you'll be able to compare 2009 and 2013 numbers.This has happened in quite a few other stores as well, from what I've gathered. As the D&D books go out of print, however, this kind of data becomes less relevant.

That doesn't mean D&D 4 is dead. At one point I thought it might be irresponsible to sell people on a game system going out of print, but there are still a good number of players, although they rarely buy books nowadays. I still find myself selling red box sets to boys interested in playing an RPG. The D&D name, combined with the low price point and the simplicity of the game makes it a better choice sometimes. You can still get most D&D products. I don't take that approach with adult customers. In my mind, Pathfinder is still ADVANCED Dungeons & Dragons and 4E is basic (or more accurately, casual).

The other data point I like to look at are core rulebooks. I haven't crunched those numbers, but I can say they're down in our store for both games, meaning we're likely seeing market saturation for new players and converts. The dream of the two games creating a larger pie is probably not going to come around, as last year was just average. Perhaps in 2014 we'll see a big upswing with D&D Next. There's still not a lot of proof that we can get both games firing on all cylinders.