I have found over the years, that many rules need to be very explicit for some players to understand them; much more so than I could have anticipated when embarking on a business that primarily caters to adults and children accompanied by adults.
I could speculate about the reasons for this, and we do have an overrepresentation of neurodiverse players and staff, so maybe these social issues are just to be expected in the circumstances.
One issue that has arisen in 4 different ways in the last few months is what might be termed player poaching. I will use some examples akin to the ones that have arisen in real life to explain what we mean by this term, and behaviours that we feel are potentially damaging to our business.
Firstly I suppose it is important to give context. Games shops lean into different areas,and we have devoted a substantial amount of our floorspace to tables and play. If we were mostly retail with a couple of tables we could have a different approach, but the floorspace still has to cover itself and electricity and other outgoings are eye-wateringly expensive.
So, if we wish to offer mostly play space, and open into the evenings, we have to make sure we cover those costs. So, with this backdrop, here is scenario 1:
A player/friend wants to play a particular format, using proxies (copies of cards instead of the cards themselves) and the games companies who supply us with promos & allow us to run preview events etc. don't allow us to run events with them. This is a very tricky situation. We try to run the events that people want, but we have restrictions if we want to remain in good standing with our suppliers. That said, if the player then goes ahead and runs something themselves elsewhere, it is not our business unless they make it our business by using us as a base to recruit players from.
What the player who does this fails to understand, is that he/she only has this pool of people because we undertake to pay the massive outgoings attached. If we or other businesses like us didn't exist, the player would need to find another way to recruit. There may also be games shops that run 9-5 or don't dedicate much space to play, that are fine with this practice.
For us, though, the player is setting themselves up in direct competition to us, and to add insult to injury, is doing it in the very space we are paying for!
Here is scenario 2:
A player comes in, meets somebody they don't know at our shop and takes them to a competing shop round the corner. Now, if they were already friends, it would be none of our business what they do. It also has nothing to do with whether we are allies with the other shop (who in this case are perfectly nice). We would ask them not to shout about other shops, advertising them etc., but perhaps to recognise that we are in competition. If you went into Tesco and grabbed somebody from the queue and said “come to Sainsburys’”, the staff in Tesco might be pretty miffed, although I doubt a small number of lost sales would be as impactful as they are on a small family run business.
There is a subtle but important difference between this and making friends over time with people. The difference is probably consideration, and not taking the space for granted. We are not a ‘given’. A Monolith that will always be there regardless of whether people respect us or not. We are not run with a government grant, and if we don't cover our bills we won't be around for the next friends to meet.
Here is scenario 3:
A player has made a gaming space at home and asks people from the shop to go and play there. Whether this is ok for us depends very much on context. If it’s the first time the player comes in, or they are very occasional then frankly it's pretty rude.
What this player fails to understand is that he is setting himself up in competition with us, as that is exactly what we are offering! If he comes to us simply to recruit players to go elsewhere, how does he expect us to cover the bills? We do not get given the space for free, so simply cannot afford to recruit players for all and sundry rather than the shop itself.
Again, it is different from some players who occasionally invite friends from the shop round to do gaming once their friendships are established. We have players who have a nice gaming space at home, and invite friends they have met at the shop round, but do so considerately and not as a replacement for playing in store.
Here is scenario 4:
A player has started a business selling the same things we do, and is coming into our shop to advertise it. This happens more often than you might expect. Sometimes it’s a ‘side hustle’ and sometimes a full-blown business, but either way it’s beyond rude to use our shop, and all our expenses and hard work, to try to launch a business in competition with us, and take sales directly from us.
Games shops come and go, often taking life savings with them, or leaving a huge mountain of debt, and only those who have jumped in with both feet have any conception of the work involved in keeping them open. I offer no apologies for fiercely trying to defend what we have spent years building up. I will remain part host, part rottweiler if that's what it takes to keep the doors open at our little haven of gaming!
