Dealing with Game Stop

[ATC 1982]

Below is a series of e-mails in Dealing with Gamestop. Please laugh at your own risk cause I know you will.

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Sir or Ma'am,

This past weekend I noticed you are riping off gamers. Some game you carry are at good prices and your 20 dollar deal that is going on is great. I was looking for the PS3 Endwar Bundle with Mic. Now that is until I saw that your company is trying to scam gamers and make huge profits. I am not normally this vocal about games, but when it is so obvious any one can see it makes me really question your tactics.

The game in question is Endwar Bundle for PS3 as I saw it at the store shelf price of 89.99. Now wait a minute why would this be 89.99? Does this game have anything extra besides the mic you may ask? NO it does not, but then again would an average Joe realize this? Not unless they look real hard and have been scoping out the game. So lets break things down even more.

New (PS3) Endwar game with out mic - 19.99 VS PS3 Endwar Bundle - 89.99
New PlayStation PS3 Head headset - 49.99 Total - 89.99
Total 70.00

So with these figures you are charging the average consumer 19 more dollars to an item that is basically for packaging. As a consumer even with an extra 19 dollars in my pocket that means I could get another game on your 20 dollar sale or a few used games under ten dollars to help you all move unwanted inventory like Dark Sector or Kameo.

Really though after this weekend I will only go to gamestop when I have to. Since you cornered the market on pre-order exclusives it appears you provide a service I need. That does not how ever translate I will buy the collectors edition as I am only looking for the pre-order bonus items. As of letting everyone else know this I will be sure to make it publicly know once again GameStop is letting gamers down by over pricing them.


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Cheers,
Toby Davis (ATC 1982)

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Here is the msg they replied with

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Dear Toby,
Thank you for contacting GameStop.com.
The price you are referring to is the Manufacturer Suggested Retail Price. This is the price that the manufacturer suggests retailers typically set for a particular product. However, retailers evaluate pricing based on many factors including current demand, features and availability. Often prices will follow MSRP but not always.
We value your feedback and will take your suggestion into account for future consideration.
Best Regards,
John
Customer Service Supervisor

[GcFlash]

Yeah having worked for Game (UK's largest games retailer) this is nothing unual. I can think of several things that were similar.

The funniest ones that I remember were the "Managers Specials" where the regonal manager thought it was a great idea to increase the average basket spend by:

Taking a console deal say a 360 + 2 game pack at say $xxx
+ what ever the current offer on software say 2 for $40
+ a deal of the week game
+ an extra pad (no discount) or a steering wheel if there was a racing game in the offer.

Making it $yyy.

And that was a managers special! I dont think I ever sold one because they looked very expensive, so you maybe got a lot of stuff but it was such a crumy deal.

Retailers know people are a) Stupid b) dont know any better and c) that they can get away what ever they want. This has change slightly with online shopping taking off but it still holds true, so dont be fooled!

Disclaimer: GcFlash's opinions are his own and should not be considered that of his former employers. :p

[Skyydragonn]

I know I will personally not buy a damned thing from gamestop UNLESS its a specific pre-order special that i really want. but 9 out of 10 times now i can find a similar or better pre-order deal at other retailers.

Let me take you back to Pre-release WARHAMMER online.

WALL OF TEXT INCOMING!

I was so excited about warhammer I decided to pre-order the collectors edition. (At the time i was still doing regular bussines with gamestop)
I went to the store to trade in a bunch of old PS2 stuff I no longer used. At first i was a little suprised at the trade in value for most of it. a PS2 and half a dozen popular titles got me less than $70 yet the resell used PS2 systems at $99...okay, no biggie. So i place my pre-order and the clerk was pretty much "okay, have a good one" I waited a good 4 minutes at the counter before he releazed i was waiting for something. So i asked "where's my pre-order codes for the Closed Beta/headstart access that comes with the pre-order? Oh...oh well, we dont have them yet. (Despite knwoign full well that Mythic stated that all codes had been distributed to retailers) The clerk told me to come back in a week or two and they should be in by then. So i waited a week and a half before going back, this time the assistnant manager waited on me and he had no idea there were pre-order codes for warhammer o.0 WTF Your an assistant manager and you have no idea what pre-order deals your supposed to provide for customers. HE also told me to check back the following week. Which i did via the phone this time, still nothing. This had been 3 weeks now, so I decided to contact Gamestop customer service via e-mail, provided them all the reciept info nessecary waiting 4 days for a reply. (There customer service site says 24-48 hrs for a reply)
When they did finally reply they again asked for the reciept information as though they never recieved it the firt time, 2 days later i get an email with my codes finally. and the day after that i got a second set of codes from them and a THIRD set 2 days after that for no apparent reason. At this point I contacted CiCi at Mythics customer service dept and was told to please delete the extra codes as they had been sent in error, all in all I spent 3 weeks waiting for closed beta access that I should have gotten when I placed my pre-order, only to get 4 days closed beta access before open beta began. The complete mismanagement of things from gamestop has led me to never use any of thier services if/when i can avoid it. Eventually game publishers will wise up and focus on a better more reliable retailer for thier specials and pre-order exclusives.

[ATC 1982]

wow .. I wish publishers would give pre-order specials to others other then gamestop as well.

[Skyydragonn]

wow .. I wish publishers would give pre-order specials to others other then gamestop as well.

While the prices are occasionally a little bit hgiher Best buy often time has similar or better (depending on the deals ) pre-order specials and exclusives as well. Now that theres one within easy driving distance from my house it's becoming my first choice for pre-orders.