Blockbuster Video 2.0 · 3:45pm Feb 5th, 2017
Kotaku: New GameStop Program Leads Employees To Lie To Customers
Kotaku: 'We Are All Scared For Our Jobs': GameStop Employees Share Their Circle Of Life Stories
Let me be clear; although my business with them has waned in recent years (Last major purchases with them were my Xbox One in 2013 and my A40 headset in 2015.) I have been a GameStop customer for a very, very long time; just about since 2000 when me and my sister bought the Pokemon games. I've bought nearly every single console I've owned and pre-ordered dozens of games up to Titanfall 1 in 2014, which was my last physical game purchase to date.
And this article, which multiple store associates and managers confirm as absolutely 100% accurate, has severed that relationship.
Permanently.
Does my location here at the mall do it? I doubt it, but who knows?
I know the transition to digital has hurt them severely, but shady business practices like these are why they should no longer be in business at all.
Never again, GameStop. Never.
And that follow-up article with testimonials...
So much of this is unbelievable.
Circle of Life is not the behavior of a profitable company. I am now convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that GameStop is in an unrecoverable downward spiral.
Seriously. Read the articles. Read the comments.
I hope we're looking at Blockbuster 2.0.
I don't even know who benefits from this practice. It hurts employees who have to intentionally turn away sales just to keep some arbitrary percentage quotas. It hurts customers, for obvious reasons (until those customers buy what they want online or at a different retailer, which hurts employees even more). And it hurts suppliers, who depend on those sales just as much as anyone. The first article mentioned the RE7, KH 2.8, and Tales of Beseria launches, and just think about Nintendo (well, those of you who haven't yet given up on Nintendo think about them. Everyone else, bear with me). They have so much riding on the launch of the Switch in less than a month, and the last thing they need right now is someone else's corporate douchery depressing sales.
It's a disgusting business practice, not to mention completely counter-intuitive to any successful business model, but I'd hate to outright boycott Gamestop over something like this, mostly because I feel sorry for their employees. I just wish there was a way to directly punish corporate, and a boycott will hurt employees and individual retailers way before it hurts corporate.
They are trying to game the most basic and damn near unchangeable parts of business: Supply and demand. Everytime, EVERY SINGLE DAMN TIME someone in the past tried to mess with these cheat things in their favor, while it might work in the very short term, in the long term it just kills said business. So yes, I see Gamestop going the ground of BlockBuster unless their corporate change their tune.