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Looking to open a store...

Hi guys and gals,

Basically, I'm looking to open a store in the North East of England selling Magic and other assorted games and CCGs, as well as a few little toys and collectibles and such. I was wondering what you guys would want to see from a Game Store.

If anyone has asked this sort of thing before, then please by all means link me as I'd just like to see what you all reckon. Obviously, any particularly large communities of Magic players who don't have an LGS and are based in the North-East of England, feel free to name a town or city you'd like one to be in and I'll start looking into it.

I'm based in Newcastle at the moment, but we've got three stores up here and I don't think there's room for a fourth... I've looked at Whitley Bay, Consett, Sunderland and Hartlepool as possible locations so far, but speak up and I'll take a look into the viability.

Thanks very much, looking forward to hearing back from you all!

Larks.

EDIT: Seems like there's a couple of requests for certain products and such. I'm going to include the following stuff in my first order, and obviously keep restocking when the stock supply reaches a certain level;

• Magic: The Gathering
• YuGiOh
• Pokémon
• Vanguard (Not sure about this one, but it seems pretty popular)
• Dungeons and Dragons (This one is a definite. I always wondered about D&D when I was a kid but NOWHERE had it! I must stock it and sell it, if only so I get awesome gamers in for a D&D night once a week :P I have a couple of mates who would quite literally chew my arm off if I tried to keep them away from the shelves with that stuff on...)
• Board Games from across the ages (Cluedo, Monopoly, Battleships, etc all the way to Settlers of Catan, Powergrid, Twilight Imperium... you get the idea.)
• Nerf guns and water pistols (I can tell you from experience that these are great for epic battles to decide who will wash up in a student apartment...)
• Various Blindbag toys for collectors and younger kids
• UltraPro and NeoSleeve stuff
• Dragon Shield stuff (I'm looking into it and although it's a bit more expensive, it looks VERY nice)
• Fantasy Flight Games stuff - Games, sleeves, etc

The guys and girls I want to cater to can be 5 or 75, I don't mind. I want the AWESOME gamers and nerds out there of all ages, sexes, creeds and colours to come round and have a great time, as well as being able to give some support to stuff that I had when I was a kid, or wanted to play but couldn't. Stuff that you know exists and hear about, but can't find in a store almost ever (D&D being a prime example...)

Snacks and Drinks will be on sale; the drinks will be refrigerated in glass-fronted mini-fridges, but there will be water as well as sodas. I'm planning on chocolate and crisps and such, but basically so long as I provide a bathroom (I am) and the food produce is sealed off-site (like Snickers bars, bags of Quavers, Peanuts, Pretzels, whatever) and not prepared on-site (I can't make you a sandwich...) then it's all hunky-dory and it can go ahead.

Just in case, I'm looking at decent prize-support for FNMs and casual tournaments, semi-regular drafts, as well as a regular Games Night or two each week or Fortnight for other games. Free play area (all I ask is that if you use it, you keep it clean and maybe just buy some snacks or a drink or something) and if you want an impromptu "Hey-dude-it's-1pm-on-Tuesday-we're-out-of-college-can-we-have-a-Draft" game, well... Assuming you buy the boosters for your draft, I'm sure I can knock in some prizes on the fly.

Pretty big edit, but hopefully it'll catch a couple of extras and answer some stuff. OH, also, yes there will be AC and a couple of cans of deoderant behind the counter just in case.

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