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Another Random Gamer Girl Rant: Game Stores
Christine Adviento | Nov 20, 2009 | Comments 7
All the gamers know where they’re located. All of you know them as well as the maps we use on Final Fantasy or Zelda.
But is the shopping experience at these video game stores different between males and females. That depends.
Maybe it’s just me and I have had a lot of really mean people talk crap while playing video games, but there are SOME stores that have employees that treat their customers differently.
Here’s a situation that happened not too long ago.
I called into this store trying to inquire about a game I was looking for. (SOOOOO not going to tell you what the game was other than the fact it was a semi-old game). That’s not the point here. As I was saying, I called this store to inquire about their inventory and see if they had the game in stock. Sales clerk checks his database, or so he says (I hear keyboard tapping). He tells me it’s in stock and I can come pick it up whenever I had the chance.
Thinking to myself, “Thank goodness I called.” WRONG! SO WRONG!!! I got to the store to try and pick up the game, and the game is not in stock! I first checked the shelves, then I realized… the shelves are barely in alphabetical order. So I ask up at the cash wrap to have them track down the game I was looking for. NOTHING. The guy at the cash wrap, who by the way, was not the guy I spoke with on the phone, told me the game I was looking for was not in stock and that I should check with another store. This scenario has not only happened once but multiple times with 3 different stores around my area. It has me thinking that the guys, and sometimes even the females that work there only dish out information to whom they deem ‘GAMER’. Everyone else just falls into the ‘STUPID’ category.
I’m not one to seriously gripe not unless something really horrible goes on (like at PacSun and Forever21 –but we won’t go there), but this was just a minute issue compared to other situations I have been in.
Which brings me back to the concept. Guys / males get far way better treatment at game stores than girls / females. Parents? Forget about it. They’re dead meat! Everything a parent or parents go looking for, the sales clerk has a plan for that.. counter sales! So then the parents or parent ends up buying stuff they really don’t need.
Very few video game related stores have associates that will treat their customers equally. And those very few stores I can appreciate.
Views: 90Filed Under: Editorials • Featured
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I’d have to say this happens to pretty much everyone – just because it’s happened to me before, and at stores I frequent, no less.
I know some people, including the manager, at one of the GameStops I go to all the time, and it’s happened to me there on occasion, as well.
I’m not quite sure if the guy on the phone just misunderstands me, or if someone purchased the game in the time it took me to get to the store. *shrug* Usually they’re pretty good about things though, even when my wife went to look for some older PS2 DDR games!
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hmmm…
i thought it just happened to me. in any case.. it’s my rant. because i hate when it happens. i mean, online the site to the store tells you SPECIFICALLY to call the store for updated inventory. swear it feels like they (the stores) don’t want me to have the games i’m looking for. hmmm, maybe it’s just me they give a hard time about the old school ps2 games i keep looking for.
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Hmmm…you haven’t been to my Best Buy, did you? We don’t make counter sales. If so, I am so surprised the parents fall for it. I laugh at them.
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As a girl who works at a game store (heaven forbid,) I can tell you a few things about that.
Used games, especially… get sold without cases sometimes. Sometimes we can get cases brought up that we don’t have the game for.
Inventory’s pretty relative as well. As far as damages, at least in our computer system, there’s no way to get them out until we physically send them out. One employee might know a game is damaged when another does not.
Also, phone conversations – yes, all customers are a priority – but those in the shop itself might need to be rung up or helped, or whatnot. We often don’t have time to physically hunt a game down.
And making sales? Really? A salesman tried to sell someone something? How dare they do their job!
It’s your job as a consumer to know what the heck you’re doing – although I’ll tell a parent what exactly they NEED for a system (as an example) and no more and if they ask a question I will answer with a straight answer – but people need to consider that we DO call our numbers into district managers each night. I am paid on an hourly wage with additional commission – but it’s still an incentive! Minimum wage at two jobs still isn’t that great, I got bills to pay, so to speak. :]
That’s just my two cents.
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yeah heaven forbid you work at a game store. i’m not blind to games being sold without cases. i’ve been known to buy them. i’m not as stupid as you portray me to be.
i never once complained about phone call priorities or in-person customer priorities. the whole thing is if you don’t have it in, you don’t have it in; end of discussion. don’t freakin say you have it on stock (because i know sometimes you’re (the sales clerk) not checking the database for the caller on the phone but you’re really checking the database for the customer in the store; i’ve seen in happen many times. i’m not blind to that either.
i never once mentioned about your pay rate. don’t school me on profits or salary raises. i’m just ranting.
granted i’ve met some really nice sales people who know their gaming stuff, but there are the others that ruin the whole game shopping experience by running their mouth.
so thanks for running a muck! if this was KI or SFII you would have already been gone and I would be battling someone else. you have now wasted my time!
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I had the excact same thing happen to me, I even tried another store after and they did the same thing. I think they are just too lazy to look stuff up when you call them. I don’t think gender has anything to do with it, in fact if it were me I would give girls better treatment because girl gammers rock!
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I’m going to have to say as a girl, yeah, I get that we’re the minority in the gaming world, but I kind of… don’t care.
As far as your rant goes, it has less to do with your sex and more to do with the laziness of that particular worker. Every store has them, not just gaming stores, so yes, it’s frustrating, but a whole article dedicated to that? Really?
After reading a couple of your articles, I have to say- if anyone’s making a big deal about being a girl, it’s you.
I use being a girl gamer to my advantage because people automatically underestimate my capabilities and that’s always a good thing to me. As far as you go, it sounds like you’ve got a chip on your shoulder. Get over the fact that you’re a girl in the gaming world… coming from another girl, I promise you, no one really cares.