are there alot of small TCG stores that are based mainly on pokemon?

D

darkpoet

Aspiring Trainer
Member
im 17 and im going to college next winter, my dream is to open up a small game store that sells pokemon, magic and yu gi oh cards. pokemon is my fave tho:D so i want the tcg part of my store to be centered around pokemon cards.....but where i live (detroit) pokemon isnt that popular. everyone loves magic and theres no tcg stores that even sell pokemon :( so basicly what i was wondering.... are there any tcg stores near you that are based around pokemon? because after my 2 years in college i wanted to move to toledo to open my shop. because pokemon seems dead here :"""""(

and btw, ik i have to sell yu gi oh and magic cards also (and things other then TCGs)
 
darkpoet said:
im 17 and im going to college next winter, my dream is to open up a small game store that sells pokemon, magic and yu gi oh cards. pokemon is my fave tho:D so i want the tcg part of my store to be centered around pokemon cards.....but where i live (detroit) pokemon isnt that popular. everyone loves magic and theres no tcg stores that even sell pokemon :( so basicly what i was wondering.... are there any tcg stores near you that are based around pokemon? because after my 2 years in college i wanted to move to toledo to open my shop. because pokemon seems dead here :"""""(

and btw, ik i have to sell yu gi oh and magic cards also (and things other then TCGs)
Click to expand...


Not so much!

The thing about TCG / Board Game stores is that like any business, they're not out to purely please the fans that they like. Maybe the owner of a store truly prefers pokemon, but it would be a terrible marketing / business decision to only sell pokemon cards and pokemon themed merchandise, or to purely advertise for that market. It'd be best to carry all of the popular (Pokemon, Magic The Gathering, YuGiOh, etc) games as well as opening your store up to hosting leagues and tournaments of all types. Advertise for everything equally, through the proper mediums.

It'd be best to keep your store unbiased (as much as it can be :p), as long as you advertise correctly and give players from every game the opportunity to purchase and play with their favorites, there will be plenty of Pokemon fans!
 
Megaphone said:
Not so much!

The thing about TCG / Board Game stores is that like any business, they're not out to purely please the fans that they like. Maybe the owner of a store truly prefers pokemon, but it would be a terrible marketing / business decision to only sell pokemon cards and pokemon themed merchandise, or to purely advertise for that market. It'd be best to carry all of the popular (Pokemon, Magic The Gathering, YuGiOh, etc) games as well as opening your store up to hosting leagues and tournaments of all types. Advertise for everything equally, through the proper mediums.

It'd be best to keep your store unbiased (as much as it can be :p), as long as you advertise correctly and give players from every game the opportunity to purchase and play with their favorites, there will be plenty of Pokemon fans!
Click to expand...

thank you :) i looovvveee magic but pokemon will allways be my fave :) lol.
 
I'm going to give you a very good warning. Focusing exclusively on card games is a very dangerous idea. Very few stores are able to focus on TCGs let alone one specific TCG. Most stores make more money selling models and comics. Pokemon cards just don't bring in enough profit to manage a whole store. The stores that become successful for selling only one game are successful because of outside reasons. Channelfireball is a magic exclusive store, but that is because they have some of the top players running it and have a ton of advertisement and name recognition because of it. I highly applaud you for giving this a try, but be ready to expand your horizons into comic books, video games, or models. There are just more money in all three than in TCGs. Good luck! Something I'd highly recommend doing is trying to expand into the online market. There are very few extra costs, and T&T could always use some good competition :) Web sales make a huge margin of profit for gaming stores. Just be sure to remember the number one rule about web sales: convenience is EVERYTHING! Make sure you have a huge selection and you are ready to ship in one business day. Good luck and lmk if you have any questions down the road. I've worked at a gameshop similar to what you want to run, and some of my friends own their own game store (well... comic shop but they also have games).
 
There is this store I frequent, that sells magic, world of warcraft and yugioh, and I had to go to wally, or travel more than 6 miles to a store that actually sells pokemon cards. The good thing is, they started selling pokemon cards, and they noticed that they sell out fast. The problem I see with their store is, they only have room for 1 theme deck box, and 4 booster boxes, so space is a huge issue. I guess Magic, Yugioh, and Pokemon is probably the best bet, since they are the 3 most popular TCGs. That same store also sells board games, like catan, ascension, pandemic, and the like. They also have an area where people play TCGs, and computers for lan parties.

I am not a detroit guy personally, but I heard of this store in Detroit, owned by some dude named Steve? You know, the guy who makes funny youtube videos to promote his store, ahem, website? Usually, when you have a lot of space, like his store, you are free to sell whatever you feel like, such as TCG cards, sports cards, and sports memorabilia.

To run a store, you better buy a crap load of product, because pokemon packs sell like hotcakes. I witnessed it firsthand at my local store, because they were starting to get into the whole pokemon thing, so they wanted to test out whether or not they sell or not, and boom, 3 of 4 booster boxes, one BW, one EP, one NV, and one ND sold out, leaving only BW boosters.

It also depends on where you are located. You don't want to be competing against stores like that Steve store I described above.
 
It's really tough to keep a store open. Over the years handfuls of stores have come and gone here. There is only one that has been around for 20+ years. It is a magic only store. They used to sell pokemon packs in very limited quantities but its always been a magic staple shop. Another source of income is of course comics/novels and random boardgames and figures but they take the back seat to magic.

The other store has been around for 8 years or so I think. It competes with them but focuses mainly on yugioh with pokemon pretty close but they also have FNM and magic drafts every week because its another facet of income. They have a heinous amount of board games and figures as well.
 
A store near me is very magic focused, but now my friend leads a Pokémon league there and they are sellling more Pokémon cards everyday. But they have a Cafe that's part of the store and that's really popular, too, and the store has just the right mix of games like D&D and WoW, Board Games and TCGs like Pokémon, MTG and YGO.
 
There's this one game shop I go too in Lakewood that's got plenty of great Pokemon TCG products! CL-ND boosters, blisters from those sets, and even the three HGSS theme decks!
 
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