Opening Weekend
It was a long, long week. We worked very hard (averaging 20 hour days) to finish the renovations and be ready for the grand re-opening in time for black friday and pretty much managed it.
Regretfully I do not have any decent "before" or "during" pictures as we were just too busy working to document the process. I only have one small one from before from the website, but I will see if I can find some more and add them later.
This is what the store looked like before we started. I know the picture is small, but you can get a feel for the general appearance. As is fairly obvious, the store front was originally a jewelry store.
The front entrance view of the store. We are still talking to the mall management about changing the halogen lights to compact flourescent fixtures. I think we have come a long way after they have seen what we have accomplished in being able to have them let us make the change to brighten up the store more.
A view of the side of the store where the families wait for Santa Claus pictures.
And we begin to walk into the store...
Turning to the right, there is the "new release" wall as well as the Ravensburger jigsaw puzzles.
Looking down the puzzle and board game wall...
Over on the other side of the store is the board game and card game section...
Turning around towards the front of the store from the cash-wrap area.
And this is the demo table which has a few games setup for customers to gain a closer view.
One of the strengths of having been a jewelry store is that we have a number of display windows to display products to hopefully attract attention and showcase some of our games. This set of two windows are on the side of the store, again where the families spend time waiting for Santa Claus. I guess if they have to stand there and wait, we might as well give them something to look at and possibly plant seeds of gift ideas...
Closer look at one of the windows, this one is featuring the game Pirate's Cove.
Another window, this one featuring Gulo Gulo. This is a dexterity game geared towards the younger players.
The two windows that are on the corner front of the store. These are the main "show case" windows that most people see and notice.
In this window we are featuring a new game that was just released at Essen called Chateau Roquefort. The display has already sold one copy and is attracting quite a few kid's eyes.
This window has featured our "star performer". I saw this game at Origins this year and ordered 4 copies. We have one copy we are using for display and sold all three of the others on Friday with many people asking for copies.
The last window in the front of the store, on the other side of the entrance had a chess set with a theme based on the movie Aliens that had been floundering in the store for over a year... We managed to sell it on Saturday and have setup this year's Spiel des Jahres winner, Zooloretto in it.
Sales are doing better than they were last year, but I've not yet spent the time to calculate the actual percentages.
Next, I'll be getting the login information and updating the store website.
Regretfully I do not have any decent "before" or "during" pictures as we were just too busy working to document the process. I only have one small one from before from the website, but I will see if I can find some more and add them later.
This is what the store looked like before we started. I know the picture is small, but you can get a feel for the general appearance. As is fairly obvious, the store front was originally a jewelry store.
The front entrance view of the store. We are still talking to the mall management about changing the halogen lights to compact flourescent fixtures. I think we have come a long way after they have seen what we have accomplished in being able to have them let us make the change to brighten up the store more.
A view of the side of the store where the families wait for Santa Claus pictures.
And we begin to walk into the store...
Turning to the right, there is the "new release" wall as well as the Ravensburger jigsaw puzzles.
Looking down the puzzle and board game wall...
Over on the other side of the store is the board game and card game section...
Turning around towards the front of the store from the cash-wrap area.
And this is the demo table which has a few games setup for customers to gain a closer view.
One of the strengths of having been a jewelry store is that we have a number of display windows to display products to hopefully attract attention and showcase some of our games. This set of two windows are on the side of the store, again where the families spend time waiting for Santa Claus. I guess if they have to stand there and wait, we might as well give them something to look at and possibly plant seeds of gift ideas...
Closer look at one of the windows, this one is featuring the game Pirate's Cove.
Another window, this one featuring Gulo Gulo. This is a dexterity game geared towards the younger players.
The two windows that are on the corner front of the store. These are the main "show case" windows that most people see and notice.
In this window we are featuring a new game that was just released at Essen called Chateau Roquefort. The display has already sold one copy and is attracting quite a few kid's eyes.
This window has featured our "star performer". I saw this game at Origins this year and ordered 4 copies. We have one copy we are using for display and sold all three of the others on Friday with many people asking for copies.
The last window in the front of the store, on the other side of the entrance had a chess set with a theme based on the movie Aliens that had been floundering in the store for over a year... We managed to sell it on Saturday and have setup this year's Spiel des Jahres winner, Zooloretto in it.
Sales are doing better than they were last year, but I've not yet spent the time to calculate the actual percentages.
Next, I'll be getting the login information and updating the store website.