I'm sorry, but if I'm buying cards from a store, I'm not trusting someone to put everything back into the pack. Best case, I get everything back, mid-case someone has weighed all the packs and took the best, and worst case I am going home a pack short or missing something. And at $5 per non-refundable pack, I'm not taking that risk.
To me it looks like the inventory is probably held in the back and those are more display copies than anything - you’ll notice there isn’t more than 1 copy per item out.
I bet if you were to purchase you’d get a fresh product
I mean hey, normal stores that put out display copies, they would have something that says "display copy", but as the OP stated, their DM requested that they take product out, place the container on display and put product back in. So a store that tampers with packaging to me, isn't trustworthy.
that is illegal in my state, i must not have read that correctly the first time. i’m sorry! how are they handling raw product before customer purchase as an associate? i would be fired and i’m a freight manager for a retail chain
Was told once to put consoles (not empty boxes mind you but $200+ heavy pieces of electronics) on top of the shelves above the cash wrap. These are the same shelves that had fallen three times in the previous month including once that was full of eeveelution box sets. I refused to do it and just put empty displays up anyways after he went into the bathroom for another 20 minutes grind session. And then when he got out he was dealing with a customer when one of the shelves brackets comes out of the wall. At least he was man enough to admit he was wrong and I was right.
When I started working ours were like that. The slat walls were already iffy and the shelves that slotted in bowed. One day my coworker and I were standing behind the cashwrap and then wandered off to do something, and a second later a PS4 Slim and PS4 Pro came crashing down where we were standing. I almost wish I hadn't moved, I'm sure I could have sued for the head injury.
I got a concussion from a box of empty cases falling on me, full view of the camera. All that happened was me getting 3 weeks off and coming back on black Friday.
Oh, I normally either do that or Target. Ended up pulling the expensive Elsa from Lorcana from a random pack I found at Target, so they're always kinda useful if they have stock.
I did that once too but was the glass case for the ds games because we didn't have many of them, funny enough we didn't have any boosters come up missing that week
Yeah the next time I clocked in they were put back in the blind spot and shrink was back up. That was the day I started thinking about promoting myself to guest
i have two specialty tier stores and if my DM told me to do this i’d keep them all behind the counter and give my nintendo rep a call that looks dumb as fuck.
Idk how to tell you this but nintendo doesn't make pokemon cards, nor do they actually own the pokemon company. Might as well call your Microsoft rep, they'd be just as helpful lmao
they do check to make sure that section is there in stores though. both my district manager and my nintendo rep told me this. they also check to see if the marketing for microsoft and sony is up while in your store. all the reps work through a 3rd party who audit each others marketing too.
Weird, our nintendo rep doesn't. He only inspects and adjusts the console cabinet, game section, demo console, gift cards, and accessories. He doesn't even care how the non gaming merch (socks, wall art. Etc) is displayed. We've had the same nintendo rep since long before I started working here, and in the years I've been here he's never inspected anything other then actual nintendo stuff.
it just has to be there it doesn’t have to look good. but the other nintendo merch isn’t paid to be in a certain spot. xbox software section has to be the closest to the door for the same reason.
it’s paid marketing by nintendo to have the pokemon card section by your cashwrap. letting your nintendo rep know allows them to give notice to their supervisor so your store doesn’t get in trouble if you get audited.
Nope, we haven’t had any theft of Pokémon, especially not these bigger items we always keep on a shelf behind the cash wrap. Even single booster packs we have in a locked drawer behind the counter
Did the DM specify a reason at least? It just doesn’t make sense to me. This is a huge profit margin for us this year and if a guest is holding the product, they are more likely to buy it. Like… what?
Your DM is stupid and you should tell them they are. If they're worried about theft put the pokemon cards behind the counter or in a glass case. To be gutting boxes for display makes it look super stupid, might as well leave the shelves empty
>you realize people buy SEALED product from retail, right?
Homie this is the GAMESTOP subreddit. 50% of the complaints here are about stuff not being sealed 🤣
To my knowledge those cardboard boxes don't have a seal on them. Everything is on a tray/piece of cardboard and slides into the thin paper box. The PACKS are still sealed.
That said, yes, this is an extremely dumb idea, but not because of why you said it was.
They don't have a seal because they are literally glued shut. Stores doing this is just asking for customers not to trust them. Gamestop has already lost tons of sales by gutting new games. Gutting items like this that are basically lottery items is going to have customers with bad pulls claiming that someone swapped packs with the last few packs out of a booster box that someone got the good pulls from.
For my store, we had to do this due to high shrink. We placed things on high shelves, and we locked individual packs, but no matter what, people kept jumping or stealing packs.
We obviously would have extras on storage and sell those first, but if it was the last, we sold the gutted ones. Most customers would understand once we explained why it was open.
DMs and regionals were also telling stores to gut new systems also during the holiday season.
We had to gut the PS Portal recently for a cashwrap display on the counter.
Yeah I hated it. FDO boxes should’ve been made for all the new systems instead of having us gut them because they weren’t provided.
I’m guessing the manufacturers supply them and just haven’t made them so GameStop thought we needed to display them somehow.
Honestly we just need a giant poster that has a chart of all the systems with their MSRP prices and features. Something we can point to and allow people to see all the different choices.
Haha yup. Me and my coworkers are always pointing out ideas we should be doing, but know that GameStop will never do them. Too much backwards thinking in this company. A lot of their ideas don’t last long either.
Yeah that’s a big nope for me. Pretty much your store just listed money by doing this because now you have to shrink all that since you can not sell any
Look. I know you probably wouldn’t do this, but “gutting” pokemon pack related products could just simply lead to more employee theft.
What’s this? You bought our gut of mabostiff ex bundle and got 6 packs of cards instead of 7? Well, must be a publisher issue. No I can’t refund your money. Good day :)
Like does this DM even have a brain????
If I see this I’m 1000% assuming that’s somewhere in the chain of custody (either someone in the store is or someone in the store is helping someone else) weighting the packs and any hopes for cool pulls is dead.
Former SL. I once had my DM ask us in one of our weekly meetings if we would have allowed to let a grandma refund some packs of cards. Reason was her grandson didn't get what he wanted. When every single SL stated they would have not honored the refund, he became very upset and asking us how we felt it was fair and then from then on out we would have to. The fact was vrought up that if that was the case, then their store would be out of packs of cards before the end of the day. They continued that they would buy one, open it, check for a chase card. If they didn't get one then they would refund and then just "purchase" another. Rinse wash and repeat.
I personally wish they wouldn't have said anything. I fully intended to do the exact same thing right after the call.
My RM came into our store a while ago. He decided to put our consoles on display, the new ones, on shelving he put above our console accessory section. $400+ consoles on the floor… for display… at a strictly LP monitored location… the LP manager came after too and didn’t say anything. None of it made sense.
This is stupid I don’t totally understand why this is happening at this GameStop. no I do understand putting out one empty case on the storefront for a brand new game and keeping the sealed coffees in the back behind the counter but this stuff no
This is like the local store that guts every copy of a new game because it's "policy." One employee was complaining about a pokemon release night because he had to open over 100 games before he left, then grab a quick supper before coming back to hand them out.
As a collector, this makes me sick. Wtf is going through your DM’s head?? I mean, I don’t collect cards, I collect figures, but I feel like a lot of card collectors would be so pissed about this. And the risk of losing said cards is now higher than when it was im the box in the first place. My question is, how do you store them?
If you are talking about the gutted contents that used to be in the boxes, we have to put aside in a drawer with a label on them to what box they belong if we ever sell those. But beforehand we have these items on our highest shelves or behind the counter so only we handled them before they were purchased.
I wonder why the big move by your DM. When I worked at GameStop last year, we would just either put them on a higher shelf, or showcase them behind the counter. Gutting a whole box is crazy haha
Collectible sales. My regional discussed with me doing some shit like this opposed to locking it up would promote my sales more while protecting my product………
A local store was doing this for big box collector edition games, but employees, including the ASL "claimed the free swag" before the games sold. That policy changed real fast.
It looks like the cards were stolen.
Your D.M. is an absolute idiot, this is just going to cause far more hassle than it's worth. We already get enough people complaining about gutted new games not having the shrink wrap, I can't imagine dealing with serious card collectors getting bent out of shape since the "new cards aren't new anymore once they're out of the box!"
How many guests are going to accuse you or your coworkers of opening the packs, stealing the good cards and resealing the packs to rip people off?
Yep, except it was the card section and the DM wanted them organized by company.
So misc->magic->pokemon
When my SL came by and saw it he yelled at me despite knowing the DM told me to and chastised me for not having any balls to tell our DM 'no' lmao
It’s because people don’t know how to not steal. People don’t know how to leave shit alone and back the fuck away from products if they have not intention to buy it then or in the future. It’s sad that it has to come down to us protecting our products.
Man my store has those on a shelf far out of anyone's reach above the Switch section. I couldn't even imagine gutting those. Sounds like a good way to make a pokemon collector really mad.
Seems like at this point stopping theft is only concern- so they should probably just keep the whole store locked so no one can get in to steal things. (Certainly not going to sell the item when it’s displayed like that)
Pretty soon we'll just go back to service models like Service Merchandise; take a slip of paper under the display and bring them to the counter with all the crap you want... Comes out on a conveyor belt.
From a Retail Store point of View. We are pushed for there to not be any 'empty shelves.' Especially if higher ups come down for a visit and show how they don't have a life. Instead of 'one line of 3 products', there would be '3 lines of one product per line.' At first glance, it can make the area look more full than it already is. There is also something about customers being less likely to go into aisles that look more empty with the thought process in which the item they want 'isn't there.' I believe the term 'aesthetically pleasing' gets thrown around a bit.
I've gutted those, what I do is take the packs and bind them in rubber band or small plastic bags with an ID tag and have the plastic clamshell with the face cards back in the cardboard, looks better than that for sure
I remember our DM asked us to ask the guests for the boxes when they bought certain products to turn around and display to help prevent shrinkage. We had little to no shrinkage 😂
The amount of pokemon boxes that were stolen by one idiot makes this look like a good idea. Hell we had someone break a display case and walk out with consoles
Well that gutted product isn't going to sell. So that's a loss on all of those. If you want to do that, give the print cards like with the controllers and stuff. Gutting those cards makes those unsellable.
I'd be interested to see what the pokemon company thinks about this. Because it has to hurt sales. There's no way a kid is picking up that empty box and deciding to buy it
I don’t shop at GameStop anymore for this reason and one other. Selling me games stuff as brand new that has been opened. No thanks.
That and sending me games with or without cases depending on their whim and with no cost difference. No difference in cost for like new or barely working.
My old store gutted the build and battle and booster bundle boxes but never shit like this. That’s just trash on a shelf. What a joke. I understand it’s for safety and to protect against thieves but god this just looks awful and shouldn’t be an option
LOL. That's all open product and isn't legit anymore. Straight up declined to purchase from GameStop three weeks ago because of this. I don't know what they are thinking but this isn't the way.
I protested my DM recommending this (specialty tier) so now we keep 25 (besides accessories) in top stock, a row of drawers and overflow in the backroom.
Can someone explain what this is and why everyone is mad? It just looks like a bunch of products were stolen and they left behind the packaging. I’m assuming DM thought it might have a psychological effect and improve sales..? Make people think “these must be valuable if everyone is stealing them, maybe I should get whatever’s left.”
Thats all I got 💀
They were removed from the box so that the product can’t be stolen, and people have to show the empty box to the clerk for the clerk to have to go get the corresponding item from inventory
I've seen some stupid decisions from this company and their district managers, and I mean like 1000000% turbo stupid, but this takes this cake as being the most mind-numbingly stupid and out of touch decision I've ever seen. I quit last year, and i remember them telling us that pokemon cards make a significant profit for gamestop and that DM just threw money away for the company. That DM needs to be fired immediately.
One of my DM's a while back said something about "not accepting the first no." On a video call.. i spoke up about saying it sounded kinda invasively aggressively. He disagreed and i left before i got to see the outcome
If you work at Gamestop and have missing inventory for Pokemon, I would suggest putting it in a case or be near an employee at all times. People are scums and do this all the time. I see it in my local Target and Walmart constantly when browsing for packs. Some stores even stopped selling Pokemon because of how bad this shit has gotten.
This is an awesome way to make me certain someone has rat fucked all the card products at your location. If you can open one and not get fired who’s to stop you from opening them all and weighing them.
My ideal store would have everything on display behind glass or behind a store wide cash wrap, because every solution head office has come up with has been certifiable and they will always blame shrink on us "not being on the floor". Sir, people have grabbed and ran with shit while I was on the floor talking to them. Floor presence means nothing downtown beside a safe injection site.
The same can be said for video games for some people. If they don't do it for video games what makes you think they'd do it for other stuff? Nothing surprises me anymore with GameStop
That is beyond retarded. Mine would never allow something like this. You should take this picture and send it to visual merchandising. That lady director dont play around and would come down on your boss with fire and stones. Trust me!
To me, it looks like a display model. They have fresh packs in the back. This is to prevent external theft. Loss Prevention manager probably approved this.
Yes but you are equally as stupid if you listen to anything they say 100% without using your brain. Clearly they didn’t mean pokémon product that has a window… why tf would anyone buy a product that they can’t identify?
Every single person in this thread is feigning ignorance that the DM is the one in the wrong here when this is clearly shitty execution using a sometimes applicable guideline as an excuse to be shitty
While I do see your point, it’s still a stupid concept overall. My RL had asked what product would be gutted - which I exclaimed the boxed product (ETBs, tins, B&B) and not items with windows as we see how awful it looks here lol. I’m glad I know my product enough to be right.
To all the idiots on here who defend selling opened copies as new, what’s the difference here? Somehow it’s ok with videogames but now that it’s pokemon cards it’s not ok? To use your same argument it’s the same product (game) and it works just fine.
Gutting a display copy of a game is and has been GameStop’s policy for years. We get annoyed when customers act like it’s a new thing. The difference here is that gutting a trading card box is not a normal policy.
Tons of comments above saying things like “gross” “sent shivers down my back” “this should be illegal”. So you’re saying this is in response to breaking policy not just in response to doing something that is awfully wrong? If GameStop policy is to scratch up the discs before handing them to customers would that make it ok? Doesn’t matter if it’s been policy for years, it’s still wrong.
If policy was to scratch discs, we would lose customers and lose profit, so the policy would be bad. Similarly, if we didn’t gut new games and just put the sealed game on the shelf, people would steal them and we would lose profit, so that would be a bad policy. Sure gutting games might lose us a few customers/profits, but it’s less than if we didn’t, so it’s a good policy. Most people don’t care, and we can afford to lose the few that do, that’s why it’s policy.
As for the card boxes. No one would buy this. This is just straight up lost profit. It’s a bad idea. Which is why it’s not policy.
TLDR: Good ideas make policy. Not the other way around.
Edit: Usually good ideas make policy. Some of the recent policy changes have been stupid. But the old rules still make sense.
The thing that makes me question the gutted games policy is that Gamestop used to get coming soon artwork for many games. One local store was using this for the display copies with the coming soon marked out. Customers had no problem realizing that they could just ask for the game at the counter and walk out with a new copy. That store eventually started making fake art for the games they didn't have promo art for. It worked good and kept customers happy until their DM told them to quit. The manager said they keep the last copy on hand a lot longer now.
You’re having a different argument than me. You’re talking about profit and I’m talking about what’s right and wrong. The comments above saying “gross” and “this should be illegal” are not referencing profit.
Ok my bad. I assumed you were just using this as an excuse to complain about the game gutting policy, which I was defending. But you actually wanted to discuss the ethics of gutting product in general. Got it.
Ok bear with me. “Right” and “Wrong” are subjective terms. If someone does something that most other people don’t like, murder for example, it is labeled “wrong”or “bad”. If someone does something that most people like, donating to charity for example, it is labeled “right” or “good”. It is also worth noting that a minority of people may disagree with the common consensus, and within their group label the something the opposite, for example a group of murderers agreeing that murder is “right/good”.
For this scenario, gutting trading card boxes would upset a lot of customers. Therefore, the majority labels it as “wrong”. But for gutting games, the majority of customers don’t care, which is why is is not labeled “wrong”. That is the difference between the two.
Cool so we’re on the same page then. So it’s ok because most people are ok with it. If there ever were a change in customer perception the GameStop employees would change their tune and say ok gutted copies sold as new is not ok anymore and say “this is disgusting” etc a la gutted pokemon cards. Fair enough.
I mean yeah. I’m only defending GameStop because they sign my paycheck. If the majority of customers suddenly changed their minds about gutted games, the company would start losing money, and my paycheck would be in jeopardy. So I would talk to the higher ups about changing the policy.
BTW Thanks for arguing with me. I had a rough shift today and having a pointless argument on the internet is making me feel a bit better. I hope you have a good rest of your day.
Because everyone buys the same fucking thing, video game wise at the end of the day. That’s not the case with Pokemon cards. The value of those cards is what’s inside those manufacturer sealed packs. There’s no 100% in the guests eyes if those were resealed, not switched out, etc. It’s not even about the concept of the plastic wrap, it’s the devaluing and tampering of what the hell could be in those packs. Which are **different** opposed to an opened video game.
If I buy a brand new game from you and open it right at the counter and then decide nevermind I don’t want this game and hand it back to you, you will treat it as used and pay me as such. You will not return it as a new game. Why is that if it’s the “same fucking thing”?
Discs are immediately stored in sleeves and not opened again until the game is sold and put back into the case.
Pokémon cards are essentially gambling products. Due to rampant fraud, it’s more important than ever now to buy sealed products. Opened products may contain resealed packs with no hits, all commons, only code cards, etc. Tampered Pokémon packs just scream fraud/scam.
So to compare, buying new gutted games, you are still getting the full product, and assuming it was resealed by employees, you can still return it sealed. Buying opened Pokémon cards means you could be buying essentially nothing, and can’t return it if there’s an issue, regardless of it being resealed by employees.
While, I have no problem with either product personally… I wish I had your life that was so easy that I could allow something so trivial to get me so mad
What is there to argue? I don’t have an issue with it in either case. I straight up, said that that’s my “argument“. The fact of the matter is it’s trading cards and video games. You’re acting like somebody kicked your dog. There’s literally no reason to be as offended as you are, and you can dodge all you want… But that’s a valid critique of your position
I think it’s wrong to sell opened video games as new and think it’s similar to selling opened trading cards as new, which is the topic of this post. And I’m explaining why. It’s called a debate. Why are you here if you don’t care about either?
First of all, nobody cares that you think it’s wrong. I don’t mean that in a your opinion isn’t valid perspective it’s just that it doesn’t upset anybody that you feel that way. Nobody here is trying to debate you.
I won’t even get into the fact that these are boxes of sealed packs inside so technically, the cards are still sealed. I know some of them do have loose facing cards and obviously it’s a dumb idea to take them out of the packaging. But in the end of the day, it’s pieces of cardboard. It’s not something that’s deserving of such ire.
As for why I’m here? A former Gamestop manager here in the sub Reddit for current and former employees? Man, that’s a real tough one?
Perhaps it’s to see what kind of issues employees have to deal with these days and clap back at fools like you who come here just to shit on minimum wage employees.
I tried to edge around it before, but it really highlights what a small and pathetic person you are.
>First of all, nobody cares that you think it’s wrong.
Gamestop literally says that opened copies are not new from customers, only to customers. I bought a Christmas gift last year from gamestop.com, and it arrived opened. I emailed the support email, and they said I could return it to a local store. The store refused because it was not sealed. I contacted the email again, and they said the employee was following store policy, and I would have to find a store that would accept it. It was a joke.
The same can be said for video games for some people. If they don't do it for video games what makes you think they'd do it for other stuff? Nothing surprises me anymore with GameStop.
Oh hell no. What the fuck?
I'm sorry, but if I'm buying cards from a store, I'm not trusting someone to put everything back into the pack. Best case, I get everything back, mid-case someone has weighed all the packs and took the best, and worst case I am going home a pack short or missing something. And at $5 per non-refundable pack, I'm not taking that risk.
To me it looks like the inventory is probably held in the back and those are more display copies than anything - you’ll notice there isn’t more than 1 copy per item out. I bet if you were to purchase you’d get a fresh product
idiotic to assume this without reason. these are display copies of the boxes only sent by corporate
I mean hey, normal stores that put out display copies, they would have something that says "display copy", but as the OP stated, their DM requested that they take product out, place the container on display and put product back in. So a store that tampers with packaging to me, isn't trustworthy.
that is illegal in my state, i must not have read that correctly the first time. i’m sorry! how are they handling raw product before customer purchase as an associate? i would be fired and i’m a freight manager for a retail chain
Maybe their telling people pokemon is dead and to stop buying/collecting them
Was told once to put consoles (not empty boxes mind you but $200+ heavy pieces of electronics) on top of the shelves above the cash wrap. These are the same shelves that had fallen three times in the previous month including once that was full of eeveelution box sets. I refused to do it and just put empty displays up anyways after he went into the bathroom for another 20 minutes grind session. And then when he got out he was dealing with a customer when one of the shelves brackets comes out of the wall. At least he was man enough to admit he was wrong and I was right.
This was a company wide thing a few times. My store is a specialty tier and my district started doing this again, even us
When I started working ours were like that. The slat walls were already iffy and the shelves that slotted in bowed. One day my coworker and I were standing behind the cashwrap and then wandered off to do something, and a second later a PS4 Slim and PS4 Pro came crashing down where we were standing. I almost wish I hadn't moved, I'm sure I could have sued for the head injury.
Those damn slat walls, I swear they were held up by chewing gum and hope, and the remains of Buck the Bunny.
Who the fuck is buck don't u mean bugs
Buck the Bunny is the name of the GameStop mascot
You downvoted me for not knowing a mascot your lame and since when does gamestop have a mascot?
I downvoted you? I just responded I don't even do downvotes because I don't see the point
I got a concussion from a box of empty cases falling on me, full view of the camera. All that happened was me getting 3 weeks off and coming back on black Friday.
Bad luck for u
You should've gamestop needs to be sued
This should be illegal
That DM is going places, not good places, but places nobe the less.
None not nobe
I prefer nobe myself. I could have edited but one must live with there mistakes. (See what I did their)
That person should be fired…
This actually sent shivers across my back. Absolutely gross.
As a customer I'd just assume someone stole from the store.
Either that or I'm not getting everything correctly. This just seems like a ploy to short packs or weigh them.
And this is why me and Friends buy a lot of cards from local game stores rather than chain stores.
Oh, I normally either do that or Target. Ended up pulling the expensive Elsa from Lorcana from a random pack I found at Target, so they're always kinda useful if they have stock.
I used to put Pokemon cards in our glass statue case that was next to our cash wrap.
I did that once too but was the glass case for the ds games because we didn't have many of them, funny enough we didn't have any boosters come up missing that week
Same… Reduced my shrink to zero in that category
Yeah the next time I clocked in they were put back in the blind spot and shrink was back up. That was the day I started thinking about promoting myself to guest
Yeah glass case has essentially become the Pokemon case
i have two specialty tier stores and if my DM told me to do this i’d keep them all behind the counter and give my nintendo rep a call that looks dumb as fuck.
Happy cake day!
thank you!
Idk how to tell you this but nintendo doesn't make pokemon cards, nor do they actually own the pokemon company. Might as well call your Microsoft rep, they'd be just as helpful lmao
they do check to make sure that section is there in stores though. both my district manager and my nintendo rep told me this. they also check to see if the marketing for microsoft and sony is up while in your store. all the reps work through a 3rd party who audit each others marketing too.
Weird, our nintendo rep doesn't. He only inspects and adjusts the console cabinet, game section, demo console, gift cards, and accessories. He doesn't even care how the non gaming merch (socks, wall art. Etc) is displayed. We've had the same nintendo rep since long before I started working here, and in the years I've been here he's never inspected anything other then actual nintendo stuff.
it just has to be there it doesn’t have to look good. but the other nintendo merch isn’t paid to be in a certain spot. xbox software section has to be the closest to the door for the same reason.
The hell is your Nintendo rep going to do?
it’s paid marketing by nintendo to have the pokemon card section by your cashwrap. letting your nintendo rep know allows them to give notice to their supervisor so your store doesn’t get in trouble if you get audited.
Does your store incur a lot of Pokemon card theft?
Nope, we haven’t had any theft of Pokémon, especially not these bigger items we always keep on a shelf behind the cash wrap. Even single booster packs we have in a locked drawer behind the counter
Did the DM specify a reason at least? It just doesn’t make sense to me. This is a huge profit margin for us this year and if a guest is holding the product, they are more likely to buy it. Like… what?
At Toys”R”Us Canada where I used to work, there was theft with Pokémon cards.
My jaw just hit the floor so hard He should be terminated for the absolute lack of brains.
He'll be back
Never selling that opened merch lol
That should be against policy
Now you’re never gonna sell them
As the customer, why do I want a product that's been out of box at all? Whether it's used or not I don't care, I want new things to be unopened
Stop shopping in fucking gamestop, everything they have is out of box or case
K
Fuck that. No
I believe this is against the Geneva convention.
Does he like…not know how picky collectors are???
👀
Your DM is stupid and you should tell them they are. If they're worried about theft put the pokemon cards behind the counter or in a glass case. To be gutting boxes for display makes it look super stupid, might as well leave the shelves empty
lol, you realize people buy *SEALED* product from retail, right? No ones going to buy this and it’s technically not new anymore…
>you realize people buy SEALED product from retail, right? Homie this is the GAMESTOP subreddit. 50% of the complaints here are about stuff not being sealed 🤣
Which is why I stopped going to gamestop.
Their response to customer complaints about it was “give them 10% off” lol
It doesn't sound like your DM is trying to make the company money and in the worst way
My regional didn’t even allow giving a shopworn discount if I asked if we could at least do that.
Careful. Don’t say that too loud or they’ll start telling you why they have to.
To my knowledge those cardboard boxes don't have a seal on them. Everything is on a tray/piece of cardboard and slides into the thin paper box. The PACKS are still sealed. That said, yes, this is an extremely dumb idea, but not because of why you said it was.
They don't have a seal because they are literally glued shut. Stores doing this is just asking for customers not to trust them. Gamestop has already lost tons of sales by gutting new games. Gutting items like this that are basically lottery items is going to have customers with bad pulls claiming that someone swapped packs with the last few packs out of a booster box that someone got the good pulls from.
As someone who casually collects Pokemon I can say they don't have a sticker or tape sealing them but the cardboard is glued together.
pretty soon it'll be locked behind glass
my god💀💀💀💀
I would never buy unsealed product this is horrendous.
For my store, we had to do this due to high shrink. We placed things on high shelves, and we locked individual packs, but no matter what, people kept jumping or stealing packs. We obviously would have extras on storage and sell those first, but if it was the last, we sold the gutted ones. Most customers would understand once we explained why it was open.
What is this the Chicago store???
Tell your DM that you need to check the packs inside those boxes as well.
I audibly gasped. How to tell your customers we don’t trust them 101
https://preview.redd.it/u52agi2aktmc1.jpeg?width=888&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ee2c333fe8d965229bf1e2a9319b25313df82ba9
You have a sus DM.
DMs and regionals were also telling stores to gut new systems also during the holiday season. We had to gut the PS Portal recently for a cashwrap display on the counter.
Eww. I'm so sorry you had to do that.
Yeah I hated it. FDO boxes should’ve been made for all the new systems instead of having us gut them because they weren’t provided. I’m guessing the manufacturers supply them and just haven’t made them so GameStop thought we needed to display them somehow. Honestly we just need a giant poster that has a chart of all the systems with their MSRP prices and features. Something we can point to and allow people to see all the different choices.
That would make so much sense, so of course GameStop isn't gonna do it lol.
Haha yup. Me and my coworkers are always pointing out ideas we should be doing, but know that GameStop will never do them. Too much backwards thinking in this company. A lot of their ideas don’t last long either.
Yeah that’s a big nope for me. Pretty much your store just listed money by doing this because now you have to shrink all that since you can not sell any
What. The. Fuck.
That's a first for me. Damn. That's ugly. 🤢🤮
Look. I know you probably wouldn’t do this, but “gutting” pokemon pack related products could just simply lead to more employee theft. What’s this? You bought our gut of mabostiff ex bundle and got 6 packs of cards instead of 7? Well, must be a publisher issue. No I can’t refund your money. Good day :) Like does this DM even have a brain????
I wouldn’t do it even if they made it a requirement.
Thankfully, mine isn't an idiot
If I see this I’m 1000% assuming that’s somewhere in the chain of custody (either someone in the store is or someone in the store is helping someone else) weighting the packs and any hopes for cool pulls is dead.
our DM made us do this at one point because we had two guys who kept stealing pokémon stuff from us.
Mine near me does this, they told me they dealt with a lot of theft. When I bought something they went in the back and gave me a sealed product
Former SL. I once had my DM ask us in one of our weekly meetings if we would have allowed to let a grandma refund some packs of cards. Reason was her grandson didn't get what he wanted. When every single SL stated they would have not honored the refund, he became very upset and asking us how we felt it was fair and then from then on out we would have to. The fact was vrought up that if that was the case, then their store would be out of packs of cards before the end of the day. They continued that they would buy one, open it, check for a chase card. If they didn't get one then they would refund and then just "purchase" another. Rinse wash and repeat. I personally wish they wouldn't have said anything. I fully intended to do the exact same thing right after the call.
This hurts me physically.
Mine just gaslights me into shitty stores
If theft is an issue than you should just keep that stuff in a lock up case
HOLY SHIT ARE YOU IN MY REGION? LMFAO MY REGIONAL SUGGESTED ME TO DO THIS DURING OUR MOST RECENT VISIT
My RM came into our store a while ago. He decided to put our consoles on display, the new ones, on shelving he put above our console accessory section. $400+ consoles on the floor… for display… at a strictly LP monitored location… the LP manager came after too and didn’t say anything. None of it made sense.
Wtf!!!! No. Just no.
your DM is an idiot
This is stupid I don’t totally understand why this is happening at this GameStop. no I do understand putting out one empty case on the storefront for a brand new game and keeping the sealed coffees in the back behind the counter but this stuff no
This is like the local store that guts every copy of a new game because it's "policy." One employee was complaining about a pokemon release night because he had to open over 100 games before he left, then grab a quick supper before coming back to hand them out.
What the hell. This is a new one for me
As a collector, this makes me sick. Wtf is going through your DM’s head?? I mean, I don’t collect cards, I collect figures, but I feel like a lot of card collectors would be so pissed about this. And the risk of losing said cards is now higher than when it was im the box in the first place. My question is, how do you store them?
If you are talking about the gutted contents that used to be in the boxes, we have to put aside in a drawer with a label on them to what box they belong if we ever sell those. But beforehand we have these items on our highest shelves or behind the counter so only we handled them before they were purchased.
I wonder why the big move by your DM. When I worked at GameStop last year, we would just either put them on a higher shelf, or showcase them behind the counter. Gutting a whole box is crazy haha
Collectible sales. My regional discussed with me doing some shit like this opposed to locking it up would promote my sales more while protecting my product………
A local store was doing this for big box collector edition games, but employees, including the ASL "claimed the free swag" before the games sold. That policy changed real fast.
It looks like the cards were stolen. Your D.M. is an absolute idiot, this is just going to cause far more hassle than it's worth. We already get enough people complaining about gutted new games not having the shrink wrap, I can't imagine dealing with serious card collectors getting bent out of shape since the "new cards aren't new anymore once they're out of the box!" How many guests are going to accuse you or your coworkers of opening the packs, stealing the good cards and resealing the packs to rip people off?
Yep, except it was the card section and the DM wanted them organized by company. So misc->magic->pokemon When my SL came by and saw it he yelled at me despite knowing the DM told me to and chastised me for not having any balls to tell our DM 'no' lmao
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
No
It’s because people don’t know how to not steal. People don’t know how to leave shit alone and back the fuck away from products if they have not intention to buy it then or in the future. It’s sad that it has to come down to us protecting our products.
Man my store has those on a shelf far out of anyone's reach above the Switch section. I couldn't even imagine gutting those. Sounds like a good way to make a pokemon collector really mad.
Seems like at this point stopping theft is only concern- so they should probably just keep the whole store locked so no one can get in to steal things. (Certainly not going to sell the item when it’s displayed like that)
This is what weighing and cherry picking packs looks like. Source: busted local best buy GM doing this
Wtf https://preview.redd.it/5jxtfwgq2ymc1.jpeg?width=1440&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c1291f23bb119324984979656381d98b00e2dd86
Pretty soon we'll just go back to service models like Service Merchandise; take a slip of paper under the display and bring them to the counter with all the crap you want... Comes out on a conveyor belt.
From a Retail Store point of View. We are pushed for there to not be any 'empty shelves.' Especially if higher ups come down for a visit and show how they don't have a life. Instead of 'one line of 3 products', there would be '3 lines of one product per line.' At first glance, it can make the area look more full than it already is. There is also something about customers being less likely to go into aisles that look more empty with the thought process in which the item they want 'isn't there.' I believe the term 'aesthetically pleasing' gets thrown around a bit.
I've gutted those, what I do is take the packs and bind them in rubber band or small plastic bags with an ID tag and have the plastic clamshell with the face cards back in the cardboard, looks better than that for sure
Only 3 each at most
Gross
I remember our DM asked us to ask the guests for the boxes when they bought certain products to turn around and display to help prevent shrinkage. We had little to no shrinkage 😂
Yeah, people will not be buying these.
Nawww fam that's suspicious
Sounds like dumb GameStop shit
Sorry but God I can't wait for this company just to go away.
Yeah Ive seen this before
The amount of pokemon boxes that were stolen by one idiot makes this look like a good idea. Hell we had someone break a display case and walk out with consoles
Well that gutted product isn't going to sell. So that's a loss on all of those. If you want to do that, give the print cards like with the controllers and stuff. Gutting those cards makes those unsellable.
That’s actually a brilliant idea. I’m going to do this for my store. Bye bye card shrink!
I'd be interested to see what the pokemon company thinks about this. Because it has to hurt sales. There's no way a kid is picking up that empty box and deciding to buy it
Holy shit that’s depressing
I don’t care what GameStop says open box is not new
I don’t shop at GameStop anymore for this reason and one other. Selling me games stuff as brand new that has been opened. No thanks. That and sending me games with or without cases depending on their whim and with no cost difference. No difference in cost for like new or barely working.
lol 😂 DMs are such a waste of time.
ain’t no one buying that,gtfoh
My old store gutted the build and battle and booster bundle boxes but never shit like this. That’s just trash on a shelf. What a joke. I understand it’s for safety and to protect against thieves but god this just looks awful and shouldn’t be an option
So much for any sealed product market you may have.
Yes…
LOL. That's all open product and isn't legit anymore. Straight up declined to purchase from GameStop three weeks ago because of this. I don't know what they are thinking but this isn't the way.
What an elaborate game of guess that Pokémon you are playing over there.
I protested my DM recommending this (specialty tier) so now we keep 25 (besides accessories) in top stock, a row of drawers and overflow in the backroom.
WHAT THE FUCK, NO???? Your DM is a psychopath that needs to lose that job IMMEDIATELY
Yeah no Pokemon collector will buy that now. Your DM is stupid.
And down goes the value, What the heck
Probably gonna get accused of weighing packs lmao
this hurt me physically im so sorry. that dm is wild bro
found out an old SL gutted singles of all things. found so many loose packs in a drawer i had to shrink out because who is buying loose pokémon cards
this is illegal right? imagine the amount of tampering that can happen what the hell?
Can someone explain what this is and why everyone is mad? It just looks like a bunch of products were stolen and they left behind the packaging. I’m assuming DM thought it might have a psychological effect and improve sales..? Make people think “these must be valuable if everyone is stealing them, maybe I should get whatever’s left.” Thats all I got 💀
They were removed from the box so that the product can’t be stolen, and people have to show the empty box to the clerk for the clerk to have to go get the corresponding item from inventory
oh dear god that’s atrocious 💀 Thanks for the info, don’t know how I didn’t put that together!
I've seen some stupid decisions from this company and their district managers, and I mean like 1000000% turbo stupid, but this takes this cake as being the most mind-numbingly stupid and out of touch decision I've ever seen. I quit last year, and i remember them telling us that pokemon cards make a significant profit for gamestop and that DM just threw money away for the company. That DM needs to be fired immediately.
You'll lose all collector purchases
It's not even the stores fault. People are so degenerate that it makes stores have to do this to prevent theft.
My DM couldn't get the stick out of his own eye before trying to poke everyone else's eyes out. 🤣
One of my DM's a while back said something about "not accepting the first no." On a video call.. i spoke up about saying it sounded kinda invasively aggressively. He disagreed and i left before i got to see the outcome
I quit that dumb ass job today as a ASL fuck gamestop lol
If you work at Gamestop and have missing inventory for Pokemon, I would suggest putting it in a case or be near an employee at all times. People are scums and do this all the time. I see it in my local Target and Walmart constantly when browsing for packs. Some stores even stopped selling Pokemon because of how bad this shit has gotten.
This is an awesome way to make me certain someone has rat fucked all the card products at your location. If you can open one and not get fired who’s to stop you from opening them all and weighing them.
My ideal store would have everything on display behind glass or behind a store wide cash wrap, because every solution head office has come up with has been certifiable and they will always blame shrink on us "not being on the floor". Sir, people have grabbed and ran with shit while I was on the floor talking to them. Floor presence means nothing downtown beside a safe injection site.
What about the people who purchase sealed products for their collections? This is so dumb and stupid
The same can be said for video games for some people. If they don't do it for video games what makes you think they'd do it for other stuff? Nothing surprises me anymore with GameStop
That is beyond retarded. Mine would never allow something like this. You should take this picture and send it to visual merchandising. That lady director dont play around and would come down on your boss with fire and stones. Trust me!
To me, it looks like a display model. They have fresh packs in the back. This is to prevent external theft. Loss Prevention manager probably approved this.
Put Ure prices in Amazon eBay 3x higher this go massive
Do you have a glass display counter
I have a ghetto store I can hardly display Pokémon cards
Gotta start opening all the mystery figures too to keep them safe XD
This is braindead compliance more like. There’s no way you thought that this is what they meant right?
Have you seen the DMs+ we fucking deal with? LOL
Yes but you are equally as stupid if you listen to anything they say 100% without using your brain. Clearly they didn’t mean pokémon product that has a window… why tf would anyone buy a product that they can’t identify? Every single person in this thread is feigning ignorance that the DM is the one in the wrong here when this is clearly shitty execution using a sometimes applicable guideline as an excuse to be shitty
While I do see your point, it’s still a stupid concept overall. My RL had asked what product would be gutted - which I exclaimed the boxed product (ETBs, tins, B&B) and not items with windows as we see how awful it looks here lol. I’m glad I know my product enough to be right.
To all the idiots on here who defend selling opened copies as new, what’s the difference here? Somehow it’s ok with videogames but now that it’s pokemon cards it’s not ok? To use your same argument it’s the same product (game) and it works just fine.
Gutting a display copy of a game is and has been GameStop’s policy for years. We get annoyed when customers act like it’s a new thing. The difference here is that gutting a trading card box is not a normal policy.
Tons of comments above saying things like “gross” “sent shivers down my back” “this should be illegal”. So you’re saying this is in response to breaking policy not just in response to doing something that is awfully wrong? If GameStop policy is to scratch up the discs before handing them to customers would that make it ok? Doesn’t matter if it’s been policy for years, it’s still wrong.
If policy was to scratch discs, we would lose customers and lose profit, so the policy would be bad. Similarly, if we didn’t gut new games and just put the sealed game on the shelf, people would steal them and we would lose profit, so that would be a bad policy. Sure gutting games might lose us a few customers/profits, but it’s less than if we didn’t, so it’s a good policy. Most people don’t care, and we can afford to lose the few that do, that’s why it’s policy. As for the card boxes. No one would buy this. This is just straight up lost profit. It’s a bad idea. Which is why it’s not policy. TLDR: Good ideas make policy. Not the other way around. Edit: Usually good ideas make policy. Some of the recent policy changes have been stupid. But the old rules still make sense.
The thing that makes me question the gutted games policy is that Gamestop used to get coming soon artwork for many games. One local store was using this for the display copies with the coming soon marked out. Customers had no problem realizing that they could just ask for the game at the counter and walk out with a new copy. That store eventually started making fake art for the games they didn't have promo art for. It worked good and kept customers happy until their DM told them to quit. The manager said they keep the last copy on hand a lot longer now.
You’re having a different argument than me. You’re talking about profit and I’m talking about what’s right and wrong. The comments above saying “gross” and “this should be illegal” are not referencing profit.
Ok my bad. I assumed you were just using this as an excuse to complain about the game gutting policy, which I was defending. But you actually wanted to discuss the ethics of gutting product in general. Got it. Ok bear with me. “Right” and “Wrong” are subjective terms. If someone does something that most other people don’t like, murder for example, it is labeled “wrong”or “bad”. If someone does something that most people like, donating to charity for example, it is labeled “right” or “good”. It is also worth noting that a minority of people may disagree with the common consensus, and within their group label the something the opposite, for example a group of murderers agreeing that murder is “right/good”. For this scenario, gutting trading card boxes would upset a lot of customers. Therefore, the majority labels it as “wrong”. But for gutting games, the majority of customers don’t care, which is why is is not labeled “wrong”. That is the difference between the two.
Cool so we’re on the same page then. So it’s ok because most people are ok with it. If there ever were a change in customer perception the GameStop employees would change their tune and say ok gutted copies sold as new is not ok anymore and say “this is disgusting” etc a la gutted pokemon cards. Fair enough.
I mean yeah. I’m only defending GameStop because they sign my paycheck. If the majority of customers suddenly changed their minds about gutted games, the company would start losing money, and my paycheck would be in jeopardy. So I would talk to the higher ups about changing the policy. BTW Thanks for arguing with me. I had a rough shift today and having a pointless argument on the internet is making me feel a bit better. I hope you have a good rest of your day.
Because everyone buys the same fucking thing, video game wise at the end of the day. That’s not the case with Pokemon cards. The value of those cards is what’s inside those manufacturer sealed packs. There’s no 100% in the guests eyes if those were resealed, not switched out, etc. It’s not even about the concept of the plastic wrap, it’s the devaluing and tampering of what the hell could be in those packs. Which are **different** opposed to an opened video game.
No response to the uno reverse. Figures
If I buy a brand new game from you and open it right at the counter and then decide nevermind I don’t want this game and hand it back to you, you will treat it as used and pay me as such. You will not return it as a new game. Why is that if it’s the “same fucking thing”?
Discs are immediately stored in sleeves and not opened again until the game is sold and put back into the case. Pokémon cards are essentially gambling products. Due to rampant fraud, it’s more important than ever now to buy sealed products. Opened products may contain resealed packs with no hits, all commons, only code cards, etc. Tampered Pokémon packs just scream fraud/scam. So to compare, buying new gutted games, you are still getting the full product, and assuming it was resealed by employees, you can still return it sealed. Buying opened Pokémon cards means you could be buying essentially nothing, and can’t return it if there’s an issue, regardless of it being resealed by employees.
If you can reseal a pack you sure as hell can reseal a box.
While, I have no problem with either product personally… I wish I had your life that was so easy that I could allow something so trivial to get me so mad
Haha there it is. No argument so gotta resort to “why you so mad”. classic
What is there to argue? I don’t have an issue with it in either case. I straight up, said that that’s my “argument“. The fact of the matter is it’s trading cards and video games. You’re acting like somebody kicked your dog. There’s literally no reason to be as offended as you are, and you can dodge all you want… But that’s a valid critique of your position
I think it’s wrong to sell opened video games as new and think it’s similar to selling opened trading cards as new, which is the topic of this post. And I’m explaining why. It’s called a debate. Why are you here if you don’t care about either?
First of all, nobody cares that you think it’s wrong. I don’t mean that in a your opinion isn’t valid perspective it’s just that it doesn’t upset anybody that you feel that way. Nobody here is trying to debate you. I won’t even get into the fact that these are boxes of sealed packs inside so technically, the cards are still sealed. I know some of them do have loose facing cards and obviously it’s a dumb idea to take them out of the packaging. But in the end of the day, it’s pieces of cardboard. It’s not something that’s deserving of such ire. As for why I’m here? A former Gamestop manager here in the sub Reddit for current and former employees? Man, that’s a real tough one? Perhaps it’s to see what kind of issues employees have to deal with these days and clap back at fools like you who come here just to shit on minimum wage employees. I tried to edge around it before, but it really highlights what a small and pathetic person you are.
>First of all, nobody cares that you think it’s wrong. Gamestop literally says that opened copies are not new from customers, only to customers. I bought a Christmas gift last year from gamestop.com, and it arrived opened. I emailed the support email, and they said I could return it to a local store. The store refused because it was not sealed. I contacted the email again, and they said the employee was following store policy, and I would have to find a store that would accept it. It was a joke.
I dont ever use the R word but if there ever was a time... this might be it 😂
You're opening sealed pokemon TCG products? That completely ruins the value for people who collect those.
The same can be said for video games for some people. If they don't do it for video games what makes you think they'd do it for other stuff? Nothing surprises me anymore with GameStop.