I Found the Strangest Video Game Store (Vacuums and Video Games)

folks I am at a store in Dayton Ohio called vacuums and video gam I'm here to interview jafa the owner who I just met normally we start these interviews out inside the store but I pulled up today and we had a little bit of a situation so jafa what's what's going on here uh a couple screws broke and uh fell and shattered unfortunately said you were coming today in 45 minutes before you came uh sign on the ground I mean there's always something to take care of hopefully the rest of the store is a little bit more intact than the exterior is would you mind giveing me a quick tour and kind of talking about the history of the store absolutely holy cow I have to say jafa I did not expect this walking in here especially with a name like vacuums and video games I kind of expected more of like a mom and pop feel to the shop so I wanted to ask you I'm super curious how much of your sales are vacuums versus video games can you share that I mean the video games and you know just anything else is definitely higher we do a lot more service so on vacuums and stuff like that that's sort of where we make that's where the money I guess you could say is a lot of people you know you buy a $300 vacuum do you want to buy another one a year later probably not so they bring it here without a doubt but there's always that question like for instance you sawell a box game and you list it accurately but the guy on the other side doesn't think your condition is accurate so then you're in that you know area then you got to deal with the return with the amount uh yeah this is real life folks please hold okay so folks jafa the owner that call that he took he actually had to piece out to go deal with sign stuff we'll catch up with him a little bit later but in the meantime we have Chris the manager here to finish the tour and give us some of the store highlights you've been working here for a total of what like I'd say probably a solid like 15 so years oh my gosh so Chris knows this store like the back of his hand can you give us like the rapid fire version of what what are some of the coolest sections and items in this place yeah retro stuff like love it so we got like an Atari Jaguar still in the box of your Cade and then basically almost every game for it close to wow 64 case it's a little scattered Baron right now like there's we got some high-end titles but then right here is probably my favorite part of the 64k we've got sculptor cut complete in box conquers two copies of stun racer not for resell Super Mario 64 bomber man 64 the second one so like all types of cool stuff and then my favorite piece the 64dd which is like you don't see those anywhere ever especially in working condition I've only ever seen one before at a convention yes through here SNES stuff it's you can tell it's just all to types of crazy games in there we got Zelda sealed in box and then just all types of loose stuff Dracula X Mega Man X3 it's just a really nice collection pride ourselves on trying to have the high-end stuff around MH then NES right front and center you have little Samson and it's a really nice copy and then our graded 9.2 Final Fantasy with the Nintendo promotion offer it's a one of one wow don't see that anywhere else and really don't know how to comp it so one thing that I'm noticing is there are no replacement cases they're all original cases do you guys is that like a policy of yours no we do use replacement cases if we have to like some people will bring in a game that's loose to us and then it won't have artwork or anything so we'll print out artwork and then throw a sticker on that says reprint art so let me see if I can find like an example yeah so what we'll do is we will take the game that's loose we'll put a sticker on it and reprint the art and it'll say reprint cover and then we'll mark it down depending on what the game is okay so like you'll be paying for the loose disc price but the game it seems like a pretty high quality printing still though oh yeah no um he actually uses like specific paper like he wants it to be and feel as good as it can even though it's reprint but we'll still let you know but we just don't want it to look B well that's great that you're like it's reflected in the price and you're being honest with the customer but it also like makes the shelves look so much nicer yeah it's a you don't want to have like a random GameStop case unless we can't print the art for it we try to prevent that but like you know how the GameStop cases and all those random things people resell to you they bring it back and it's like it's like just says GameStop in the title of the game it doesn't look good on the Shelf you want it to look uniform you want all the games to look the same so we pride ourselves on trying to make the store look as good as we can so as a 10 plus year store manager what's your perspective on like what sets vacuums and video games apart from other local stores uh we pay better like our our prices are fair and we make sure that we give you the best price possible we try to make sure that our selection is good and we also try to make sure that the games are clean and make sure that everything looks nice for you to take home we test everything warranty everything it's a really pride ourselves on just having the best of the best like we're trying to just make sure the store looks great everything that you get works and everything's good yeah I mean I can attest the prices and the selection are topnotch like it's it's not common to run into a store that has this much stuff that isn't super overpriced exactly yeah that's the biggest thing is our prices is like our prices are fair and our prices are low and then if something you see is marked up a little bit and you feel like it's a little overpriced just bring it to our attention and then we'll look it up and then go from there so folks I've got a ton of spicy questions for jafa once he gets back about what it's really like to own a game store like this one but in the meantime I'm going to take a look at these shelves and see if we can find something to flip now jfa did say that if I'm buying a good bit he can work a little bit of a bulk discount for me and this section was one that instantly caught my eye that we've been having trouble staying in stock with on Amazon is the handhelds for example like this one right here the red new 3DS XL we're pretty close on we're paying 210 on that people send this one in a good bit I don't know why we get higher for this uh this one's at 240 so you know even at like 15% off we can pull the trigger on that we also do weirdly well with DSI consoles I want to say we're paying in the like high 40s on those so that might be a section that we can do pretty well with folks this is another area right here for some potential deal making Wii sports for some reason we cannot keep in stock but it looks like they've got like 20 plus copies the big question mark is I don't know whether this is normally a super fast mover for them I know at a lot of game stores it is so they might not be super willing to negotiate I know right now we're paying 22 a piece on those they've got them stickered at 30 but if they're moving kind of slow I wouldn't be surprised if that's the kind of deal that could be mutually beneficial at least on maybe a few copies this is another one of those Wii games that we pay really well for cuz we just can't stay in stock Guitar Hero 3 Legends of Rock looks like they do have a good number of copies here I believe we are paying yeah $17 on these I believe that might be going down a dollar next month but again you know if he's willing to do 20% or so on this this could be another solid mutually beneficial deal a lot of people I'll see in the comments saying like dude why why are you talking about like the money that you're hoping to make on these games right in front of vendors or in front of store owners and I realized what a lot of people don't understand is we're very much on the same team Joffa I'm going to ask him about later he's also very much of the mindset of collaborate don't compete so that's another thing that I want to ask him about because he cooperates even with local resellers very often so Joffa I know owning a video game store is a career path that a lot of people it's really easy to ROM fantasize but what can you tell me about like the day-to-day actual reality of being a game store owner I mean it can be rough I mean there's a lot of expenses and I mean during certain times of the year you know during Christmas tax time everything's great everybody's happy yeah then after tax time you know a lot of people start selling stuff off or you know there's a big low and there's a lot of days that you know buy after buy stuff we have to process and it's constant like it's awesome seeing stuff coming in like man I've never seen that but after you've done it like 75 consecutive days of like all right yep we just we got three of those now you know it does get tiresome a little bit and in those slow seasons does cash flow become an issue too I mean it hasn't but I mean it does put stress on us like we were looking you know at our numbers like yeah we had a great day in sales but we tripled that in buys and right this store does I think a lot more buying on average than most stores um just from what I know from other stores that I talk to I'm friends with you know we obviously compare stuff and talk and we're like well what's your numbers looking like or what's your buys like and and I know in most cases I'm double to Triple most stores Buys so what do you think it is about this store that sets you so far apart from the others CU that it sounds like both in Acquisitions and in sales you're kind of Head and Shoulders above the competition what is it that gets you there I don't know if I'd use term Head and Shoulders above I just would say I mean we offer the percentages that we offer even for resellers is enticing due to the fact of you know by the time you pay your fees and deal with the customer on the other end is it worth that extra 10 to 20% kind of deal um the other thing that a lot of people we get a lot of good inventory in because the existing inventory there's something they want so they're willing to trade for it to get it and right which you can't do that online I mean there well I shouldn't say there are some place you can trade in on but for the most part you can't get on eBay and say Hey I want to trade these games for that so and it's also in store which makes it easier if you're going for a high-end game I know how I am you know if you're getting a box game you're going to want to see it yeah you know pictures you know they work but you know holding it feeling the you know the card board smelling the cardboard it's a completely different thing like oh that's a replica as soon as you touch it or open it you know it it's hard to duplicate that by just looking at pictures online so I think that's probably part of it I think people got more confidence in buying uh you know a mid tier expensive game at a store that if there's a problem they can come right back and be like hey what's going on can we do this can we fix this why isn't this working so you're doing a good bit of buying from local resellers who would rather sell to you than do all the work of selling it on their own is that like cuz there are a lot of stores that don't necessarily like they see other like local resellers or vendors or other stores more as competition one thing that I say a lot is collaborate don't compete what is it that make made you adopt that mentality I mean there there's some resellers that you you can't work with I mean just there's some businesses you can't work with it just depends on the person and basically I don't want to compete with them like for the most part if I'm using price charting and I got a reseller they can make money just off of where I'm set at so that works and you know as long as you're not people don't come in and go you know you take 10% of your value I mean that that sort of makes it work and then like we discussed on the reseller and I work with other stores cuz there's certain stuff that they'll be sitting on the tie end that you know it's sort of aged so we'll we'll move stuff around I talk to other stores like hey well let me bring that down here CU I've got a I don't want to say we got a following for higher end stuff but we do move a lot of high-end games I mean we've gone through what is it three little samsons in the last month two DDS yeah two N64 DDS yeah um two kons uh so we sort of like other stores will be like hey this isn't working for me but you have this let's do a trade and and we do that all the time I've got three or four stores that I do that with what did you have to sacrifice to get the store to this point uh first year I think me and Rob both worked over 320 days jeez 12 hours or more but that's you know and I'm sure people are going to say you know I've got a son uh wife uh outside life and you know people are going to say you're sacrificing that and I'm like it's only a sacrifice if it doesn't work long term you might lose a year or two but in the if things work out you gain the back end so my goal with this store is you met Chris I'm hoping I'm only going to be here a couple hours every few days MH and the store basically run itself that's what we're trying to establish this store as is basically to where it runs itself have a setup that you know everybody knows it everyone this goes here we do this with this this shelves for done stuff these are controllers that are untested next time you plug in a 360 hit this you know it it it will run itself with the right setup and that's what we're trying to do and we've gotten close like I said I underestimated the trade ends the trade ends like we'll have this store looking nice and then 4 seconds later it looked like a flea market blew up in here and it just and I can't complain I mean the inventory is what makes the store go sure one thing that I always like to ask people is on this channel we're very money positive what can you tell me about the kinds of numbers that this store does I mean this first year that me and have been Partners it's somewhere in the 650 675 range oh wow which sounds good mhm but me and him basically don't take pay we pay the employees and everything goes into the store wow like the way I planned it out like we we do get paid but we're not taking much basically the store gets a majority till it builds to a point where it withstands and stuff and it's about there like I feel this store is on the threshold of where it will support itself and that's the point we had to get to you can't start something and then pull from it right out of the gate cuz then you know you get into trouble with depleted inventory and if somebody doesn't have something to trade against they're not going to bring it to you they're going to go to somebody else right so you want to keep the cash flow healthy at all stages so one thing that I have kind of struggled with in the past of how do you know when is the time to start taking money you don't because there's always that next deal like I mean just like last week uh not trying to boast or brag or anything but we spent 135 and it it's stuff you don't see like we had an almost complete North American Dreamcast collection coming was 20 games short yeah I mean that's not a thing that comes in and you're like planning for I mean you got sales tax your lease sign fell off the building I mean you got to fix the sign it's just a constant rotation of you got to keep the business bank account healthy enough to withstand you're going to have shots at you constantly and most businesses fail on the principle of they don't plan for the worst case scenario and when that happens the money is not there to cover it and that's when things start going South quick you're like well we'll just pull this out and we'll get rid of this and then you know customer service starts sliding let's cut an employee right and that's our biggest thing is customer service I mean I cannot put that ahead of anything else even if our inventory was you know well below average I feel our customer service alone brings people in like our turnaround time on repairing consoles is 1 to three days wow and unless you bring it on like a Friday then basically one to three business days but that's what we you know if there's a problem with the game you know it's got a sticker on it but you don't have your receip still going to take care of it we know it's ours you know it's just certain things that businesses don't do anymore that you know people hold a grudge what are some of the other business principles that have served you best over the course of the last 15 years just flat out honesty I mean customers that come in you know obviously we have people bringing games and no question our pricing that monitor is that high so I can flip it around and go these are the last five solds this is what price charting has at these are the last five eBay sold listings so you're upfront with how much you're hoping to get for an item the spread that you're hoping to make and people are generally understanding that you know it's a business and you're trying to make money right and like I said at the margins that we do I mean we're I I don't know where we fall with other stores I mean comparatively but I know most stores are like 30 40% Max cash or trade value yeah that's very stand I mean and if you talk a larger chain like you know GameStop or a Game Exchange it's usually going to be significantly lower but and then again if you look at those models and that's what I don't you know that's sort of what I look at so I took GameStop for instance they're not doing well yeah and there's specific reasons why they've made a chain that is identical everywhere you go and they're running the same product and it's already oversaturated and there's no draw like what's your reason unless you know you don't have a pull anymore yeah there's no retro there's nothing you know yeah obviously they drop cool limited run or whatever stuff that comes in but other than that and then if you want to trade something in you're going to get murdered right they've got a selection that's maybe 10 to 20% of what you have here and they're paying way worse right and that's and that's why I didn't base my model anywhere close to that uh I mean that's why it was sort of easy for me to establish this store relatively quick I mean this is a year the two principles that I used of we pay more and like I said 50% our lowend you get a little Samson I paid full retail on it wow just because I want it I've taken losses on games just to have it I mean it but it just works out you know people like coming in store seeing stuff or they're like hey I could have got like the DD from overseas but then like when's it going to get here m is it going to be intact you know and it's it just makes things easier but it makes them a lifetime customer too and if they ask me to get them something chances are I'm going to have somebody they can get so when people ask you should I get into this industry should I start my own video game store what do you do you recommend it no not not at all okay why not even a little bit I mean it's Cutthroat I mean if it wasn't I if it was a different situation it wasn't me that came here it would have been over very quickly cuz most businesses if they're smart are not going to let another business set up they're going to for instance if I was in another business and I saw me coming I would have checked what I was paying and since I was already established I'd have gone another 20% above just to just to make it hard for the competition I mean you can't do anything if you're basically suffocating because you're not getting inventory right cuz they're not going to have the cash flow that you do and that and would you say that that's the case for like most parts of the industry that like if you're trying to just get started in a local market that has established players they're it's going to be especially hard for you it is and there's just with the online sales anymore I mean it it is it's just hard in everyone's going to come in your store with a phone and they're going to price check like I said that's what's hard to deal with you know everyone is going to price check everything it's easier to get stuff online and that's there's a fine line there there's 10 guys like you right I mean and you're not like you're more streamline but there's guys that are like me you know that are they will just go through and take every they want everything and they leave no crumbs and those there's 20 of them everywhere you go especially in you mean when you're looking for inventory yeah like you you used to be able to go garage sailing and it was just AO yeah 20s NES games you go to a garage sale now there's seven guys like clawing at those NES games at least in this area that I've seen like we've done the route 40 sale and the amount of people I run into that I know and it's just like so which way you going yeah and then you're playing the game of like trying to out run them like go a couple miles ahead and then you see them pass and that's just sort of how the gaming industry is right now well and people ask me sometimes if I had to start over whether I would go to video games again if I didn't have the Amazon Edge and I usually say honestly I'd probably go the opposite way and get into something super boring that nobody cares about right that there is that there's not going to be a ton of competition for like Hardware you know like door hinges or something super boring uh cuz there is a lot to be said for that yeah the two years after I left or well two to five years that we did online sales I was doing rock man and guitar and that was was 10 years ago and nobody was doing it like you could go anywhere a Goodwill and it's like $1.99 for a guitar drive down the street there's a you know a drum set a guitar L there yeah and I was just you know accumulating and then I realized on eBay well here in Ohio yeah no value but they can't get this stuff in New York California Texas Florida so that's how we sort of started and then we got more and more popular cuz we were refurbishing it and it turned into an actual business like were with with the unsexy stuff that no one else wanted and then that turned its head rapidly now you go everywhere everybody's guitar yeah well the and the the funny thing is like if I were to start over again today I think I'd be more likely to compete with you on the vacuum side than on the video game side cuz that's another thing that like people no one's like I want to own a vacuum business mom you know well that's the funny thing like the uh the mes and the uh the rainbows like that's what what what are I don't know what that is their older vacuums and you can pick them up at Goodwills and stuff but online you know they average 2 to 400 I mean they and no one would know right I mean new e sure I mean that's like I said it's a thing I mean and there's also decent money in parting them out too right like their individual Parts can be worth a lot of money that's what I did like our eBay we did tools the tool itself wasn't worth anything to me yeah I mean some occasions obious snap on certain brands but the battery and charger which are smaller and lighter was worth more for me to piece it out and we did that all the time I mean that was like our bread and butter batteries chargers weird stuff that's what eBay was for us we found the niches the holes the gaps that I didn't have to worry about who I was competing against like when I went to Goodwill auctions like I don't know if you're familiar with the Cincinnati one but they do big like gondolas and everybody for themselves live bidding inperson bidding and I could bid confidently because I knew what guys were doing what and then at the end of the day the video games that they got we worked out a deal on the back end so I was getting what I need they got you know I'd let them go through what I didn't want they'd get what they wanted and it was it worked well and that's how I started networking and those same people are the same people I deal with today what advice do you have for someone who is just starting out in video games or in collectibles in general and they're trying to they're trying to get their feet under them you know they're Scrappy what do you tell them have good people around you I mean the people you have around you is going to be what defines how it turns out because if you're if you're known in the community as a guy that's you know unsavory let's say or you know willing to cut you for a dollar uh you're it's going to be shortlived I mean it travels fast and it you're fair and easy to work with you're going to get more and more people I mean what's the old rule uh somebody has a bad experience they tell three people but if somebody has a good experience you're lucky if they say something to one person right that's sort of how it goes in this business you will be well known at some convention in five minutes so so true and folks this is the deal that we ended up coming away with if uh any of you guys are oneup users these are some of the games that we do pay the best for that we ended up doing a little bit of a deal on for 1,100 in total Jaa thanks a bunch again for having me out been a pleasure was awesome

Channel: Renix Pesale

Views: 25,461

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Id: UrwVEa3RHn0

Length: 25min 56sec (1556 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 08 2024