It’s been revealed by Kotaku that GameStop will be giving customers an extra 20% for their trade-ins, and simplifying the structure for determining how much your games are worth. It’s going from a convoluted structure based on rewards, promotions, Game Informer subscriptions, etc, to one where the only difference is cash vs. store credit, and whether you are a Power Up Rewards member. This all sounds great doesn’t it? Simplicity! More money! Huzzah!
It does sound great, it’s supposed to, that’s how PR works. Thing is, anyone who does the math quickly realizes that this is just Gamestop ripping off their most loyal customers even more than ever before. That extra 20% for trade-ins sounds amazing, like Gamestop is listening to it’s customers for the first time ever, and doing something positive as a result. Too bad they are doing exactly the opposite, lying to people’s faces, and everyone seems happy about it. Meanwhile, Gamestop’s executives continue to laugh at us gamers for how gullible and stupid we are as a demographic. Let’s do some math!
As you can see in the lead image from Kotaku above, under the admittedly obtuse old system there are a myriad of factors that determine what you get for your game. Under the new, simplified system everything is a lot more clear. First, let’s examine the old system: Every game has a base value. That value is “0%”. For simplicity, we’ll assume this is $10. Now, if you are a Power-Up Rewards member, you get an extra 10%. So now it’s $11. But let’s say you trade that in towards another game right away, like 95% of us do. They tack on another 40% to the base, which is $4. Our total is now $15. As a savvy customer, let’s assume one of Gamestop’s frequent promos is going, where you get a bonus $10 on trade-ins: $25. If you are also using a Game Informer coupon, it’s another 20% on the base, so add $2. Congratulations! You just got $27 for your $10 game!
Under the new system, the base goes up 20%, the 20% that everyone is lauding Gamestop for. So our $10 game starts at $12. Power-Up Rewards member? Add 10% for a total of $14.50. Promos? Game Informer discount? Putting it towards a new title or pre-order? Sorry, the new simplified structure doesn’t have those. That’s it, your game is now worth $14.50, whereas last week you could have gotten $26 for it. Now we see the harsh reality of Gamestop’s plan: they are actually giving you as much as 50% less than the old system.
Recently, Gamestop claimed that 75% of their customers supposedly don’t know they can trade-in games. As gamers, we find this hard to believe, but I think it bears out. There are a lot of customers who aren’t actually gamers. Think about all those parents and grandparents who are just getting something for little Johnny’s birthday. Tammy got a good report card, so Grandma is taking her to Gamestop – the only time Grandma will ever be there. This is 75% of Gamestop’s customer base, evidently, though that number still feels pretty high. The point is roughly 75% of their customers rarely, if ever, trade anything in. This new program benefits those customers by adding 20% to their games’ value, something Gamestop will no doubt promote the bejeesus out of. The remaining 25% of their customers are us: gamers who buy and trade games regularly, are Power Up Rewards members and Game Informer subscribers, and who almost always take advantage of all the additional promotions. We are now getting up to 50% less than we were before.
I guarantee you that the customers this benefits trade in far fewer games than the smaller portion of customers who trade-in all the time. That extra 20% on the base price pales in comparison to how much you lose from the other modifiers going away. So, while Gamestop is touting this new system as good for gamers, the company is actually once again screwing over it’s most loyal customers. The people who almost never trade-in get a paltry couple bucks, those of us who provide probably 90% of trade-in traffic get ripped off worse than ever. My advice: if you have anything you are thinking of trading in, do it now before they start offering you that extra 20%. You’ll probably get more money.
rape stop