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sandman

By sandman
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Lag

Lag

Posted
Posted

What could they legally have done differently? (note they couldn't legally have communicated any more about their financial situation than they did)

Credit / Gift cards are money lending. People NEED to realise this and if that needs to be made really fucking explicit in terms and conditions then it should be.

GAME isn't legally obliged to accept the trade. The employee could say, "we aren't accepting trade-ins of that title at this time."

He might be asked, "Why not?"

And he could respond, "These decisions come from head office I'm afraid. I am not privy to their decision-making. Now, about that loyalty card..."

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ontwofronts

ontwofronts

Posted
Posted

Wow. Did not know that.

How in the fuck do they survive?

You're assuming it's the size of the estate that did for Game. Most likely it's the size of the estate combined with the supermarkets combined with online retailers combined with poor/outdated service style combined with trade in competitors and so on.

The only reason PWC have trimmed so aggressively is to be make it more attractive to sell, who is to say that a different management over the last 5 years couldn't have kept a 600 strong chain sustainable?

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Dudley

Dudley

Posted
Posted

GAME isn't legally obliged to accept the trade. The employee could say, "we aren't accepting trade-ins of that title at this time."

He might be asked, "Why not?"

And he could respond, "These decisions come from head office I'm afraid. I am not privy to their decision-making. Now, about that loyalty card..."

And that would be news everywhere in a second.

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new member

new member

Posted
Posted

Anyone know if you can check what points you have on your Gamestation reward card online?

You should be able to if your elite card is linked to an account on the GS website. The site is still down though so you won't be able to do it without going to a store at the moment.

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Lag

Lag

Posted
Posted

I suspect, somewhere, that there might be some exaggeration in this post but I can't quite spot it.

I confess I don't understand Dudley's point.

GAME should not commit prima facie fraud. It's up to them how they present this policy.

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Badger

Badger

Posted
Posted

So RBS, who couldn't run a bank, are now going to lead a consortium to buy a failing business which is challenged by both the economy and the fact that the industry prefer digital downloads and no secondhand sales.

That's going to go well, I'm sure...

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mushashi

mushashi

Posted
Posted

So RBS, who couldn't run a bank, are now going to lead a consortium to buy a failing business which is challenged by both the economy and the fact that the industry prefer digital downloads and no secondhand sales.

That's going to go well, I'm sure...

The primary reason the whole thing collapsed so quickly is because they lost their credit insurance (due to unknown reasons, maybe it's all part of some larger game RBS were playing) which led to suppliers not willing to supply goods without upfront cash (understandably given the possibility of facing a big loss if GAME did fall)

If this is now restored, why would the suppliers not supply them?, unless they also dearly desired the company to fail and the loss of credit insurance presented a golden opportunity to enact their wishes.

It's not as if a lot of the suppliers' other customers aren't indulging in the double-dip by selling 2nd hand goods in direct competition to the goods they buy from their suppliers, is it?

The suppliers are within their rights not to supply companies if they so wish, but they'd pretty much be down to

Shopto/The Hut/some smaller generalist retailers if they wanted to punish customers who directly competed with them for business.

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Rev

Rev

Posted
Posted

They may well just strip the company for parts in an effort to make back more money than any of the offers received from OpCapita etc.

If they were going to do that, they'd be better doing it whilst in administration, no?

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mushashi

mushashi

Posted
Posted

Looking into the common perception that Gamestation were teh awesome and GAME were the spawn of Satan for buying them, the numbers don't really back that up.

GAME had 407 stores in 2006, they had revenue of £586 Million and pre-tax profit of ~£24 Million for the UK operations.

Gamestation had 217 stores in 2006, they had revenue of £203.5 Million and a pre-tax profit of £2.1 Million.

It is also explicitly stated that one of the strengths of Gamestation was that they had a heavy focus on 2nd hand, so if anybody is to blame for the entire merged group expanding into and relying on 2nd hand sales, the blame seems more with Gamestation putting ideas into people's heads. Their share of 2nd hand was about as much as GAME, despite way fewer outlets.

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ontwofronts

ontwofronts

Posted
Posted

Which more importantly indicates they know who the buyer is and it's basically done.

It may do, or it could be an indication that all interested parties want to maintain goodwill in the business.

Alternatively, it could be to do with the stock that PWC know that no supplier is going to make a claim against.

'the banks' are owed £100m. My guess is that they see a better chance of getting this back with their debt for equity swap* idea than just allowing GAME to sink.

* I don't know what this means... googles

http://en.wikipedia....for-equity_swap

http://www.semplefra...DebtEquitySwaps

oh, ok.

There has to be some real value in Game group as a going concern. Despite their problems, they still had a fantastic income, it just couldn't support their cost base. Given a choice you'd rather have an existing business with regular, loyal customers with an identifiable brand than start from scratch.

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Rev

Rev

Posted
Posted

The I've-just-come-up-with-it-but-it-makes-sense answer is that there is a buyer who is genuinely interested, but not at the moment. RBS are keeping it ticking over until they are in a position to buy.

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ontwofronts

ontwofronts

Posted
Posted

The I've-just-come-up-with-it-but-it-makes-sense answer is that there is a buyer who is genuinely interested, but not at the moment. RBS are keeping it ticking over until they are in a position to buy.

If I could be arsed I'd go and have a look at Games share price at the time of a change of console generation and, if it supports my theory that it rockets in that time, I'd speculate that there is a good return from swapping debt for new lean Game and holding onto them for the next two years.

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boxoctosis

boxoctosis

Posted
Posted

RBS will have no interest specifically in the video games sector. All they will care about is maximising shareholder value or in this case minimising their losses.

They obviously think they have a better chance of extracting value from an equity stake in a slimmed down going concern than other alternatives (eg as a creditor in a liquidation.)

And to Badgers earlier point - pretty sure that RBS now is a vastly different beast than the one that failed.

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