Posted in: Games, Video Games | Tagged: Circle Of Life, gamestop

The Horrid "Circle Of Life" Is Being Broken And Rebuilt At GameStop

Published Sat, 25 Feb 2017 11:45:05 -0600

Last updated Sat, 25 Feb 2017 12:07:34 -0600

If you're a frequent customer to GameStop, then you know about the horrible system that is the "Circle Of Life." The picture below has made the rounds online about how the video game chain does business when it comes to new and used products. The idea is that if you excite customers about one area (using the picture below, let's say Reservations) then they'll be apt to use that service and come in for New Sales. When they're done with those new games, they'll come back to Trade them in and use that credit to buy other Pre-Owned games. And hey, while they're at the counter, you can tell them all about Reservations again. Essentially this is a mantra for employees to follow to get people coming back so GameStop is their one and only place to get anything.

Well, as it turns out, the circle is a vicious cycle both in front of the desk and behind it. Smart gamers realized long ago that a system like this only makes the company more money and doesn't really help the gamer find great deals, especially with their pricing system designed to mark up must-have titles regardless of condition. While behind the counter, the company has been monitoring all of its employees with a metric system for their performance, and in recent years if you failed to meet a certain score, you'd be out of a job regardless of title or tenure.

Apparently, the company wised up to the negativity… sort of. Starting next week, individual employees will no longer have a score, but instead, the store as a whole will be rated. A "Circle Of Life" score will be based five areas: pre-owned sales, pre-orders, new games, traded games and reward cards—which will track the store's progress as a whole. While it's a nice gesture to not put individual employees in the crosshairs, the entire system is still flawed because now you're rating an entire store and everyone working there. So what do you think will happen in this new system if a store doesn't meet its metric goals? It isn't too far fetched to assume the company would fire everyone and start over, or worse, close it down.

The move seems to be in response to a Kotaku article about how employees were being reprimanded and fired for selling new games, which sounds insane when you think about it. If a sales rep on a car lot sells a new BMW, he doesn't get punished for not getting rid of the old Honda in the corner. A sale is a sale, except when you work at GameStop. We'll keep an eye on how the changes impact their business moving forward, the changes are supposed to take place on Monday at the latest. But don't be too surprised if you start hearing stories about store closures in a couple months because a store making tons of money on new sales was punished for not getting rid of a bunch of Xbox 360 titles.

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