AUDIO: GameStop Would Like To Buy Your Car... and Your Lawmakers...
Eye On America bravely investigates:
Welcome back to this week’s “Eye on America”, where we voraciously fix our blind eye on something so you don’t have to. Today, we focus on GameStop, a constitutive cornerstone of emerging entertainment and legacy leisure alike. Their recent struggles have been the source of some monumental changes in their business model that we would like to share with you today. Grab a seat, crack open a Tab, and let’s get into it!
GameStop is synonymous with “used”, and not always in the cutesy “save a buck on a game” way. Sometimes it’s more of a “You forgot the power cable at home, so the best I can do is $5 store credit or $3.50 cash” situation.
Your treasure trove of gaming history that you reluctantly sold to keep the plug at bay netted you about half a dime bag. Funniest part is, as I start to get what the young’uns call “old”, I recall GameStop didn’t accept “classic” stuff when I needed money as a kid.
At least you can sell your childhood.
Today, GameStop has begun to specialize in merchandise, accessories, and reselling classics. There is much more to offer today than in the PS3 era. I can’t complain, though; If I was willing to wait, there was always a copy of a game that I wanted in a replacement case with no art for nearly half price. If I only had a couple of bucks, there were plenty of titles in store I could get and quite likely enjoy if I were a little less picky.
Local used and classic game stores are starting to see some competition! Not on what they will give you for your games. Those are all horrible.
Today’s GameStop marketing strategy has become so aggressive that they are targeting a completely new set of competition:
Your local gas station. Your favorite junk car part lot. All of it.
That’s right! GameStop sees the pricing pressure felt by the average American family at the dealership and the pump and is bringing its Circle-Of-Life program to bear on this new adversary.
Gasoline has become a serious pain for people, and GameStop is betting its future on reselling used gasoline and automotive components. Like a Chevron and Pick-N-Pull at the same time. All of this without compromising on their heavily marked-up used product and terrible trade rates.
Bring in a can of gas in a sealed and regulated container, and they will make an offer on it, no questions asked. My neighbor was late for the third day in a row this week! I might have a new one next month! That’ll teach you to have loud reggaeton parties on Tuesdays.
Want to buy a shady-looking catalytic converter painted to look like Kirby? Licensed product. Just don’t check your ring camera or the serial number.
Why, just yesterday I saw a gorgeous set of bitchin 235’s on rims rattle canned in the back of the store to look like Temu Voltorb!
Many have stated concerns that this is little more than a couple of rogue stores acting as a front for illicit chop shops offloading junk. To that I say phooey! Do you not remember the great GameStop WallStreetBets uprising? A company as innovative and core to the cultural success of our nation would not engage in the aiding and abetting of larceny.
They will even make an offer on your entire car! Not only will you receive their legendary Circle-Of-Life pricing, but you will also be entitled to an entire year of Pro Rewards for free! Nothing says “gotta sell my commuter to pay the electrical bill” like 3% off a used copy of “Rollie-Poly-Olie’s Interstellar Adventure” for the Game Boy Advance!
GameStop’s new “Used Everything” model is leading to a vibrant array of offerings in stores all over the country. Stores in the Bay Area have been making a killing on “certified pre-owned” needles and broken light bulbs. I called the store owner to put the Eye On America on them, and they informed me that the product was moving faster than a scratched-up copy of Final Fantasy 7. The overhead to acquire them was nothing. People just left them on the floor outside, saving them thousands in shipping costs. They assured me that these savings were in no way passed on to the consumer, in synergistic alignment with their Circle-Of-Life KPIs.
The Oakland store took nearly exclusively to the certification and sale of used Glocks, Berettas, and Springfield XD’s. The profit margins are great, they told me, as long as you didn’t spend too many hours filing off the serial numbers.
In a chilling and refreshingly honest move, GameStop DC has started trafficking in the only currency that matters there: legislators. Most of them are highly used, but I was reliably informed that many of them still had a lot of life left in them, if you bought the protection plan.
The shelves were stocked to the brim with vintage copies of Biden (2004), Sanders (2016), and the preorders for Cortez (2028) and Booker (2025). The latter of these has driven people to wait in line for over 25 hours to pick up their copy. That’s got to be some kind of a record.
For other “consoles”, available titles included stacks of Gaetz (2023), Graham (2020), and a couple of tattered copies of Rand Paul and Thomas Massie in the back corner in a section labelled “RINO” (apparently not a top-selling genre in today’s market). No idea what that means, but they sure seem like they have been there a while. The store staff told me they had a cult following, but they didn’t sell much. Behind a curtain labelled “incumbents only”, we were told they had copies of Boebert (Beetlejuice Edition) and an unfortunately common Swalwell (2020 edition) only available in Chinese…
Eye On America asked the DC store manager how he acquired used legislators to sell in his store. He chided me for my naivete, but smiled conspiratorially and rumbled softly, “Man, they’re practically giving themselves away”.
Eye on America salutes GameStop for its renegade innovation, vicious tenacity, and its dedication to its fervently loyal customer base… but mostly for the free copy of Gabbard (2023).
Check back in next week, when Eye On America turns its blindest ocular appendage to Ford Motor Company and its spectacular bid to achieve the impossible: building cars in America.
Thank you all, and good night!