Big News!

About three weeks ago I hinted that something big was on the way. Today I am pleased to announce the big news - I am opening a hobby shop.

It has always been a dream of mine to have a hobby shop, and when our closest flgs went out of business a few months back I knew that I had the perfect opportunity at hand. One of the biggest challenges of opening a niche retail store is finding a problem that needs a solution (a lack of gaming store where there is demand) instead of creating a solution where there is no problem (a gaming store where there is a lack of demand.) After reading and reading I finally came up with a business model that I think will work - the shoestring gaming store.

The current plan is to have the gaming store open on Friday nights and Saturday - this is traditionally when hobby and game stores are the most busy. By having these hours it will also let me keep my day job. The goal of the hobby shop isn't going to be to replace my source of income, the goal is going to be to pay the rent on the building. I think this will give me an edge in the market as I won't have to move as much product to break even.

Getting the business set up has been quite an ordeal and I have learned a lot. All in all it has been quite fun, but also pretty expensive. Even with trying to run as lean as possible I have already ran up quite a bit of debt, and the store isn't even open yet.

The work begins

The hobby shop is going to be separate entity from The Hogs of War, but I am sure there will be the occasional bit of news posted here and there along the way. Be sure to keep checking out the blog the rest of the week and I will fill you in with more information about what has been, and what will be going on with the hobby shop.