GameStop planning to close 120 stores this year

[longy999]

Earlier this week GameStop hosted its 2014 Investor Day, at which it outlined some core business plans for the coming year. What does that mean for gamers? Less stores, basically.

It's not a mass closure, but the company is clearly looking to streamline its business — it's planning to close 120-130 stores in the coming year, out of a current worldwide total of 6,457. Not a major dent, but the company appears to be looking to markets larger than the dedicated gaming space; it currently has plans to expand its Spring Mobile, Simply Mac and Cricket brands with hundreds of new stores across the franchises.

These are focused on the mobile device and Apple consumer gadget sectors.

This movement into new fields has been described as an era of "GameStop 3.0" by CEO Paul Raines, due to its attempts to expand its non-gaming business to more closely resemble its primary business.

GameStop is clearly a major game retail presence around the world, particularly in the U.S. Are you a fan of its stores, and would you miss your local if it's one of those that gets closed down?

[scorpionnet]

That is not good, some people will be affected, but business today are adopting different strategy pointing more toward stream. Thanks longy999 for keeping us updated

[CloudStrife7x]

i would definitely miss my gamestop if it closed down, i get all my games there

[revsix6]

Dang, hope it's not near any of my area :(

[g10_glitterboy]

The only reason to even shop at GS is to pre order collectors editions of games. So many other retailers over the past 6-8 years sell the same new games so GS is not the only place to buy them. You can almost always get the games online much cheaper and without the hassle of GS employees trying to get you to trade in your stuff for peanuts then turning around and selling it for $5 less than the brand new copy.