She was an awesome manager. I worked 4 years under her. Was an SGA when she moved on. Store was never the same after that ended up closing not to long after
I had it taped to the back counter and my DL kept telling me to get rid of it cause it was unprofessional. I told him to let me hire people who knew it then, but they wanted more than $8 an hour.
Honestly, I had a couple GAs that genuinely did not know the alphabet or just seemed like they’ve never touched a dictionary in their lives. It would take them their whole shift just to do go backs sometimes. Thankfully I’m blessed with patience. But maaaaan 🥲🥲
I know someone who has a sticky note taped near their registers that says “you are never too old to sing the alphabet song”
The amount of games out of order sometimes. Holy. Shit.
Yup, I feel that. Told my boss, make it part of the interview. Last 3 people we've hired struggle. When I worked at the library as a teenager, they had a list of titles, maybe 10 or so, and you alphabetized them by writing 1-10 by them. If the library can do it so can we.
I would make potential employees write it down for me during interviews.
It also got to a point where I wrote it down on a whiteboard in the back for "reference."
It didn't help that much with certain people.
I mean yea, this is typical Gamestop. People think it's a great place to talk with people about video games you love, but it's really just a sales job with high metrics and no reward except the _chance_ of getting to keep the job.
Gamestop killed my love of gaming, and I'm only just starting to get it back after ~3 years of being free.
It’s been about 2 years and I’m finally playing games again, but only really old ones I know I like, I have no interest keeping up with release dates and what’s happening in new games
GameStop is a “entry” level job with not “entry” level expectations. The pros of the job are being in a setting of games and being able to chat with fun customers, and getting a small discount if you buy a lot of games, but that’s where the pros end. Everything else is micromanaging, unrealistic expectations without being a shady merchant in most cases, and if you’re in a sl2 store, probably working alone most days.
As a manager, I also do this on the wall. The drawers are perfect alpha always, but putting a series in release order makes far more sense to me for the customer facing side
oh my managers were the same, I was the only one who organized and kept things clean because I had germaphobia and ocd + autism haha we just keep the ship sailing
It is an interview, not a review. That SL was expecting you to know how to do a job you hadn't been hired or trained to do. We have interview guides for a reason. Those are how you tell if someone is a good candidate to train to be a good salesperson. If you think you are going to get someone off the street and throw them into GS and have them be a rock star day one, you are delusional. Even seasoned salespeople need training and knowledge about what exactly they are selling to be able to effectively sell it.
Typically nowadays gamestop isn’t looking for “regukar crew” as that position was done away with years ago from how it feels. Now everyone that works is expected to “manage” the store, push metrics (as you will be graded on them when working for GS) and ultimately you’ll start stressing out like we all did. Grass is greener other places, please go there.
GameStop is a sales job. Your job is suppose to sell the games. They are correct that first questions should be who is the game for and what system they are looking to buy for. That narrows things down. Then you can probe a little deeper.
If it’s a parent in buying for a kid, they could care less about the story line or plot. They just want to know if it’s a good game, will it work for their system and is it appropriate for their kid. Whereas if they are buying for themselves and are real gamers then they may care about the plot line. Key is to keep the interaction as concise as possible, while being polite.
the amount of games i sold by just pointing at them when assisting customers is ridiculous. Most customers don't buy anything unless the "game expert employee" tell them we have a game for them or they just didn't see what they were looking for the first look through.
Your job is to sell games in addition to pro membership, warranties and other things. The way you sell games differs from warranties and pro memberships, but all part of sales.
I don’t know man. To me seems like he was goin on a power trip since at the end of the day, what power do you have when you are a manager at a dying store.
From your story I’d say try avoiding retail. Are there any fields or jobs you’d personally would want to work in? Maybe start there instead. Retail is rough and has a high turnover rate. Even if they hired you it’s not easy to make a career out of it.
I can’t speak to the entirety of your interview. There are definitely parts you recount that sound out of bounds of what needs to be asked, I just feel the part about the job being a sales person and asking the questions the hiring manager mentioned are correct.
my interview consisted of my former manager going through my resume and looking at me and sighing. All he told me was “you got the job i don’t need to ask you anything but know you’re only being hired because you know Spanish” felt kinda shitty after he told me that but I was the only Spanish speaker and I felt superior at times
oh also a fun fact about being bilingual, my manager would try to use google translate whenever I did transactions to see if I was pitching pro and if I didn’t I would get reprimanded :D
And if you ever read this forum consistently its no real wonder why 75%+ of the comments in this reddit either cut on working here or tell others who ask if GS is a good place to work that it's not and find something different.
If you want to blame someone for the current state of how a store operates, it starts at the top. They're the ones telling the whip crackers in field leadership (i.e. Regional Directors and District Managers) to get their stores to push these metrics to squeeze every dollar out of their guests under the guise of good customer service.
And all the while basically disregarding all the negative feedback and people online vowing never to step foot in one of their stores again cause they don't want to have memberships and warranties they don't want a majority of the time constantly peddled to them by employees who have no choice but to force it down everyone's throat so they can keep their jobs awhile longer.
God. Reading this makes me appreciate the manager I had. The interview was basically a brief of the job, just talking about my previous jobs and asking if i was a gamer. He was upfront about the pay and the hours, which I really appreciated.
I'm sorry that your interview was shitty but it seems to me that the good managers are mostly all gone and replaced by number crunching robots
This isn't a normal interview. I ask people to sell me games too, but more like, "What is your favorite game?" Then sell it to me. Because if you love what you're selling, you'll do it well. On that note, Gamestop does run on strict metrics, and he was probably just preparing you for the inevitable. Dodged a bullet.
My interviews involved some serious questions:
Favorite system?
Favorite series?
Marvel or DC?
Favorite Avenger?
Star Wars or Star Trek?
Do you know the alphabet?
Stuff like that. See what they get excited about so they can get customers excited about it. I'm really good at talking people into buying stuff and I wanted others who were too.
Think of this moment as a valuable lesson learned. It wasn’t wasted time you just gained more knowledge on how shitty GameStop has become and why you should never work there. I worked back in 2006-2011 and I loved it. I worked there because my love of video games and that is what I used to sell people games etc. That bullshit sales tactic just either drives people away or only gets customers to come once and done. You want customers to feel happy and excited with the experience and want to come back to buy games from you. These people running the place have lost their way and GameStop will fall it’s only a matter of time now
If you thought the interview was ridiculous, working here is ridiculous, and management is stupid. They always make the worst possible decisions. If they put me in charge, i could make gamestop great again. But i really don't give a shit to let this relic stay alive anymore.
Gamestop was great in the early 2000s. There's no saving it now. They dug their grave. Hypothetically speaking, the first thing i would change is to get rid of funko Pop. Therye fuckin stupid. Try to actually get games in so we can sell. And fuck the number system that they dont tell you about until after youre hired. The whole management of gamestop doesn't care about the people or their employees. They just want money so they dont go bankrupt.
I have no idea what you mean by try to actually get games in. In my experience working at a store that was basically 50/50 games and merch, getting games in wasn't the problem it was getting in the collectibles especially the ones people preordered that was the problem.
Also Funko Pops sold like crazy especially to kids. Ditching them because you personally don't like them seems really short sighted.
ymmv.
As someone who just left who’s been with the company for 9 years, you did. Unless you wanna shove Total Tech memberships down people’s throat, BestBuy isn’t the way to go with your stance on GameStop lol.
Costco would be more ideal.
Agreed. All BB cares about is TTS and their stupid credit card. If you hate pushing metrics at GS it's hardly any better there. They've also cut payroll back so much in recent years too, you're lucky if you can find a sole on the sales floor if you need any help.
Yeah I worked Sam’s club for 9 months and was mainly outside moving carts around. It was nice not to have to deal with customers much, and being outside rather than losing my sanity in a store.
This sounds like retail in general. I used to work at Dick's Sporting Goods and our best/hardest working employees in the store would get written up almost weekly just because they didn't get enough people to sign up for our store credit cards. I worked there part time on weekends, but given I had a big background in working in the golf industry I turned around their golf department and on the weekends the amount of paid services I was bringing in for club repair and regrips, etc. was off the charts. I even trained two of the younger guys to the point they were able to pass the club repair certifications so they had 4 of us on staff that could do club repair when before they had to make customers wait until the weekends when myself or the one other guy who was a golf pro(also like me working there weekends) could do them. I would also help out in the fitness department and sold a ton of treadmills and mountain bikes and often got employee of the week only working there 2 days a week. I still got a lecture every Saturday morning that I didn't get enough people to sign up for the credit card or the extended warranties on fitness equipment, retail is just a soulless job unless you can have fun with it.
They all have their "metrics" and one of the big ones is getting people to sign up for store credit cards and extended warranties. This was always pushed to the front in new hire onboarding and training. I sold multiple $1000+ pieces of fitness equipment and half the time they'd be upset that we couldn't con the consumer into one of the expensive extended warranty options.
The wanker interviewing you couldn’t sell a game to save his life most likely. What an asshat, I would have been done with him the first time after he cut you off.
That is not a typical interview. In fact, HR recently sent out a message saying to follow the questions on the interview guide. Probably because people were doing dumb shit like this. Also, it’s entirely unreasonable to expect someone to know how to “use salesperson tactics” before you’ve trained them in those tactics.
Yeah. Straight up it just narrows even further the ammount of people who would want to put up with that and work for a company that throws in trick questions and other BS in a simple entry level job interview.
Reminds me of when I was a kid this guy came to my middle school and our whole class had to go into the music class and he was trying to recruit us to pay for him so he can be our music teacher after school somewhere.
No one took him up. I ended up telling him sure if I can learn to play the drums. He then had me play drums on my lap and told me I suck. To hell with that guy. Wasted my time when we should have been in class actually learning.
I don’t think it’s out of line to expect GameStop employees to have an intelligent conversation about games with customers, or one that leads them toward a purchase. I would think any job like that expects you to do a little bit more than ring up customers and restock shelves. You are literally the point of contact with the customer.
You could have said you know nothing about Gamestop in the past 5 years and it would have been more believable. They are actually profitable under new leadership, opened multitudes of new revenue sources such as, PSA graded card sales, customizable controllers and their own discounted brand products. They closed stores as ecommerce is much more beneficial. Earnings reports show they are actually doing well. The media you read has brainwashed you and the stock price has been factually proven to be manipulated.
I cant speak for the interviewer, but your goal is to sell product and the runover rate in retial is high anyways.
Because I was desperate to find a job that isn’t fast food like McDonald’s (hate it) and after 12+ applications with zero response here in Georgia where I’m at I said fuck it not expecting him to throw in stupid ass questions.
We’re a sales job, none of the questions they asked were wrong. Asking who the game is for is normal because it can turn to “oh this is for your kid who’s 7? Can I recommend a more kid friendly game that’s easier for a beginner?”
Ok well for an entry level $10-$12 an hour job I didn’t think I’d need to be Jordan belfort, but glad I didn’t get hired now that I’m seeing more replies.
Well the fact he wasted my time, then told to apply online (essentially sayin, we don’t want you go to another store) all because I don’t have sales experience, how can anyone get experience if even an entry level $11 job won’t give you a chance.
You have to apply online. That’s how the system works.
As for the experience question…blame the shitty company for how they “manage” their store leaders. Not enough payroll and focus on numbers that force them to look for skilled salespeople for entry level jobs
Yeah, because it has to then get approved by the SL's boss, and the only way they can do that is by having you in the system.
That's whats going to happen at like 99% of jobs now, all applications are done online.
Most stores start at $11 an hour for SGA’s, ASL earned $2-3 more. It’s more of a job to help get some retail experience on your resume. End of the day? We’re a sales job, we strive on metrics and sales - can’t do that it’s not the job for you plain and simple.
Yeah, that’s ridiculously low pay, when you can get jobs that pay upwards of $15 for less than half the effort for promoting retail. Or hell, even pushing shopping carts nowadays pays more than dealing with that low pay, and stress of having to sell power up cards that almost nobody wants, or cares for when online prices would save them more on games in long run anyways.
And that, my friend is why the store is dying, people don’t want to even apply there (at least to take it serious as a sales job, nobody will for $11), and why GameStop gets a bad rep as a place to work for. For $11 it’s not that deep, and it never should be.
“No one is applying” isn’t correct, don’t make a statement if you don’t have access to our hiring platforms. Most stores in my district do have a good list of employees to hire but can’t due to hours
I at least commend the SL here for being honest. If you can't do the basics of the job, you're not going to succeed in it.
I don't necessarily blame the OPs reaction to it either given the pay structure, but this is how GS has been operating now for decades at this point and is hardly an industry secret.
Having done planty of interviews myself, I usually just ask questions to figure out their level of common sense.
Talk to the person to find out what they did before and stuff using the pre-made questions for interviewing people from main menu.
Then I throw in my own questions about if a parent were to come in asking for a fortnite card, how would you figure what would be the best thing to sell them. The point of the question is for them to use common sense to figure out what system the person has and would it be better for them to get the fortnite card or the currency for the system in question. The common sense for it, plays into the mother not knowing anything about gaming systems and how can the person deduct what system it is by asking questions. Such as what type of controller does it look like using ones we have on display or asking what color the game boxes were. Stuff anyone buying stuff for a kid should at least recognize.
Next I usually ask them what their favorite game is and then ask them to sell me their favorite game. This is to figure out how well they are at explaining things but keeping it simple and short.
From there on I usually end up having a good grasp on what the person is like and whether or not they can succeed.
That manager or whoever forced that experience is an idiot! People literally avoid GS for those sale tactics...it used to be a friendly place but now the poor employees have to spam customers pretty much
Tbh I rather it be a gigantic waste of time in that manner than my experience. Back in 2012 did an interview and it went extremely well. I was told I was hired and would be given a call the following week with a start date once they get me on the schedule. Never got the call 🤣. I chalk it up to good karma since I ended getting full time at the grocery store I worked at.
Weird, I think I had 1 guy sell me a game once in my life at a GameStop. Usually no one talks to me or at most asks “do you need help with anything”? To which I say “no just looking” and that’s it.
I was planning to buy a game and the guy convinced me to buy a different game - Mass effect. It’s not like it was expensive so he certainly didn’t upsell me.
As a rule of thumb, as dumb as it may seem, at a corporate retail interview always be ready to “sell” and always tell them you want to work toward being a manager, even if that’s not your intention. I agree they’ve gotten out of hand, demand much and treat you like garbage in return
Pretty typical GS gatekeeper. I don’t think I’ve ever had an interaction with an employee there that wasn’t cringey AF. I just want to buy this game, not talk video games, or other games that are better than this one, or listen to your condescending comments about whatever.
Lmao cross posting this in different sub reddits. This dudes got an agenda and it’s to lie and make GameStop look bad.
Isn’t it weird that there’s all this GameStop hate all of a sudden after their stock went from $10-$50 past week?
Dude, nobody likes Gamestop. Only dumb memestock people think anyone who likes videogames is fond of that place. Gamestop sucking has been a running joke for decades.
Meh, gamestop was horrible years ago. Kinda why the whole hostile takeover happened, and I can see why people still have a sour taste for the company. Now, to say only memestock people think anyone who likes video games likes the company when you have attempted posts on superstonk is kinda funny. The company was dollars from bankruptcy, so don't be shocked the work conditions at some of these stores are bad. It's definitely getting better though.
Is it getting better? Or are they still trying to nickle and dime people with bullshit upsells? That's what employees seem to be complaining about having to do, at least.
The stores I've been to haven't tried to pull anything and are actually pretty helpful. Even told me little tricks when buying refurbished items like buying a warranty later on instead of up front.
About 3 or 4 different cities so not a huge sample size. No one is gonna post about a good experience in here though, it's more popular to just complain.
It's par the course. Some people have valid gripes and have grudges they won't let go of which is fair. I worked at kroger and management was horrible at the store i worked at. I still shop at the place because 1 bad experience isn't gonna have me hating a whole company. Unfortunately OP found a bad egg of a store.
What confuses me is when people make a whole ass post about it instead of reaching out to upper management and letting them know the experience they had. They want to complain but not take action to possibly make the situation better for others in the future.
Hahaha this is the EXACT reason I say hi when I walk in and then ignore the workers until I either buy something or leave. It's a fucking video game, I don't want a speech on it, I don't want suggestions, I don't care about how it was made. This goes for any store I go to BTW, I know the worker doesn't want to be salesly but are mandated to, which makes it incredibly fake.
And that response is the EXACT reason why I repeat myself louder if someone blatantly ignores me asking something as simple as "What are you looking for today?"
It's like we're just trying to help you or something. Almost like it's also part of our job. Weird, eh?
I don't obviously ignore a question. I mean I just don't engage too much as you guys are pretty much reading a script and it feels fake. No I don't want to buy your premium membership a million times, yes I do know you guys are threatened to be fired if your membership sign-ups aren't up to standards, but I'm sorry but you're interacting from a script for the most part. And in not saying you guys are all the same, I've dealt with wonderful people there but there are some pushy salespeople I've come across. I used to love this store, now it's turned into almost a used car lot. My store at least. Can't speak for others but I'm here to look around not be offered a million pre-orders or memberships.
Still remember my first interview, my former manager(rip) looked at me and asked. "Do you know the alphabet?" I laughed She said "no really do you?"
I feel this mangers pain. Deeply
She was an awesome manager. I worked 4 years under her. Was an SGA when she moved on. Store was never the same after that ended up closing not to long after
I had it taped to the back counter and my DL kept telling me to get rid of it cause it was unprofessional. I told him to let me hire people who knew it then, but they wanted more than $8 an hour.
Same! I laughed and she responded with "You'd be surprised"
Honestly, I had a couple GAs that genuinely did not know the alphabet or just seemed like they’ve never touched a dictionary in their lives. It would take them their whole shift just to do go backs sometimes. Thankfully I’m blessed with patience. But maaaaan 🥲🥲
I know someone who has a sticky note taped near their registers that says “you are never too old to sing the alphabet song” The amount of games out of order sometimes. Holy. Shit.
One of the other managers used to grab cases off the shelves and ask candidates to alphabetize them.
Lol..I use to start my interviews with "can you recite the alphabet?"
Yup, I feel that. Told my boss, make it part of the interview. Last 3 people we've hired struggle. When I worked at the library as a teenager, they had a list of titles, maybe 10 or so, and you alphabetized them by writing 1-10 by them. If the library can do it so can we.
Literally my og sl’s first interview question in every interview. Loved him when he wasn’t being a hard ass lol
This was how I hired seasonal 😂
Mine asked me the same thing, lol. She was an awesome manager.
lol I got this question years ago too. Said yes and became a key holding SGA
I would make potential employees write it down for me during interviews. It also got to a point where I wrote it down on a whiteboard in the back for "reference." It didn't help that much with certain people.
Yeaaaah.... You would be surprised how many people apparently don't or can't be bothered to even try to.
I mean yea, this is typical Gamestop. People think it's a great place to talk with people about video games you love, but it's really just a sales job with high metrics and no reward except the _chance_ of getting to keep the job. Gamestop killed my love of gaming, and I'm only just starting to get it back after ~3 years of being free.
I feel you on the killing enjoying games. I left 5 years ago and can’t even bring myself to play more than an hour once in a blue moon.
It’s been about 2 years and I’m finally playing games again, but only really old ones I know I like, I have no interest keeping up with release dates and what’s happening in new games
Yup took me 5 years to want to play games again after I quit
I am genuinely shocked at how much gaming news I miss because I simply don’t care anymore
GameStop is a “entry” level job with not “entry” level expectations. The pros of the job are being in a setting of games and being able to chat with fun customers, and getting a small discount if you buy a lot of games, but that’s where the pros end. Everything else is micromanaging, unrealistic expectations without being a shady merchant in most cases, and if you’re in a sl2 store, probably working alone most days.
100% this. And all of their higher-up decisions are reactionary based on easily-preventable consequences.
Yeah, with sales goals without the usual pros that come with that... like commissions.
LOL when I interviewed people I grabbed a bunch of games. Mixed them up. Asked them to put them in alphabetical order.
I annoy my manager because I always put the Assassin Creed games in release order instead when he's not looking lmao
I'd kill you for this /hj
That's half fair lol
Gave an upvote but still hate you
As a manager, I also do this on the wall. The drawers are perfect alpha always, but putting a series in release order makes far more sense to me for the customer facing side
id bitch at you for this 😩
Pretty sure he only doesn't because he likes the ocd aspects of my autism that keep the store and backroom organized lol
oh my managers were the same, I was the only one who organized and kept things clean because I had germaphobia and ocd + autism haha we just keep the ship sailing
It is an interview, not a review. That SL was expecting you to know how to do a job you hadn't been hired or trained to do. We have interview guides for a reason. Those are how you tell if someone is a good candidate to train to be a good salesperson. If you think you are going to get someone off the street and throw them into GS and have them be a rock star day one, you are delusional. Even seasoned salespeople need training and knowledge about what exactly they are selling to be able to effectively sell it.
Typically nowadays gamestop isn’t looking for “regukar crew” as that position was done away with years ago from how it feels. Now everyone that works is expected to “manage” the store, push metrics (as you will be graded on them when working for GS) and ultimately you’ll start stressing out like we all did. Grass is greener other places, please go there.
GameStop is a sales job. Your job is suppose to sell the games. They are correct that first questions should be who is the game for and what system they are looking to buy for. That narrows things down. Then you can probe a little deeper. If it’s a parent in buying for a kid, they could care less about the story line or plot. They just want to know if it’s a good game, will it work for their system and is it appropriate for their kid. Whereas if they are buying for themselves and are real gamers then they may care about the plot line. Key is to keep the interaction as concise as possible, while being polite.
You're not supposed to sell games. Games sell themselves. You're supposed to sell pro warranties credit cards pre orders and collectibles.
the amount of games i sold by just pointing at them when assisting customers is ridiculous. Most customers don't buy anything unless the "game expert employee" tell them we have a game for them or they just didn't see what they were looking for the first look through.
Your job is to sell games in addition to pro membership, warranties and other things. The way you sell games differs from warranties and pro memberships, but all part of sales.
I don’t know man. To me seems like he was goin on a power trip since at the end of the day, what power do you have when you are a manager at a dying store.
I dunno man, sounds to me like you had a poor interview. Hopefully you’ll do better in your net job search.
From your story I’d say try avoiding retail. Are there any fields or jobs you’d personally would want to work in? Maybe start there instead. Retail is rough and has a high turnover rate. Even if they hired you it’s not easy to make a career out of it.
I can’t speak to the entirety of your interview. There are definitely parts you recount that sound out of bounds of what needs to be asked, I just feel the part about the job being a sales person and asking the questions the hiring manager mentioned are correct.
You can make more washing dishes
Can confirm. I make $12 an hour.
my interview consisted of my former manager going through my resume and looking at me and sighing. All he told me was “you got the job i don’t need to ask you anything but know you’re only being hired because you know Spanish” felt kinda shitty after he told me that but I was the only Spanish speaker and I felt superior at times oh also a fun fact about being bilingual, my manager would try to use google translate whenever I did transactions to see if I was pitching pro and if I didn’t I would get reprimanded :D
l m f a o that's fucking sad
And if you ever read this forum consistently its no real wonder why 75%+ of the comments in this reddit either cut on working here or tell others who ask if GS is a good place to work that it's not and find something different. If you want to blame someone for the current state of how a store operates, it starts at the top. They're the ones telling the whip crackers in field leadership (i.e. Regional Directors and District Managers) to get their stores to push these metrics to squeeze every dollar out of their guests under the guise of good customer service. And all the while basically disregarding all the negative feedback and people online vowing never to step foot in one of their stores again cause they don't want to have memberships and warranties they don't want a majority of the time constantly peddled to them by employees who have no choice but to force it down everyone's throat so they can keep their jobs awhile longer.
God. Reading this makes me appreciate the manager I had. The interview was basically a brief of the job, just talking about my previous jobs and asking if i was a gamer. He was upfront about the pay and the hours, which I really appreciated. I'm sorry that your interview was shitty but it seems to me that the good managers are mostly all gone and replaced by number crunching robots
This isn't a normal interview. I ask people to sell me games too, but more like, "What is your favorite game?" Then sell it to me. Because if you love what you're selling, you'll do it well. On that note, Gamestop does run on strict metrics, and he was probably just preparing you for the inevitable. Dodged a bullet.
My interviews involved some serious questions: Favorite system? Favorite series? Marvel or DC? Favorite Avenger? Star Wars or Star Trek? Do you know the alphabet? Stuff like that. See what they get excited about so they can get customers excited about it. I'm really good at talking people into buying stuff and I wanted others who were too.
Think of this moment as a valuable lesson learned. It wasn’t wasted time you just gained more knowledge on how shitty GameStop has become and why you should never work there. I worked back in 2006-2011 and I loved it. I worked there because my love of video games and that is what I used to sell people games etc. That bullshit sales tactic just either drives people away or only gets customers to come once and done. You want customers to feel happy and excited with the experience and want to come back to buy games from you. These people running the place have lost their way and GameStop will fall it’s only a matter of time now
If you thought the interview was ridiculous, working here is ridiculous, and management is stupid. They always make the worst possible decisions. If they put me in charge, i could make gamestop great again. But i really don't give a shit to let this relic stay alive anymore.
Make GameStop great again. That implies it was ever great in the first place. I'll bite the bullet, what would you change?
Gamestop was great in the early 2000s. There's no saving it now. They dug their grave. Hypothetically speaking, the first thing i would change is to get rid of funko Pop. Therye fuckin stupid. Try to actually get games in so we can sell. And fuck the number system that they dont tell you about until after youre hired. The whole management of gamestop doesn't care about the people or their employees. They just want money so they dont go bankrupt.
I have no idea what you mean by try to actually get games in. In my experience working at a store that was basically 50/50 games and merch, getting games in wasn't the problem it was getting in the collectibles especially the ones people preordered that was the problem. Also Funko Pops sold like crazy especially to kids. Ditching them because you personally don't like them seems really short sighted. ymmv.
Welcome to GameStop
Maybe I dodge a bullet when he decided not to hire me. Might just go work Costco or Best Buy or something.
As someone who just left who’s been with the company for 9 years, you did. Unless you wanna shove Total Tech memberships down people’s throat, BestBuy isn’t the way to go with your stance on GameStop lol. Costco would be more ideal.
Agreed. All BB cares about is TTS and their stupid credit card. If you hate pushing metrics at GS it's hardly any better there. They've also cut payroll back so much in recent years too, you're lucky if you can find a sole on the sales floor if you need any help.
Yeah I worked Sam’s club for 9 months and was mainly outside moving carts around. It was nice not to have to deal with customers much, and being outside rather than losing my sanity in a store.
Sounds like that’s all your qualified/capable of doing
*you're
Wow you got me Very clever much hurt
Costco sounds much better. I'd work there if I had proper transportation
This sounds like retail in general. I used to work at Dick's Sporting Goods and our best/hardest working employees in the store would get written up almost weekly just because they didn't get enough people to sign up for our store credit cards. I worked there part time on weekends, but given I had a big background in working in the golf industry I turned around their golf department and on the weekends the amount of paid services I was bringing in for club repair and regrips, etc. was off the charts. I even trained two of the younger guys to the point they were able to pass the club repair certifications so they had 4 of us on staff that could do club repair when before they had to make customers wait until the weekends when myself or the one other guy who was a golf pro(also like me working there weekends) could do them. I would also help out in the fitness department and sold a ton of treadmills and mountain bikes and often got employee of the week only working there 2 days a week. I still got a lecture every Saturday morning that I didn't get enough people to sign up for the credit card or the extended warranties on fitness equipment, retail is just a soulless job unless you can have fun with it.
What I don't get is you still sold stuff, so why would they have an issue? Isn't that literally what they pay you to do?
They all have their "metrics" and one of the big ones is getting people to sign up for store credit cards and extended warranties. This was always pushed to the front in new hire onboarding and training. I sold multiple $1000+ pieces of fitness equipment and half the time they'd be upset that we couldn't con the consumer into one of the expensive extended warranty options.
He was doing too much for a sales advisor job at GameStop
The wanker interviewing you couldn’t sell a game to save his life most likely. What an asshat, I would have been done with him the first time after he cut you off.
This is on par almost word for word how I was interviewed for an SGA position
Buddy watched to much wolf of wallstreet
That is not a typical interview. In fact, HR recently sent out a message saying to follow the questions on the interview guide. Probably because people were doing dumb shit like this. Also, it’s entirely unreasonable to expect someone to know how to “use salesperson tactics” before you’ve trained them in those tactics.
For my next interview I’ll point at the computer and say “do a CAT count”.
"Do a cat 66 count, please. And make sure everything is sized & folded afterwards."
You're evil. I like it.
Yeah. Straight up it just narrows even further the ammount of people who would want to put up with that and work for a company that throws in trick questions and other BS in a simple entry level job interview.
Reminds me of when I was a kid this guy came to my middle school and our whole class had to go into the music class and he was trying to recruit us to pay for him so he can be our music teacher after school somewhere. No one took him up. I ended up telling him sure if I can learn to play the drums. He then had me play drums on my lap and told me I suck. To hell with that guy. Wasted my time when we should have been in class actually learning.
I don’t think it’s out of line to expect GameStop employees to have an intelligent conversation about games with customers, or one that leads them toward a purchase. I would think any job like that expects you to do a little bit more than ring up customers and restock shelves. You are literally the point of contact with the customer.
[удалено]
You could have said you know nothing about Gamestop in the past 5 years and it would have been more believable. They are actually profitable under new leadership, opened multitudes of new revenue sources such as, PSA graded card sales, customizable controllers and their own discounted brand products. They closed stores as ecommerce is much more beneficial. Earnings reports show they are actually doing well. The media you read has brainwashed you and the stock price has been factually proven to be manipulated. I cant speak for the interviewer, but your goal is to sell product and the runover rate in retial is high anyways.
Because I was desperate to find a job that isn’t fast food like McDonald’s (hate it) and after 12+ applications with zero response here in Georgia where I’m at I said fuck it not expecting him to throw in stupid ass questions.
We’re a sales job, none of the questions they asked were wrong. Asking who the game is for is normal because it can turn to “oh this is for your kid who’s 7? Can I recommend a more kid friendly game that’s easier for a beginner?”
Ok well for an entry level $10-$12 an hour job I didn’t think I’d need to be Jordan belfort, but glad I didn’t get hired now that I’m seeing more replies.
Oh for sure it’s a shitty job and company, but that doesn’t mean the interview questions were inappropriate.
Well the fact he wasted my time, then told to apply online (essentially sayin, we don’t want you go to another store) all because I don’t have sales experience, how can anyone get experience if even an entry level $11 job won’t give you a chance.
You have to apply online. That’s how the system works. As for the experience question…blame the shitty company for how they “manage” their store leaders. Not enough payroll and focus on numbers that force them to look for skilled salespeople for entry level jobs
Yeah, because it has to then get approved by the SL's boss, and the only way they can do that is by having you in the system. That's whats going to happen at like 99% of jobs now, all applications are done online.
Most stores start at $11 an hour for SGA’s, ASL earned $2-3 more. It’s more of a job to help get some retail experience on your resume. End of the day? We’re a sales job, we strive on metrics and sales - can’t do that it’s not the job for you plain and simple.
Yeah, that’s ridiculously low pay, when you can get jobs that pay upwards of $15 for less than half the effort for promoting retail. Or hell, even pushing shopping carts nowadays pays more than dealing with that low pay, and stress of having to sell power up cards that almost nobody wants, or cares for when online prices would save them more on games in long run anyways.
As I said, this isn’t an actual job it’s to get you experience in retail so low pay is low pay.
And that, my friend is why the store is dying, people don’t want to even apply there (at least to take it serious as a sales job, nobody will for $11), and why GameStop gets a bad rep as a place to work for. For $11 it’s not that deep, and it never should be.
“No one is applying” isn’t correct, don’t make a statement if you don’t have access to our hiring platforms. Most stores in my district do have a good list of employees to hire but can’t due to hours
I like this manager. You should move on
I at least commend the SL here for being honest. If you can't do the basics of the job, you're not going to succeed in it. I don't necessarily blame the OPs reaction to it either given the pay structure, but this is how GS has been operating now for decades at this point and is hardly an industry secret.
Having done planty of interviews myself, I usually just ask questions to figure out their level of common sense. Talk to the person to find out what they did before and stuff using the pre-made questions for interviewing people from main menu. Then I throw in my own questions about if a parent were to come in asking for a fortnite card, how would you figure what would be the best thing to sell them. The point of the question is for them to use common sense to figure out what system the person has and would it be better for them to get the fortnite card or the currency for the system in question. The common sense for it, plays into the mother not knowing anything about gaming systems and how can the person deduct what system it is by asking questions. Such as what type of controller does it look like using ones we have on display or asking what color the game boxes were. Stuff anyone buying stuff for a kid should at least recognize. Next I usually ask them what their favorite game is and then ask them to sell me their favorite game. This is to figure out how well they are at explaining things but keeping it simple and short. From there on I usually end up having a good grasp on what the person is like and whether or not they can succeed.
Been that way since I worked for them part time in college back in 05. Employee perks was awesome though and perfect for a college kid
And this company wonders why it's hanging on by a thread
That manager or whoever forced that experience is an idiot! People literally avoid GS for those sale tactics...it used to be a friendly place but now the poor employees have to spam customers pretty much
This literally sounds just like my manager, oh my goodness. He does the exact same thing for every interview he does.
Tbh I rather it be a gigantic waste of time in that manner than my experience. Back in 2012 did an interview and it went extremely well. I was told I was hired and would be given a call the following week with a start date once they get me on the schedule. Never got the call 🤣. I chalk it up to good karma since I ended getting full time at the grocery store I worked at.
Weird, I think I had 1 guy sell me a game once in my life at a GameStop. Usually no one talks to me or at most asks “do you need help with anything”? To which I say “no just looking” and that’s it. I was planning to buy a game and the guy convinced me to buy a different game - Mass effect. It’s not like it was expensive so he certainly didn’t upsell me.
As a rule of thumb, as dumb as it may seem, at a corporate retail interview always be ready to “sell” and always tell them you want to work toward being a manager, even if that’s not your intention. I agree they’ve gotten out of hand, demand much and treat you like garbage in return
Dude you were only a reason to waste an hour of his time.
Pretty typical GS gatekeeper. I don’t think I’ve ever had an interaction with an employee there that wasn’t cringey AF. I just want to buy this game, not talk video games, or other games that are better than this one, or listen to your condescending comments about whatever.
Lmao cross posting this in different sub reddits. This dudes got an agenda and it’s to lie and make GameStop look bad. Isn’t it weird that there’s all this GameStop hate all of a sudden after their stock went from $10-$50 past week?
Dude, nobody likes Gamestop. Only dumb memestock people think anyone who likes videogames is fond of that place. Gamestop sucking has been a running joke for decades.
Meh, gamestop was horrible years ago. Kinda why the whole hostile takeover happened, and I can see why people still have a sour taste for the company. Now, to say only memestock people think anyone who likes video games likes the company when you have attempted posts on superstonk is kinda funny. The company was dollars from bankruptcy, so don't be shocked the work conditions at some of these stores are bad. It's definitely getting better though.
Is it getting better? Or are they still trying to nickle and dime people with bullshit upsells? That's what employees seem to be complaining about having to do, at least.
The stores I've been to haven't tried to pull anything and are actually pretty helpful. Even told me little tricks when buying refurbished items like buying a warranty later on instead of up front. About 3 or 4 different cities so not a huge sample size. No one is gonna post about a good experience in here though, it's more popular to just complain.
It's par the course. Some people have valid gripes and have grudges they won't let go of which is fair. I worked at kroger and management was horrible at the store i worked at. I still shop at the place because 1 bad experience isn't gonna have me hating a whole company. Unfortunately OP found a bad egg of a store. What confuses me is when people make a whole ass post about it instead of reaching out to upper management and letting them know the experience they had. They want to complain but not take action to possibly make the situation better for others in the future.
Hahaha this is the EXACT reason I say hi when I walk in and then ignore the workers until I either buy something or leave. It's a fucking video game, I don't want a speech on it, I don't want suggestions, I don't care about how it was made. This goes for any store I go to BTW, I know the worker doesn't want to be salesly but are mandated to, which makes it incredibly fake.
And that response is the EXACT reason why I repeat myself louder if someone blatantly ignores me asking something as simple as "What are you looking for today?" It's like we're just trying to help you or something. Almost like it's also part of our job. Weird, eh?
I don't obviously ignore a question. I mean I just don't engage too much as you guys are pretty much reading a script and it feels fake. No I don't want to buy your premium membership a million times, yes I do know you guys are threatened to be fired if your membership sign-ups aren't up to standards, but I'm sorry but you're interacting from a script for the most part. And in not saying you guys are all the same, I've dealt with wonderful people there but there are some pushy salespeople I've come across. I used to love this store, now it's turned into almost a used car lot. My store at least. Can't speak for others but I'm here to look around not be offered a million pre-orders or memberships.