The first thing Play N Trade founder Ron Simpson wants to know about you—or anyone he meets —is: Are you a gamer?
And if the answer is “no,” he takes that as a challenge. Simpson is a video game evangelist, who isn't shy about converting the uninitiated to the second coming of video gaming, which is light years ahead of the video arcade games he grew up playing.
It was gaming that caused Simpson, 43, to have his head shaved every summer. Making him shave off his “cool” surfer hair was his father's annual threat if he caught him wasting his time in a video arcade. The threat didn't dissuade him.
Before moving to Colorado Springs and doubling the business in a video game store for the absentee owner, Simpson's retail experience was in the jewelry business. His tournament experience came from the California Youth Authority where he was a correctional youth counselor. “You could control the kids with (video game) tournaments,” he says. “If they stepped out of line, they couldn't participate.” And since they played in teams, if one messed up, the entire team was eliminated.
“It's the same thing we're doing now, but it was behind bars,” he says of the multifaceted tournaments Play N Trade stores run as promotions.
In the early days, Simpson ran the tournaments out of his basement as a reward for his VIP customers. “It got out of hand,” he says, and they shortly moved the tourneys to the store locations.
He began franchising in 2003, and now spends his time on the ultimate video game—developing technology to streamline the business side. He has software that can determine how much a used game is worth—profits on used games are much higher than on new—and a digital people counter that will help determine if salespeople are living up to the brand's customer-service policy.
If franchisees aren't gamers, they need to pair up with someone who is. “It's all about the culture and having experts on staff, he says.
