By Paolo Succi on April 24, 2014 at 2:08pm
GameStop CEO Paul Raines announced at an investor presentation Tuesday that the company plans on closing 120 stores but plans on expanding their newly acquired brands to a over 300 new stores Games Industry International reports.
Calling the new regime "GameStop 3.0," the CEO announced that they are closing the brick-and-mortar locations to accommodate for the shifting focus to wireless services. Earlier last year, GameStop acquired two wireless retailers, Simply Mobile and Simply Mac, which are smaller retailers focused on AT&T and Apple wireless products respectively. The CEO considers these a natural move considering wireless and gaming technologies are not mutually exclusive, acknowledging the overlap as "gaming-adjacent."
GameStop addressed their expansion strategy at the investor meeting with a breakdown of which stores exactly will expand. They currently plan on cornering markets that are currently under-served by Apple retailers with a planned 20-25 Simply Mac stores, adding 200 Simply Mobile retailers and adding five times more Cricket stores from 31 to 100-150.
How exactly GameStop plans to penetrate these markets will rely on past companies that have made similar moves. Raines cited kitchen equipment retailer Williams-Sonoma and garment manufacturer VF Corporation as inspirations.
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