[Musings of a Game Store Owner] The Art of Building Pt 1

I've been talking about the 'community building' post as something in the works for a while. I spent a lot of time considering how to address the multitude of concepts and concerns in a way that's engaging and effective, and come to the conclusion that what I've promised is a little too vague.

It's well and good to talk about how to build a community. Everyone wants to hear about it and I have something to say- but I suspected I wasn't being clear enough and my trip to the trade show (see last week's post) only lead to confirm that suspicion.

I like to make sure we're all talking about the same things using the same language, whenever possible. (Maybe someday I'll talk about the difference between dudespeak and ladytalk; but not today.) I'll be talking about several different subjects, possibly over a few weeks. It's very helpful to put our conversations on the same playing field and make the topic and terminology easily understood by all.

Uncomplicated. That's what we need. 

What do we mean by community? That's a critical question we need to ask. my idea of community is vastly different from the community that the folks at Mox Mania want to build, and is just as separate from the community enjoyed by the folks at The Fantasy Shop. None of them are wrong, but they are different, and it's important to know that up front.




My case is probably vastly different from many others. There was already a store in town when mine was created, and the other store vastly influenced the attitude and culture at my store from day one. Without disparaging or disrespecting the other store, it was a place many folks didn't feel comfortable, and the original owners of my store wanted their community to be "NOT THAT". That was the entire idea behind their community and culture- simply not to be like the other guy in town.

The original "motto". It's very different now.

Since that time, the idea of community and what our store is about has been refined quite a lot, and TheDude and I have a very serious vision for what we want our place to be. But that's NOW. We didn't always have that vision, and it's easy to overlook when you're just trying to keep the doors open.

If you are a new FLGS or club owner, or person in charge of building stuff, you should probably ask yourself: what do you want it (thing you are building) to DO?

I have no idea what this is. Why would I use it?

What do you want your store to DO in terms of community? Do you want to be a competitive Magic: the Gathering environment? Do you want to foster the tabletop miniature hobby? Do you want to be a place to buy stuff? Examining your end goal and purpose is a pretty crucial part of the design process if you want to be successful.

To think of this in terms most of us might understand, an apartment/flat does something vastly different than a Tudor home. You use different materials and building processes to create these things. Different kinds of people live in them, and they are maintained in very distinct ways.

And ideally, you have PLANS. I mean, you don't just hand tools and lumber to some dude you know and pray for the best, right?

Because the wrong person with these can lead to disaster...

Well, you CAN. But it sure better be someone you trust, and someone that knows how to build what you WANT- or you end up with a big mess and you have to start over again.

"Well yes, technically that IS shelter. No, it is NOT what I wanted."

Just because you have plans doesn't mean there won't be mistakes now and then. My professional sources tell me "sometime plans are wrong", and the guys on the job have to talk to the boss and tell/ask them "hey, what's up?". I mean, you can't build a skyscraper and only put sprinklers on the bottom floor. 

This is a bad thing. You don't want this. 

It's also important to note that your vision is yours. As long as you have ownership of it, you can revise it and mold it to fit your culture and environment. You might discover that certain issues or concerns change over time, and your community reflects those changes without doing anything about it. You might also discover that your community doesn't appreciate anything and complains incessantly. Either way, the community and the vision for it are yours, and YOU get to decide how and what you want to build them into a future you will enjoy. 

This idea is similar to the one regarding plans, but different in execution- it's a lot more like a building inspector visiting your site. If the inspector tells you your two story house is busted, you can check your plans against what you have to know if he is right. If you have a one story house; you know he's on point and you need to fix it. If you have a two story house and you meet code, but he's saying it's busted because it doesn't have a fence, you know he's trying to hijack your vision and can set him straight. 

My dad spent most of his life as a guy that applied the ideas of theoretical physicists. He built colliders for Fermi and Hadron. He tested the cold fusion idea with a ridiculous machine the lab dubbed "Mr. Fusion". All my life, I've been surrounded by the art of building things just to see if they work and then examining how they do it.

It's only now as an adult that I understand the implication of examining how things are made, and can utilize that  information in a way that's helpful. I'll be looking at each aspect of building community over the next few posts so that we can tell if they work, and if so- how. Questions are always encouraged.