New "Community Hub" as Just Games expands

Monday 19 March 2018

Just Games, one of St Peter Port's newer shops, is expanding its business and moving to a new location with plans to become a new community hub for island gamers.

The gaming store is moving from its location in Church Square to a larger premises at the Albany, and is also combining its business with another local children's and gaming store, Kid's Crazes.

But the expansion isn't just to increase the shop floor of the business, but rather to begin creating a "community hub" for local gamers to use and enjoy.

"We currently get in anywhere between 25 and 30 people for Magic (a popular collectable card game) events, and similar numbers for other games' events, but we have to do those later in the evening or at other unusual times because the shop is not large enough to host them during open hours," Just Games Director, Stu Lean, said.

"We have been really blessed where we are at the moment, it has been a really great location, but this is an opportunity to expand. When we want to host an event now we have to move most of the stands around the shop to put out tables - we are going to have tables out at anytime of the day now." 

Pictured: the current Just Games store in Church Square.

The move itself does bring the shop outside the centre of Town, but it will now be located closer to more parking, and still only a short walk away from the Square, and with two floors set to be used, Mr Lean said they also had plans to use the new facilities for other events.

These included birthday parties, competitions, new-game demo events, and also ideas to install facilities like a breakfast bar to allow people to eat in the store while looking out over the harbour to facilitate lunchtime visitors.

And while much of the new space will be used for gaming tables and TVs, the larger shop would also allow more ranges of games and larger stocks of ranges to be sold.

Steve Carre, the owner of Kid's Crazes, said the two businesses combining their efforts was a natural step as they both worked in very similar markets. With the new premises being much larger, he said both himself and Mr Lean decided it would be the most realistic approach for them to both take advantage of the space and work together. Branding for the two businesses - which are effectively being merged - is currently being worked on.

"The plan is to open early April, but that isn't set definitely, we will have to see what happens with deadlines but things are starting to come together now," Mr Lean added. 

Main image: Stu Lean and Steve Carre outside their new shop on the Albany.