Awesome Cards, Collectibles, & Games — Local services in Londonderry

Just left awesome cgc. Took a day trip checking out different card shops with my fiance of 7 years for our anniversary today and ended up at this card shop. When we walked in I brought in a mix of single Pokemon cards and a graded card of my own! I wanted to look around and then was gonna ask about their trade in pricing but the lady at the counter asked me about my cards before I had a chance to look around. She made sure to point out that my graded card wasn’t tradeable or my Japanese cards (which is fine, I’m okay with the policy) I asked her about prices and said that I would have to pass given their current pricing for trading (which is totally reasonable and fair but I just didn’t want to trade at the time for their pricing ) After passing on store credit I was viewing their selection of singles and boxes (which are great! They have a cool variety!) HOWEVER the lady at the counter had a different demeanor after talking to me. Very short with me and treated me like I was a waste of her time. I took awhile to look at packs with my baby and my fiance in which she asked multiple times if we were all set. After looking at packs and deciding to get some Surging sparks, I went to look at their pokemon binders before asking for the packs. Once looking through the binders I went to say I like a card to my fiance and the lady jumped in to say that all cards are sold at market price. I then asked if they did any slight deals like even a few dollars if I were to buy multiples. She's instantly and rudely shut me down and said NOPE. I instantly closed the binder and left the store. I felt embarrassed for even asking due to the way she was treating us. I didn’t even get to buy the packs that i wanted or any of the singles that I liked because I felt like a bother to the employee. Honestly seems like a great store with some cool products but someone was obviously having a bad night and it made our night worse by a lot. Drove from Rochester NH and I went in with $300 and trade in material so I was looking to spend my money at the store but I left with nothing but a bad experience. Won’t waste the trip back ever again. (And yes it’s the Londonderry store)

As an edit. 0/2 as a customer? It’s rude to bargain on cards? I thought we were in America. 2 she didnt look at my cards other than from a distance. I didn’t waste any ones time. I was planning on spending money until i was treated rudely.

Very surprised after saying your store seems nice that you’d bash the upset customer. Proves my point of why I won’t be wasting my...

Convenient but Unpleasant

I have visited AWESOME a dozen or so times because of the convenience of their single card buying and selling. However, as a woman I’ve just had one too many bad experiences here with multiple male employees to justify going back. It is a pity as I’m sure the community who plays here is lovely. I have been in by myself and with my boyfriend and every time have been aggressively belittled and/ or criticized. (Though my boyfriend, who knows very little about Pokémon, has always been treated with a neutral respect.) Anything I say as pleasant small talk while buying my cards is torn apart and nitpicked, and I have tried both meekly taking it and speaking up for myself, neither with good results. At one point I tried to defend that the nit-picking doesn’t really matter as long as the consumer (me) is enjoying the product and was told that “Pokémon doesn’t care about your feelings.” Cards that I am buying are tersely over-explained (mansplained) to me, despite me expressing that I understand. I generally love nerdy spaces in part for the welcoming communities, so it is definitely especially saddening to see this kind of gatekeeping and misogyny in this type of space. I only hope that the staff continue to grow and the space becomes more welcoming in the future.

Edit: I find the response to this review, as well as several other reviews expressing similar discomfort with employees, very disheartening. It is concerning that the business’s priority is to deny culpability at all costs rather than considering customer comfort, especially as a woman-owned small business. I do not think my original review was by any means rude or vitriolic, so it was shocking to me to receive such an aggressive and untrue response in return. I have visited the store and purchased many times over the past few years before making a rewards account with my name and phone number attached, and accompanied my boyfriend when he makes purchases. Additionally, the only people present for the whole of our interactions today (the most recent instance, but not the only one) were me, my boyfriend, the employee, and a teen who was throwing cards behind the counter. I truly wish no harm to this business, I only hope that they take the input of their customers seriously at at least have a conversation with employees rather than taking their...

The short review: Could be so nice and I wanted to love it, but it's full of bootlegs and scalper prices.

The long review: It's a nice store, and the staff seem friendly. I always go into a little shop like this wanting it to be a new favorite. There are some interesting and fun things to poke around in ($1 empty Pokemon tins and $1 kids figures AKA "finger puppets", for instance), but quite a few bootleg items as well. This is my #1 complaint about the store. Off the top of my head for Pokemon merch, there is a 2 for $1 mini figure bin that are bootlegs, a rack that has unofficial rubber keychains, a shelf of Pokedolls that are counterfeit (and try to minic real Pokedolls), and a huge wall of Olyfactory plush, which is a known bootleg company. As a collector, this does lower my opinion of the store and make me wary, but I suppose it would be fine for a child who wants to play with things versus someone looking for collectables. (Although carefully inspect anything first, as there are many safety concern horror stories about bootlegs due to their lack of regulation/QC) Bootlegs are not labeled as such.

Sadly, don't come here looking to grab retail priced packs. While I was there waiting to check out, an employee admitted to another customer that he could get the same Elite Trainer Boxes on eBay for less than they were selling them, and that they overprice their cards. No misinterpretation here, he outright said that totally unprompted! I understand that the market is wild lately, but it was surprising to see scalper prices in a physical store. I'm not sure if they are buying packs from scalpers and therefore need to charge more, or are misusing an official connection with a supplier or bots. I personally did not buy cards due to this pricing, but of course, it is up to everyone on an individual level to decide what practices they want to support.

While there were some neat things to poke around in and the store was well stocked with cards if you really, really needed a pack opening fix, the sheer amount of bootleg merch in combination with the card pricing (and staff comments) gave it a much more "investor" vibe than "collector." It's somewhere I want to stop by and see how it changes after (if?) this scalping, reselling...