Saturday was a momentous day in the history of Warlord Games, with our first ever store outside of Nottingham opening its doors. It’s safe to say that the turnout for the Grand Opening exceeded even our wildest expectations, and Warlord Games Wigan was absolutely packed out. Here’s the man behind the project, Kris Sherriff, with a look back at how we got to this point.
I can’t believe it’s been six months since I last sat down to write one of these pieces! The progress from picking up the keys to the Grand Opening weekend we just had has been astonishing. Looking back at the space we inherited from inside the finished store that welcomed well over a hundred folks from all over the Warlord Games community to celebrate the moment with us, it’s honestly a testament to the hard work of everyone involved to make it happen.
So, when Marcus asked me to write another piece as a bit of an After Action Report for the Grand Opening, I did my usual thing of saying, “Yes, but what if…”
What if I took a bit of time to share some of the ‘fun’ stories of the journey that lead us to the Grand Opening? Strap in as we go back to the shell of a building we took possession of back on February 2nd.
The accident of finding the store itself involved a little bit of behind the scenes networking, as it never actually hit the normal market. I had been looking at a few spaces after we settled on Wigan as the final location with one in particular showing a lot of promise, but I was struggling to envisage how it would work for events, when someone mentioned 19 Hallgate to me. The foreclosure notice had gone up and it was managed by a letting agent I had already been dealing with, so I reached back out and managed to schedule a viewing before it hit the market. A viewing where I was told I should bring a torch…
A lot of you will have seen the old pink shop front, but the inside was a different matter. Random MDF constructions anchored into the walls, garbage everywhere, and a strange partition wall that was bolted to the floor, built out of old pallets and cardboard boxes! All this was viewed through the subtle illumination of my phone’s flashlight (obviously I forgot my torch on that first viewing.). But in spite of all that, I could not shake the sense that this was the correct choice. Yes, it needed obvious work, but there was something about the shell underneath that I knew would work.
Moving forward to that wet February morning, I picked up the keys and met the contractor on site to start the demolition work and have us open in mid March, or early April at the latest…
Enter Stage Left, the great antagonist of our story: the Electricity Company.
We were informed that, as the unit had been without power for an extended time, they would not simply turn it back on. Instead, they wanted to book an engineer to inspect the site, and so it would be six weeks until we had power. This delayed absolutely everything, as there’s obviously a limit to how much work could be done without it.
Demolition nevertheless continued, as we stripped the main area of the store back to a shell, and eventually the power was restored. Now’s a good time to mention that the store at one point in its life was an old bookies (betting shop), which had controlled entry systems fitted, that while there had been no power to the store had not been functioning. On the day I had scheduled to meet the electrician on site to assess the state of the unit once the power had been switched back on, the magnetic door locks powered up.
No, there was no exterior override, and also no, we didn’t have the key to the fire door at the back of the shop… This meant a fun-filled morning of hoping the locksmith could drill out the lock on the fire door, and hopefully get it done in time so that I could still meet with the electrician and add “Uninstall Magnetic Door Locks” to the list of work I was about to give him!
Now, I don’t want to spoil all of the funny stories about the process of getting the store ready, (if you want to see the flood that we had two days after the unit was repainted, you can check out the store Facebook page!), but the thing that stands out after all of them was how everyone just took each setback in their stride.
We never lost faith in the project or second-guessed that what we were building was correct, and that’s a testament to that original vision we laid out in those first articles. It wasn’t about speed and opening as quickly as we could, it was about getting it right, so that when we did open, it was a space that yes, we could be proud of, but also a space that you all could be proud of. A space that was welcoming and accepting, and had the Warlord Games feel to it, a place you would be happy to bring your partner, parents, or friends and say, “this is what I spend my time doing, this is the home of my hobby.”.
And boy, did you!
The Grand Opening was absolutely astounding, I was genuinely moved by how many people made the trip over the period of the weekend. Literally hundreds of people stopped by, some to take advantage of the deals, some to talk with the special guests, but lots just came to be a part of something that honestly felt significant for us all. If you did come and enjoy a pie (it is Wigan, after all!) or a piece of cake, from the bottom of my heart, thank you, you absolutely made my day!
From the fact that we had to control entry to the store and do one out/one in for over two hours, and the impromptu street party that developed as a result, to the hard work of the newly trained Wigan Store Staff who managed to serve an average of one customer every two minutes in spite of all of the weird and wonderful offers we had confusing our poor tills, we were absolutely blown away by just how many of you there were!
I loved the craziness of it all, the Tombola prizes, the free sprues, seeing the huge range of people at the Paint & Take all enjoying themselves and embracing the day, and all of the conversations going on all over the store. I even saw Konflikt ’47 author Dan Hewitson crack a smile! (We reviewed the CCTV and we think it was actually a grimace – ed.)
But, alas, as we get towards the close of this piece, I find that looking back on the Grand Opening success feels wrong. My focus is inevitably drawn to the future, to the next restock, the next release, the next games night, the next tournament, the Wigan Store’s first birthday, and, dare I whisper it, the next Warlord Games Store…
The Grand Opening wasn’t the end of the journey. It’s just the beginning.
