GameStop Corp. is an American video game, consumer electronics, and gaming merchandise retailer. The company is headquartered in Grapevine (a suburb of Dallas), Texas, United States, and is the world’s largest video game retailer, operating 5,509 retail stores throughout the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe as of February 1, 2020. The company was first founded in Dallas, Texas in 1984 as Babbage’s, and took on its current name in 1999. The company’s retail stores primarily operate under the GameStop, EB Games, ThinkGeek, and Micromania-Zing brands. The company declined during the mid-late 2010s due to the shift of video game sales to online storefronts and failed investments by GameStop in smartphone retail.
In addition to retail stores, GameStop also owns Game Informer, a video game magazine.
GameStop traces its roots to Babbage’s, a Dallas, Texas-based software retailer founded in 1984 by former Harvard Business School classmates James McCurry and Gary M. Kusin. The company was named after Charles Babbage and opened its first store in Dallas’s NorthPark Center with the help of Ross Perot, an early investor in the company. The company quickly began to focus on video game sales for the then-dominant Atari 2600.[ Babbage’s began selling Nintendo games in 1987. The company went public in 1988. By 1991, video games accounted for two-thirds of Babbage’s sales
GameStop acquired EB Games (formerly Electronics Boutique) in 2005 for $1.44 billion. The acquisition expanded GameStop’s operations into Europe, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Two years later, in 2007, GameStop acquired Rhino Video Games from Blockbuster for an undisclosed amount. Rhino Video Games operated 70 video game stores throughout the Southeastern United States.
GameStop purchased Free Record Shop’s Norwegian stores in April 2008. The company acquired 49 stores and converted them into video game shops. Daniel DeMatteo replaced Richard Fontaine as GameStop CEO in August 2008. DeMatteo had served as company COO since 1996. Fontaine, who had been GameStop chairman and CEO since 1996, remained the company’s chairman. J. Paul Raines, formerly executive vice president of Home Depot, became company COO in September. GameStop acquired Micromania, a French video-game retailer, in October 2008 for $700 million. GameStop, which had previously owned no stores in France, now had 332 French video-game stores. It also acquired a majority stake in Jolt Online Gaming, an Irish browser-based game studio, in November 2009. Jolt closed in 2012.
J. Paul Raines became GameStop CEO in June 2010. He replaced Daniel DeMatteo who was named executive chairman of the company. While serving as CEO in 2012, GameStop’s digital revenue grew from $190 million in 2011 to more than $600 million in 2012.
GameStop acquired Kongregate, a San Francisco, California-based website for browser-based games; terms of the deal were not disclosed
GameStop acquired Spawn Labs and Impulse in separate transactions during 2011. Spawn Labs was a developer of technology that allowed users to play video games that were run remotely on machines in data centers rather than their personal computer or console. Impulse was a digital distribution and multiplayer gaming platform. GameStop closed Spawn Labs in 2014.
GameStop purchased BuyMyTronics, a Denver, Colorado-based online market place for consumer electronics, in 2012. Later that year, it acquired a minority interest in Simply Mac, a Utah-based authorized Apple reseller. GameStop acquired the remaining 50.1% interest in Simply Mac in November 2013. GameStop also acquired Spring Mobile, a Salt Lake City, Utah-based retailer of AT&T-branded wireless services, in November 2013. They obtained 163 RadioShack locations as of February 26, 2015, as well. All GameStop stores have been closed down in Puerto Rico at the end of March 2016, citing increased rates of government taxes. On August 3, 2016, it acquired 507 AT&T store chains in plans to diversify into new businesses and less dependent on the video game market
