Tesco Wants to Have 20% of UK Game Retail by 2012

Supermarket giant Tesco has said that by 2012 it wants to take a 20% stake in the UK game’s market, becoming the second largest retailer in the UK.

Tesco recently pushed out its pre-owned service to the majority of its Extra stores. Now, it wants its top 250 stores to have “proper” game departments. “We have already doubled our share on software, hardware and peripherals in the last year,” said senior buying manager for games John Stanhope. He continued: “The team has also doubled in size in the last 18 months. We now have the resource to get to 20 per cent of the games software market.”

Entertainment director Rob Slater said that the company had previously been shunned by games publishers: “I have been here just over two years and my first meetings with the video game suppliers were quite challenging. They said ‘You are not really a priority for us’, which is unusual for Tesco.”

“The next step is to have service desks at the heart of the department. In the top 250 Tesco stores we have the opportunity to create a proper games and entertainment and electrical department.”

If they do manage to carve a considerable chunk into the specialist market, stores like Game and Gamestation will be increasingly worried about their futures. The company who owns both retailers recently cut back on staff and store locations, so they’re hardly booming and Tesco, the third largest retailer in the world, certainly has the ability to make some considerable gains.