RF Generation Message Board

It looks like Goodwill has a gaming focused store in North Carolina called the Grid.

http://www.goodwillsp.org/shop/thegrid

http://imgur.com/a/YEMPF

Looks expensive but I would go If I was in NC.

Banana, any chance this is nearby you?

I think Disney might chime in soon and tell them to change the name - the grid is from Tron.  hahaha

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5S6s5dZXNM

This is about an hour and a half away from me. My parents live down that way and I'm headed there soon. I'll try to check it out if I can get away from family duties for a bit.

I have to say that I'm not very hopeful with this store in terms of their prices. It's a shame that charity shops such as these who operate off of donations are now gouging customers for profits sometimes much higher than sold items on eBay. I can't really find anything in my local Goodwills anymore. One of the stores has a separate "Computer Junction" section apart from the main store which only deals in games and computer supplies. All you can find in there are sports games and anything of value (in this store and the others in the area) is transferred to this main office and auctioned at shopgoodwill.com.

Also, went to "Value Village" today and saw a loose Intellivision console on the rack. When the employee brought it down, it had a price on it of $165!!!! The manager came and had an employee look into it (most likely on eBay) and they marked it down to the low low price of $45..... Oh yeah, the system was untested. It's a shame that so-called "charity stores" are getting greedy and profiting off customers in this way. The same store gets opened box items from the local Harbor Freight and charges more for them than the store (only 2 blocks away) charges for them new. I know this might sound like "sour grapes" on my part, but if you're given something for free, you don't exploit that generosity.

Between this and the Goodwill auction site no wonder I never find games there anymore.

Yea, Goodwill has gone to shit now. If I do find something there it is usually so overpriced that it is ridiculous.

A friend of mine in the Charlotte area posted something about it on her FB page. Within minutes there were several people commenting on how bad it was.....oh well.

It doesn't surprise me. Goodwill has been bad the past 5+ years now.

I don't think they're profiting off customers because they're a non profit organization.  If they are, that's pretty shady and they could probably get into big trouble with the U$ government.  I don't think they want to f*** with Uncle Sam. 

I can only speculate why Goodwill would need to gouge customers with certain items, but I really doubt the upper management is collecting big bonuses as that would land them in hot water. 

Yeah, I'm not saying that anyone specifically is profiting from these inflated prices. My point is that it's odd that thrifts, who are suppose to provide donated (free) items at more affordable prices for lower income families and individuals, are raising prices on certain items, including video games, to gouge specific audiences. I have no problem with paying a reasonable price for an item, especially when it goes to a good cause, but marking a loose, untested Intellivision for $165 is ludicrous and dare I say greedy.

I was told byy an employee at my local Goodwill that all video game items were being sent out to be auctioned off at ShopGoodwill.com.  It was very disappointing to me.  I'd never had a great score there.  It was small stuff like Medievil for PS1 for $3, Mortal Kombat 1, 2, and 3 for Genesis for a couple of bucks, but it was sad knowing I'd never get that kind of stuff there again.

Being a non-profit doesn't mean that you don't make a profit, it simply means that you reinvest all earnings back into the business, and provide a public benefit in order to avoid paying taxes.

I believe to be non-profit all the company needs to do is reinvest 25% or 33% of their profit back into the company, so yes they can make a tidy profit.

Well............looks like I'm headed down toward Charlotte tonight. The store is open until 9:00, so I'm going to stop by and check it out first-hand. Will report back. :)

Good Luck...

And the verdict is?  We are all waiting in suspense!

This is the typical case of don't judge a book by its cover, or more importantly, don't let your impression of Goodwill cloud trying something out at least once. I actually thought the store was really awesome! Their selection of games was awesome (several boxed CIB NES, SMS, 32X, and even GG titles), the employees were super nice, and the prices were actually really fair. I was trying to determine what made people comment on disliking the store and the only thing I could come up with is that there really weren't any of the more popular titles (Mario, Zelda, Pokémon, etc.) there. I assume these get picked through quick and since this place depends on donations, they don't stay in the store long. I grabbed several tougher to mind games that I had been looking for and I'll probably post a pic of them when I'm not on the road. Anyway, I thought this place was great and can't wait to check it out again.

Interesting thread here. Yeah here in CT it's not different with the Savers and Goodwills. All the prices have gotten super high. Things are priced all over the place.
They also get items from target and sell them for high prices. These were clearance items at Target for a few bucks now marked up.

I also don't like when they ask if you would like to round up the change to donate it. I'm already paying high prices, no thanks.

I'm all for charity but Goodwill is no longer for low income families. Maybe I some clothes,but I even look for furniture as well and those prices are sky high as well


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My local Goodwill must be an oddity, because most everything here is pretty reasonably priced.  They charge no more than 4 bucks for most games, cartridge or disc-based, unless they're multi-disc PC games, and even then I've only seen them charge, at most, 8 bucks.  As for their Target resell items, they mark them down well past their clearance prices, and I've not seen any furniture go for more than 40 bucks, which in that particular case was for a very nice, large, almost-new entertainment center.  Only problem with ours, though, is it's a pretty small store, so the selection is generally not too huge for any one type of item.  Other than that, I've found some pretty decent stuff in there, and so far have no intentions of stopping.

My local Goodwill NEVER has any gaming stuff. EVER.

I think you are in the majority and the Goodwills in my town are the same way. This a specialty store for computers and video games that Goodwill created in Charlotte. It's not the norm for what shows up in Goodwills. Plus, with Goodwill now online, you might want to look at your nearest city on shopgoodwill.com and bid on games/consoles. That's where all of their good stuff goes now.