While we had online operations underway already and had a soft opening on Thursday the 9th, Desert Sky Games in Gilbert opened for the first time publicly on Friday, August 10th! That first "Magic on a Friday Night" (since we were awaiting our Wizards Play Network approval) drew 30-ish players and it seemed like we had all the space in the world at our original 2,400-square-foot suite at 2531 South Gilbert Road.
Now that the move is pretty much in our rear-view mirror, looking back on how badly it went has been a somber experience. We went into the move flush with money from a moving sale and we had arrangements in place for an inexpensive buildout. Even with a projected sales drop due to the move, we were on track to return to normal growth trajectory within a few months, ostensibly assured by holiday sales. In practice, we had months of delay, had to have a bunch of work re-done to meet code, and thanks to all the downtime and our initial ability to use only a third of the new space, we saw sluggish sales throughout late 2017 and well into 2018, including a moribund holiday season where it seemed like nobody shopped local until it became too late to buy from Prime. We had to borrow, and that meant servicing debt, and that meant money flushed down the rat hole. It sucked.
The good news is that we had substantial inventory and asset reserves, and we were able to lean on that throughout the months after the move. Between cashing chunks of that out and utilizing financing as cash-flow reinforcement, we were back to mostly normal operation by late spring. Most of the moving debts are paid off and none of them are coming back. The store's economic machine is running hot now, and we're starting to really taste that size advantage.
And that size advantage has been at the center of all this. During this entire ordeal, the key asset, the reason we moved where we did in the first place, was in our hands and locked down. We had the space and we had the location and we had it on a favorable lease. We have DSG Chandler, the biggest game store in Arizona, by a nose over Prescott's Game On and Glendale's Imperial Outpost, both excellent businesses. We have access to the freeway less than a mile east and additional freeway access to our south and west, and we're in the heart of Chandler's professional tech corridor, an outstanding place to do business. We have acres of parking and great food options nearby. We face north so the afternoon sun no longer scorches the storefront. And we have by far the most organized play capacity in the East Valley, coming at a time when other area stores were opening larger storefronts and starting to get a little braggy and belligerent against the compact-but-high-volume business engine I had in place at DSG Gilbert. Now we have over 6,000 square feet, elbow drop. We know how to leverage that asset into monetizable activities. And best of all, we're paying the right price for it.
Physical facilities are the most difficult part of a retail business to change. Leases typically lock the business in for three to five years or more. Internal changes are expensive and external changes are oftentimes not possible at all. I spent over four years at Gilbert literally climbing the walls extracting every last square inch of value I could out of that facility, and it was maxed out. I wasn't going to be able to take the business any further until I reset the baseline. DSG Chandler was the result of that. We went big rather than going home. Going home would have been easier, but then we wouldn't have the vast untapped potential of our physical plant today.
The ownership group is finally exactly where it needs to be. We had some great contributory investors early on in 2012 who sold their equity during the first year or so of business. We then had two difficult separations from partners who went on to open competing stores, one of which had a decent two-year run and closed in late 2016, and the other of which opened in 2017 and has not been consequential. The ownership group now includes one of the best and most respected judges in the southwest, an electrical engineer who works miracles for us behind the scenes, some guy who writes blogs, and my wonderful wife who serves as our final sanity filter when we're about to embark on some risky plan.
They say hard times make strong people, and if that's the case, then sun's out and guns out as far as we're concerned. I don't think DSG Chandler is performing anywhere near its ceiling yet, and we are only beginning to scratch the surface of what our new hub facility can do. We are painstakingly gardening up a business culture where our employees know we have their back and trust them to use integrity and good judgment, and their performance reflects that trust and confidence. We are carefully cultivating a player community through the fearless expulsion of toxic individuals, despite our foreknowledge that those we ban will repay us with a social media smearing, which indeed several have done. It is worth it because the player base that remains is Good People Whom Others Like To Interact With. We're in the business of selling fun. It is essential that every part of this mechanism be oriented toward that.
DSG Chandler won't always be the biggest dog in the yard. Capitalism ensues as usual, and someone else will expand and be the new square footage leader, or someone else will show up and open huge right from the grip. They will benefit from that the way we're benefiting from it now. In the meanwhile we will have had that much more additional time to iterate, improve, develop, diversify, deepen, and reinforce. We'll probably have satellite locations again before much longer. That was something we figured would be in place by now back when I posted our move announcement for our 5th anniversary. Then the store move ran late, and ran expensive, and so on, and I figured the prudent thing to do was to shelve expansion plans and just make sure we got the core back to 100%. We did, and we want to spend the rest of 2018 laying in reserves, and then our eyes will be on the horizon again for branching out. Meanwhile, at our hub, by the time the DSG Chandler lease ends in September 2022, I hope against hope that it's just like DSG Gilbert was in 2017, where we burgeon at the boundaries and cannot possibly squeeze anything else in.
And if the trade winds shift and blow cold, we'll pivot and do something different. Despite all of the foregoing and how much pride I have in our people and this thing we've built, I am eminently willing to go "microstore" and pick up my stethoscope and hang out a shingle and do things that way. It wouldn't be my first choice, not after putting a year of blood and treasure into building a megastore, but I will do what I must to ensure the best long-term outcome. Volition supersedes all other prerogatives.
Here's hoping for good tidings when the end of Year Seven comes around the bend!
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