A BELOVED games and hobbyist retailer in Reading is moving to larger premises, owners have announced.
Eclectic Games, currently situated in Union Street (also known as Smelly Alley), is set to up sticks and expand to a new location in Market Place this summer.
It comes after a decade at the site and nearly twenty years of operation as an independent, family-run business.
Owners have signed a long-term lease on the ground floor and basement of 21 Duke Street, and will be refitting the former gym over the months of June and July.
The 1,869-square-foot, air-conditioned basement will hold up to 100 people, across four dedicated games rooms and a casual gaming lounge, while the ground floor retail space will continue to host games demonstrations in an improved retail environment for a better customer experience.
Owner Becky Ottery said: “We loved our time in Union Street, which has seen us through Brexit, the pandemic and various other personal challenges and difficulties, alongside us growing the size of our team, winning six awards and being shortlisted for many more, both locally and internationally.
“At the time we moved in it was a significant improvement from our previous Market Place location, giving us more games space and a larger shop floor, and we could hardly have been more ‘town center’.
As our sector of the entertainment and retail economy has grown massively since 2015, we now need a more flexible space to better support the increased number of customers and communities that are the biggest driver of our ongoing success.
“Calendar space, by which I mean the ability to host more than one event at the same time in comfort, has become the major limiting factor in our current unit.
“The layout in Duke Street should roughly triple our capacity to run on-site events, even though the maximum number of people we can host at any one time is only increasing by about a dozen over what we have right now.
“The ability to run more and different events to support additional communities and product lines will be the key to Eclectic Games’ continued growth.”
Full details of upcoming events at Eclectic Games are available via: eclecticgames.co.uk
