GameCrazy locations are mostly found inside Hollywood Video locations, but they do have some "stand-alone" stores.
Hollywood Video was having some major financial problems until April 2005 when they were bought by Movie Gallery (but are still operated seperately). Now, Movie Gallery has had the worst year and a half in its history, dropping from over $30 a share to $3 (90% overall drop).
Up until early 2006, management never caught on to employee secrets, such as how to override the system to literally steal store credit (rememember the whole "store credit good for six months"?), change preorders (assuming you never picked up the game or there was a conteset going on), and mishandled inventories that allowed defective merchandise to be unaccounted and repeatedly traded in to build up credit (most of these were used to up the store's number of MVP sales.
Most of these problems occurred within the district I had worked in, and right around the time of the 360 launch, management started to actually "try" to make sure things went smooth. It was the district manager's job to make sure stores just looked organized, and not make sure they were functioning effeciently. Like I said, in early 2006 they finally started cracking down on underperforming and corrupt stores.
I was a generic shift leader (at Reseda/Vanowen), and after the store manager and two other employees quit simultaneously, I had to perform inventory. Countless games were missing, including SEVEN copies of "God of War", three copies of "Burnout Revenge", used copy of Marvel Vs. Capcom 2, a used slim PS2, a GameBoy Micro, and various other titles.
The store management is also obsessed with keeping the store looking organized, without doing anything themselves. When I was mvoed over to Reseda, I reogranised the store three times in one week (including taking down all the shelf games and moving them from one side to another). The first was because GBA was supposed to be taken down, then GBA was supposed to be put back up because our store wasn't supposed to, and then taken down again because our store actually
was suppsoed to take it down.
A new manager (from GameStop no less) came in and let the store go to hell, ignoring the fact that we knew more than he did. I was apparently supposed to become the assistant store manager (and get paid $8.50 an hour, woot!). He told me he had seen the other employees work, but not me (because I worked all the bitch shifts), and needed to make sure that I was
devoted to the job. He then told me I had to work 40 hour weeks in order to keep it. I told him no, since $8.50 an hour was a joke (I get paid $13 at my other beaurocratic job), and quit. Two weeks later, every other employee at the store quit. Another month later, the employees from the Tarzana store found out that their store was closing down (rent was $60,000 a MONTH!), and made their way to Reseda. The new manager quit and went back to GameStop (where employees put up with that bullshit apparently), and Reseda is now doing a lot better than it was, but still not as great as it should or could be.
The moral of the story? GameStop managers are taking down GameCrazy from the inside to set up for a buyout. You heard it hear first. I don't actually believe that, but Movie Gallery Inc is dying.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movie_Gallery
A great read, with more legal and business issues.