Smarty Brands managed to reverse the decline of JRC by transforming

The gaming industry is undergoing a transformation, and it affects all parts of it. If brick-and-mortar stores really flourished in the past, they don’t get the same harvest now. JRC has a story to tell. Back last year, for the fiscal year from February 2019 to January 2020, sales exceeded half a billion, after which they rapidly declined in the subsequent period. They fell by as much as 371 million. And they didn’t do much better last year, because another drop followed, this time around 241 million.

JRC’s lifeline was the Smarty Brands group, which at the time bought one of the biggest game sales players. Compared to last year, the new owner managed to increase the growth of the well-known store by more than 50%. They themselves comment on their success for CzechCrunch magazine as follows:After a year of hard work, we can say that we managed to breathe new life into JRC. We bought it as an exclusive brand that we wanted to develop. And as long as we’re good“

The combination of video games with electronics that happened this year certainly helped overall. Thanks to this, in JRC stores, in addition to games, we can also find consoles or collectibles. It can be said that Smarty Brands have moved in the same direction as Xzone. It probably wouldn’t be too surprising if in the future we also see JRC start making their own versions of some games, which would be quite nice.