Who knew that ThinkGeek had physical store locations? Not me, until recently — New York, Florida, Texas, and now their 9th location just opened in my city of Raleigh, North Carolina!
Behold this nerd haven, located in Crabtree Valley Mall directly across from GameStop (smart marketing, especially since they own ThinkGeek).
ThinkGeek’s Raleigh location storefront.
I couldn’t go to the grand opening festivities, but even a week after it opened, the ThinkGeek store was packed with people exploring the shelves and stocking up from the wall o’ Funko Pops.
They have a little bit of every fandom — Star Wars, Star Trek, Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, Marvel Universe, and DC Universe are the biggest ones, but they also have plenty of video games, anime, and American cartoons like Steven Universe.
Some people have complained about it basically being a Funko Pop store, but since Crabtree Valley Mall doesn’t have a Hot Topic, I appreciate the huge selection.
My only disappointment with the store is the lack of original un-licensed items. There is only a small section of my favorite part of the ThinkGeek website, their unique and geeky items that make up most of my birthday wishlist every year. The things they do have in stock, though, are pretty great — My husband gravitated toward the color-changing potion bottle, but I wanted the unicorn drinking horn. My hope is that the holiday season will encourage more unique items that can’t be found at the nearby Barnes & Noble or GameStop.
The location is also a bit small, but that could change someday! According to a staff member, this is definitely not a pop-up situation, and as great as business has been so far, they are definitely here to stay in Raleigh. Apparently GameStop plans to open 25-50 ThinkGeek storefronts within the next year in the United States. Maybe they’ll be as huge of a success as Hot Topic or GameStop itself!
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Amber Neva Brown is the Young Adult book reviewer for Girls in Capes. She is the Inventory Manager at Quail Ridge Books in Raleigh, NC and is a huge proponent of the Indies First and We Need Diverse Books campaigns. She also recently acquired her Masters degree in Publishing with a double concentration in Editorial and Children’s/YA at Rosemont College.
