Shop Spotlight: Mighty Lancer Games in Bridlington

This article originally appeared in issue 57 of Tabletop Gaming. Pick up the latest issue of the UK's fastest-growing gaming magazine in print or digital here.

Nathan and Emma (Mr & Mrs MLG in the community) run Mighty Lancer Games, a store in Bridlington that recently moved to a new, bigger premises. We catch up with them about being a FLGS.

Can you tell us a little bit about how the store first got started?

Nathan always dreamed of owning a games shop since being a small boy, but as with many things, real life took over and instead he grew up to forge a career on a completely non-game related path. Eventually, with a wife, little girl and a threat of widespread redundancy in his industry, talk of the dream resurfaced and quickly turned into a little slice of the internet and even smaller brick and mortar store in our home town of Bridlington.  

What’s it like being a FLGS in your area?

The community is amazing, we have regular gamers who come in and are not afraid to help newer gamers out if they need it, the shop is family friendly and we hope everyone agrees it has a great atmosphere.

We are in a small sea side town, where it’s a two minute walk to the sea from the shop door. Being in a seasonal town has its advantages and its disadvantages. We get to meet lots of new people as visitors come to the town and pop in, we hold event in the summer such as ‘meet Pikachu’ when Pikachu comes down to the shop and people can have their photo taken with him, and then in the winter months, it is a lot quieter. 

What titles have you found most popular recently?

Games Workshop Is always popular, most people have heard of them, they are the market leaders in their field and their products are always sort after. We also stock a huge range or Reaper Miniatures, and we also do Reaper Bones Subscription Boxes once a month and advent calendars at Christmas. We love Reaper, they are great miniatures at affordable prices and nice people too. 

Have you any favourite memories associated that you’d want to share?

Currently Mr MLG is teaching Mrs & Little Miss along with one of our friends and their little girl how to play Pathfinder, having never played before they are having so much fun.  We also loved it when the Scouts came for an organised visit and had a lesson in painted space marines and Stormcast Eternals, their faces where a pleasure and they really enjoyed it. Teaching the kids Dungeons & Dragons in the shop, their imagination and enthusiasm was infectious. 

How has it been through COVID-19?

Tough. Having never gotten to open the shop doors of the new premises was very disheartening. Our plans for events, and being really excited to show everyone the new place got completely shattered and left us feeling a little dejected – but we knew people still need the hobby, now more than ever. Our website offered free delivery to local people so we could keep their spirits up with new projects, we got our Discord fully running to run the Kids D&D online so they could keep playing, we used our Facebook group and Discord so we could keep in touch with the community and make sure everyone was okay, and that they were not alone. We continued to make our YouTube videos showing some of the basic skills to building and painting miniatures to help people who were new or still learning and we tried our best to stay positive, and safe. 

Have you any plans for after COVID-19? 

We plan to carry on as always, get more games going on the gaming floor, get the chattering and excitement back into the store, help more people, build up the community, carry on supporting each other and building up the ranges we have in store… but no, we are not moving to a bigger shop again. 

Where can I find it?

39-43 King Street

Bridlington
East Yorkshire
Website: mightylancergames.co.uk
Facebook: facebook.com/mightylancergames
Youtube: youtube.com/c/MightyLancerGames