By Gabe Ouzounian

Contributing Reporter

Old Guard Hobbies, located in Sterling Heights, a popular hobby shop for tabletop gaming enthusiasts and model builders alike, has closed its doors.

Old Guard, an independent hobby shop that opened in 1993, saw a steady decline in business once the economy started depriving people of disposable income. Jeff Standley, the current owner of Old Guard, said that because the store caters to a niche audience, specifically table top gamers, it depends on people spending nondiscretionary funds. 

“When I decided to close, I kept blaming myself, thinking I could have been a better manager,” Standley said. “But its not just me, a lot of stores around here are closing as well.”

Standley has been the owner of the store for four years and has worked at the location for 14 years. He took over the store when the previous owner, Al Slisinger, died of a brain tumor. Since then, Standley has felt awkward running the business saying that he never got the full training he needed.

“While he was training me to run the store, I kept [telling] him, ‘teach me more, I’m not ready for this’, and he told me that there was always more time,” said Standley. “But you never know when you’re going to wake up with a brain tumor.”

Another factor in Old Guard’s closing was competition from Games Workshop, a U.K. based company that specializes in the popular Warhammer series of models. Games Workshop has four locations in metro-Detroit, including Rochester Hills, Auburn Hills, Novi and Ypsilanti. The company provided Standley’s store with their series of models, which Old Guard sold at a discount.

As Old Guard began to compete with local Games Workshops, Standley’s store began experiencing delays in shipping requests. Representatives for Games Workshop were unavailable for comment.

Since the closing, Standley wants to move on to a different job.

“I’d been trying to pass the store onto one of my employees. This job was just too unstable,” Standley said. “But the guy I was training said that his funding fell through and that he couldn’t do it.”

Now that the store is closing, Standley is actively training to be an ambulance driver with aspirations of eventually becoming a paramedic.

Even though Standley has begun preparations for leaving Old Guard Hobbies, he said that when the store closes, there will be aspects of the job he will miss.

“More than anything, I’m going to miss the people. Our customer base was really strong, some of these guys have been coming here since the store opened,” Standley said. “One of my employees, Steve, I remember him coming here when he was just a kid, buying Pokémon cards. Now he’s almost 20 years old.”

Frequenters of the store are also mourning the store’s closing, including a student of the College for Creative Studies and local, Gabriel Bañuelos.

“I’ve been going since I was in junior high. I guess that would have to have been almost 10 years now,” Bañuelos said. “I was looking for a local hobby shop that had Dungeons & Dragons stuff, and when I got there I saw all the models and jumped right in.”

Bañuelos added that he will probably purchase any models he wants online, rather than entering a Games Workshop, claiming that he finds the atmosphere of the chain store too pushy.

Steve Perry, an employee of Old Guard says that he will also miss the store.

“I’ve been coming here for 15 years and was so happy when I finally got a job here,” Perry said. “I remember a [tournament] that we hosted where people from four different states competed. Jeff [Standley] and I took fourth place.” Perry said that he will continue his hobby and try to keep in contact with Standley.

Old Guard Hobbies closed Oct. 31.

For reviews of Old Guard, visit www.insiderpages.com. For more information on Games Workshop, visit  www.games-workshop.com.