Redcap’s Corner’s second home as of next month (Photo by Annamarya Scaccia / West Philly Local)

Hear-ye, Hear-ye, Baltimore Avenue gamers! Come early next month, West Philly’s gaming hub, Redcap’s Corner, will open its second shop in the area – at 4812 Baltimore Avenue in the storefront space of HOW Properties’ new apartment building on the corridor.

According to co-owner Benn Roe, who runs Redcap’s with Adam Friedman, the new shop will differ from its Drexel University-area flagship at 3617 Lancaster Avenue by becoming more family-oriented. While the Baltimore Avenue location will carry a very similar gaming product line, there will be a strong emphasis on Pokémon rather than Magic the Gathering, Roe said. Additionally, the calendar of events for Redcap’s 2 will differ drastically from the original shop—instead of tournaments and competitive game-play that attracts serious gamers and college students, the new place (which seats only 30) will focus on learn-to-play demos, family board game nights, casual and after-school leagues, and open-play nights.

“We’ll run tournaments here and there, but our focus will be on less competitive fun and giving kids somewhere safe to hang out after school,” Roe told West Philly Local. “Pokémon is popular with kids, and we’ve been getting increasing interest in Pathfinder from young role-players, so it’s a safe bet that those games will make it onto the calendar.”

While opening dates are not set in stone since construction is still happening at the new location, Roe did assure they will throw a grand opening party once Redcap’s 2 opens its doors in early July. West Philly Local had a chance to chat with Roe more about Redcap’s second shop, why they chose Baltimore Avenue, and why they chose to focus more on families this time around.

West Philly Local: Why are you opening a second Redcap’s Corner location?
Benn Roe: We have a lot of customers who live much closer to Cedar Park than Powelton Village, many of whom don’t have cars. We used to see them a lot more often when we were located at 40th and Locust. Since so many of these customers are family gamers and we want to be convenient for them, it just makes sense to open a new location. Like most brick and mortar stores, we’re never going to have prices that compete with Amazon. We manage to stay competitive by staying convenient and offering additional value in the form of play space and event programming.

WPL: Why did you choose this particular storefront? What is it about the Baltimore Avenue corridor that drew you?
BR: Baltimore Avenue and Lancaster Avenue are mirrors of one another in many ways (physically, not least of all). Lancaster Avenue has been a really great fit for us, and we felt Baltimore Avenue made sense for all the same reasons. It’s a thriving commercial corridor in the heart of a community-oriented area of West Philly. Fostering community is very important to us as a business, so it just felt like the perfect place for our second location.

WPL: Part of the difference of this location is that it will be more family-oriented. Why did you choose to focus more on families for this location?
BR: There are really three major groups of gamers: competitive gamers, family gamers, and beer-and-pretzels gamers. We saw value in a second West Philly location for the reasons I mentioned above, but we didn’t want to cannibalize our business by attempting to cater to the same crowd. Our Powelton Village location already meets the needs of the competitive gamer, and Baltimore Avenue just makes so much sense for reaching out to the family gamer. Ask me again in a year or two about how we plan to reach out to the beer-and-pretzels gamer.

WPL: What do you hope for your Baltimore Avenue location?
BR: We just want to make people happy. Games are fun, and we want to share them with our community. From the kid with nowhere to meet his friends, to the parent who could use a few more hours to his or herself, we want to bring more smiles to more people. If having a second Redcap’s Corner on Baltimore Avenue makes a handful of people happier, we’ll have done our jobs.

-Annamarya Scaccia