Hi Everybody,

Due to the new rules that came into effect in Liverpool in the early hours this morning, JustPlay's gaming tables are now temporarily closed and all in-store play and events are cancelled. Opening hours will be updated to reflect this. The store is still open for business as usual, serving all of your gaming and hobby needs!

Whilst Liverpool Council's Website states that Covid-secure venues (which as anyone who has visited the store will know, we are, and have been since) are exempt from the new rules, the government website on new Liverpool rules which were published with very short notice lastnight make no such exemption. Therefore, due to the large fines for businesses that break the rules, we have no option but to close our tables whilst we seek further information on this confusing guidance.

Any in-store event that you've paid for which is affected by this will be transferrable or refundable as you prefer. Contact us at your leisure to get this sorted. There's no time limit on this, though, so feel free to just ask to knock it off your next purchase or a future event entry at the time if you prefer!

We hope that you continue to support us and shop with us, even though you're unable to game with us right now. We lose a significant amount of our custom when we're not able to open for gaming, so we'd love you to continue shopping as you normally would, it would help us out a lot!

Regards,

Ritchie, Ian and Team JustPlay

Hi Everybody,

Our in-store play and covid19 page has been updated to reflect the government's latest guidelines and the "rule of six", so we thought we'd just take a moment to explain how this will work for our events.

First the simple changes, following government guidelines:

• You must only attend the store in groups of 6 or less
• You must not play or socialise with people from other groups - social distancing rules apply as usual.
• We require fully up-to-date contact information from you by law if you are playing in-store, so please make sure your account on the website is up to date (including name, address, email address, and phone number)

How does this impact events with pairings and multiple rounds?

We understand that events may still go ahead with numbers of people greater than 6 partaking in the same activity, as long as groups within that activity are limited to a maximum of 6. Therefore, effective immediately, all of our events will have some simple structural changes to accommodate this. Here's a couple of examples:

Magic events will be played within swiss pods of 6 people, with prizes distributed on a per-pod basis.

Warhammer Tournaments will be paired within groups of 6, with the overall winner of the event being decided using usual tiebreakers.

Magic: Commander Wednesday nights will still operate as usual, except both games on the night will be played with the same 4-person group

Check your events or consult with the staff member running the event for further info.

In Summary

These simple changes will keep events mostly intact and you'll still get largely the same tournament or event experience that you would have had before. All these changes do from a gaming point of view is slightly change the scoring dynamics and prizing, but in these unusual times we're sure you'll agree that being able to play and enjoy yourselves safely is the most important thing!

As ever, please let us know if you have any questions, concerns or feedback via the usual channels.

Regards,

Ritchie, Ian and Team JustPlay

Good News Everybody!

In line with government guidelines, JustPlay will be reopening on Monday 15th June and we wanted to give you some information on what you can expect.

JustPlay will be open for shopping

The JustPlay store will be open for shopping as "usual", between 12pm-6pm Mon-Fri, and 11am-5pm Saturday. These hours may be subject to some change, but this is what we're expecting.

We will of course be implementing safety measures in store, some of which we'd already implemented before the lockdown. These will be clearly displayed on a new website page (coming soon) and on posters in the shop, but will include:

• Increased cleaning schedule with staff cleaning and wiping down contact surfaces regularly
• Hand sanitiser dispensers for staff and customers at the entrance and around the store
• Social distancing for all customers and staff, with visual aids to assist you in maintaining distance
• Limit on the number of people in the store at any one time (pending government guidance)
• Facemasks will be mandatory, for the protection of staff and other customers

We will also be adhering strictly to any updated healthcare guidelines as they are published.

For local customers, we also have a new and improved store pickup ordering feature on our website. Unlike the old method, this new feature will send you an email or text when your order is ready to pick up, and give you clearer notifications as to what's going on with your order, enabling you to order online in advance and limit the time you need to spend in store should you so choose.

JustPlay will still be closed for gaming 

Government guidelines still prohibit the opening of cafes, bars, restaurants, and similar leisure venues. We know that "games store" and "gaming cafe" falls into a grey area in these descriptions and it is certainly possible to "rules lawyer" what's written in the guidelines, but we believe it is important for safety that recreational venues remain closed. As such we will be opening purely as a retail store for the time being. The government's reopening plan says "4th July or later" for leisure-type businesses to reopen, and we'll be watching this for further developments.

New store layout

Given the above, we've decided to have a major overhaul of the layout of the store. We'll be expanding the shopping area so that social distancing can be maintained more effectively whilst browsing, and to help us with having the space to implement safe queuing. We'll post some pics as soon as we have them.

We're also going to be stocking a hugely expanded selection of hobby products - more info on this soon!

We're looking forward to getting a little bit of normalcy back, but it is important for everyone's health and safety that we do it properly and carefully. It's important for us to protect our staff and our customers, and these measures will help us do that. Undoubtedly things will continue to change rapidly as they have done in the past few months, so please do keep an eye on our blog for any updated information!

Regards,

Ian, Ritchie and Team JustPlay