About Us

I have been selling and trading miniatures for years. When I was laid off from my job in the summer of 2019 I only had my sales training and work ethic to fall back on, so I started flipping Warhammer armies to pay the bills. That same summer, my family of 3 grew to a family of 4 and we welcomed my daughter into the world. It was hard, and finding work that had the benefits and pay that we needed was difficult. Selling Warhammer secondhand worked for our main bills, but it was not quite enough. We kept our home and we never went to bed hungry, but my wife was tired of wondering when a big sale would come in. So in October I got a job; nothing great, but I continued my flipping. Due to learning a new job and working 40 hours a week, I was not able to keep up with the Warhammer community like I wanted to. In December of 2019 I got an offer to work for FedEx Express and I took the offer. The pay was way better per hour even though it was a part time job and it had amazing benefits which we needed badly. My wife and I agreed that when we were in a better spot I could pick up where I left off. After all, I could always find buyers for Warhammer online, right?

Fast forward to March of 2020, I had just finished training and decided that I could start flipping again to build up inventory and capital. Then the unthinkable happened, the world shut down. All of the sudden the competitive scene for Warhammer 40k was gone, and so was the high demand for "flipped armies". It seemed like over night my hobby and my "side hustle" were out of reach so I had to wait. A little over a year later I had grown in ways unimaginable and so too had my ideas. I decided that I was not going to live life waiting for the perfect opportunity to come to me, I was going to make the perfect opportunity out of what I had. "What was it that I had" you might ask? Tons of models in a massive personal collection spanning from the 1980's to today, enough to open a store on and that was all I needed. I had a little money from my income taxes, and I had no idea what all I needed to do, but I knew I wanted to be successful "on my own". So I started a business and that is where we are now. 

Secondhand Soldiers IS a business, and its goal IS to be profitable (I have a family to feed after all), but the goal is to EARN the patronage of the local gaming community. I always heard from people that I should spend my money at my LGS because they existed, but I thought it was weird that I owed them something as the customer. I could never understand why the stores could or would not "earn my business". Simply put, the previous stores were set up on more traditional business models which were not flexible enough to let them go after more niche markets. With a little help (thanks for spending hours on the phone with me guys) from my friends, I figured out ways to structure our business model so that we can provide for the niches other stores could not target. By cracking the code we can:

  • Build a solid Trade-in system to help people that wanted their Trade Credit to go further
  • Create a membership option so that schedule-limited gamers could always get a game in
  • Build a locker solution that allows access for renters at any time
  • Create a clear and consistent valuation strategy so our customers know what they are getting
  • Keep the Secondhand miniatures and collections rolling in so we can have a constant stream of minis and bits for our customers
  • Manage a website for online sales offering discounts on product and shipping
  • Find affordable ways to maximize our space
  • Avoid debt, so we can work smart and grow with our community

I gave myself unrealistic expectations and worked over 550 hours in a 7 week time frame to meet those expectations. Working at Secondhand Soldiers and FedEx made it difficult, but with a little labor from my father (thanks Dad for everything), some help from my friends (you know who you are) and an INCREDIBLE wife (who painted and put up with my stressed and exhausted self), we finally made it. 

I can say proudly: "I have paid my dues, and now I am ready to start EARNING the business of our local community." After all of that work, there is still a ton to be done. I hope to be a boon to our Shreveport/Bossier City gaming community. Not a competitor in a market, but a neighbor who offers complementary services.

We are ready to change the tabletop gaming experience in Shreveport/Bossier and can not wait to do it.