If you somehow thought it was a joke, and we don't blame you if you did, but GameStop and its “Trade Anything Day” promotional event is a real thing, and it happened last Saturday.
GameStop later clarified the promotion to let people know that no matter what the item was, everyone would get a flat $5 trade-in credit. In other words, trading 10 stones wouldn't magically get you a Nintendo Switch 2. But what if it did?
The campaign drew the ire of fans and employees alike, seemingly going viral overnight due to its extensive list of “Dos” and “Do Nots” that somehow enabled the taxidermy trade-in. Ahead of the event, employees understandably began to fear the worst.
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But now that the event has pretty much come and gone, we can officially say it went as well as you'd expect. Which means no one was dealing in taxidermy, but people were trying to ship off lots of junk.
Most of these items were meant to go to charity. If it…
On GameStop's subreddit, employees and players shared the types of items that were successfully purchased at their store. In an employee's shop was a phone cord, a map from Skyrim, a board game and what appears to be a birdhouse.
Elsewhere, someone traded a Kinect, a baseball figure, and what appears to be an unused Jujutsu Kaisen figure. Another image in the thread shows a Switch Lite buried in a pile of clothes, though it's unclear if the console actually works.
In a separate post, someone noted that they would try to trade in two cans of the Pokemon x Campbell Soup collaboration, only for the employees to reportedly scoff at their items.
The intent of the event seemed to be built around people donating things they would otherwise have no use for, such as clothes that don't fit, board games, old video games, along with pantry items that could all be donated to charity.
Unfortunately, when you tell people they can shop for anything and also have employees who would rather do anything than make a pit stop at the local charity centre, you get that combination, along with all the rubbish we've seen.
Of course, this would be a one-time, get your $5 and leave kind of event, but that didn't stop enterprising “entrepreneurs” from sharing their escapades of going to multiple GameStop stores to get $5 in credit over Reddit and social media.
In the case of the cutest trade-in, a kid, along with his parents, traded in a handmade Among Us x GameStop artwork. Hopefully that $5 can help them get what's on their holiday wish list.
Finally, someone tried to replace his “friend” named Bobby, a leaf with a face made of marker. Unfortunately, GameStop didn't accept the blade, and really, if they're your “friend”, why would you try to trade them in for a measly $5. Aren't friends worth more than that?
All this to say, for many who probably work at GameStop, it was probably just another day in the life.
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