Overview
Love sports? Have a passion to be involved in your local sports scene? Why not make it your business?
Play It Again Sports is the largest sporting goods retailer of new and quality used merchandise in North America. Ranked in Entrepreneur Magazine’s Top Franchise 500, we offer our customers cash on the spot for their quality used sports gear and fitness equipment, and provide them significant savings on their sporting goods purchases for the new gear they need. Our stores are eco-friendly, community-focused and an important part of the fabric of their local sports scene. For parents with growing kids, we are the preferred sporting goods retailer for the value they seek and the quality merchandise they need.
The stores range from 3,000 to 4,000 square feet and are in suburban centers and power strip malls. The franchise monitors secondary market trends and style changes so that the franchisees and their staff can focus on buying the right merchandise at the right price. The point of sale system has a built in pricing matrix, allowing the franchisees and their team to simply enter the items on a touch screen monitor to get a price quote for the customer.
The stores pay cash on the spot to people who bring in quality used items purchased within the past couple of years. These items are then resold for 70% to 90% less than what the item would be new. No appointments are necessary for customers who wish to sell items, and they can sell all year round, no matter the season.
Why Choose Us?
With a high level of brand awareness, Play It Again Sports is the #1 choice in sports resale franchises. We service the value-oriented customer who loves to find great merchandise at a great price. Our franchisees are sports fanatics and embrace their role in the community in serving their customers the best product at the best value with the best service in the industry. In addition:
- The retail resale segment is hot right now, representing the fastest growing segment of retail today
- Environmentally-friendly business models are driving the green economy
- Recycling businesses focused on sustainability are on trend and growing, and are especially important to Gen Z and Millennial customers
- The shared economy represents the greatest opportunity for entrepreneurs now and in the near future
- The service resale retail stores provides to their customers makes us an important part of their communities
Despite the robust growth of Play It Again Sports, plenty of opportunities remain for new stores. The franchise website lists the cities/areas in each state that the company would like growth in.
Winmark, the parent company for Play It Again Sports, offers extensive training and support to store owners in areas such as business planning, pricing, styles and trends, retail site selection, marketing and advertising, and field operations.
Ideal Candidate
Play It Again Sports prefers that its franchisees serve as hands-on store owners and operators, although the company can give consent for a franchisee to delegate the duties. That’s necessary for those owners who have multiple locations. The candidate must be passionate about the brand, the good purpose we serve to our communities and the important role we play in the local sports scene. No prior retail experience is required – in fact, most of our franchisees had no retail experience prior to joining our franchise.
Winmark reports that many of its franchisees become multi-brand owners (with the brands available being Once Upon a Child, Play It Again Sports, Plato’s Closet, Style Encore and Music Go Round). Franchisees who are interested in this possibility may also make ideal candidates.
History
Winmark Corporation, based in Minneapolis, is the parent for Play It Again Sports and has been franchising the stores since 1988, over 30 years as a successful franchise. Winmark focuses on used items, and its other franchises include Style Encore, Once Upon A Child, Plato’s Closet and Music Go Round.
Training And Support
The training program consists of more than 65 hours of in-store and classroom training in areas such as store operations, merchandising and customer service.
Disclaimer
The Average Store numbers are the 2019 Average Gross Sales and Average Gross Profit amounts stated in Item 19 of the 2020 Play It Again Sports® Franchise Disclosure Document (as reported by 257 of the 258 stores that had been in operation at least one year as of December 28, 2019). Of the 257 reporting stores, 100 or 39% of the stores attained or exceeded the Average Gross Sales and 101 or 39% of the stores attained or exceeded the Average Gross Profit. The Top Quartile Average Gross Sales and Average Gross Profit only relates to 64 of the reporting Play It Again Sports® Stores who ranked in the top 25% of the gross sales range. Of the 64 reporting stores in the top quartile, 21 or 33% of the stores attained or exceeded the top quartile Average Gross Sales and 18 or 28% of the stores attained or exceeded the top quartile Average Gross Profit. A new franchisee’s results will likely differ from these results.
