GameStop Corp. is an American video game, consumer electronics, and gaming merchandise retailer. The company is headquartered in Grapevine, Texas (a suburb of Dallas), and is the largest video game retailer worldwide.  As of 2022, the company operated around over 4.500 stores including 3,014 in the United States, 253 in Canada, 417 in Australia and New Zealand and 954 in Europe under the GameStop, EB Games, EB Games Australia, Micromania-Zing, ThinkGeek and Zing Pop Culture brands.

GameStop traces its roots to Babbage’s, a Dallas, Texas-based software retailer founded in 1984 by former Harvard Business School classmates James McCurry and Gary M. Kusin. The company was named after Charles Babbage and opened its first store in Dallas’s NorthPark Center with the help of Ross Perot, an early investor in the company.

Babbage’s merged with Software Etc., an Edina, Minnesota-based retailer that specialized in personal computing software, to create NeoStar Retail Group in 1994. In October 1999, Barnes & Noble Booksellers purchased Babbage’s Etc. In May 2000, Barnes & Noble acquired Funco, the owner of Eden Prairie, Minnesota-based video game retailer FuncoLand. With its acquisition of Funco, Barnes & Noble also acquired Game Informer, a video game magazine that was first published in 1991. Funco was renamed GameStop, Inc. in December 2000 in anticipation of holding an initial public offering for the company.

The company’s performance declined during the mid-late 2010s due to the shift of video game sales to online shopping and downloads and failed investments by GameStop in smartphone retail. In 2021 however, the company’s stock price skyrocketed due to a short squeeze orchestrated by users of the Internet forum r/wallstreetbets. The company received significant media attention during January and February 2021 due to the volatility of its stock price and the GameStop short squeeze. The company is now ranked 521st on the Fortune 500. In addition to retail stores, GameStop owns and publishes Game Informer, a video game magazine.

According to en.Wikipedia. Source of photo: internet