NeoStar Retail Group was formed as the unified parent company for the merged Babbage's and Software Etc. chains on December 16, 1994.
Babbage's Etc.[]
1996-2001[]
Designer:
Unknown
Typography:
Thymesans
Launched:
November 1996
After NeoStar filed for bankruptcy in 1996, an investment group led by Leonard Riggio (then the primary shareholder of Barnes & Noble) purchased the company and renamed it to Babbage's Etc.. Barnes & Noble would buy Babbage's Etc. outright in 1999. In 2000, B&N purchased Funco, Inc., the owner of competing game retailer FuncoLand, and renamed it to GameStop, Inc., with Babbage's Etc. repositioned as a subsidiary.
GameStop Corp.[]
2001-2012[]
In 2001, GameStop Inc. (formerly Funco, Inc.) and its subsidiaries, Game Informer and Babbage's Etc. (which owned the GameStop, Babbage's, Software Etc., and Planet X chains) were consolidated and organized into GameStop Corp. In 2004, the company was spun off from Barnes & Noble; by this time, most stores owned by GameStop Corp. or its predecessors had been converted to GameStop locations, with very few vestiges of the other chains remaining today.
