Shop management games are popular. There’s no getting around that. They’re also a genre that I feel that I have had extensive amounts of time playing. As a young Sean, I dabbled in the horrors of poorly-constructed rollercoasters in Rollercoaster Tycoon. OK – not a shop simulator, but still a game where you run your own business. But in these past few years, these types of games have seen an absolute explosion. From managing a homebrew shop (in Brewmaster: Beer Brewing Simulator) to managing a power washing company in PowerWash Simulator 2, there’s no end to these. Something will be out there for you. Maybe you, yourself, want a game of managing a thrift shop. A game like Thrifty Business.

Thrifty Business is, per their Steam page, a relaxed shop management simulator. This title is also the third launch from Spellgarden Games, following their prior releases of Ritual of Raven and Sticky Business. Spellgarden definitely has an aesthetic that they seem to go for in their games, harkening back to the old 90’s graphics of video games. Thrifty Business is no exception to this.

Gamer Social Club was able to receive an early look at Thrifty Business and I was ready to leap into the void of managing a thrift shop with this one. So, without further ado, let’s go sell some old stuff!

The World & The Story

The World

Regionally Thrifty Business, while left somewhat vague, appears to take place somewhere within the United Kingdom. How do we know? Well, we’re told within the first 30 seconds of the game (we’ll get into that). That being said though, we never see any of the outside world, as all of the game’s actual content takes place within the walls of our thrift shop (The Rusty Nook).

So, we must remain content behind our counter at The Rusty Nook. Because that seems to be the only place that we will ever go and we’ll have to live vicariously through the lives of our regular customers.

The Story

So, the story of Thrifty Business isn’t really about us – it’s about the folks that patronize our business. We start from humble beginnings as we have purchased The Rusty Nook from the former owner, Ingrid (and her pet iguana, Igor). Ingrid wants to see the world and cannot do so in this small British town. After the tutorial of the game, we really don’t see much else from her, as she departs for London after a few in-game days.

So yes, Ingrid now gets to see the world and that leaves us to learn about the lives and tribulations of the regulars of our business. Let’s see who we have:

• Archie – An old friend of Ingrid’s.
• Birdie – The Founder of the Queer Dating Nights at the shop.
• David – Just starting his life at uni.
• Ezra – An animal lover who bonds over helping others with their pets.
• Grace – A single mother and lover of reading and crafting.
• Gwen – A yoga instructor who recently split from their partner, Yuki, and an avid traveler.
• Isla – A fashion-forward teen who starts the Clothing Swap Nights at the store.
• Jess – A baker obsessed with scones.
• Lillian – The founder of the shop’s Book Club Night.
• Lotta – A photography enthusiast looking to find out who she is.
• Marc – A father who has just sent his son off to uni and is looking to find meaning in life.
• Marsaily – A recent widow looking to honor her late partner with a hike they had planned.
• Yuki – Gwen’s former partner who is looking to live life without his other half.

The stories of these individuals are presented in several ways, including conversations at the shop, as well as text messages with them. And given the low-stress, cozy vibes of this game, everyone gets a happy ending and finds meaning in their lives. Which, in this day and age, is kind of a nice reprieve.

The Gameplay

Buying & Selling Used Goods

So, as the name of the game implies, Thrifty Business is all about running a thrift shop. Well, those used goods come from somewhere. Namely, the residents of the local area. In game, you’ll use the “Messy-Ger” to find boxes of goods to purchase to sell. When looking at the boxes, you won’t know 100% of what will be in them, but you’ll get a sense of what kinds of items are available.

This will be crucial, as certain character stories are driven by them “finding” certain goods at your shop. The nice thing – they tell you exactly what they are looking for. Once you have purchased your boxes for the day, it’s time to get them up for display. Drag the box from the void outside of your shop and get to unpacking!

What ensues is basically a game of Tetris, in terms of managing your shelves and display racks. Certain items can only be held/displayed on certain displays (i.e., clothing cannot just be stacked on a shelf). That being said though, there’s no inherent “problem” if you don’t display similar items together. It purely becomes aesthetics. I’ll get into that later.

Cleaning, Decorating, and Managing the Shop

So, you’ve opened the shop for the day. Now what? Well, before that even starts, you have the option of decorating your shop with themed…decor. The Shop will have all manner of shelves, racks, tables, and decorative items, along with flooring and wallpaper options. These are all purchased with the shop’s money.

Now, there are also Stamp Cards that you can complete that provide even more decorations – each of which follow a specific theme. These options are “unlocked” with Community Points.

How do we obtain Community Points? Good question! The main (and only way, I believe) – picking up the plethora of garbage that gets dropped in your shop by your customers. Seriously – use the waste bin, you heathens.

The only other tasks that are available during the day are re-stocking any shelves if you have excess stuff in storage and cashing out customers. You get one block of storage space and can unlock more with in-game money. I’ll be honest, I rarely used this feature – easier to just have everything on display.

Cashing out customers is just the click of your mouse to check them out. Sometimes, a conversation will prompt, especially with our key Regulars who found an item that they had requested.

One last piece I’ll touch on is expanding your shop. Initially, you will only have one room accessible. You’ll be able to further expand your shop out to a total of six rooms. The further you expand, the pricier those expansions become (which makes sense). There will also be a room that is opened once you start hosting events at the shop, but this really cannot be accessed outside of those events, nor can you stock goods in this room.

Hosting Event Nights

As I had mentioned previously, there are several “community nights” that can be held in Thrifty Business, all of which are headed up by a specific individual from the community. You get the following options when it comes to the community nights:

• Queer Date Night;
• Easy Meal Club;
• Repair Cafe;
• Grief Support Circle;
• Clothes Swap Party; and
• Book Club

Events are created by accessing the Calendar in-game and dragging events onto the calendar itself. Now, here’s the unique caveat with event nights. Certain event nights will have customers looking for specific items. For example, the Book Club will want to see more books in stock and the Easy Meal Club wants to see kitchen wares available for purchase.

I believe that we’ve touched on everything, so let’s dive into my thoughts.

The Good

Cute & Vibrant Designs

Thrifty Business truly does provide vibrant designs for the artistically-minded, given the large palette of options for colors and designs. Coupled with the Stamp Cards, you could constantly re-arrange and re-design your shop any number of times. Or, design specific areas of your store to fit the aesthetic you’re looking for with that theme.

Relaxing Gameplay

The gameplay itself is non-consequential in every sense of the world. There are no penalties for not cashing out customers right away. Wanna leave your shop looking like the aftermath of a concert? You can do that, sans judgement! Heck – there’s a Steam achievement for it!

That being said – Thrifty Business is very much aiming for that contingent of gamers that want gameplay with no negative repercussions. And after a long day sometimes at work, I appreciate that.

Interesting Characters

The various individuals you interact with in the game all feel like…very real people. They have hopes, dreams, fears, preferences, and desires. And in a shop management game, this is outside of the norm, if I’ll be honest. But that’s a good thing! I actually have some vested interest in the various folks who come by on a day-to-day basis.

Inclusive World

Thrifty Business makes a point to ensure inclusivity in the game. You have the option to pick your pronouns, and there are a wide variety of characters from all walks of life within the world of the game. This should come as no surprise, as Spellgarden Games is both a queer and female-led game studio, and I applaud them for including these facets within the world.

The Bad

Relaxing Gameplay…that Stagnates Fast

So, while I did enjoy Thrifty Business, the relaxing gameplay does, unfortunately, stagnate very quickly. The days kind of all become the same routine of buying boxes, unpacking boxes, opening the shop, cashing out customers and cleaning up garbage (if you feel like it). This becomes even more apparent once you have exhausted every characters’ “arc” and obtained a picture of them for your collection. Then it just becomes…grinding for the sake of grinding and unlocking more customizable decor. But this leads me to my next point.

No Consequences = Does It Matter?

Maybe this is a me thing and it very well could be. But because there are zero consequences for not cleaning up trash or designing your shop a certain way, it begs the question why bother? If my customers don’t seem to mind the trash and the only reason I pick up trash is to gain Community Points for more decor that doesn’t impact the actual gameplay…you see where I’m going with this.

It might be me and if you have the drive to really design your shop a specific way, then this game exceeds in that area. But if there isn’t a reason to do so, you might turn into me and just start putting items wherever in the shop just to unpack them.

Along this line of thought, it would have been nice to see some level of point of including more common items together. Maybe it slightly boosts their prices? Maybe having so many similar items together prompts customers to buy more of that item type? I don’t know, but it’s missing something.

The Overall

If you are looking for a cozy, no-consequence shop management game that features a robust amount of customizability in terms of decorations, then I highly recommend Thrifty Business. But if you are looking for something deeper, in terms of strategy, then…I might suggest looking elsewhere. That isn’t to fault the game – it just provides a very calm, surface level of gameplay with some interesting character stories. You might need to strategize. You won’t need to optimize. You’ll just play. And I enjoyed it for a time. But after a certain point, I found myself wondering “When is this going to wrap up?”

Thrifty Business is available today on Steam and is currently listed (as of May 18th, 2026) for $11.69 (a 10% discount for the normal price of $12.99).

Gamer Social Club was provided an early access copy of this game for the purposes of this review. This review was played on PC (Steam).