Like many folks, I like to go to stores like GameStop and trade in games I’m tired of in order to get credit toward new games. And for many years, GameStop has also dealt in and accepted DVDs and Blu-Ray DVDs.

That came to a halt this weekend as I brought in a couple copies of Mamma Mia! to get rid of, and was confronted by a raw recruit of an employee who looked at me blankly and said, “What are these for?”

“Trade ins,” I told him.

He turned to a more experienced co-worker. “Do we do trade-ins on movies?” he asked. His co-worker turned to me and told me they’d finally discontinued the movie trade-ins.

Why stores hire new people so close to the holidays rather than shipping them off to Las Vegas Nevada until after the Christmas rush is beyond me.