Back again with a cozy game, and instead of a game about cleaning, I played a game about running a thrift store in a small town.

This week is the Thrifty Business demo!

Thrifty Business is a cozy management game from Spellgarden Games. The game is going to be released for the PC sometime in 2026!

Instead of running my own online business selling stickers and such like in Sticky Business, you take the reins in running your own 90s-themed thrift store. Bought from a woman who is obviously out of a movie that I for sure have seen before.

She just wants to move to England

Story aside, Thrifty Business is all about loosely managing your own store. You will place furniture and buy items online, through your purple flip phone, that match the brand of the thrift store you want to run.

In the style of Unpacking, items come in boxes, and you have to place them to your heart’s content. There is a lot of stuff that can come in packages. If you want to be a stuffed animal and backpack store, then you can do that, and if you want to just sell kitchen and basic decorations, THEN YOU CAN DO THAT TOO.

When you are done situating everything the way you like, you can open the store and watch the adorable people waddle in. Customers walk in with their colorful attire that matches the energy of the art design of the game, ponder the items on the shelf, and when they find something they like, their faces light up, and you take their money. A nice little jazzy bit plays out until everyone leaves the store, and rinse and repeat until the day is over.

Get a rundown of everything you sold for the day to gauge interest in items, sleep it off, then go back to buy and shelve items.

Small upgrades are the name of the game in Thrifty Business. Ordering items and fulfilling requests reward the player with points to purchase upgrades for the furniture of the theme that they want to go for. I personally just purchased random upgrades and was met with 3 different kinds of shelves and clothing racks, which helped me in absolutely no way.

Make enough money and you can expand the store to hold even more toys, candlesticks, and kitchen equipment.

Thrifty Business is a game I can see myself playing when I just want to unwind and hang out on my couch with my Steam Deck. The gameplay loop in the demo has to enough to keep me hooked. I love games like Unpacking and the store management aspect like in Moonlighter, so I cannot wait to play Thrifty Business