Welcome to the Pink Controller!

We are so excited that you're taking time to learn about us and the next steps in this quest.

I'd like you to take you on a journey to the not so distant past. When women gamers were considered unicorns, or beautiful set dressing for games and gaming events. I spent a great deal of my young life, gaming in private or hiding the fact that I was a gamer. This was so I could fit in with other women, who thought gaming was an oddity or knowing anything technical was a guy thing. There was no coveted title of 'Gamer' or 'Geek' when I started out. I can remember vividly looking for work while going to college, and spending my downtime, in what would become Game Stop. I laid waste to all who dared to challenge me at Tekken, all while wearing a designer suit and I LOVED it. I wanted badly to be part of the industry, but couldn't figure out how, or where to go.

My love affair with games started long before I ever set foot in a college, but I can say without any guilt that I bought a console before I ever purchased a stick of furniture for my first apartment. Though no one ever told me gaming was a bad thing or a guy thing, I always got the impression it wasn't for me. From seeing women displayed nearly naked on the cover of gaming magazines and boxes, and later websites, even later seeing them pass me on the E3 Show floor, I always felt that nothing was ever aimed at me as a female gamer. In 2003 I decided to do something about that and created a website called Gameinatrix.com. The goal was to create a space where women could come and talk about games together and find others to play games with and fully be their gamer selves. It was a wonderful ride that led me to the small team that now help run The Pink Controller and it's podcast, Gamer Girls Radio after we lost Gameinatrix.com a few years ago. I would not have been able to continue without my party, as any gamer who's ever played an RPG, would tell you.

Life intervened a few years ago and the domain is now owned by a squatter, but another idea born over late night gaming sessions between Master Blaster and me back in 2006, was waiting to grow. We'd wanted to go further than just talking about games, reporting gamer news, and doing reviews. We wanted to go bigger. What if we could create a store for women gamers and geeks that wasn't just underwear and bras with Pokeballs on them? What if we could hand pick cool things that women gamers would love to wear? Not just to events, but every day and everywhere, even if they didn't work in the gaming industry.

What if we could give back to the female gamer community by sponsoring women led events and organizations because no one does? We couldn't do this in 2006 when we bought the domain name. But we could now. After seeing a game industry professional and friend lament that she could find nothing to wear to a conference that said Proud Geek and was still professional, I knew it was fate calling and ThePinkController.com was fully born.

When I started Gameinatrix.com, one thing women gamers always hated was being given was a pink game controller by the guys to play with. We took the name, hoping we could turn it into a powerful symbol for women geeks and gamers everywhere, not unlike the hats donned by the women in the Women's March. All of our apparel, jewelry, and cosplay is handpicked by us. Not because it's sexy, not because a man thought his girlfriend or friend would look hot in it, but because it's what we'd wear. It's what we love and hope you'll love too. It is as our motto states here ‘We make geek look good.'

We hope you'll love what we pick out and feel free to shoot us an email or comment on our Facebook or Instagram to let us know! Follow us on Twitter to see when we add awesome new merch! If you don't see something you like, let us know, we'd be happy to see what we can find for you! And yes some of it is customizable! We never try to sell you a guys shirt and tell you to get a bigger size if you happen to be more endowed in the chest area. We personally have had enough of wearing men's clothes disguised as women's clothes (unless you like wearing Menswear, in which case, rock it, we don't judge). We believe you should be comfortable and happy with your garments and they should be made for and fit you.

As you'll see with our blog, we still talk about games and still geek out over comic books, movies and all that is geek cool in between. We'd just like to take you along for the ride this time. So, LFG?