Interactive Entertainment Merchants Association

The Interactive Entertainment Merchants Association (IEMA) was a United States-based non-profit organization dedicated to serving the business interests of leading retailers that sell Interactive entertainment software (including video games, multimedia entertainment, peripherals and other software). Member companies of the IEMA collectively accounted for approximately seventy-five percent of the $10 billion annual interactive entertainment business in the United States. The association was established in 1997 by Hal Halpin, its president and founder, and counts among its member companies the largest retailers of games including Walmart, Target Corporation, Blockbuster Entertainment and Circuit City. The IEMA also sponsored an important annual trade show in the promotion of the business of the video game industry called the "Executive Summit".

In April 2006, the Interactive Entertainment Merchants Association merged with the Video Software Dealers Association to form the Entertainment Merchants Association (EMA).

The IEMA was largely responsible for the acceptance and industry wide adoption of the self-regulatory ESRB ratings system, having endorsed it and subsequently required software publishers to rate all games in order to have their product sold on store shelves. The IEMA had also worked with parallel trade groups in the business including the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) in defeating laws that would prohibit the sale of Mature-rated games to minors. The group instead voluntarily committed to carding policies and procedures, requiring Government-issued photo identification, for all M-rated games - in much the same way that movie theatres voluntarily ask for ID for admittance to R-rated movies.

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