Right now we're trying our best to close the current store (Puff N' Stuff Gifts and Novelty) to make room for arcade cabinets. Once the floor is cleared, I'll try my best to take some "before" pics before the "after" starts.
as for the 50¢ dilema, I recently answered a email with this concern. Let me copy/paste my response:
50¢, Really ? Isn't that kinda steep ?:
Trust me, if there was any other way, we would make all of our games 25¢ per play, but because of current economics, we can't. To be clear, It's not a We Won't , it's a We Can't situation. Because of our opening budget, we will be opening with 20 games, expanding with 1 or 2 new game purchases per month. I hope by our 30-35th game purchase, we will be able to lower down the price to 25¢ per game. Also even though most games will be 50¢, we do plan to only charge 25¢ for fighting games and "Continue ?" platform games (Ex: Ghost and Goblins, Dragon's Lair, Simpsons, etc.).
I hope this sets your mind at ease. We're not trying to make a fortune. Just trying to make enough to keep the lights on, pay the bills, and have a entertaining atmosphere for fellow gamers to hang out.
As for a Barcade idea, we're right next door to Bryant Lake Bowl, which is more of a full funtioning bar with eight 100+ year old lanes in the back. Theres no need to compete, plus becase of zoning we can't searve alcohol (It's complicated). On the weekends they're jam packed full of people, which love to come in to play our games.
While we were a gift shop, we get alot of decent foot traffic from Bryant Lake Bowl in the evening and the regulars (collage kids) are very excited about a arcade opening up.
On our other side of our shop is Jackson's coffee and Gelato, which is full of parents and kids that love to come in to our shop to play our Defender, Donkey Kong, and Donkey Kong Jr. Machines, which currently bring in around $120 total a month, at 25¢ a play.
We talked about pricing with regular gamers that coming in (Flat rates, quaters vs. tokens, 25¢ vs. 50¢, etc.) and we feel that 50¢ is very reasonible for most games and only charging 25¢ for true quarter eaters (Defender), Fighting games (Street Fighter) and obsure games (Congo Bongo)... Then when we get 30-35 games, we'll open up the books and see what we can do with making all the games 25¢.
I'm hoping that we will be able to draw in more of the bryant lake nightlife, kids in the weekend mornings, and offer privite party packages for birthdays and events. Also as a ordained Minister, I could preform Weddings at Rusty Quarters... I don't know if anyone would want to get married at a arcade, but I think it might be something that might get us some free press in a local newspaper.
Bottom line, My wife and I want to give it a go. We did some research and asked around... Brought in some of my personal games to see how they would do /see if there was any interest (People are REALLY EXCITED!) and all we have got is positive feedback with step 1 and going on to step 2. We're going on 2 years on a 5 year lease on the retail space so we gotta try something. I really think we'll do ok... and then after our lease is up, we'll think about looking for a larger space or a closed tavern space to explore a Barcade idea, but for right now we're give Rusty Quarters a shot.
Once again, thanks for the input guys. Any more comments or suggestions (good or bad) are greatly appreciated.
Sincerely,
Sage James Spirtos
Rusty Quarters Retro Arcade & Museum