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Ixian
Oct 09, 2001

Ex-Sweathog.

Ixian posted:

Some of you may remember, way back in the early days of 2003, I did a series of posts about starting a LAN gaming center, and kept them updated once a year for several years. I'd like to share some of those old posts with you but apparently I am too stupid to be able to find them in the archives (I do have access) so we'll have to go by memory, unless someone else can figure it out. To sum them up:

Early 2003 I start a LAN gaming center in Arvada, Colorado, just north of Denver.
By the end of 2003 it has already been more successful than my wildest dreams could have imagined. Our biggest problem is crowd control and loitering.
By mid 2004 several local entrepreneurs approach my partners and I about setting up their own centers. We work out a deal where we help them set up, they use our brand name, and we begin building a grand gaming empire in the Denver area, eventually growing to 5 stores, although only the Arvada store is really my own.
By 2006 some of the centers start to fail, for some of the reasons below. By 2007 all will be gone, except mine, in Arvada. They weren't the only ones - with one exception, every single center I knew of in the greater Denver area failed after time. We're literally back where we started, us and one other center 8 miles away.

That's an awfully short recap of what was really an extraordinary amount of fun, drama, stress, triumphs, and failures but it is what it is.

Update! Radnor is smarter than I am and found the threads:



In any case, it's been close to 7 years - March, 2010 marks the 7th, in fact - and it's had it's ups, and it's downs. Certainly it's lasted longer than many a center I can think of, and with a little luck will keep on trucking - more on that later.

In fact, I can't even count the number of these things that have started and failed in the time we've been around. It's got to be at least 30, and that's the ones I personally know of. LAN Centers are one of those concepts that sounds really cool, and are surprisingly easy to set up, and just as easy to gently caress up. Some just peter out. Some fail in truly epic ways. All of them fail for the same reasons though - they got it wrong. "It" is the secret sauce, the magic mix, whatever you want to call it, it's the thing that brings the right group of customers in, and keeps that group happy, and growing, and keeps the wrong mix out.

If I've learned one thing in all this time, it's that technology has very little to do with it. Everyone, especially these days, has a fast internet connection. PC's are now in some ways so ridiculously overpowered that you can buy one for next to nothing that will play most modern games without a problem. And piracy has so overwhelmed the PC gaming scene that your average gamer can, without much effort (or technical skill) get any game they want, free. Trying to design a center around those things - the fastest internet, the best video cards, the slickest keyboards, the latest games, whatever - just enters you, unknowingly, in to a losing battle with time. You will never, ever keep up.

People come to play in LAN centers - at least my LAN center - for the same reason people go to bars, even though it's 10 times cheaper to buy your own booze and drink at home: Because they want to hang out with their buddies. Because they want to get away, from the lovely apartment they live in, from mom, their girlfriends, roommates, whatever. If you think about it there really aren't that many places to get away to after work and/or school every day. Lots of people go to bars, or they join a bowling league, or take up an improv class, or whatever. Gamers go to LAN centers. They may even have the game they like to play at home, in fact they probably do, but it doesn't matter. We're cheap, we're open, and their friends are there, or at least people they can make friends with.

That's why we're still around, having figured that out from the get go. It takes a lot of work, though - just like your neighborhood bar, it only takes a few bad seeds to set off the wrong vibe and next thing you know, your regulars aren't coming in any more because "that guy" is there, and "that guy" isn't spending a whole lot of money. Or you can have an rear end in a top hat decide to covertly use your place to meet people to sell weed too, and next thing you know half the parents in your area are banning their kids from going to the store....they find out, they always find it, all it takes is one to hear about it from their kid and the next day the entire block knows - they'll never tell you directly, either. It's not a "problem" you "solve", in other words - it's a constant process, every day, paying attention to who your customers are and what they want. It's a big job, every single day, and if you gently caress it up, you'll end up like all the rest.

When it's good, it's great. When it's bad, it's bad. Running a small business is hard enough. One thing I've never figured out in all this time is why some guys (it's always guys) start centers apparently believing the rules of running a small business don't apply to them. You have to know your customers, your market, your marketing, your back office operations, your accounting, your competition, everything.

In any case, it's been fun, and I'm more than willing to answer any questions you all might have about it, but I should get to the real purpose of this post: I'm looking for help, local help, in the Arvada, Colorado area.

Not an employee; I have those. Here's the situation: in late 2005 I moved to Austin, Texas, due to my wife needing to care for a family member. That worked out just fine; I love Austin, and I now run Operations and IT for a software company here, but it means I can only manage what can be managed remotely. For the last 4 years I've had a partner and a manager who were great - the best years the store had was 2007 and 2008, in fact - so it hasn't been much of a problem, until now. My partner has gotten increasing busy with his own concerns and is getting out, and my manager finished college and has moved on to bigger and better things. These leaves me with 3 regular employees - kids, really - and me trying to manage them long distance.

Needless to say, that isn't working out to well. Business has suffered and foot traffic has dropped off precipitately - there's no guesswork involved here, I know exactly when it started and why. The last couple of months I've seen a lot of things go wrong or just not get done. This is to be expected; I don't pay a whole lot, they are surrounded by games, and there's no one there to manage them day to day.

I could search around for another manager, but a manager is just another employee, and that's not really what I need. I'll just end up having to manage them, remotely, and failing at it. What I need is a local partner, someone who is A)a responsible adult and B) not a moron who C)wants to learn how to run and manage a small business. I can't pay a whole lot, salary wise, but I can offer a sizable revenue split - i.e. the more money the store makes, the more you get paid. If the store doesn't make anything or loses money, you get very little. If it does well, you do well. In other words, like owning your own business works, minus the downside - the liabilities (debts) I hold are mine alone, no one new has to assume them, and the worst thing that could happen is if the store fails you have to find something else to do - which trust me, is far from the worst that actually would happen if that occurs.

So here's the pitch: If you, or someone you know, is interested in helping out full time, basically taking on the reigns of a successful small business, and you can genuinely commit to this, let me know. I'm not asking for money/investment - money isn't the real problem, I can get money, but not without a plan for the store to improve. What I'm really asking for, and what really is at risk here for anyone considering it, is time. You'll need to be at the store, a lot, almost every day. You'll need to be a people person who can deal with customers (young and old, and their parents). You'll need to be driven by a desire to constantly improve whatever it is you are doing. I can help a great deal, and lend my experience whenever needed, but in the end if you do this, you'll be the one in charge, day in, day out. For the right person, this could be a fantastic chance to learn some things most people never get figure out about running a business. Having this on a resume is, I can personally guarantee, a big deal - I can tell you the fact that I started and run my own business was far more of a big deal to the company I work for now than my college degree or years in the business.

As I said, I can't offer a lot of money salary-wise - in fact, I can't offer much of anything beyond a small hourly wage - so if you are looking for a 9 to 5 with a steady paycheck and benefits, this isn't for you (neither is any small business, for that matter). There is a real potential to earn a lot more than that, of course, but that is going to be up to you (and me, to a lessor extent). The risk is your time - you could put a lot of it in, the store could not improve back to where it was, and you won't end up with a whole lot out of it. The upside is you could get it running right and end up with quite a bit, and the experience to go with it.

Interested? Have other questions? Let me know, PM me or ask for my personal email, I'll be happy to talk with any serious request from there.

Ixian fucked around with this message at Nov 07, 2009 around 14:34

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Kessel
Mar 06, 2007



While I'd like to hear more about running a game centre, I wouldn't pick my next manager from a pool of goons.

Ixian
Oct 09, 2001

Ex-Sweathog.

Kessel posted:

While I'd like to hear more about running a game centre, I wouldn't pick my next manager from a pool of goons.

As many different kinds of goons as there are people - well, mostly. Some retards, sure, but some genuinely good people too. I figure there's a better pool here than, for example, Craigslist.

Plus I've been here a long time so I more or less know what I'm getting in to by asking.

Maybe.

Kin
Nov 04, 2003

Sometimes in a city this dirty, you need a real hero.

I've got a business and marketing degree, a bit of exprerience and i like games. I live in the UK though . Migrate your business to the UK and i will work for you here!

FuSchnick
Jun 06, 2001

Scruffy's gonna die the way he lived...

I'm interested in hearing stories about how the other locations eventually failed. Where there any specifics, or was it just a matter of not adhering to the general problems you mention in the OP?

Brother Larry
Dec 11, 2000
I have naked pictures of my girlfriend but I'm too whipped to share them with you.

If I was single and could move anywhere and salary didn't matter, I'd jump on this. I've been learning about and planning on starting a business for years now, and this seems like it would be great experience to do hands on, and you sound like a decent guy to work for. Sadly I'm not in a position to do something crazy.

The game centers I've seen fail happened largely due to having regular tournaments to attract highly competitive but flaky douchebags with prizes and cash, ignoring the mostly casual crowd who I saw bringing in more money. The end result was that the douchebags scared everyone away by being super competitive, and once they had their cash money and free poo poo, never showed up again.

You mention in the OP that you have to know who to keep and who to let go, how did you get rid of someone who was causing problems?

Ixian
Oct 09, 2001

Ex-Sweathog.

Brother Larry posted:

If I was single and could move anywhere and salary didn't matter, I'd jump on this. I've been learning about and planning on starting a business for years now, and this seems like it would be great experience to do hands on, and you sound like a decent guy to work for. Sadly I'm not in a position to do something crazy.

The game centers I've seen fail happened largely due to having regular tournaments to attract highly competitive but flaky douchebags with prizes and cash, ignoring the mostly casual crowd who I saw bringing in more money. The end result was that the douchebags scared everyone away by being super competitive, and once they had their cash money and free poo poo, never showed up again.

You mention in the OP that you have to know who to keep and who to let go, how did you get rid of someone who was causing problems?

Part of it is just how you, the owner(s) carry yourself, and how often you are there. I noticed a market difference in the types of customers we got after I left, for example, and it took some time to adjust to that.

You are right about the super-competitive guys - we saw that a lot with Counterstrike. In fact at one point I banned CS in the store (I made a thread about that too, wish I could find it, around March 2004). That hurt more than it helped but yeah, you get the guys where all they do is play CS, ADD-style, and talk major trash while doing it, and pretty soon you get a lot of regular customers who don't want to play with them. And in the meantime you have the CS-Elites, all of whom are convinced they are MBA candidates who have your business figured out, asking for tons of free poo poo, like they are star athletes who attract a crowd.

Easiest way is to really pay attention to what works, what games attract what people, and work from there. You have to collect stats - a lot of stats - and look at trends, etc. It's no different from any other business, only in the case of LAN centers most owners never figure that part out. I have stats going back to when we opened on what games get played and how much, what times of day are busier than others, what days of the week, what months, ages of players, everything. I study that stuff like it was sent down from the mountain and adjust from there. It's a lot of work, and no one can "teach" it to you, beyond the basics - I learned through a whole lot of trial and error.

treat
Jul 24, 2008


Did you mention the name of your place? I don't know if it was one of your brand name centers, but I went to one out in Englewood - somewhere around Broadway and Dartmouth - a couple of times in early 2006. I was making peanuts at the time and didn't have my own rig, so we went down there for some $20/12 hour all night deal to play Steam games with each other.

Ixian posted:

People come to play in LAN centers - at least my LAN center - for the same reason people go to bars, even though it's 10 times cheaper to buy your own booze and drink at home: Because they want to hang out with their buddies. Because they want to get away, from the lovely apartment they live in, from mom, their girlfriends, roommates, whatever. If you think about it there really aren't that many places to get away to after work and/or school every day. Lots of people go to bars, or they join a bowling league, or take up an improv class, or whatever. Gamers go to LAN centers. They may even have the game they like to play at home, in fact they probably do, but it doesn't matter. We're cheap, we're open, and their friends are there, or at least people they can make friends with.

This really struck a chord with me because from my experience, it really is just like a bar. It's loud, smells awful, everything's sticky and people are puking from drinking too much of something they shouldn't have.

The place was full to the brim of 10 to 13 year olds playing WoW and Warcraft 3, spilling 2 liters of mountain dew on everything and a few 30-something year olds in the corner by themselves eating entire store bought chickens and doing the same thing.

Pulling the clerk away from grinding his WoW character long enough to open ports or install specific steam games on computers lacking them was a pain in the rear end and we spent most of those 12 hours just trying to get the games people didn't play to work with our limited access to the PC's.

One friend went down the street, rented some 360 game and played it on the single xbox they had in order to get some value out of his $20. I went to sleep on the couch among screaming kids demanding their turn at the game he had rented. I'm neither surprised nor remorseful about that place going under, as I'm sure it did.

In their defense, I did go to the hole in the wall bar next door for a drink only to witness some redneck bar brawl break out, and blamed the hell on earth that was both of these establishments on human nature in general.

I'm sure you've got plenty of great stories of incredibly lovely nerds loving things up. That's the kind of thing I want to hear.

treat fucked around with this message at Nov 06, 2009 around 22:20

apekillape
Jan 23, 2009


I'll totally do it, but I'd have to move to Denver Arvada. You pay enough for a small crappy apartment in Denver Arvada?

(I'm not joking in the slightest. I've got a grown-up resume and everything.)

apekillape fucked around with this message at Nov 06, 2009 around 22:35

Brother Larry
Dec 11, 2000
I have naked pictures of my girlfriend but I'm too whipped to share them with you.

Ixian posted:

Part of it is just how you, the owner(s) carry yourself, and how often you are there. I noticed a market difference in the types of customers we got after I left, for example, and it took some time to adjust to that.

You are right about the super-competitive guys - we saw that a lot with Counterstrike. In fact at one point I banned CS in the store (I made a thread about that too, wish I could find it, around March 2004). That hurt more than it helped but yeah, you get the guys where all they do is play CS, ADD-style, and talk major trash while doing it, and pretty soon you get a lot of regular customers who don't want to play with them. And in the meantime you have the CS-Elites, all of whom are convinced they are MBA candidates who have your business figured out, asking for tons of free poo poo, like they are star athletes who attract a crowd.

Easiest way is to really pay attention to what works, what games attract what people, and work from there. You have to collect stats - a lot of stats - and look at trends, etc. It's no different from any other business, only in the case of LAN centers most owners never figure that part out. I have stats going back to when we opened on what games get played and how much, what times of day are busier than others, what days of the week, what months, ages of players, everything. I study that stuff like it was sent down from the mountain and adjust from there. It's a lot of work, and no one can "teach" it to you, beyond the basics - I learned through a whole lot of trial and error.

The Counter-Strike comment is exactly dead on. That game chased me away from one of them with the exact kind of people you mention, and as far as I heard, it never really recovered and closed eventually. I've found from experience that usually the quiet wheels need attention too, like the cube farm folks.

I'm curious about your statistical data - how do you track and manage that? Do you have anything fancy like an .exe tracker that talks to a PoS to get personal customer history into a database, or do you eye it all and roll with intuition? If you just eye it, how do you track it, like Excel or something?

Thanks for answering questions

Ixian
Oct 09, 2001

Ex-Sweathog.

apekillape posted:

I'll totally do it, but I'd have to move to Denver Arvada. You pay enough for a small crappy apartment in Denver Arvada?

(I'm not joking in the slightest. I've got a grown-up resume and everything.)

Yes and no.

No, in terms of hourly wage, it's not far above minimum. It isn't a salaried position by any stretch of the imagination.

Yes, in that if the store can be brought back to it's early 2009/2008 revenue levels you can make considerably more than a crappy Arvada lifestyle would cost you.

I won't sugar coat it though, it's a risk. A risk of your time only, sure, but a risk nonetheless. It'd be better suited to someone already there but I'm open to ideas.

treat posted:

Did you mention the name of your place? I don't know if it was one of your brand name centers, but I went to one out in Englewood - somewhere around Broadway and Dartmouth - a couple of times in early 2006. I was making peanuts at the time and didn't have my own rig, so we went down there for some $20/12 hour all night deal to play Steam games with each other.


It's called Maximumgamer, http://www.maximumgamer.com is the website - and it's a nicer site than the store probably deserves at the moment We were never down in South Denver, but I am pretty sure I know the place you are talking about - it's gone.

Brother Larry posted:


I'm curious about your statistical data - how do you track and manage that? Do you have anything fancy like an .exe tracker that talks to a PoS to get personal customer history into a database, or do you eye it all and roll with intuition? If you just eye it, how do you track it, like Excel or something?

Thanks for answering questions

I use Smartlaunch, which is software designed for game centers. It collects just about everything ever done in to it's database.

Their reporting software sucks, but luckily databases and writing custom reports is something I am good at, so I have a web interface I wrote years ago that pulls whatever details I need. Everything is done through a client on the PC's, and Smartlaunch tracks everything done via the client. The result is a ton of statistics that, over time, really help explain what is going on.

Ringo Star Get
Sep 18, 2006

GET OUT OF MY FUCKING WAY


Seeing that you have to have a shitload of PC hardware, do you have relationships with companies to sell you their stuff in bulk or is it something that you just hop online and just buy via Amazon?

I can only imagine how many keyboards and mice you go through.

Ixian
Oct 09, 2001

Ex-Sweathog.

Ringo Star Get posted:

Seeing that you have to have a shitload of PC hardware, do you have relationships with companies to sell you their stuff in bulk or is it something that you just hop online and just buy via Amazon?

I can only imagine how many keyboards and mice you go through.

I have a lot, but not enough to really qualify as "bulk", believe it or not. Most stuff is just Amazon (I have a Prime membership, so free shipping) or Newegg.com.

Occasionally we'll get free stuff from companies looking to push products, but it's been a while. Last time was Ideazone with their ZBoard gaming keyboards. They were nice, but not up to the stress of a LAN gaming center. That was at least two years ago - the economy hit everyone hard.

My rule for keyboards and mice is to buy cheap and buy often. Customers who actually give a poo poo usually bring in their own anyway.

GaryLeeLoveBuckets
May 08, 2009


I would really like to hear the epic failure stories of gaming centers please.

The bar analogy is spot on and applies to comic/boardgame/card game stores as well, as I've seen smaller stores thrive only because of the atmosphere. A LAN center closed here a few years ago that I went to a couple of times, mostly because of the elitist attitude you mention. Every time I'd walk in, they'd try to sell me a $600 video card or a 1337 Gaming Chair with built in speakers. The place turned into ZOMG HALO/CS WEEKEND COME PWN NOOBS, filled with bros from the local uni trash talking 12 year olds.

But yes, please tell us about spectacular failures.

J
Jun 10, 2001



Got any tips, tactics, stories about getting the undesirables out of the store and keeping them out? It seems like there would be a LOT of people that would go to a LAN center that fit the negative stereotypes that have been posted here so far, and turning away that many of them but still being the best business decision is interesting to me. I always enjoyed your threads about the LAN center from years past and it's nice to see an update this many years later.

Sieg
Sep 28, 2009


I worked at a LAN center in college, and had a really good time doing it. In addition to my meager wages, I could come in and game anytime I wanted.

It was successful, but after about two years the owner decided to turn the place into a big party center after hours for his friends and their friends (we closed at 2 AM). They would totally trash the place, spill beer on everything, smoke, and we would be left with a total mess to clean up when we came in to open at 11 AM.

I walked out after four weeks of not getting paid.

Place closed about three to four months later.

I have often thought about opening my own LAN center, but instead I went into computer programming. Still some fond memories though.

Ixian
Oct 09, 2001

Ex-Sweathog.

Usually with LAN centers you end up with one of two scenarios:

One is the absentee owner. This, sadly, is what I am in right now, by the way, and what I'm trying to correct. Personality drives this business and if the guy who actually owns it, or really anyone who is not connected other than "I get paid $8/hour to be here), isn't there, you've got problems. You don't see too many of these anymore.

Two, far more common, is the maladjusted MMO owner. You tend to see this a lot - the guy who runs the place (and, usually, the kids that work for him) are serious WoW/EQ/Pick one MMO addicts, and when you walk in they are sitting behind the counter - usually located in the back, where they are less likely to be bothered - running Raids or whatever. They can hardly be bothered to help you and when they do you get serious attitude, the same grumbling they'd give Mom if she walked in their room at home and made them take out the trash. You tend to see this a lot, because a surprising number of owners are guys who got some money somehow (maybe their 401k from some crappy IT job, maybe mom and dad, never really figured it out to be honest but it doesn't take much to open a very basic store) and decided there'd be nothing finer in the world then to own a store where they could play their Night Elf all day long. Sometimes these can last a surprisingly long time, but never successfully.

Those are garden variety failures. The epic ones all involve some guy - usually more than one - who somehow managed to get their hands on a truly astonishing amount of money, and sunk it all in to the center. Folks, if you put a half million dollars in to a center I am here to tell you you probably aren't gonna get it back.

The biggest I know of personally was right here in Austin, Texas. I can't remember the name of the place but it was a branch of an existing store in Buffalo, NY. This guy spent an epic amount of cash - the place was close to 6,000 square feet, had several private rooms, custom racks for PC's, rigging for lightshows, a full hot food bar, you name it. He even paid to have the roof reinforced so it could support the two new 10 ton A/C units he brought in. I mean, this place was like a LAN gaming center fantasy - any "that would be cool" idea you could think of, he paid for. He even had a custom built private office in the back with a one-way glass window so he could sit back there and play games while watching over his empire. It was glorious, and looked cool as hell.

It was also an enormous expense. I found out about it after searching for centers in Austin (at the time, I was considering opening one here) and finding it - empty. A few weeks before the guy had packed up, left everything in the store, and moved back to Buffalo, declaring bankruptcy along the way. He had gotten a bank loan for a lot of the equipment - Frost Bank, back in 2005/2006 it was stupid easy to get a business loan, just like it was with mortgages - and the bank had come in and repo'd all the gear for later auction, but the setup was still in there, just minus the PC's, monitors, and chairs. The landlords immediately put me in touch with the bank, but I ended up passing on the auction, as they weren't interested in a good "winner takes all" deal and instead sold everything piece by piece, probably for far less than it cost.

The shopping center owners also offered me a deal to move in and take it over for literally half the rent - they were super desperate - but unfortunately, half was still over $6,000 a month. That's right, this guy paid over 12k a month in rent alone. His total expenses, with employees (he had 3 working at any given time), inventory, and all the rest had to be well over $20,000 a month. If it had been 3k, I might have gone for it - I mean, the place was already set up, the network cables already run, all it needed was chairs and PC's. Even the grill, triple sink, and grease pit were there, and it was licensed by the health department for the rest of the year. I'm glad I didn't do it though.

Now, when you consider that the very best LAN centers I've seen in 7 years, including my own, don't even gross 20k during their very best months - and that's when they are super busy, hitting all the right moves - you can imagine what this guys life was like. I bet he grossed maybe 10k a month at best, and he held out for a year. Not only did he lose that much a month just keeping it open, he didn't make a dent in the huge amount of money it cost to open the center in the first place. I can't imagine even now what he has to deal with.

There was another one in California that bought out an old movie theater and spent something like a million bucks to open that was even bigger. There's a nice market for this business, but it's very local. People aren't gonna drive 20+ miles to go to your store; mostly you'll get people in 3 or 4 mile radius. Unbelievable how much money went down the drain with those guys.

Ringo Star Get
Sep 18, 2006

GET OUT OF MY FUCKING WAY


I'd always assume its location, location, location. How did you go about finding the right place?

P.S. - This thread is awesome because I've only been to one LAN center and it was pretty much some dude's basement but it was fun as hell.

Ixian
Oct 09, 2001

Ex-Sweathog.

Ringo Star Get posted:

I'd always assume its location, location, location. How did you go about finding the right place?

P.S. - This thread is awesome because I've only been to one LAN center and it was pretty much some dude's basement but it was fun as hell.

Luck. We almost ended up in another space - the one I liked, ironically - but we got a last minute deal in a shopping center right across the street from a high school, in the middle of suburbia. You are correct, that fact made things a lot easier when we started.

AbsoluteLlama
Aug 15, 2009


This is very interesting. I've thought about starting something like this here, but was discouraged by a friend's experience with starting a TG shop (basically, his partner scared away all the customers). It seems like a business such as this is successful purely on its reputation.

I would actually think LAN centers could possibly become more popular in the last couple of years. LAN parties are pretty much non-existent now since it's next-to-impossible to get games to work without an internet connection blah blah blah. A LAN center wouldn't have these problems (or so I think). Anyways, the University in town setup their own student gaming lounge last year, and it's free (or well, included in tuition i guess), and actually well run, so I'd pretty much be out-gunned starting something like that in town.

How do you get rid of the CS asshats, or, generally the types that only come for competitions and not for fun or take part of the community. Also.. what about 'creepy' types. One thing the local gaming club did at the last LAN I thought was pretty cool was have genre specific tournaments instead of a specific game. So the fighting tournament consisted of half a dozen or so fighting games. It seemed to make the tourny more interesting, and level the playing field so somebody can't just play Soul Caliber for 25 hours a day and sperg out at the tourny.

apekillape
Jan 23, 2009


Ixian posted:

Yes and no.

No, in terms of hourly wage, it's not far above minimum. It isn't a salaried position by any stretch of the imagination.

Yes, in that if the store can be brought back to it's early 2009/2008 revenue levels you can make considerably more than a crappy Arvada lifestyle would cost you.

I won't sugar coat it though, it's a risk. A risk of your time only, sure, but a risk nonetheless. It'd be better suited to someone already there but I'm open to ideas.

That's a perfectly reasonable wager, I wasn't doing anything important with it anyway.

Is there an e-mail address I should send some info to? You have anything in particular you want to know I should include in the process of selling myself? I've got some ideas, I figure I'll just throw the lot at you.

apekillape fucked around with this message at Nov 07, 2009 around 04:31

Quickpull
Mar 01, 2003

We're all mad here.

Ixian posted:

Yes and no.

No, in terms of hourly wage, it's not far above minimum. It isn't a salaried position by any stretch of the imagination.

Yes, in that if the store can be brought back to it's early 2009/2008 revenue levels you can make considerably more than a crappy Arvada lifestyle would cost you.

I won't sugar coat it though, it's a risk. A risk of your time only, sure, but a risk nonetheless. It'd be better suited to someone already there but I'm open to ideas.

To be honest I'm a bit confused by your proposal. You are someone who is ambitious with a knack for managing a business who kept a gaming center running out of your own dedication to the place. Now your asking someone else who can do the same thing to do it for almost no money and "the experience"? If someone could do what you've done why would they accept this position. I mean, would you?

Ixian
Oct 09, 2001

Ex-Sweathog.

Quickpull posted:

To be honest I'm a bit confused by your proposal. You are someone who is ambitious with a knack for managing a business who kept a gaming center running out of your own dedication to the place. Now your asking someone else who can do the same thing to do it for almost no money and "the experience"? If someone could do what you've done why would they accept this position. I mean, would you?

Not offering "no money" just "no guarantees". I'm perfectly willing to split revenue, and when the store is running right, revenue means several grand a month, to start. Which, incidentally, is how I started with the business, with the added bonus of putting up a lot of money to do it at first - something I'm not asking here.

The Azn Sensation
Mar 09, 2009


While I couldn't move to where you are, I am a bit interested in if you still offer the ability to open up other stores with your name? In Tempe, there is jack poo poo to do besides drink, or go to ASI and ... Drink. So competition is non-existant.

Quickpull
Mar 01, 2003

We're all mad here.

Ixian posted:

Not offering "no money" just "no guarantees". I'm perfectly willing to split revenue, and when the store is running right, revenue means several grand a month, to start. Which, incidentally, is how I started with the business, with the added bonus of putting up a lot of money to do it at first - something I'm not asking here.

Ok, that's what I didn't understand. You said you we're looking for a partner but all the details said was "very little money and great experience". Are you actually offering some degree of ownership in the business?

VV-You're my hero-VV

Radnor
Dec 11, 2002

Octoparrot is watching you.

I found your other threads!

First Thread - http://forums.somethingawful.com/sh...threadid=578542
2004 Update - http://forums.somethingawful.com/sh...hreadid=1139561
Banned CS - http://forums.somethingawful.com/sh...threadid=853353
2007 Update - http://forums.somethingawful.com/sh...hreadid=2271540

Catsworth
Sep 30, 2009



If I wasn't in school still ('Bout a year left~) and had the money to situate myself out there (Vegas currently, so it's not like it's across the country), this would look really appetizing.

For now though, all I can say is best of luck to you.

Aphrodite
Jun 27, 2006

MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH


Just a random question.

How do MMOs work in a game center? Do people come to play their own accounts or something?

Catsworth
Sep 30, 2009



Aphrodite posted:

Just a random question.

How do MMOs work in a game center? Do people come to play their own accounts or something?

To all the ones I've been to, yes. You'd have to already have an (active) account, and the center would just have it installed and (hopefully) patched up to date, then you just log in and play.

Jack_tripper
Jun 07, 2009


treat posted:

The place was full to the brim of 10 to 13 year olds playing WoW and Warcraft 3, spilling 2 liters of mountain dew on everything and a few 30-something year olds in the corner by themselves eating entire store bought chickens and doing the same thing.

The new manager should include this quote in the local TV spots

apekillape
Jan 23, 2009


Quickpull posted:

To be honest I'm a bit confused by your proposal. You are someone who is ambitious with a knack for managing a business who kept a gaming center running out of your own dedication to the place. Now your asking someone else who can do the same thing to do it for almost no money and "the experience"? If someone could do what you've done why would they accept this position. I mean, would you?

Frankly, I'm not busy and it sounds interesting. Many people want to do something like open a game center, but lack the impetus and/or capital, or have too much sense to risk dropping a bunch of money on such a shaky proposition like his competitors did. As long as it covers the rent, it sounds like a pretty solid deal to me.

Ghrist a Gaylord!!
Jul 09, 2007

Eat My Phở

Ixian posted:

The biggest I know of personally was right here in Austin, Texas. I can't remember the name of the place but it was a branch of an existing store in Buffalo, NY. This guy spent an epic amount of cash - the place was close to 6,000 square feet, had several private rooms, custom racks for PC's, rigging for lightshows, a full hot food bar, you name it. He even paid to have the roof reinforced so it could support the two new 10 ton A/C units he brought in. I mean, this place was like a LAN gaming center fantasy - any "that would be cool" idea you could think of, he paid for. He even had a custom built private office in the back with a one-way glass window so he could sit back there and play games while watching over his empire. It was glorious, and looked cool as hell.

Was this place "CyberJocks" by any chance? I remember visiting a few times and thinking it was pretty swank. Too bad it failed like it did, but c'est la vie.

Der Luftwaffle
Dec 29, 2008


Do you have things like free wireless to bring in the public or is the whole thing strictly geared for gamers.

dave_o
Aug 22, 2004

I'd trade my shoes for a gallon of booze, I'd drink it down and I'd die

I'm a quality analyst for a vendor of a fruity computer company if you'd be interested in some additional root cause analysis on the data you pull from your site.

There's a local place around here that's a coffee bar/LAN center that does pretty well, it draws a pretty diverse crowd and provides something for non-nerd friends who may end up tagging along.

Miraculous Meat
Mar 18, 2008



This thread has been a fascinating read so far. Thanks for the insight on what it's like to run a small business. I really hope you find what you're looking for.

I've never been to been to one of these LAN centers. My experience is limited to internet cafés and the local card/comic book/used game store. The former is clean and somewhat cold, where everyone minds their own business and does whatever they need done. The latter is much more laid back and friendly, but it's a cluttered, disorganized mess that smells like a dumpster hobo died in the back room. Obviously, it's also host to the most stereotypical goony like people you will ever meet, staff and visitors alike.

Looking at the images on your site I can see that your place looks fantastic, really a best of both worlds. I really like how it's arranged. How does it work, one game per circle of PCs? What are some of the rules that you enforce? I also think everyone would love to hear some horror stories of bad customers you've had to deal with.

Wandering Knitter
Feb 05, 2006

I am not much for talking.

I really don't have any experiance in LAN centers (I been in one, once) but your place reminds me of when my old gaming shop was actually good.

You know, before the one bad apple drove everyone away, and they focused on poo poo no one wanted, and decided that comics were totally the way to make money in a bad economy.

VVV I think "Oh, I'll start selling ____ to get serious money" is the death cry of any geek-store.

Wandering Knitter fucked around with this message at Nov 07, 2009 around 06:37

Speeddub
Jan 03, 2008

Pooling enthusiast. See you at the YMCA!


I think the most effective location for a store like this would be near a middle class highschool. The only successful one I've ever seen (Well, I use successful relatively, it's closed now) was pretty much just diagonal across the street from my high school, and within a few months of opening, almost every male student at the school was showing up at least once a week. The owner was an older asian man, and he was really cool, he wouldn't ever be gaming when you showed up, he would be reading the paper or reading the news online. He had some young sons (maybe 6 and 8 years old) who generally spent the day with him at work, and they'd either be hanging out in the back room or sitting on 2 PCs right next to their dad. He had fun, and had tournaments, but did them the right way: impromptu, with prizes like a pizza for the winning team. He'd even play in the tournaments, with his two little sons on his team and whenever they won he'd just buy pizza for everyone.

Anyway, the point is, he was really smart about it and it had a steady base of regulars who never caused trouble. Eventually, he moved away from the store, and sold it to some 20-something redneck who really didn't know what he was doing. The new guy didn't really give a poo poo about anything, and was too busy (either on the phone, playing counterstrike, or in the back room) to help a customer most of the time. He also didn't hire anyone else, so he was always the only employee there. Kids realized that they could just walk up to his computer and give themselves free time, and he'd never even notice it, because he was too 'busy' with other things. Within a couple weeks, it was the cool hang-out spot for seedy types that you don't want in or around a business. There were shady older guys selling the kids weed, some pretty serious fights out front (which the owner would always just ignore), and I heard years later that after I stopped showing up, there was prostitution - i.e. really trashy girls just hanging out there selling blowjobs in the bathroom, but I don't know the validity of that. Obviously, the place started bleeding money, but the solution?

The solution to the failing business was to repaint the store to look like camo, put camo nets all over everything, rename themselves, and start selling airsoft and paintball guns.

Yeah. They were out of there within a few months.

So I guess it really just all comes down how serious the owner is and keeping it simple.

Countblanc
Apr 20, 2005



I've always dreamed of owning a card/hobby shop, which obviously isn't exactly the same thing, and enforcing strict behavior and hygiene rules. But whenever I visit any similar shop it's always full of gross huge people that make jokes that would come across as vague threats to normal people. Have you ever kicked someone out because he was, quite literally, stinking up the joint, or are those people a necessary evil since Billy Yu-Gi-Oh and his mom aren't keeping your store afloat on their own?

Soth
Jul 21, 2004

And lo, the god of atheism didst smite the Mushroom Kingdom!

Speeddub posted:

I think the most effective location for a store like this would be near a middle class highschool. The only successful one I've ever seen (Well, I use successful relatively, it's closed now) was pretty much just diagonal across the street from my high school, and within a few months of opening, almost every male student at the school was showing up at least once a week.

Preach it brother. I think all three of the high schools I went to had a card shop within about 1/4 mile or less of them. Of course, of those, there was one that had two shops by it, both are closed. One had one shop across the street, it closed and there's a different one in its spot now (it seems to be doing well, it was full of nerds when I went in today.), and the third is Things from Another World in downtown Milwaukie. There was a Lan Center down by there for a while that seemed pretty good, but I guess something went wrong there.

Soth fucked around with this message at Nov 07, 2009 around 07:47

Kaal
May 22, 2002
If you can read: remind me not to troll GBS

I definitely remember your threads from back in the day. They were quite interesting, and I'm glad to hear you are still in business. Good luck finding a local manager, it's hard to get a feel for someone over the phone. It's too bad that neither of your supervisors were able to recommend someone on their way out the door, but sometimes that happens. As I'm sure you're just as aware as I am of the successes and failures of Goonsourcing, I applaud your optimism and wish you luck finding someone.

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