[Res]

You raise especially awesome and valid points, Stuffy, but rest easy knowing that I along with my family do not do things 99%. When we start something, we make sure it's the best it can possibly be.

1) Find -good- people to work there.
--This might be the hardest part. After all, it's just a mini golf course and an arcade. Both places went down hard after pretty much going to the local high school for regular workers and management.

This is being taken care of. While I have especially trusted friends (HighL4Nders anyone?) that are lining up for jobs, my dad actually has some school officials (Vice principals and secretaries) that have asked for work there. In our history of owning around five to six businesses in the past, we've never hired anyone that falls below a certain standard, and as such, we have no worries about who we'll be bringing aboard.

2) All around maintenance.
--This is a personal pet peeve of mine. If I go someplace and the buttons do not work on the game, chances are i'll never go back. Same with minigolf: if the course is banged up, I doubt i'll go back. Maintenance is appreciated.

Regarding maintenance, that isn't a worry of ours either. For the past seven years, we've held the highest possible ratings and standards for our RV park in nearly every book, agency, guide, membership that has come to evaluate us. Once again, we hire people that we know are fully capable of handling all kinds of jobs like that, but by no means are we afraid to get out there and tackle what we need to ourselves. If something with one of our businesses doesn't please us, or if there's a SINGLE thing wrong we can fix to improve it, we will. And we won't have any problem doing so. This is established when we purchased the course. The existing golf course is in great condition, and as long as it's under our management, it'll stay that way.

Edit: Also, we have a special vendor in a neighboring city that is going to sell us high grade arcade games. I'm uncertain of their 'return' or 'defect' policy, but I guarantee you guys that if I find a game that isn't running right, I'm going to call him and raise hell until he fixes it or tells me how to.

3) Manageable Gimmicks.
--The mini golf course near where I live had the Cutest gimmick: real sandtraps and water hazards.
Problem was:
keeping the water clean - Standing water is never good and I imagine bubbling each and every water hazard is just too expensive.
keep course clear of sand from people hitting from the sandtrap - people are supposed to take out the ball from the sand.. but they dont.
So now the water is a hole painted blue and the sand is gravel which is easier to clean.

Interesting thing about it, this course actually has a little manmade river that runs through about half of the course. It's powered by a standard pool pump, and has fish and a few other aquatic things in it. While we're in Louisiana as well, it will have a type of 'Cajun' theme, but we'll be sure to keep the place nice. The course itself is astro turf, and the sandtraps on the couse are just little intentions in the ground with a thicker set of turf on it. No problem, and especially easy to clean. Hoses right off.

) Cards vs. Tokens vs. Quarters
--If you all can manage using a card(best) or token(good) system, that would be great. Even if they take tokens or keep their cards, ou still have the monies.

I actually raised this as a problem when we discussed it. Personally, I am against 'tokens'. It makes things much more difficult to handle, and if people are only using quarters, they won't worry about exchanging things. We make plenty of quarters at the park to begin circulation, and to keep the quarters rolling seems (To me at least) to be the easiest system to use. We may have a 'ticket' system with prizes and whatnot, but that will be determined later.

5) Keep the freebies in check.
--Failed site: had a section dedicated to old arcade games which were adjusted for free play. When they broke, they took low priority in fixing them up. Eventually everyone lost interest.
--Good site: hires a person whose job is to just play games. Not only play games, but be good enough to show off and gather a crowd. They have unlimited tokens/card credits and occasionally put credit for random people watching games. "Here, try it out." while at the same time probably getting them hooked

That is actually a fantastic idea, thank you. :| With the sections of games we're going to have, there won't be any favoritism about the consoles. If someone reports a problem, we'll find it, fix it (Not a bad repairman myself, nor is my dad), or if we can't do that, we'll refund. Unlike a lot of other arcades around, we'll actually refund if you say the machine ate your money.

But I like that idea of the crowd drawer. And I know just the people for the job, too. (Locals. Sorry guys. )

Very awesome, but you all will have to watch people so they don't ruin it for everyone. I would expect some attempted break-ends in the arcade.

We've got security fully covered.

[Jake]

I'm amazed, but I won't believe that you have a fully functioning non-rundown arcade until you post videos

Seriously, decent arcades don't exist around here.

[Res]

Three to four months. Hell, I'll even tape pre, mid, and post production for you. Give me 'till Saturday to get a camera over there and stuff.

[Master Of Stuff_NA]

*sees response, tear rolls down face*

so beautiful... no words... should've sent a poet...

[Jake]

*sends for Kimo*