# Episode 437: The Pinball Capital’s Francis Wisniewski **Source:** Pinball Profile **Type:** podcast_episode **Published:** 2026-04-01 **Duration:** 24m 31s **Beat:** Pinball **URL:** https://www.pinballprofile.com/episode-437-the-pinball-capitals-francis-wisniewski/ --- ## Analysis Jeff Teolis interviews Francis Wisniewski, owner of the Pinball Capital, an 8,000 sq ft pinball arcade opening April 2nd in Stone Park, Illinois with 120 machines. Wisniewski discusses his path from Chicago trader to pinball venue operator, his experience running the Kickback in Wisconsin, his business philosophy emphasizing machine maintenance and community over competition, and plans for the grand opening featuring Roger Sharpe and a screening of 'Pinball: The Man Who Saved the Game' on the 50th anniversary of The Shot. ### Key Claims - [HIGH] The Pinball Capital will have 120 pinball machines across 8,000 square feet in Stone Park, Illinois — _Francis Wisniewski stated this directly; also mentioned multiple times throughout interview_ - [HIGH] The grand opening is scheduled for April 2nd, coinciding with the 50th anniversary of Roger Sharpe's famous shot — _Francis Wisniewski confirmed opening date and Roger Sharpe's attendance for the anniversary celebration_ - [HIGH] The venue will employ a full-time technician to maintain machines — _Francis Wisniewski stated 'I've got a full time tech at the pinball capital'_ - [HIGH] Francis Wisniewski is 52 years old and previously worked as a floor trader on the Chicago Board of Options and Board of Trade — _Francis stated 'I was a floor trader on the Chicago Board of Options and the Chicago Board of Trade' and 'at 52'_ - [HIGH] He purchased the building rather than leased it because the lease rate was roughly twice the mortgage — _Francis stated 'the lease rate that the person offered was twice as much as what the mortgage was'_ - [HIGH] The Pinball Capital is 15 minutes from both Stern Pinball and Jersey Jack Pinball headquarters — _Francis stated 'We're 15 minutes from Stern and Jersey Jack and a lot of the top players in the world'_ - [HIGH] Francis previously ran a gym exclusively for overweight individuals and a bakery before pinball — _Francis described running 'a gym... you had to be 50 pounds overweight to join' and 'a bakery for a while with my friend'_ - [HIGH] The venue will be family-friendly with no bar and events targeting kids and families on Saturday mornings — _Francis stated 'We don't have a bar and so it'll be very family friendly with events towards kids and families on Saturdays'_ ### Notable Quotes > "I fell in love with it when I was 16, playing at a pool hall, Monday Night Football pinball. And that shot on Monday Night Football where it goes through the goalposts, I just had to repeat that over and over again." > — **Francis Wisniewski**, early in interview > _Origin story of Wisniewski's passion for pinball; nostalgic entry point at age 16_ > "I hate going into any pinball location and the games aren't working or they're dirty or, you know, I'm okay with a couple switches not acting right, but, you know, if the main feature doesn't work or the lock doesn't work or something like that, like... the flipper's not powerful enough?" > — **Francis Wisniewski**, mid-interview > _Articulates core business philosophy: machine maintenance is paramount to player experience_ > "I like the pinball community. Like I've been welcomed by other pinball owners already. I don't feel like there's a competition there that you have in other businesses. I think more pinball creates more pinball." > — **Francis Wisniewski**, mid-interview > _Describes collaborative rather than competitive mindset toward other pinball venue operators; contrasts with other industries_ > "If you're going to finish last in a tournament, you better be there enjoying it for some other reason... the community is the best part of pinball." > — **Francis Wisniewski**, mid-interview > _Emphasizes community and inclusivity as retention strategy, especially for casual players who may not be competitive_ > "I do random prizes. So yeah, that person might come in last, but holy cow, look at this, I just got a Jaws Translite and that's kind of the exciting thing too is that they're all equal in that sense." > — **Francis Wisniewski**, mid-interview > _Tournament structure philosophy emphasizing equal opportunities for all players, not just top finishers_ > "Roger was very gracious in agreeing to come to our grand opening... At the time he just came right, our grand opening party, going to be on the 50th anniversary of the shot that he made." > — **Francis Wisniewski**, late interview > _Confirms Roger Sharpe's attendance at opening; frames event around historical significance_ > "Building a community, right? Like, if you just have an arcade and there's no lead night or no person there that gets other people to play and, you know, creates this fun environment, then people aren't going to necessarily come back." > — **Francis Wisniewski**, mid-interview > _Core business insight learned from partner Jim; emphasizes community-building as retention strategy_ > "We're going to add a QR code to every machine so that you can... link to a Google doc. If you see anything wrong, you know, report it." > — **Francis Wisniewski**, mid-interview > _Specific operational innovation to crowdsource machine maintenance reporting from players_ ### Entities | Name | Type | Context | |------|------|---------| | Francis Wisniewski | person | Owner of Pinball Capital arcade in Stone Park, Illinois; also owns Kickback in Middleton, Wisconsin; age 52; former floor trader | | Jeff Teolis | person | Host of Pinball Profile podcast; conducting interview with Francis Wisniewski | | Roger Sharpe | person | Historic pinball figure known for 'The Shot' (1976); attending Pinball Capital grand opening on April 2nd; signing Bank Shot machine as raffle prize | | Jim | person | Partner at Kickback arcade in Middleton, Wisconsin; known for maintaining machines to high standard | | Andy Bagwell | person | IFPA tournament organizer; provided feedback on tournament machine setup and maintenance at Pinball Capital | | Pinball Capital | venue | New pinball arcade opening April 2nd in Stone Park, Illinois; 8,000 sq ft; 120 machines; family-friendly; no bar | | Kickback | venue | Pinball arcade in Middleton, Wisconsin; owned by Francis Wisniewski and Jim; known for quality machine maintenance | | Stone Park, Illinois | location | Location of Pinball Capital; near Stern Pinball and Jersey Jack Pinball (15 minutes away) | | Stern Pinball | company | Major pinball manufacturer; headquarters approximately 15 minutes from Pinball Capital venue | | Jersey Jack Pinball | company | Pinball manufacturer; headquarters approximately 15 minutes from Pinball Capital venue | | IO Bar | venue | Pinball venue in Madison area where Francis Wisniewski discovered tournament pinball and became re-hooked | | Raymond Davidson | person | Top tournament player who provided feedback on Pinball Capital machine maintenance | | Erin Seiden | person | Runs events at Bells and Chimes; will run events at Pinball Capital | | Tom Graff | person | Helping Francis build streaming rig for Pinball Capital | | Cedric | person | 9-year-old pinball player who finished second out of 47 in recent tournament at Kickback; beat top 500 players | | Pinball: The Man Who Saved the Game | product | Documentary film about pinball history; will be screened at Pinball Capital grand opening on April 2nd | | Pokemon | game | Newly announced Stern Pinball machine; referenced as major licensing achievement and draw for casual players | | Game Terminal | venue | Pinball arcade in Tennessee; referenced as model operator for quality venue management | | Electric Bat Podcast | media | Podcast referenced as source for learning about arcade operations; hosts mentioned as good operators | | Pinball Profile | media | Podcast hosted by Jeff Teolis; this interview is Episode 437 | ### Topics - **Primary:** Pinball venue operations and business model, Machine maintenance and player experience, Tournament structure and community building, Pinball Capital grand opening event, Francis Wisniewski's background and path to pinball - **Secondary:** Competitive pinball and IFPA tournaments, Game diversity (EMs, solid-state, modern games), Roger Sharpe and 'The Shot' 50th anniversary ### Sentiment **Neutral** (0) ### Signals - **[venue_signal]** Pinball Capital, an 8,000 sq ft family-friendly arcade with 120 machines, opening April 2nd in Stone Park, Illinois, near Stern and JJP headquarters (confidence: high) — Francis Wisniewski confirmed opening date, location, machine count, and proximity to manufacturers; this is a significant new venue in a major pinball market - **[operational_signal]** Pinball Capital will employ full-time technician; implementing QR code reporting system for player-identified issues; location managed by owner with high maintenance standards (confidence: high) — Francis stated 'I've got a full time tech at the pinball capital' and described QR code system and commitment to machine upkeep - **[venue_signal]** Pinball Capital positioning as hub for tournaments and events; Andy Bagwell, Erin Seiden, and other IFPA organizers already involved; streaming infrastructure being built (confidence: high) — Francis confirmed partnerships with IFPA organizers and building streaming rig with Tom Graff - **[community_signal]** Francis Wisniewski explicitly describes pinball venue operators as collaborative rather than competitive, contrasting with other industries; emphasizes community-building as business model (confidence: high) — Francis stated 'I like the pinball community... I don't feel like there's a competition... I think more pinball creates more pinball' - **[event_signal]** Pinball Capital grand opening April 2nd coincides with 50th anniversary of Roger Sharpe's famous 'Shot'; film screening and commemorative event planned; signed Bank Shot being raffled (confidence: high) — Francis confirmed Roger Sharpe attending, film screening, and raffle of signed Bank Shot; event synchronized with historical anniversary - **[venue_signal]** Pinball Capital explicitly designed as family-friendly venue with no bar; Saturday morning events targeting kids and families (confidence: high) — Francis stated 'We don't have a bar and so it'll be very family friendly with events towards kids and families on Saturdays' - **[tournament_signal]** Pinball Capital plans random prize draws rather than top-finisher-only rewards, designed to incentivize participation from casual players, not just competitive players (confidence: high) — Francis described 'duck race' tournaments with random translite giveaways and approach of making 'them all equal' - **[personnel_signal]** Jim (Kickback partner) serving as operational mentor to Francis for community-building and machine maintenance best practices (confidence: medium) — Francis credited Jim with teaching him importance of building community and maintaining machines at high standard - **[competitive_signal]** Young players (age 9-12) are dominating tournament results, beating top 500 IFPA-ranked players due to fearlessness, rule knowledge from online resources (Discord, YouTube, forums), and willingness to take risks (confidence: high) — Francis cited 9-year-old Cedric finishing second out of 47 players; noted youth learn from Ray Day's channel, Discord, and online tutorials - **[product_strategy]** Francis highlighted Pokemon Stern announcement as major draw for casual/family players; discussed importance of having varied IP licenses to attract diverse player demographics (confidence: medium) — Francis stated 'Pokemon was just announced... the people that are going to be coming in there to catch them all will be fantastic' --- ## Transcript It's time for another Pinball Profile. I'm your host Jeff Teolis. You can find everything on pinballprofile.com. We're on Twitter, X, Instagram, at pinballprofile. You can email pinballprofile at gmail.com. And if you'd like to show your support, that would be wonderful. It's not necessary, but we certainly do appreciate it. It helps with the ongoing costs. Thanks so much to Lua W, to GME Law, Jerry S, Tony V, Stefan R, Sean I and more. That's patreon.com slash pinball profile. And of course check out our Facebook group too. We are going to go to talk to a man who you just saw featured in this week in pinball. Kinetasys did a great article on Francis Wisniewski. How you doing Francis? I'm doing great Jeff, thanks for having me. Francis, I saw the article and I saw this big, big operation you're doing there in Illinois for the Pinball Capital and over 8,000 square feet of pinball. It's not like you just popped up out of nowhere. You've certainly had some experience in the past, including a place where you've been for the last little while, the Kickback in Middleton, Wisconsin. I've been watching Fox Cities Pinball and a lot of action there. So, first of all, let's talk about your involvement in pinball and where this came from. What is the story behind this game? I fell in love with it when I was 16, playing at a pool hall, Monday Night Football pinball. And that shot on Monday Night Football where it goes through the goalposts, I just had to repeat that over and over again. Now I realize it wasn't that great of a game, but that got me hooked. We, off and on over the years, didn't know about the competitive scene. Even though I lived in Chicago for 25 years, I didn't know there was competitive pinball. And were you in Pittsburgh for a bit too? I grew up near Pittsburgh, and Altoona, PA is where I grew up, but I was in Chicago after I graduated from college and had no idea that there was competitive pinball. And I had some in my house, like I had pins in my house and didn't know until I went to. I moved to the Madison area about nine years ago and I went to IO Bar a couple years ago and I saw a pinball tournament and that got me re-hooked on the game. Now most people that play pinball aren't tournament players but there must be some competitive bone in you or again you're certainly drawn to the machines from having them and being around them but the competitive side for most people it's kind of foreign. I played sports and now at 52 I feel like I'm too old to play basketball or football or anything that I used to. I don't recover very well and I was a floor trader on the Chicago Board of Options and the Chicago Board of Trade. And that's what they're called really the ultimate competitive arena. You're trying to make money and you have to out yell the person next to you, stay cool under pressure. It's, it's, uh, that was one of the hardest things I ever did and that kind of got my competitive juices where they are now. Okay, sidebar. What TV show or movie closely represent... Trading Places. ...closely represent... it is Trading Places. Now is that your favorite one or is that like the most accurate to what real life's like? I wonder if there's another one. I mean, that's my favorite. It's kind of, uh, it's only a small part of the movie, but it could be that intense sometimes. I don't know if there's another one that actually portrays it very well. The trading floor is not portrayed as much as like Wall Street where they show the really you know rich guys making trades but the where on the floor where's actual action and the you know the guys are competitive that doesn't get that doesn't make the movies very much but that's where like I think in the movie he says pure capitalism and that's exactly what it is. It makes sense, absolutely, for sure. So now back to pinball. You're hooked on watching this competition and yeah, the older you get, it's certainly easier than running the bases or skating up and down the ice or whatever sport you may be doing. You mentioned going up and down the court on basketball. It's a little easier when you're just standing there and you're pressing a few buttons, but I say that as an older person myself, but you do notice who's dominating the tournaments. It's the kids! Ah yeah, we had a great tournament at Kickback a couple weeks ago and Cedric is 9 I think, finished second out of 47 people and the tournament finished at 12:30 in the morning and he almost won it. So he beat a couple top 500 players so it's crazy how these young kids are dominating. They're fearless, they learn the rules, they're not afraid of the risk, and that knowledge of especially on the modern games of what's the best strategy whether it's watching video, reading tutorials or tilt forums or Wikipedia's or whatever the heck it is, you certainly find out that information. I know that Discord is great and a lot of people go on to Ray Day's channel just to. We've got some good tournament talk and these kids absorb it. Whereas, you know, we have mortgages to pay and jobs to do. You know, it's a little harder the older you get. I mean, there's definitely the mental part, but don't downplay the physical part either. I've been in, you know, tournaments that are 14 hours and, like, my knees are killing me at the end and, you know, I'm having a harder time concentrating and my back hurts and, you know some of these tournaments take forever and some of these games take forever. Steve Bowden know it at 52 it not as easy as it is at 21 I think Steve Bowden always says ABC always be cashing meaning do well in the tournaments and kind of pay some of your costs. I'm more ABS always be sitting find it you're not playing grab a seat park your bike. No you have to I think yeah. For sure speaking of great competitions as we talk about the pinball capital, you know, there's a great mix. I got to talk to Andy Bagwell just pre-tournament going over every game that was going to be in the tournament and him making changes to like Taxi where we wanted to limit the bonus so that it would be more fair and him noticing every you know flipper hop and stuff like that it's you know you can tell where the difference is on knowledge and experience you know no matter how much you play there you know there's a couple guys that are maybe uh you know that next level above. Getting that information, storing that information, being able to use that information, those are all key, especially when you might only get to play that game one time. So three balls, there's not a lot of room for error and those little things make all the difference and the top players seem to have it. So you got some good experience with that and I wonder, and we're going to talk more about being an arcade owner, from that tournament I saw that it wasn't just all modern games. You have a nice mix, which is really required in certainly the state and provincial championships and even bigger tournaments. So nice mix there, Francis. Thank you. I mean, I really like, I mean, 80s and 90s Williams Valley, that, you know, what's what I grew up on and there's definitely a desire for other people to play those games, too. I've fallen in love with EMs recently too, like, it's just amazing the rules and the creativity that the EM guys had with, you know, circuits and wires. Like, they didn't have memories or modes and they were able to make a game really fun. I'm just amazed, like, we have Stars and Harlem Globetrotters at one of our locations and people rather play that sometimes than, uh, Godzilla right next to it. The you know simpler games sometimes are really they're more fun and they're more competitive. I'm very interested in what you just said there because again not being an arcade owner but certainly frequenting them many times what is important to an arcade owner you're not a coin drop place you're a twenty dollars a day or a hundred and twenty five dollars a month both great prices you know you're not really dependent on the dollars and quarters going in the machines You, I guess, it's more important for you to have all the machines working so that there's a good experience for the players and you've got a full time tech at the pinball capital. So that's, that's wonderful too. There's nothing more disheartening than when you go to play your favorite game and you see the out of order sign on it. So you've got your full time tech looking after that. But again, back to the fact that it's a pay one price. Does that afford you the ability to have a bigger variety versus it's got to be the hottest title, it's got to be the hot IP? Yeah, I don't think EMs are that great for coin drop necessarily, but having a mix of all the, you know, EMs, the solid states, the moderns works really well, I think, on a pay one price model. And I think what you said was really important. I hate going into any pinball location and the games aren't working or they're dirty or, you know, I'm okay with a couple switches not acting right, but, you know, if the main feature doesn't work or the lock doesn't work or something like that, like... But the flipper's not powerful enough? The flipper's not powerful enough? Oh my god, yeah. I mean, it's hard for me to stay there and play when it's, if the, you know, the people that are in charge don't maintain it. And so that's probably my number one priority, opening this new place. Jim, my partner at the Kickback, does a great job keeping our games, you know, running at 100%. And, you know, with 120 games, it's going to be a challenge. But that's, you know, that's our goal is to make sure that it's every game working like it's supposed to. So I assume because you have a full time tech there and they're not playing the 120 games, You rely on the public to give you notes. Hey, just letting you know, the opto is not working. That spinner is not working. That rollover is not working. The in lane is not working. The flipper is weak. How do you get that information? And I assume it's vital because I don't know what you've got. You've got sheets there. Hey, help us out here just to let us know. We're going to add a QR code to every machine so that you can. It'll link to a Google doc. If you see anything wrong, you know, report it and hopefully just talking to the players. I want to know, you know, I appreciated when Andy Bagwell and Raymond Davidson went through my games and pointed out everything they didn't like or, you know, every switch that didn't work. Like, if you can make those guys happy, then the general public guys are going to, they're not even going to notice a third of what the top players notice. So I'm hoping to have, you know, we're 15 minutes from Stern and Jersey Jack and a lot of the, you know, top players in the world. And I'm hoping that those guys are the ones that are telling me what's wrong with the machine. Do you know how refreshing it is for a player and a tournament player and myself when I hear you say that when you're told about these things, and some may be little, that you care about them? Because it wouldn be surprising to hear an arcade owner go yeah I get to that Or yeah I know there a few lights out here and there but the flippers work the score wheels work the main stuff works But it can be frustrating for certainly tournaments and even just the casual players that are trying to maybe get to a wizard mode or try to complete some mode and something's not working. Sounds like you and your partners there and the techs want to make sure that's all working. That's great. It's definitely a priority. It's not ever going to, you know, it's still pinball and It's not ever going to work 100% but if players understand that we're making that effort and they report to us the issues that they see and we work to fix them then I think everybody could be happy about that. So the big day is coming up. It's April 2nd. It's opening day, opening weekend. You're going to be showing the movie Pinball: The Man Who Saved the Game because it is this year the 50th anniversary of The Shot. We're here with Roger Sharpe. And look at that, you're giving away a signed Bank Shot from Roger Sharpe. Tell us about what's going on opening day weekend. Roger was very gracious in agreeing to come to our grand opening. At the time he just came right, our grand opening party, going to be on the 50th anniversary of the shot that he made. And, you know, it was just awesome to talk to Roger. It's not too far from his home and he agreed to come. I had a Bank Shot already and so he agreed to sign it and we're gonna raffle it off. We're gonna recreate the shot after the movie and it should be really fun and celebrate him and our opening at the same time. I think it just kind of worked out magically to be you know a perfect event to launch our you know the launch arcade. So there are so many pinball players in Illinois and in that area in In the Midwest, do you have people lined up to run tournaments, run leagues? There's a lot of, you know, IFPA people, including Andy Bagwell, you know, that are already have run leagues in that area. I've run weekly leagues for one of my locations. I think we're not even open yet, so I think we'll get more volunteers as we get going. Erin Seiden from Bells and Chimes is going to run her events there. I think we want to be the place that anybody can come in and run an event if they want to. You know we're going to probably see a lot of it too because I'm sure streaming will follow as well. Yeah, we're going to have a streaming program actually. I'm pretty excited about this. I'm building a streaming rig with Tom Graff's help and anybody that wants to stream can use our rig in their laptop and come in and stream and make their own content from our location. It's going to be great. 120 machines is the target, 8,000 square feet and you know, when we were talking about the business side of it too, it was easier for you to buy the building than lease, I assume. Yeah, Chicago real estate is kind of crazy and you know, the lease rate that the person offered was twice as much as what the mortgage was and just kind of made sense. If I'm going to go all in on this project, basically, I was going to buy the building. Francis, you've ventured into different businesses in the past and you've settled on pinball. What are some of the other things you've done and why is pinball the best one? I ran a gym for a little bit and... It was a gym for... you couldn't get in if you weren't... you had to be overweight. As someone who's overweight, it's very intimidating to go into a gym and so we ran a gym for a couple years. You had to be 50 pounds overweight to join the gym and we had some very good success. Couple people losing over 200 pounds. Nice. And, but it was a tough business model and just a very competitive business market and didn't work out on the end. And I made some bad decisions on rent and stuff like that. But, you know, you have these ideas and you try them. I also ran a bakery for a while with my friend and raked, you know, kind of between insomnia and crumble and... It had to be crazy hours, any kind of food industry. Yeah, again, the business model was tough, trying to sell a cookie for $3 and, you know, trying to get enough people to come in and it was fun. I enjoyed the process but, you know, food is a very tough business. Pinball is a tough business too. There's great competitors in Chicago, but I like the pinball community. Like I've been welcomed by other pinball owners already. I don't feel like there's a competition there that you have in other businesses. I think more pinball creates more pinball and I'm not out to, you know, beat the other pinball places. I play at other pinball places too that are, I play at IO in Madison, even though I own Kickback. I enjoy the people and I enjoy playing at other locations. We don't have all the games. They have different ones and I'm a pinball player first. So as long as people have good pinball, I'm going to go play there and I don't see it as a competition. I see it as a partnership. You're right. Who knows? It certainly opens doors for possibilities. People may be experiencing for the first time. Maybe they're there for a staff party or some sort of group gathering and just their world This just expanded like I never knew this existed I didn know this was here Oh my gosh it only It all these wonderful possibilities That being said, I kind of want to know as a business owner as an arcade owner you do have to cater to everyone But I curious kind of what the bread and butter is And maybe it different in different places But my guess would be more so the general public versus tournaments which are wonderful and give great exposure But You can do tournaments and you can do multi and multi running tournaments all the time whereas you want to keep the doors open and the bodies going through it and using your machine So is there one or the other or are they both kind of simpatico in a way? I think, yeah, I think you said it right there. It's a mix of events with general hours, but creating just a good environment for pinball. I've been all over the country before I opened this place two summers ago just looking at some of the best places past times and down in Tennessee, Game Terminal. I listen to Electric Bat Podcast and Wedgehead. I think those are great as operators to learn from those guys that have been doing it for a while. For sure. And then just watching my partner Jim, it's really about building a community, right? Like, if you just have an arcade and there's no lead night or no person there that gets other people to play and, you know, creates this fun environment, then people aren't going to necessarily come back. It's got to feel like its own little city or its own little community, and that's why people come. If you're going to finish last in a tournament, you better be there enjoying it for some other reason. And so, especially when you first knew the pinball, you're going to finish in the bottom 10% or whatever. Why are you coming back to play if you're just getting beat? So, I think the community is the best part of pinball. With that being said, a lot of the tournaments that I run, you know, maybe you're fortunate enough to get some prizes from some of the vendors. A lot of people are Stern Army members and I'm sure you'll do that too. And you get some perks with that here and there. So instead of giving the top players always the prizes, I like to just do random prizes. So yeah, that person might come in last, but holy cow, look at this, I just got a Jaws Translite and that's kind of the exciting thing too is that they're all equal in that sense for when it comes to prizes. So again, Stern Army, even the insider connected. I mean, Pokemon was just announced. If you get a Pokemon machine, which I'm sure you will, the people that are going to be coming in there to catch them all will be fantastic. It's just going to be, it's a real winner for Stern and there are a lot of winners from a lot of different companies. Just the hype of seeing the different games. So I assume kind of more family oriented at the pinball capital than maybe, you know, some of the colorful language that you might see in some of the machines. Yeah, we don't have a bar and so it'll be very family friendly with events towards kids and families on Saturdays, Saturday mornings. And I think you're dead on on the, I do on my tournaments too, I do a duck race every, you know, next to last round and give away a translite or something. And, you know, top players get points. I don't know why they need to get paid, you know, like they're, what they're getting out of it is their ranking. And videos to watch but just talking to the people hey what are you doing give me give me two give me three things to do and then it's just a matter of executing it okay now i've got the rules knowledge and the next thing you know you'll you'll be doing this and maybe it's even flipper tips you can get from some of these players there's lots of great videos out there of course Abe Flips just had his Mastering Pinball that's one of the best and all his uh YouTube videos but there's a lot out there and a lot of information And you don't need to score great to have a fun time playing pinball, but you know, the deeper you get in the games, certainly the greater the experience and it's there for everyone. And you can do it at the Pinball Capital starting grand opening, really, April 2nd. I'm so excited for you there in Stone Park, Illinois, just minutes away from Stern. You've probably had a few sleepless nights to this point so far, haven't you, Francis? The construction part of opening a business is the, I'm going to say fun part, the stressful part and the unpredictable part, but it's almost over, so very confident that we're getting close and now we get to open to the public and just play pinball. I'll be there someday soon and I really look forward to it. I think it's going to be a great weekend there with Roger Sharpe giving away the Bank Shot game and just 120 machines, 8,000 square feet in such a perfect pinball place. And, you know, you've got big events like Expo coming up, so maybe start making some tournaments, some pre-tournaments or some post-tournaments with all those people right there. They're going to want to check out the pinball capital for sure. Yeah, we're looking forward to Expo. I've gone the last couple of years and I have to try to figure out what events we can run that don't interfere with Expo but also, you know, complement Expo as well. Sounds great. Francis, it's been a pleasure to talk with you and I look forward to seeing you in the near future. Jeff, look forward to meeting you in person. Okay. This has been your Pinball Profile. You can find everything on pinballprofile.com. We're on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, at Pinball Profile. You can join our Facebook group as well. If you'd like to show your support, don't worry, it's always free, but thank you so much to those at patreon.com slash pinballprofile, like Ken G, like Jake C, Erica's Pinball Journey, John L, Colin M, and more. Thank you so much. Check out the Pinball Capital opening April 2nd in Stone Park, Illinois. _(Acquisition: groq_whisper, Enrichment: v4)_ --- *Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: 6dc763f6-94cb-44f5-b4d5-ba9c64d554cd*