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Jersey Jack Pinball Update 2018

Pintastic New England·video·1h 31m·analyzed·Sep 22, 2018
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.030

TL;DR

Jersey Jack Pinball 2018 company update: growth milestones, game roadmap, and community engagement.

Summary

Jack Guarneri, founder of Jersey Jack Pinball, delivers a 2018 update presentation at Pintastic New England covering company growth, game production status, touring/promotional activities, and Q&A with community. Topics include Wizard of Oz sales (~3,300-3,400 units), ongoing Hobbit and Dialed In production, new Hobbit code update (July 7), support for home vs. location customers, factory tours inspiring young people, and global distribution partnerships.

Key Claims

  • Jersey Jack Pinball has sold approximately 3,300-3,400 Wizard of Oz machines

    high confidence · Jack Guarneri directly stated this figure during the presentation

  • A new Hobbit code update will release on July 7 (7-7)

    high confidence · Jack Guarneri announced this specific date during the presentation

  • Jersey Jack Pinball is the only major pinball factory still building all games they have released

    medium confidence · Jack Guarneri paraphrased someone else's comment ('Somebody told me'); not directly verified

  • Wizard of Oz machines will be built again in October 2018

    high confidence · Jack Guarneri stated 'we'll go back and build some' in October

  • More than 1,000 Pirates of the Caribbean machines are on order

    high confidence · Jack Guarneri stated 'we have more than 1,000 pirates on order'

  • Dialed In machines generate $400-$500 per month on location

    medium confidence · Operator Tommy Lyons stated this in response to Jack's question about operator revenue

  • Jersey Jack Pinball most sales go to home customers rather than arcade/location operators

    high confidence · Jack Guarneri stated 'most of the The Games we build and sell go to home customers'

  • Pat Lawlor is returning to pinball design with a new game coming next year

    medium confidence · Jack Guarneri mentioned Pat working on 'his next game, which will be out next year'

  • Dialed In manuals were received and will be distributed to customers and distributors

    high confidence · Jack Guarneri confirmed 'we have them now' and discussed distribution plans

Notable Quotes

  • “We're very blessed and very lucky that we have an amazing loyal customer base.”

    Jack Guarneri@ 2:27 — Demonstrates gratitude and acknowledges the foundation of Jersey Jack Pinball's success

  • “It takes longer to install a light kit than to build a whole game.”

    Jack Guarneri or Butch (unclear)@ 12:33 — Illustrates technical complexity and customer support challenges for older machines

  • “You have a pinball machine at home, your friends come over, that's great. Strangers come over, that might not be so great, but they learn pinball.”

    Jack Guarneri@ 20:41 — Captures the grassroots evangelism strategy for growing the pinball market

  • “Jack can speak. He just won't shut up, but he can speak.”

    Ken (Jersey Jack employee)@ 21:47 — Humorous characterization of Jack Guarneri's communication style

  • “I just think we're still right over here, ready to go up, because everybody's still finding out about pinball machines.”

    Jack Guarneri@ 29:44 — Expresses optimism about pinball industry growth potential and market position

  • “We want to make prices go down, actually. We can figure out how to do that.”

    Jack Guarneri@ 29:57 — Indicates desire to reduce game costs, counter to industry pricing trends

  • “Jack, if you think I'm going to help you build The Games, you can go to hell.”

Entities

Jack GuarneripersonJersey Jack PinballcompanyWizard of OzgamePirates of the CaribbeangameThe HobbitgameDialed IngameButchperson

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Location/operator revenue struggling despite machines' presence; operators report mixed financial results ($400-$500/month cited as achievable but not guaranteed); indicates challenging economics for location-based play

    medium · Tommy Lyons stated machines 'make mate/man and they don't make mate/man' and cited $400-$500/month in steady revenue, acknowledging it's 'rough today for operators'

  • ?

    business_signal: Jersey Jack reporting 1,000+ Pirates of the Caribbean pre-orders/backlog; indicates strong demand momentum for new title

    high · Jack stated 'we have more than 1,000 pirates on order'

  • ?

    code_update: New Hobbit code update scheduled for July 7, 2018 release with advanced gameplay features

    high · Jack announced 'on the 7th of July, 7-7, there will be a new code update for The Hobbit'

  • ?

    community_signal: Jersey Jack conducting factory tours for educational groups, scout troops, and institutions; incorporating pinball into academic curricula (geometry); demonstrating commitment to youth engagement and industry growth

    high · Jack described Princeton students studying pinball geometry; teachers incorporating pinball into curriculum; factory tours generating sustained engagement

  • ?

    community_signal: Pinball evangelism and grassroots adoption strategy; emphasis on home ownership driving word-of-mouth growth; targeting underserved demographics (seniors in retirement communities, youth in educational settings)

    high · Jack discussed speaking at retirement community, noting strong engagement from 90+ year-old players; emphasized friend-to-friend evangelism model for home machines

Topics

Game Production and StatusprimaryCode Updates and Software SupportprimaryHome vs. Location Operator MarketprimaryCompany Growth and Manufacturing CapacityprimaryCommunity Engagement and EvangelismprimaryPat Lawlor's Return to DesignsecondaryGlobal Distribution and International ExpansionsecondaryIndustry Pricing and Market Positioningsecondary

Sentiment

positive(0.82)— Jack Guarneri expresses gratitude, pride in company achievements, and optimism about market growth. Discussion of loyal customer base, successful game sales, and community impact. Some mentions of challenges (licensing disputes, operator difficulties, price pressures) but overwhelmingly positive tone with celebration of milestones and future prospects.

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.275

0:00
Male Speaker 1 Male Speaker 2 Hey everybody. Are you ready to hand this off to me, Dave? Male Speaker 1 Just about. Still good access to the pizza back there so people don't have to push too many seats aside to get out of your pizza? It's all for me. You've got to knock the skid over. And you've got to tuck his gun in the pizza. That's like the proxies. You've got to get by him. Find a seat. He's going to get by me. And here he is, Jack Guarneri.
0:51
Thank you. Thank you very little. Thank you. Everybody had pizza? This has become a tradition for many years. When we couldn't make games, we made pizza. And we made shirts and we made other stuff. And I have some giveaways later. We're going to have question and answer. And I just wanted to thank Gabe, first of all, first and foremost.
1:16
Gabe and all those people running the show. And it started from really just a little idea that he had. Kind of like the little idea I had to start a pinball company. he started the show. And I really enjoy it. I really appreciate it. And I really thank you and your people for the show. I think it's really great. So thank you.
1:39
Didn't it actually start from a little guy on your forum that wanted his update every two weeks? Yeah, every Friday, every Thursday, during the Wizard of Oz years. And it was years. Steve would be writing me in general. What is my update? Where's my Friday update? Where's your magic iPad? What's going on? Listen, how many people here have the pinball ringtone on their iPhone? So when your phone rings, everybody is looking at their phone. Yeah, Gabe started with that whole thing, and we would struggle to come up with an update. I think one week, a coil fell off the shelf, and Jen and I used it as an update or something like that. Now it's a little different. We've built several thousand games. We're very blessed and very lucky that we have an amazing loyal customer base. How many people here have a Jersey Jack game? Anybody? Come on, it's cool. Good, good.

Wayne (Australian distributor)@ 28:42 — Illustrates how early skepticism was overcome through relationship-building

Gabe
person
Pat Lawlorperson
Joel D. Guzmanperson
Tommy Lyonsperson
Wayneperson
Pintastic New Englandevent
Pinball Expoevent
Jack Guarneri Jr.person
Mandala International Corporationcompany
Jen Guarneriperson
Kenperson
Four Seasons retirement communityorganization
Nijel Hallperson
  • ?

    licensing_signal: Jersey Jack had to resolve trademark dispute over 'Make Pinball Great Again' slogan; obtained trademark after determining unauthorized use, preventing competitor use on merchandise

    high · Jack described dispute with bar owner Louis using slogan; Jack obtained trademark to prevent further unauthorized use

  • $

    market_signal: Jersey Jack reporting home collector market as primary revenue driver (majority of sales) versus location/operator market; indicates structural shift in market composition away from traditional location-based arcade model

    high · Jack stated 'most of the The Games we build and sell go to home customers' and that he 'recognized that home customers would be the up-and-coming thing' since 1999

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Pat Lawlor, legendary pinball designer, returning to active design after retirement; new game in development for Jersey Jack Pinball launching 'next year' (2019)

    high · Jack stated Pat 'is working on his next game, which will be out next year' and emphasized wife's gratitude for getting him 'out of the house'

  • $

    market_signal: Jack expressing desire to reduce pinball machine prices rather than increase them; acknowledges current price trajectory as concern

    medium · Jack stated 'We don't want to make prices go up. We want to make prices go down, actually. We can figure out how to do that.'

  • ?

    product_concern: Jersey Jack offering discounted light kit upgrades and labor support for older Wizard of Oz machines; acknowledges lighting issues affecting some units; demonstrating post-purchase support commitment

    high · Jack mentioned '2.0 light kit that we're selling at a discount' and offering 30-hour labor installation for affected machines

  • ?

    product_strategy: Jersey Jack planning Wizard of Oz production resumption in October 2018; continuing Hobbit production; Dialed In in ongoing production with strong sales momentum

    high · Jack stated 'we'll go back and build some' Wizard of Oz in October; multiple references to ongoing Hobbit and Dialed In production and sales

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Jack Guarneri expressing cautious optimism about market cycle positioning; believes industry still in early growth phase rather than mature/declining; suggests sustainable expansion potential

    high · Jack stated 'I just think we're still right over here, ready to go up, because everybody's still finding out about pinball machines'

    • 2:39
    Maybe one of the questions later will be, when are you guys gonna start building parrots? So we'll leave that for a question later. I don't wanna answer it now.
    2:49
    But it's not long. I said summer, and there were people that went, They went on to the astrological weather charts, and they said summer starts on the 21st of June and ends on the 21st of September. So is it closest to the 21st of June or closest to the 21st of September? And they just said yes. The silly answer to the whole thing is obvious, when open costs arrive, we build dams. And we're lucky we have more than 1,000 pirates on order. Did anybody get to catch Butch's dive with the pirate dam? So I learned a lot. And thank you, Butch. It is truly a blessing to have you work now full time for the company. We're really lucky that we have a lot of passionate people working. Oh, look at this. Come on in. That's great. Anybody want to take any home, you're welcome to take a to-go plate. Very nice. It's not Brooklyn, but it's OK. It's good. Price is right. So who's going to complain? Yeah, so we're really lucky that we have so many people in the company. Pretty much, I would say, everybody that really love pinball and love what we're doing. They love our customer base. They love to spread fun and happiness in the world. It's a crazy world. And we are very lucky to be making things that are fun, make people smile. And I get a lot of emails and phone calls from people. The majority of them are people that are really happy with their games. And especially young people and women still tell me about Wizard of Oz. Every show I go to, so far this year I've met 90,000 miles in the air so far. And I guess today the first half of the year ends. So I'll certainly make it to 1K United again, I'm sure. I still have a trip to Australia and a whole bunch of other trips. Pretty much almost every weekend I'm at a pinball show or two. And it's really cool. It's really a great thing. I was in China a couple weeks ago. I was visiting a factory and I was at the amusement park show. And I was in Paris and I was in Vienna. I was in Austria.
    5:07
    It's great. It's great. I'm doing this now, believe it or not, like 42 years. And imagine that I'm just 45 years old. So how the hell did that happen? So really kind of lucky. I never thought I would start a pinball company. It was just, we just wanted to make games. I didn't know all of what was involved. And it was a good thing, because the entrepreneurial side of me had to convince myself that this is what I wanted to do.
    5:38
    And we had some difficulties, like everything worth doing. All games take a lot to make and to design. And if you played Pirates of the Caribbean and you spent some time with the deep dive with Butch, you really got to see, you know, this much of the surface of what that game is. Because there's so much more to that game that goes into it. It's all the engineering, all the mechanical drawings, all the programming, all the sound, all the ideas, things that we think about that we say are great today. and then we wake up tomorrow morning and we throw it out in the garbage and we start all over again. And part of that, you know, the DNA of the company, for good or bad, comes from me in the beginning because it's going to kind of be what I think it's going to be. And the people in the company just want to make great games and they want to make all you guys happy. This poor guy can't see me because I'm standing right behind him, so sorry to make you strain the neck. So I have a little video put together, a bunch of pictures. And if anybody has any questions, just stick your hand up and I'll be happy to answer. Or Bush will be happy to answer. Like I said, we have some posters and some other stuff. Some crap, I mean some collectibles that Gabe, some collectibles that Gabe gave me. You know, the factor is pretty funny because we have things that get rejected. And then, you know, I go and I, I don't know if I have, yeah, I go take this and I go like that and I give it to somebody and it's an automatic collectible and I see it on eBay for like $200. I said, wow, I should do that for my retirement account. It's in the junkyard of the bank, yeah. Exactly. Hi, Gabe. How are you, buddy? Give me a hug. This thing, aside from his wife and kids, I'm the only one that loves him. Not true. All right, boys, go ahead. One again. Eric Karamanian. Nice Armenian band. I worked with some Armenians years ago. I ran Mandala International Corporation, which nobody probably knows. Mondal was in the coin-operated amusement industry. You know. You know Mondal for sure. And so does Mike the Donut. Where's the Jersey Jack pinball distributors? There's Big Mikey from Automated Services.
    8:10
    Preservably so. And you have Tommy Lyons from Seacoast Amusements. Tommy. And you have... He's not a Jersey Jack distributor, but somehow he gets games now and then.
    8:24
    Todd Tucky, the one who... Is Alan Seahat back in the room? Or is Alan... Alan was eating Chinese food on the floor of the... Am I okay over here with the audio? I hear myself.
    8:39
    I have a difficult time hearing myself because I've got my Brooklyn accent kicking in. I don't know about that. All right, let's go to the first one. Eric? Where's this guy taking pictures? What is he doing?
    8:54
    Where's this going? Is this going? I never see any of these pictures. People are taking pictures all the time. I never see this. There's no film in any of these cameras.
    9:04
    Okay, so what are we looking at? Back of your head, Butch? That's very nice. Going on our YouTube channel. Okay, really? You have a YouTube channel? Wow. I can't believe it. You couldn't even send me an email a few years ago.
    9:20
    He could still ask for an upgrade. Are you there? Look at, oh, you have people. I have people. I've got to be honest. He was so relaxed yesterday. It's so cute watching him grow up. Actually, that was so long ago. I'm wrong. That was today. It was so long ago. Because I got up at like 4 in the morning. I got here this morning. Because that was this morning. He was so relaxed, and I was shocked. And you said you have great people. So that's a good thing.
    9:47
    So we're trying to make Bimbo great again, right? So in 2015, hi. You want to sit? I'll take a hug tomorrow. I love you, too. Check us in the mail. Okay. So, you know, back in 2015, somebody ran for president and came up with the saying, and I ripped it off and I said, make pinball great again. And I didn't want to spend any money. Where the hell is the picture? Where is that?
    10:16
    Can everybody see me? So I got this idea to make these hats, make pinball great again. And we gave them out. Mike has a bunch of them. And I didn't want to spend money trademarking that saying. We need to give lawyers more money. And somebody with a bar called Patterson's in St. Louis actually started making that stuff and selling it on his website. So I had to say, what are you doing? I've been using it. No, I've been using it for five years, he said. Five years. Well, prove that. He couldn't prove it, so now we actually have the trademark. I had to spend money and get the trademark. So he can't use that anymore. So you've got to battle for everything. I don't know why it has to be a battle, but you've got to battle for everything. So go to the next one, Butch.
    11:11
    So I always love kind of starting with this picture because this was really the first part of the dream come true, you know, a whole line of Wizard of Oz games in the building. And Wizard of Oz, we've sold probably 3,300 or 3,400 games so far, and most of them actually work.
    11:33
    You know, George is laughing because he had his game in our building. We had to rebuild the whole game. I don't see the great cloud over you, George, So I think it's been exercised right out of your life. So you have good luck again, okay? So we're going to bless you with the pinball.
    11:51
    Good. Stay awake. Hello? Hi. Nice to see you. So Eric's got wires coming out there and everything like that. So there are Wwise late kits available. If anybody has an old Woz game and you're having issues with your lighting, we have a 2.0 light kit that we're selling at a discount. So if you have issues, email me or email Butch, and we'll work out some kind of deal where we can get your game up and running. We also, for the people that can't install them, because it's about how many hours?
    12:30
    That's a trick question. It's about 30 hours to install this. It takes longer to install a light kit than to build a whole game. Is that right? That's probably right, yeah. Yeah. So we're doing the labor on them and everything, so we want to make sure we try to support everything we sell. Go to the next one.
    12:48
    And those are Hobbits. We're actually still building Hobbits, believe it or not. Somebody told me we're the only major pinball factory still building all the games that we've released. So we're building Wizard of Oz later this year, probably in October. We'll go back and build some. Mike has a bunch on order. A few other people have a bunch on order because people around the holidays might buy some. And Hobbit, we still have some Hobbits we're building. Can I have a question?
    13:19
    More Hobbits. By the way, on the 7th of July, 7-7, there will be a new code update for the Hobbit. And I can send you release notes if you want. It's a bitch about, I mean, if you want to look at what they are in advance, pre-criticize the people and come up with your own ideas for what you would do if you were a software programmer, how you would make the game play.
    13:48
    Dialed In, mixed in with Hobbits. So this was taken a couple weeks ago when we were building some Hobbits and Dialed In. Dialed In is still really a great game. It's still gaining traction. Who hasn't Dialed In here? Yeah, I mean, today I heard a lot of compliments. And I wanted to thank you for incorporating this artwork. You know, this is original artwork. This is not by John Yancey. This is done, who's the artist? Joel D. Guzman. Right here, right here. Where is he? Guzman. All right.
    14:29
    Up and coming pinball artists. These should be doing pinball machines for sure. because this is beautiful. He took the idea. Yeah, and we're going to give away some of those. And Joel, you can sign some if they're not signed. And Rich will sign them. And Mike can sign them. And Joel's signature would be worth it. I can sign them. Yeah. I would sign one for me. I want to hang one up. It's beautiful. Really nice. Great work. Good job. Yep. So we're building dialed in still. Yes. Are you talking about how you're still spelling old games? They're not old games. Beat that guy up. That's putting words in your mouth. Yeah. What is this, fake news? See, this is the problem with this country. That's CNN right there. This is the problem right here. Did I say that? Did I say they were all a band? No. OK. Absolutely. Thank you. He's a member of the media, this guy. Yes. See, I like that hat, too. What I was interested in is, how much of the sales these days are going to individuals versus arcades and locations? I like that accent too.
    15:35
    So that's proprietary information. I don't know if you're business. No, actually, most of the games we build and sell go to home customers. And when I started pinballsales.com at the end of 1999, I really recognized that home customers would be the up-and-coming thing. And a lot of people told me that that would never, that I'd be out of business and nobody at home wants to buy a pinball machine or anything like that. You know, it's rough today for operators. I'm an operator and there are a lot of operators that we support with games. But, you know, when you think about it, the fine game... I have a canulary check over here. Several thousand dollars and a required service. And our games do very well on location, but it's still an uphill battle for a lot of the guys. Right, Tommy? Yes. You're an operator, right? You've got games on location. I do. Do your games make any money?
    16:30
    Yes and no. Okay. Okay, that's it. So they make money and they don't make money. There's a great answer for you. No, elaborate. No, really. They do hold $400 to $500 a month, but it's all straight and steady. And the good part about it is when they're out on location, a lot of people tell other people. And I have two locations where the bowling center opens up at 10 o'clock and there's like six of them just there. And all they do is they play the pinball two or three hours and then they leave. So he's waiting for the new dial then to be invited to put it in there and take out the Wizard box. But the Wizard box has been there about two years, two and a half years and it's already paid for itself. So you get locations like that that will make the money.
    17:16
    Alan has like five of them on location. Alan does have a whole bunch of them on location. He's eating Chinese food inside. Why would he want to be in here?
    17:26
    What can I tell you? So let's go to the next one, George. But it's mostly home customers. which is great, which is all of you people, which is wonderful. This is a site that I never thought I would see in my building.
    17:41
    Games in boxes, ready to go to customers all over the world. And it's a great thing. When you start something and there's nothing in the building, and we used to sit at the lunch table, Jen and I and a couple other people would sit at the lunch table in front of the building. The whole back of the building was dark, and there wasn't one part in there. And we would joke, you know, hey, how many games did we build today? And of course, there was nothing. When you have something like that, you're actually saying, you know,
    18:14
    there are a whole bunch of people going to buy our product. There are a whole bunch of people going to work here. There are a whole bunch of vendors going to make parts for us. There are a whole bunch of distributors that are going to do that. Just none of them know it yet. But I knew it. So it's kind of funny. It's nice to see something like that come true. and work towards making it comfortable.
    18:35
    So we get a lot of visitors to the factory, and we get groups of young people, especially classes, scout troops, different organizations, and we let everybody in. So everybody comes, and we give them a tour, and they're very curious. These kids were from Princeton at a school where they were actually studying geometry, and they were designing the pinball machine in their studies. So it's kind of cool that teachers are incorporating what pinball machines are into a curriculum to teach them mathematics and theory of geometry.
    19:19
    And they were there. You can go to the next one. They were there, and what we found at that time was all the boys gravitated towards The Hobbit and all the girls gravitated towards Wizard of Oz. I mean, what a surprise. I kind of knew that, but they all love those games. And you can go to another one. You're probably in these pictures. You won't see anybody like this. You won't see any kid like this.
    19:49
    So they were all, they had a whole attention span. I had it the whole time they were in the factory. It was really very cool. It was something to see.
    20:00
    Go ahead, go to the next one. At the end of the tour, which was maybe about an hour and a half, they did ask a lot of questions. They all wound up at my office, and I sent a bunch of collectibles for each one of them. They all took something home, and some of them I put into their college fund. I don't know, but it was great. You know, those kind of groups, that's the future of pinball. You know, I was here earlier, and some of the guys from the club up in Canada, they were talking about, you know, how you have to keep spreading the word of pinball, how you have to keep evangelizing, because that's what we're really doing. You know, you have games at home, your friends come over, that's great. Strangers come over, that might not be so great, but they learn pinball. And they learn about what's going on, and they say, well, I didn't know I could have a pinball machine at home. then before you know it, that person has more games than you have. So it's pretty cool how that happens.
    20:59
    I was invited about two months ago. There's a lot of retirement communities around our area in central New Jersey. And this is an upscale one. It's called Four Seasons. And some guys from the men's club found our building. And they came in and they invited me. And actually they came to the door and they said to one of my guys that answered the door, they said, we're looking for a speaker. So they thought, okay, what do you need a speaker for? We're going to have to hear Sean move up. That's what they asked himself. Yeah, so it wasn't a speaker for a game. They were asking somebody to come to the men's club to speak about pinball machines. So Ken, who we love in the building and does everything, went and found me. Does not talk a lot. Yeah, no. And Ken said, oh, Jack can speak. He just won't shut up, but he can speak. So I went there, and it was really cool. And these guys, most of them are World War II veterans, and the guy playing that game was over 90 years old. It was really great. They had a great time.
    22:08
    Pinball was something that probably in a lot of these retirement communities, it wouldn't be a good thing to have in a clubhouse because of reflexes and motor skills and interaction, social interaction. So those people out there, opportunists or entrepreneurial people like Todd, figure out maybe you can go to Brookdale and all these places and get them some pinball machines because they loved it. They had a great time.
    22:35
    And this guy was like 92 years old. And I was happy he was standing, but he was actually playing the game. It was pretty cool. Dialed in. So dialed in is still going strong. We selling a lot of them It kind of Gabe theme for the show Go ahead keep going Go ahead Butch I sorry Wade That was my cue Sorry Yeah
    23:02
    So you see in here, Butch talks about changes. When we first had the prototype game, our geniuses, our Einsteins, they named the theater Einstein Theater. And they thought it would be pretty cool, except like this Jewish hospital in New York, which actually owns the name Einstein, which was given to us by the family, said, you can't use that unless you pay us a shit ton of money. And we said, no, that's okay. We'll just call it something different. Or you sent us a bunch of crap signed by Jack, maybe. They didn't want that. They wanted me to sign some checks. That's what they wanted me to sign.
    23:38
    If you remember, it was really a great expo. It was a lot of fun. We had a lot of people in the room. It was Pat Bowler's return to pinball after many years. and it was really a great experience. A lot of our customers, they were looking at the game. That's a guy named Steve Sabota from California. He's a collector. That picture is what everybody was doing at the show. They did that with Pirates. They did that with Wizard of Oz. They did that with Hobbit. They're just looking down and playing the whole game with their eyes, just falling in love with the game, saying, you know, this is really something I want to own, it's something I want to play, it's something I want to cherish as part of my collection. And that's really what we try to do.
    24:29
    The great Pat Lawler. So it was really good getting Pat out of retirement. His wife has thanked me many, many times for getting him the hell out of the house. And he has really a great focus in his life. He's making games. He's working on his next game, which will be out next year. And if you want to know what it is, it's a pinball machine.
    24:58
    That's right. It's a pinball machine. There's Pat with the other jersey, Jack. That's my son, Jack, who also works for the company. And that was last May when games first went on the line. Who does Pat look like in that picture actually? Doesn't he look like the guy with the cell phone on the side of the game? That picture with the square golf buckle and the red shirt? I kind of think that John Yancey took poetic license. Anybody waiting for dialed in manual? Good. You know, we have them now. They finally came in. I didn't bring any with me because my daughter Jen figured that there would be a whole bunch of fish fights trying to get them. That was back in March. Butch really produced an amazing manual. It took a long time to print because they had to cut the trees down first and they had to turn them into pulp and make all these. Make all the inks because they're in color. But we're going to get them out to everybody. I think we're going to send some to our distributors at Soul Games and then we're going to send some direct. So we'll be in touch with everybody in the next week or two and figure out how to do that. Get them out to everybody. So thanks for waiting. Everybody that bought an LE game gets one and everybody who bought a CD game gets one. And they'll also be available for sale for anybody else that wants to use one as a doorstop or something like that.
    26:30
    Wheel chuck for you. Yeah, this is down in Australia when we had a pirates party a few months ago, and Jack came with me. And they had a, they had this guy, Captain Jack kind of guy, and he was drunk for real the whole time.
    26:48
    So I, seriously, you know, like, I felt like it was an act until, like, he burped and almost knocked me over. He was pretty funny, and he was very good in character, and all the Aussies really liked the guy. And I didn't have to pay him. My distributor, Wayne, paid the guy. It was a long time. It's a good time for your joke, you know. Go ahead. Oh, yeah.
    27:13
    Where do pirates go when they get hurt? Anybody know? I do. Yeah. Are you kidding me? I asked people when we were taking a picture at one of these shows, and they said, all right, everybody, smile. Say the letter after Q. And Lee says S.
    27:41
    Technically, you're correct. But I was looking for R. I wasn't looking for R. S. She just doesn't have the same thing. Go ahead. Go, go, go. This is going to take a little night if we do. You're getting text messages. I am getting text messages. Okay, just get rid of that. I just don't touch it because then it'll bring it back. I know. There you go. So that's Wayne, the guy in the dial-in shirt. Anybody know Wayne? This is Pitbull Australia. You guys hear about him? Anybody hear about the guy that was going to build medieval madness like for years and years and years in Australia? That's the guy. So he's really a great guy. You know, he congratulated me when I started the company because he had control of all the Williams parts before Rick had them at Planetary Pitbull. Well, Wayne had all those parts. And, you know, Wayne figured he would help me out in the beginning when I started Jersey Jack Pinball. So the day that I announced the company, Wayne sent me an email and it said, Jack, if you think I'm going to help you build games, you can go to Hedlund. Wayne.
    28:50
    That's what he wrote. He's my distributor now. So I kind of forgive him for that. He really didn't mean that. He was getting very emotional. He plays the distributing games that other people play. Yeah, he's a great guy. He's very good. His skill is really sales rather than building games. His skill, yes. He's not a diplomat. So his skill is in selling games. He's not in the diplomatic attache of anything. Because he would start World War V already. He'd be working on that.
    29:24
    I don't know. This is just a picture from a show. There's just so many shows I go to. I think this was in Austria. a few months ago. People are pinball crazy around the world. It's just growing and growing. And, you know, I get asked the question, like, where are we in the cycle right now? Are we here? Are we here? Are we up here? Are we going down?
    29:44
    I tell you what, I just think we're still right over here, ready to go up, because everybody's still finding out about pinball machines. So hopefully, you know, the prices don't keep going up. We don't want to make prices go up. We want to make prices go down, actually. We can figure out how to do that. But I think we're at the beginning. We're really still at the beginning. This has got to be overseas because the men have purses on.
    30:09
    I saw a couple of guys here with purses. It's a handbag. This, I think, is in Seattle. It's a valet on the right side from Shorty's, a great bar. He's a great operator. The other guy is a crazy customer. He's a great guy. He just loves what we do.
    30:35
    This is an Austria. That's one of our distributors. Nijel Hall on the left. And the guy on the right runs a gigantic pinball museum in Europe.
    30:45
    So it's just amazing. Different cultures, how games transcend. And everybody really has a lot of things in common. This is down at Allentown. I think this was a year ago or two years ago. We had a bunch of games. Joe Newport was a really good distributor for us in Pennsylvania, so that was in his booth. That guy's not having a good time at all. No, he's having a terrible time.
    31:08
    There's Butch and a technician, John Moran, that works with me, who won a pinball tournament. He actually just texted me about something a minute ago, so I'll have to check what he texted about. He knew that I was going to show his picture, I guess. And I got his little trophy there, too. Yep, yep. Krakow Pinball Museum. What's really cool, I was in Poland, and I was never in Poland before, and you think about a country like Poland, what the hell is that place? It's like way out there. And the pinball club, they are such fanatics about playing pinball. I went to this club, and I was almost like, I don't want to say I was held hostage, but I was like held hostage. I didn't have a car. And every sign in the country reads C-Z-S-Z-Y-Z-K-Z-S-V-K-Y. So I couldn't go anywhere. I didn't know anything. Nobody spoke the language. I was there for a whole weekend. I had a great time with the guys. Pinball's alive and well in Krakow and in Warsaw. You know, there's a pinball museum there. And they actually send me stuff. You know, they send me chocolate and they send me hats. Somebody's making your hats there. You're going to have to shut them down. That's okay. He did it without a commission, but he's a friend, so it's OK. So it's totally OK. I was watching all of the Autobahn, all the little signs say, Auspark, Auspark, Auspark. I'm like, where is Auspark? Why is it so important? It's exit, silly. It's exit. I found that out. I learned it. I thought they were talking about you eating beans. No, no.
    32:46
    That's another one of our distributors in Europe. That's, I think, a show in Austria, too. Some of these shows, they actually give me my attire to wear. So this was a show where they made a shirt for me, and they said, put this on, please. And I put it on, and just gave me something to wear. I can travel the world pretty much without any money,
    33:09
    without any clothes almost, and without a place to stay. And people just pay for me, and they put me up. It's embarrassing. you know. Last night I was at Mike's house. He put me up. His wife cooked a gigantic steak. This guy, Todd, shoved it in his mouth. He had one. Frank had one. He couldn't eat fast enough. He followed the thing down. It was unbelievable. And he took video of it besides. So I don't know. It's like, we have a good time doing this. Like I said, we're really lucky and blessed. Very, very lucky. So I'm going to say, how are you in Seattle? It's not work. I tell you that. It's not work. If you can get a job working for a big company, do it. Do it. I don't know. Or maybe start your own pinball company. There's not enough of them. Good luck with that one. This is Christoph Wienhardt, and he is our distributor in Luxembourg in France, and those are all his games. And he got a Pirates prototype with all three spinning discs, and I will have to go to Luxembourg to try that out. It was called Dead Hands to get that game back. That game will never come back. He told me that already. Next. This is at IAAPA. And that's actually my dad playing a Hobbit. That's probably a couple of years ago. My dad in that picture was about 90 years old. So, yeah. That's the booth at IAAPA a few years ago. Maybe that's 2015 or something like that. Yeah. I like the way the games all look good together. They're all different, but you can tell they're all related. Yeah, they're all related. We don't make one better than the other. We make them different than each other. So that's what we try to do. We don't try to outdo ourselves. This is in Germany. This is one of the fellows that works. One of our newer distributors, Pinball Universe in Germany. They have an amazing facility. And I see, I look a little fat in that picture. That's before I lost like 12 pounds. So that was a couple months ago. I stopped eating pasta and bread. Yeah, no more asphalt.
    35:19
    I don't know. Summer's coming. I want the Louvre's a few times. This was a cool picture that was kind of taken by accident. I had an off day when I was in Paris, and I went to the Louvre. Anybody been to the Louvre? Well, yeah. Those that didn't go, go there. It's a really amazing, amazing place. I spent about eight hours there that day. And I was with one of my French friends, customers, It was Medi Pierre Hadibi. And Medi says, put your arms up like the French prime minister at the inauguration. And I just put my arms up at random. I moved somewhere. And it looked like there was a W, like a wizard, shooting out of my fingers. So it was kind of a cool, accidental picture. You know, I went to the Louvre back when they reopened it with that glass pyramid in the 80s. And that entire area in that picture was one big line. They had it going around like concentric squares. There were that many people standing in line to get in. It was unbelievable. This day in April, it was 90 degrees. It was just beautiful, beautiful weather in Paris. Everything was blooming. It was just a beautiful place. I love it. Amazing thing that the Mona Lisa picture, you see that all the time, and you think, oh, that must be some gigantic portrait. That thing's about this big. And it's behind four foot of glass, and you can't get anywhere close to it. You can't take a picture. You can't. You can take pictures. I have pictures. Well, yeah. It's painted on a piece of wood. across the street. Painted on a piece of wood. You know what just threw the thing away? Crazy stuff. Crazy. Maybe our games will be in a museum. There's me on Champs-Élysées. Parc de Triomphe. Louis. A lot of pinball. A lot of pinball in Paris. Anybody seen this picture before? Yes. Yeah, a couple of you, Dave. Yeah, you've seen everything before. So this is a picture of me when I was 14 years old on social media.
    37:19
    That's my CD radio. I was very active, all kinds of electronics, always as a kid. I could see the cover of my radio was off because I probably had my hands in there tinkering with something or other. And what was your handle? My handle was Jelly Bean.
    37:39
    Yeah. Yeah, I got my ass kicked a couple times. Actually, I got on the air during Easter time, and the girl across the street, she picked my handle jelly bean. And it was good that I was on the track team, because nobody could catch me to kick my ass. So, yeah, it was a good experience for me. There I am in one of my electronics classes doing something. I have no clue, playing with some kind of signal generator or something like that. I wound up, the highest I got, I didn't become an engineer. The highest I did was I got my second class FCC license. So I had to learn a lot of electronic theory, and I had to learn all about the FCC, and I had a thought of maybe working at a radio or TV station. But instead I took a detour and started fixing pinball machines, which wasn't a bad detour. So this is the guy responsible for me being in the industry. His name is Heinz Magdolinsky. That was at his 70th birthday party in 1996. And he was German. He got blown out of a U-boat during the war. And the first day that I went to work for his company, he drove over the Brooklyn Bridge and looked down at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. And he said, yeah, yeah, if we would have won the war, I would have been an admiral by now. So it was kind of interesting. We had an interesting relationship. and unfortunately six months after his picture, he had a heart attack and died. But he taught me a lot of things that I still use today. We used to go fix an electromechanical game. We had games in all these colleges. And you go fix a game in like two minutes, and then it's missing a bunch of screws, and he would go take the game and pull it over like this and kick the bottom, and only screws would come all the way over. and he would take every screw and he'd put it back in the game where it belonged. And I'm like, this old son of a gun. Like, let's get out of here. What are you doing? Like, come on, I want to get out of here. No, no, no. If the manufacturer meant for one less screw to be in the game, it would be there. Every screw has a place and you must find it and put it back.
    39:56
    Wow. Well, that definitely stayed with me. So he's smiling down on us and probably laughing and it was really good training. Especially seeing that 70 porno mustache on you.
    40:10
    Yeah, well, it gets better. Oh, yeah. So there I am. That's probably 1977, 76. No, that's probably 1975. I'm wearing one of the famous sweaters that my mother made for me. And I remember what that was. It was C.W. Post College. and It's going to be 77 because Carly's looking Okay, and there you go.
    40:37
    So we just got to correct everything this guy, you know. It's poetic license. Thank you, Dave. I love you. You're the best. You know, I first said it was 1977 and then I backed up to 75. So I was right. I had to go with my first You didn't go to college, but you worked in a lot of colleges. I went to, I listened. I went to Columbia University. I went to CW I went to New York Tech, I went to Brooklyn Law School, went to Brooklyn College, St. Francis, I went to every one of them. I didn't get a degree. Listen, neither did Bill Gates, it didn't hurt even one of us, but he got a couple bucks more than me. So, I made a mistake here in this picture. I should have actually posed with the Bigfoot game instead of posing with the Lost World. I don't think anybody knows where Dave should go to Resident Expo. How many were made, Dave? And where are they right now? Two, right? Two. Those are those, right. And he still exists. Nobody knows.
    41:34
    Well, Dennis Nordman is not included. Right. And, you know, this was at Replay FX a few years ago. And I found The Lost World, and that game looked the same, and I didn't look the same. So I took a picture with it. Paul Ferris is here. Yes, where is he? In the show somewhere. Oh, he's not here. Okay. Well, there you go.
    42:00
    So this is typical Brooklyn, and that was in March of 1977, before John Travolta wore that outfit in Saturday Night Fever. I just copied you. I just want to go on record that he ripped me off.
    42:13
    Could you dance like him? No, no, no, I can't dance at all. That's disco. Yeah, what was the car? Anybody know what the car was? Mustang? Yeah. That was a Datsun. So he puts his arm up like this and that's the disco fever back there. Yeah, pretty much. I was about 110 pounds. So you know, I was thinking of pirate games way back then. This is New Year's Eve 1977 and I knew I would do a pirate game. Captain Kidd. Anybody have that? Who made that game, Dave? Dave. Play Matic, I think. Sagasa, Sonic, Playmatic, maybe Playmatic. I think Playmatic, yeah. Very obscure company. So obscure we can't even say he's wrong. But something was made just like that. What game was made just like that, Dave? It's the same artwork.
    43:08
    Ship Ahoy. Ship Ahoy, right. Give him, like, something. I don't know why. Okay, get out of this picture. Let's go. That's when I didn't have a problem losing a couple pounds. I couldn't gain any weight. I think I weighed 110 pounds in that picture. I might still have those pants. This is an IAAPA show. We'll be done with the home movie part of this soon. This is an IAAPA show in 1990 in Washington, DC. And the people standing there, they had a big amusement center, big arcades in Coney Island. Wally and Dinah Roberts. Did you know them? Did you know them, Mike? Brooklyn? No. Todd, did you know them at all? Did you know them? They were there forever. They've been there forever. I guarantee that. They were institutions. They're both long gone. Got to keep going.
    43:58
    We used to open our factory during the summer to have these barbecues and tours and everything, and it was a wonderful thing, but we don't have any dates to really do it anymore, and we can't get everybody together to do it, and it's difficult, and we get asked all the time if we're going to do it. I'd love to do it, but with all the shows and traveling, we just can't get it together. But maybe one of these days again.
    44:24
    The guy on the left is Ryan C from Australia. The guy in the middle is a crazy customer from Westchester, Charles Thomas. And the guy on the right is one of our employees, a great employee, Dave, works on the assembly line. Again, we get a lot of people, media people like you, come and visit us and bother us and ask us all kinds of questions that we answer happily or we make stuff up. You know, at least we get them out of the building at some point, and we'll sign some crap and send you away. Yeah, in fact, next.
    44:57
    That's those guys that I have on the three-class, sir. Keep going. Again, you know, people come, they do little blog stories, they do all kinds of things. This lady, the retirement community that I went to, They actually have a TV channel where they do all kinds of news stories and feature stories. And she came over to find out about how a pinball machine was made. And they spent like five hours there, and their show was like five minutes long. So there was a lot of stuff on the cutting room floor.
    45:31
    And Dave has been there a long time, no? Yeah, and these were the two gentlemen that came originally to scope out the place. You know, they're two Purple Heart World War II veterans. So nice to see those guys interested in pinball for sure Adam not here but this is Adam charity that he runs Right Mike The 200 Foundation He a sponsor of this show He a really great guy and he streaming live Pirates of the Caribbean, I believe, right? So, we get involved with a lot of different charitable causes and we pretty much don't say no to anybody. But Adam is a really great guy and he does a lot for a lot of different charities and he takes one of his major loves, which is pinball, and he makes it translate to raising money for charitable. He's the sponsor of this seminar program. And he is the sponsor of this seminar program. This is just him. So we thank him for that as well.
    46:36
    That's my son Jack and my daughter Jen. Without them, a lot of things don't run. So I'm very grateful that they're both involved in the company. that's a shot of my dad from a couple of years ago he's still with us thank God, 92 years old he even gets to play pinball when he can he's down in Florida so he's doing well Jack you've been married how long this summer?
    47:01
    35 years we both have dads that are 90 plus years old we're very lucky that's true and we have wives that will probably be saint dealing with both of us That's a picture of my granddaughter, Olivia. That's Jen's daughter. And there's no time like really early starting them on pinball. She can't reach around the cabinet, but she laughs hysterically as the game is played. And Jen sent me a picture the other day. She was under the cabinet turning the switch on to play the game. So there's no hope that she's not going to play pinball. And Jen is expecting a little baby. We're going to have a grandson at the end of the year. So there will be another kid running around soon trying to play. Congratulations. Yeah, it's really great. Thank you.
    47:57
    Oh, I wanted to throw this in because this is my next business. I just wanted to give you guys a heads up. On the road to Hana, anybody been to Hawaii? So this is on the road to Hana. I had to stop and take a picture of it. It's my next business. It's a very simple business. It's a coconut stand.
    48:15
    My inventory is on the right side. It grows on the trees. In the middle is my work area with a machete. On the left side is my waste product. And when I run out of coconuts, I'm done for the day. So one day, maybe I'll be over there playing with coconuts. Should have got out in front and put your hands up. Yeah, I know. There's a rainbow there somewhere. And that's about it. That's about enough of me. if anybody has any questions, that would be good. We're going to give, I don't know how I'm going to do that, but maybe the people that ask questions will get one of those free gifts. They will do it that way. We'll mess you all up, so you'll actually have to ask a couple of questions. Anybody have a question?
    48:58
    Yes. One of the things I've noticed about your games is that they're all very clean in the sense that I would not have any problem if I had grandchildren. I would not have any problems having them play those games. If I had the parents who come here, I've noticed over the years the parents and the kids gravitate to your games because they're all so clean. Is that a conscious decision to build the hobby to make sure that the games you are producing are on PG or below so that people could have their kids play them and not have to worry about any other problems? Yeah, it was. I mean, you know, in all my businesses, they're all family related. I mean, my other service company does service at a huge amusement center in central New Jersey, I-20 America, and it's family related. You know, I know that guns and violence and sex and all that stuff, drugs, they sell and they get used as promotional things, and I can pick themes that really glorify a lot of that stuff. We're not going to do it.
    50:07
    When Playboy came out years ago, and I was Stern's biggest distributor, we actually put the game on the website. And I was at the show. There was no Facebook and there was no Twitter or anything like that. And I put it up on the website. And I was still in Las Vegas. And my wife called me and she said, hey, you know, I see you got the Playboy game up there. And yeah, she says, do we need the money that bad? Do we need to sell that game? I said, what do you mean? So she explained it to me. And I took it off the website. I didn't sell it. You know, she said, you're Grand Knight in Knights of Columbus. You're a Eucharistic minister. You're a lector. You're on the board of directors of the church and the finance committee and everything. Maybe that exploits women and maybe that's not exactly the product for you to sell right now. And we don't really need the money that bad, so why don't you take that off the website. So, you know, to make conscious decisions like that, you know, it's a... I didn't think I'd get into an answer like this, but it's the truth. You know, everybody in every kind of company has to decide what they want to do, what they want to be, what they want to make money on, how desperate they want to be to make money, and what it is. And I can tell you that we'll probably do a music game. There I said it. Somewhere in the future, I want to do a music game. Rock and roll bands and things like that, some of them are more wholesome than others. But I think most of them are in good fun. So I don't get offended if Metallica has a cross in there, because I'm Catholic. I don't take offense to that, because they think it's just some kind of design feature of the game. To me, it means something different. So I think today, in this country especially, we've come to the point of a lot of sensitivity about what we do, what we say, who we keep as friends. Hyper. And where we go, yeah, it's not all bad. Some of it is too much, and some of it is too little. And we all make our own choices. I think the long, professorial answer to that is that as long as I'm picking the themes and the ideas is, the company does.
    52:23
    We want to run a family show. That's what we want to run. So our customers respond to that. We're happy with that. So give that guy something.
    52:31
    A lovely poster. How about that? Have the guy next to you sign it over there. Who's the one in group? Yeah.
    52:37
    How can we get that over to him? David, you're not doing anything. Hey, Jack. Yes. Is there any? Todd Tucky, everybody. Todd is writing 10 books.
    52:50
    10 books. What the hell is with the microphone? It works like somebody's pinball machine. I'm sorry, what are you doing?
    53:01
    You know who you need? You need Paul Young. What's that guy's name? Not Paul Young. Frank Young. You know, the guy from, that crazy guy from Pinball Expo. If you find him in the hallway, run the other way. Yes, Todd. So Todd's writing. This guy is writing, he can't even read. I can't believe he's writing. He's writing ten, ten books, books on pinball. Right? Is that right? That's the plan. The first book comes out September 1st. Can I get a book? Can I buy a book? Can you inscribe a book for me? Thank you, Harry.
    53:51
    You had a question. Well, yeah. The rumor has it that the first musical, and Zena does it for me too, the first musical, it could be the battery that's going bad, the first musical pimple you're going to do is one of the Bay City Rollers. Is that true?
    54:08
    How did you find out? No, it's not. They did do one good song, Saturday Night. It's a Saturday night. Village people. Yeah, village people.
    54:23
    I like that. I would say that the Yankees ground crew between, but I would mention that I'm a Yankee fan in this territory. Yes?
    54:35
    You're putting your hand up? Yeah, that's you. What's your name? Jared. Okay. Wait, hang on a minute.
    54:45
    All right, two-part question. So you make an amazing game, like dialed in, a non-licensed game. You flip to something that's been made for Portland Pirates. How does that process take place? Who's involved in those decisions? You're sitting around a table.
    55:05
    You've got ideas on the line. How does that even come to the select? You know, I don't want to say it comes from me, but, you know, it's a discussion. And, you know, I knew I wanted to do Pirates again. You know, because I sold, Pinball Sales, we sold about 700 Pirate games. When Dennis North had designed that game, and we showed it on the Pinball Sales website on July 14, 2006. We sold 100 games that day. Without eBay, without, you know, anything. We sold like 100 games that day. And women, girls especially, love both theme and Johnny Depp and everything. And I said, you know, if I could get that with the five movies, that would be really cool. And we went into the Disney pool and we got that game. So doing it, it was a lot of fun. I think Eric is a brand new designer, as Butch was talking about during the deep dive. Here's somebody that grew up in the industry. He had a lot of ideas all his life, young life, about how to design something or what he wanted in it. And we just let him loose. We actually told him, make a standard size game without enough of a play field. And he made a white body game without a play field. So this is how people actually listen to us, you know, about what they're doing. But some of it's encouraged, you know, I mean, we want them... I don't ever want to build fences around people, right, because it gets cheap. I want to have people that want to do more and want to take their passion and turn it into something great. So, yeah. So, you know, we have the next three games we're working on right now. We have ideas and licenses for like another three after that. So six games in the history of the company. We'll start spitting that a little faster, but we're not going to compromise quality, and we're not going to compromise depth of the game. we're probably not going to turn out a game every six months and use, reuse, and overuse the same thing over and over again. It's a difficult process. But we're getting better at it. We really are.
    57:19
    Alright, thanks. I have a good question. Are there any code updates that you're particularly excited about? Well, I am excited about the Hobbit code update. I think it's a long time coming, but again, you know, Ted, Keith, the guys, you know, Joe Katz and JT, they put a lot into it. You know, they could just put out something and say here's your code update and good luck with it. But the game is, these games are so deep. You know, Butch talks about the only way to play some of these games and see all the stuff that they can do is like with the glass off. You know, who's going to get to them, you know? So, we don't want them to be frustrating for first time players, but we want them to be really deep for people to get in them. And I'm sure there'll be another code update for Dialed In as well. There's some animation and some other things we need to touch up and finish, but Pirates will ship code complete also. Doesn't mean there won't be a code update at some point or other, but I want to ship real games. You know, we shipped Wizard of Oz with a box of lights. You know, it was like, wow, look at that. It can actually make the ball go around and it scores. Great. but yeah, I mean Wizard of Oz who knows, those crazy guys might call up and update Wizard of Oz I hope not, I hope they're working on other stuff give him something did we have a question down here? yeah, I got it right here so it was mine he said his English is not great do you have a game you want to make but he said it's too much Do I have a game that I want to make but it is too much expensive? You know, everybody wants me to make Harry Potter. I always get that question, everyone in the world. You know, if you get the license, we'll make it. We don't really care if it's expensive. If it's a great game, Wizard of Oz was not a cheap license. Hobbit was not a cheap license. It wasn't cheap to make Dialed In as an original theme. It cost more to make Dialed In than a licensed theme because you could just do so much more. So too much is also relative. Too much expensive is, we could ask 20 people in here and get 20 different answers. But that doesn't scare us. Pinball company is, you're really trying to put it all out there and put everything into the game. So a lot of times in the beginning of what we're doing, nobody's thinking about money, unfortunately. You know, they're just thinking about what the game is going to be. Then, at the end, the financial people go,
    60:01
    now you've got to think about money. It's crazy. Here you go, another picture. Yeah. Yeah, who else? Sam, yes, the money. Yes, right here. How many themes or ideas of games do you have? You know, listen, here's what happens. Every single day, customers call me, email me, and text me and say, you know, you know what would be a great game? This would be a great game. Why don't you make this game, you know? And there are ideas coming in, like, all the time. Like, if you're standing next to a beehive, and the bees are just swinging you, like, every minute. There are people that, you know, give me ideas that I always respectfully say, thank you, and I listen. And some of them, you know, you know, they're not good.
    60:49
    You know, some of them are good, but can't be done. You know, so everybody, you know, it's like that line, you know, that old movie, Officer and the Gentleman, you know, everybody wants to fly jets. My grandmother wants to fly jets. Everybody wants to come up with an idea for a design of a pinball machine, but there are a lot of great pinball machines that haven't been designed yet. Hopefully we'll do a few of them. Audience member 2 So besides that, how many do you have? How many companies do you think that are, that don't have all the ideas that people have? You know, I think, I think a lot of people think about ideas for pinball machines all the time. I don't think it ever stops. They could be working on a title and they're designing something and something happens and a movie comes out or a sequel comes out or a show comes on or a song plays or somebody has an idea for something from years ago or the future and people say, gee, could we make a pinball machine out of that? There are ideas that come to me where a licensor calls up and says, I have a license. I'll tell you a true one. Everybody knows who Bob Ross is? The guy that paints? So if somebody makes this game, just kick me a couple of times. They called me relentlessly asking me if we would make a Bob Ross pinball machine.
    62:13
    I don't know. To me, personally, a pinball machine is like good versus evil. some kind of story, some kind of something that we can work around. The Wizard of Oz lends itself to that. The Hobbit lends itself to that. Dial-in lends itself to that.
    62:33
    Pirates of the Caribbean lends itself to that. Oh, look, Bob Ross. If I was making a chia patch, I got that. Oh, well, I'm making a pinball machine. I can't imagine.
    62:44
    I said to the lady, I called her back after 30 calls, And I said, you know, I love Bob Ross. Oh, then you'll make the game? No, I'm not going to make the game. You know, she said it would be great. I said, I wouldn't even know how to begin. You know, I'd begin with a blank.
    63:04
    Begin with white on the back last. And then we've got to go get something to get blue. And then get the size brush. And then we have to do something. Maybe we can figure this out.
    63:15
    Let's go with rainstorm. Maybe we can figure it out and follow that. Maybe you've got to go get a brush, and then you've made a mistake, and now you've got to cover it with a happy little tree.
    63:28
    Right? Or maybe it could be a pinball machine. You know, listen, if Spooky makes this in two years, I just want to know that we've discussed it here first. Yeah, maybe it's time to bring back the designer game seminar. Designer game seminar. There you go. That's a good one. I think everybody knows, like a book, if Todd could write a book, Everybody should write a book. No disrespect, everybody probably has a good book in them. Probably everybody could design a pinball machine. It may not be, you might not even buy it yourself after you've designed it. But everybody could design a pinball machine. Why not? We all play them. We know what's great that goes into them. We know what we like in them. We know we don't like in them. Why not? You know, it wouldn't be a bad thing. All right, give that man something. Yes. The low scoring threshold that you have on the games, is that the conscious decision? Yes. Yeah, you know, I got tired of looking at games where you shoot the ball and you get a billion points.
    64:27
    It's like that scene in Meet the Fockers, you know, where Gabriel Focker got a trophy for ninth place. You know, like, if you really want extra digits, get an index card with three zeros at the back of it, And you'll feel better that you scored more. You know, I'm a buckaroo at home. When I get 1,000 points, the light lights up. And, like, I play my guts out to make that happen. So I want the game to have low scoring achievement, you know, to feel like you actually did something and you earned the score. So that was the idea. And then the far right digit is just a W drum that doesn't move, that has a zero on it. Yeah, there you go. Maybe we can use that on the Bob Ross game. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. Still be good. That would be skill shot. That's good. All right, give him something. We're almost out of stuff. Yes? Have you ever considered trying to connect games via Wi-Fi? Yes. I have. Yeah, I have. But yeah. Yeah, you might see that. And that's a list of future. I think that's pretty cool. The only thing about playing online tournaments and stuff like that is, I don't know if you have the glass on hand. It's kind of strange. It would be fun. But to me, pinball is always a social thing where people are together. I really like to see four people playing a game, rather than one person in Nairobi playing against somebody else in Switzerland or something like that. How can being in the basement of your mom's house on the computer be social? I just don't get it. I don't get it. It's much more fun to spend time with them. Why do you live in the basement of your mom's house? What's that? What do you do in the basement of your mom's house? How old are you at this point? You don't know. Instead, I'm a mustache. So do you plan on creating an interactive pinball machine that everybody can play with each other across the country then? If you could make that happen. I don't know. I think there's a place for that. I don't know if, I don't know. You got to think about how that's done. I don't know. You know, technology is there now to do it. But again, it's, I don't know. I've got to think about it a little bit. What's his? The guy with the blue shirt. I know who that is. I forgot his name.
    66:47
    It's hard to remember all the names. Yes? I came in late. I apologize. You came in late. Did you get any pizza? There's some nice cold pizza here.
    66:55
    Yeah, sure. Have a slice. Question. Dialed in with your first non-licensed type way, and it's done very well. like any ideas for any more unlicensed? Yes, absolutely. It wouldn't surprise me to see another unlicensed game from us in the next few years. One of the things I say is never say never. I think you have to say that if you start a pinball company. I wouldn't rule it out, but I could tell you that the next three games at least are licensed. So it could be the fourth one or fifth one after that possibly. Some of the people have some pretty good ideas for some original theme games. And, you know, look, we talked about Dialed In a lot in the past. I knew it would take a really long time for it to catch on because whatever we called the game, people would hate the name. I remember seeing Donkey Kong at a show years ago and said, wow, what a stupid name. And then I played the game and I loved it. And I saw Pac-Man and I said, what the hell is that? And I played it and I loved it. So, you know, these things have to grow on you. Better Weekends dialed in with the name.
    68:04
    Welcome. There's pizza there if you want, you know. You're here for the guy next to you? Yes, better. So hang on back. I'll get it to you in a minute. This guy, I think he's looking for $10 from me or something. I don't know what it is. We'll find out.
    68:18
    You know, it took a little time. It took a long time to sell, like, the first 1,000 games. It took about seven months. where right now we have more than a thousand games worth of orders for Pirates of the Caribbean. And you hear, Pirates of the Caribbean? Okay, I want that game.
    68:33
    Great. Yeah, dial it in. You're like, what the hell is that? Nobody even dials anything anymore. What is that? Where'd they come up with that stupid name? You know, dial out, last call, dial in. It's about a guy with a cell phone. Do I destroy the city Jack or do I save the city Yes exactly That what you do All right give that guy something You need me Yeah I just wanted to say I would like to see this industry I think that maybe someday we'll develop technology where the price of a pinball can be brought down to $7,000 and still have good quality. Right. You see that table with the pizza there? Get a ball, and you can roll it on there. It'll be just as much fun. The problem is that you got that, didn't you? The problem is really, you know, it's really difficult to make a game that's a fun game today because that's why there's used games. There's a lot of great used games out there for probably more than they're worth, $2,000, $3,000, $4,000, $5,000. You know, at this show, we had a customer looking for an average family to buy an average family. There were three here, none of them were for sale. So I agree with you. I wish, you know, we could do it somehow. It's not that we're not thinking about it, but it's difficult. Several years ago, there was something to add to the machine that was for sale. A lot? Yeah. They wanted one. A little over four grand for it. Four grand? It's probably broken. Maybe it was stolen. Well, you should avoid it. The next time you see one of my games for four grand, call me, because I've never seen one. One fell off a truck that was six grand. I mean, it fell off and was broken. It wasn't stolen from the site.
    70:13
    Give him something. Tell him to shut up. I mean, just give him something. I think you covered that. All right. The gentleman in the back with the blue and white striped shirt, and I'll get to the next guy that has the Ip in his ear. Talking to Rome right now. Yes? I have a question. Yes? I'm a first-time purchaser. First time in the blog of all. Really? What did you buy? Yeah, a great choice. I was searching for an epic for a boy one day. I had no idea what was happening with him, so I started to see . I fell in love with the nostalgia of the magic of the . I got to get you to remember.
    70:54
    I fell in love with the nostalgia of The Wizard of Oz. Everyone knows that tale. I'm 50 years old, and I got a 14 month old boy. I want a gift from that one day. Do you plan to hold on to produce the little nostalgia type of themes, nostalgia? You know, those are the ones that motivate me. And to know the price of the machine, I had no idea. It was very hard. And then I realized the manager came to me. Alex. Alex, pleasure to meet you. I went to the factory, to the factory before I made the purchase. And it was just that time. You know it was that time. and I traveled for a long time and I just, I see the magic and I am committed to purchase in the future if there is that nostalgia. I'll sign this guy up and take his money. Well, thank you. You know, this never gets old and again, you know, just to say it's a blessing and it's wonderful to hear that. I don't take that for granted. I really appreciate that. It's very humbling on behalf of the whole company that puts all their heart and soul into making this product. And yeah, they're going to be products that last generations. I mean, that's what it is. I mean, we're still fixing some chipboard machines made in the 30s and 40s. And Dave was around then as a little kid when they were brand new and he was playing them. He could tell you how many were made and all that. Yeah, he was at the factory making them. So, you know, absolutely come back to the factory. What theme game would you like to see? Let me ask a question. And, Boyce, you don't have to give me anything for it. I mean, again, this is all new to me, but I'm reading and I'm learning, and all these people, my first show too, this is my first show. I hear rumors, and to me, I hear things, I hear things.
    72:45
    Willie, what kind of bio? Oh, next question. Boy, sorry. Oh, oh. Take one of these back from him. I don't know. Okay, okay. That's good. Those would be great titles for pinball machines, wouldn't they? It would be amazing. Imagine those games as pinball machines. When we first started with The Wizard of Oz, there was a guy that came to a lot of the shows, and you'd bring his young kid with him, and you'd have the young kid ask the questions that Jack couldn't not answer. I know. Were you going to do a new topper for The Wizard of Oz? This was Vince Minnick. Yeah, for a kid. Vince Minnick. And his kid was really little then. This kid now is bigger than me. Hey, graduated high school with me. Yeah. Holy cow. How did that happen? He's a big kid. And he actually asked me, and I X-Fo with everybody there. He said, what's in the crystal ball, Jersey Jack? And I said, oh, it's a kid. I can't lie. I said, well, there's LED lighting in the crystal ball. So it turned out to be the monitor. I didn't lie. There was something in there. I didn't want to. I like to keep a little bit of a secret, because then it's kind of fun. and surprise people. Yes? Yeah, I've worked in arcade, played around with arcade games for a while and I'm trying to get into pinball. What are some good skills to learn when you're talking about getting setups and all that kind of stuff? Well, gee, you know, first of all, the first thing you gotta learn is how to pull the plunger back.
    74:16
    Oh, on the inside. You know, there's a lot of expert play. I'm a pretty good player, but I don't put a lot of time into it. I like to kick the crap out of the game I can tilt it in there and play Brooklyn style. You know, I kick it like that after I lose the ball. My games are all ranked. I wouldn't do any of that stuff. But you know, post passing, capturing, catching ball,
    74:41
    you know, learning the rules of the game is really important. Were you here earlier? Yeah, I'm not supposed to talk about the rules of the play, I'm talking about the make, getting it to work, the electronics work. Oh. I'm more interested in the bits and parts. kind of a hard work ethic. There's plenty of those in the game. Very cool. That's kind of why I started with the standard arcade machines. It's a parts and treat. Modular, very modular. Yeah. Yeah, I like stuff that's like that. Buy one of his copies. The way to get into it, I would say this. Buy a game and restore it. Well, no, I wouldn't do that. I would buy something you like and restore it and learn that. Take it all apart, not at the same time, and put it all back together. Or get a game that has a really bad play field in it and buy a new play field and learn how to take everything off one play field and put it on another and wire it. And what all the parts actually do. Why do they do that? Take kind of a simple game, even if it's an electromechanical game. Try and make it look as good as it can and try and make it work as best it can. Yeah, I think everybody pretty much started tinkering with games. Nobody was like plopped and said, oh here's a pinball technician that knows everything. We all make mistakes and we all try things and we learn. But now there's a lot of resources because now you have YouTube. There's a lot of instructional places. There are a lot of news groups and stuff like that. There are a lot of pinball clubs and that kind of thing. So I would join a pinball club. Where do you live?
    76:15
    Connecticut. So you know, go over there to Automated, to Mike's place. Mike's got a ton of crap in his building. I mean he's got a ton of great games in his building. They need to be restored. Okay, go over there, you can work for him. Okay, he'll pay you, maybe you'll figure out how to do something with all those people. You can work on some of his games. He'll put you in a room with some of the games and you'll learn how to fix games. You might be better than some of the people that started years ago. You never know. If you like doing it, you're going to be really good at it. Maybe something like that. But join the pinball club. Because then there'll be other people that'll be a support group for you to learn. That would be the way to do it. Give him something. I got something. You have anything? Hey, I was going to tell you, one of the first things I did, I bought a pinball machine for my sister. And I brought it up in my old Delta 88, which you could fit an entire pinball cabinet without the head in the back seat of a Delta 88. Closed both doors, no problem. What year was that made? Yeah, that's a 70s car. I put the back box in the trunk, and I put the back box all wrapped up under the Christmas tree, and then my HTK at work, and I didn't know much about pinball at the time, I just knew I loved it, my sister loved it, and I wanted to get her a game. I got those two connectors backwards in the Williams back box, the black with the white, the white with the black, and turned it on, We're going to play pinball. I fried every chip on there except the ROMs. It's a good way to learn. Yeah, it's a very good way to learn. There's a lot about circuit board repair, fixing that game, getting it right. It's a good way to learn. That's kind of why I was asking. You're going to make mistakes. It's a good way of learning from somebody else's mistake, like Butch's. Don't do that stuff. The most important thing to remember is that soon after you become a pinball owner, you will become a pinball repairman. Exactly. There's just no other way. It's just the way it works. Who has the red Mustang outside?
    78:13
    Because we wanted to try to figure out if the pinball machine will fit in there. We were going to stick, you know, pirates in there or something like that and see if you can move the pinball machine with that car. So nobody's here with that car. Well, if you see us shove the pinball machine in this guy's car, whoever he is, then you'll find out if it fits in there. We're going to put it on his roof, but he didn't have a roof.
    78:37
    No. So do we have any little kids who want to ask about the future plans of the company? Do we have any little kids that want to ask about anything at all? Yes. Here's a little kid.
    78:53
    One question for you. When you started Wizard of Oz, you said you were going to make it at the end of this year. Once you're done with Wizard of Oz, how long are you going to make parts for? up to five years and then you're gonna get all done with seven lefties left, then we have to scramble to get to buying parts? Or is it something where after like 10 years you might do a run of like wire forms or trees or crystal balls, so people might be able to get something like CPR, they can do play fields for people that wanna do like an old world or a cycle. I'm just curious where you might be in reference to that. If a guy happens to buy a Wits and Bonds 10 years from now, and they'll be able to be parts of it once it's done.
    79:37
    You know what I say quite a lot. First of all, I renewed that license for another five years. So if it's the 100th anniversary of Wizard of Oz and we're still making Wizard of Oz, it's okay with me.
    79:49
    The answer to that is if you need to buy something, when I used to buy my new games, I used to buy a play field, a decal set, a plastic set, and just tuck them away because the manufacturer probably won't have them in a few years. So my simple answer would be, if you think you need spare parts for anything you buy, pinball or not, buy them when they're available. Don't bet that somebody will have them in five years. You know, Miracle makes all play fields. So if Miracle is in business ten years from now and there's a need to make Wizard of Oz play fields, I'm sure he'll make them. He's making taxi play fields, He's making Tales of the Arabian Nights. He's making Adam's Family. He's making Adam's Family play fields now, and it came from 1992. So, you know, I think the resource of the pitball community now is that somebody somewhere will figure out how to make something to keep all of this stuff alive for a really, really long time. Long, long, long after I'm gone. And we're making improvements, too. The board said that we'd sell you for the Wizard of Oz. It's better than the original. Yeah, it's true. It's not great. All right. You don't get nothing. You're at the show. Eric, what do you want?
    81:08
    You're asking a question? You're asking what I've done so you can go dinner. You want the microphone? Yeah, sure.
    81:20
    When his mic doesn't work for him, that would be like irony. You can toss it up. So we've seen some recent companies like Dutch Pinball and especially Highway Pinball have financial troubles.
    81:35
    And you face a similar scenario as Highway Pinball and Dutch Pinball. Why do you think you succeeded where others failed?
    81:48
    Well, that's a good loaded question. First of all, I will tell you, I give all thanks to God. I have a really amazing, lucky, wonderful faith in God. So I never gave up.
    82:04
    I give the credit to my family, who supported me and stayed with me and encouraged me. And really good friends, like Mike, who believed in me. Other distributors that believed in me and what we were doing. People that worked for the company that didn't give up. You know, I do believe if you don't give up, you can't fail. The likelihood of failing is a lot less if you don't give up. Sometimes you have to give up because all effort, all hope is gone.
    82:37
    You know, look, look. I was in the business at the time, you know, about 38 years, something like that, 37 years, whatever it was. And I've done a lot of different things in the industry as a distributor, manufacturer, operator, technician, all these different things. And yet with all the people, all my connections, all of my knowledge and all of everything,
    82:58
    it's impossibly difficult to do what we did at the level we were doing it. And it's a difficult road. And there were some people that probably looked at me and said, if that idiot could do it, I could do it too. But they were probably wrong. They weren't me. And I wouldn't give up. So I do think whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger.
    83:24
    There was a time I went from 175 pounds to 147 pounds, and I wasn't trying to be on a diet. It was a lot of stress and a lot of difficulty. But again, I feel great now.
    83:39
    We're on the right path, and we're into this now seven years. So, you know, all the people, all the customers that gave us money and believed in us and trusted in us, all that, I'm really thankful to all those people because they built the company. It was definitely not me by myself. There was a lot of people involved.
    84:03
    I'm very humbled and very thankful for it. And I've been told that because of what we did, it brought a lot of other people into the industry. It brought people in and made mods and all kinds of different things. And it brought people to the shows. And it brought a lot more competition, a lot more awareness about it. And that's all good. I'm happy because it was a group effort. It was everybody. It just wasn't me. So yeah, I guess that's the answer. I guess. Thanks. . Thank all of you. I appreciate it. Thank you. All right. We've got one or two more. And, okay. What's he got? You got something for him, Butch? He's got all this stuff around here. He's shaking his head. At what point in your life did you decide that you wanted to start a pinball company? What was your inspiration?
    85:06
    So I've said this story before. I was Stern's biggest distributor for a lot of years. I loved Stern Pinball. Gary Stern and I were good friends. My idea was not to put Stern Pinball out of business. My idea was to make great games. We went from selling about 1,500 Stern Pinball machines a year. And Mike was a competitor. And we worked together. We didn't work against each other. We worked together. We sold each other games. I was at a Sopranos. He sold me one at a really high price. and then I went home.
    85:37
    No, you know, he always helped me out, and I always helped him out. We were always good friends. You know, and we went from selling about 1,500 games a year, and in 2009 and 2010, we sold about 47 games in a year. You know, and, you know, in an unexpected way, I'm going to say what people have said. You know, they didn't want to buy, you know, NBA, or they didn't want to buy Buck Hunter, or they didn't want to buy those games. And I told Stern, listen, make better games. You know, you've got to make better games. You know, we sell everything nobody needs. It's not related to the recession. Nobody sold me one game back during the whole recession, 2008, 9, 10, 11. Nobody called me up and said, oh, shit, I'm not going to make my mortgage payment. Can you buy all the games back? It never happened. So I said, you know, 2010, I spent some time thinking about it. And there were a lot of people in pinball that were out of work. And a lot of people encouraged me to do this because they wanted a job. And, you know, the first person you have to convince is yourself. You have to sell yourself when you're an entrepreneur that the idea makes sense. And what happens with entrepreneurial people is that we're not realistic. We oversimplify things. You know, we say, you know what, I can leap right through that glass window, And as soon as I get through it, I'll figure out how to fly. And you didn't realize that when you leap through the window, you get all bloody and you might bleed to death. So it's a work in progress. So that's kind of what made me decide that. My decision was either I stopped selling brand new pinball machines, or I started a company that manufactures and designs and manufactures brand new pinball machines. So I joke and I say I did the easier of the two. So am I there? I appreciate that. I'm glad you guys supported and girls supported the company and the idea that we were going to do it because if people didn't step forward and say they were going to buy those games,
    87:41
    I wasn't going to go speculate and start some kind of fund and raise $12 million and pay a bunch of people all kinds of money to make a bunch of games that nobody's going to buy. I wanted to make games that people wanted to buy. So I needed people. We had to do a backwards kickstart of it. He never existed. And I had people that didn't like me. And he actually called the Attorney General of New Jersey and said I was running a Ponzi scheme. People came to the building. They saw a million dollars worth of parts and pinball machines. And they said, hey, good luck. Take care. What can I tell you? If I write books, it would be a hell of a lot more than 10 books. I can tell you that. I can promise you that. So give him some. Thank you. Thanks for that. Can I hear the question? Who else? John? Yes. Here's a guy, John Graywich. Anybody know John Graywich from Canada? This guy, don't ever bring him a bottle of port wine. I can tell you that. He's a great guy. Yes, John. I was just wondering, Jack, we see pictures of your factory sometimes. Are you maxed out on space, or are you still good for another five, ten years? We're good. You know, when Data East was running, they had a 42,000-square-foot building. and we're building about 16,000 games a year. We're building right now around 3,000 games a year. And we have 50,000 square feet. So, you know, what the building has to become, it always has to be this thing where you bring parts in. Excuse me, where you bring parts in. I didn't even have a pizza. You bring parts in and you ship parts out. It can't be something where everything goes in and nothing goes out. So for us right now, it's good. It's a good space. I don't need more room. We're good. But if you have some empty space somewhere that you want to give me for the right price, I might be interested. You never know.
    89:31
    Anybody else? Yes? I have a question. It's a little bit more of a beaten path, but I like the promotional item we did for it down in the comic book. I'm a bit of a comic book geek. And I thought that was a great idea. How did that come about? How did you process it? And in fact, is it something you might even use going forward with other machines to help promote and get more out? because conferences are the kind of medium that everyone loves. And those are the kinds of kids. Yeah. I had, you know, I wanted to have a background story to how this thing came about. And a comic book was a great way to do it. My niece's husband, Sal Rucoleri, writes comic books as a hobby. So he drew them and did the story. And a few people worked on it. And it was a lot of fun, you know. Personally, I'd like to have that somewhere up on a website somewhere and keep adding to it and downloadable and keep the story going. But everybody's too busy to do all that stuff. We could all think of a million things. The problem is making them all live and happen and everything. But I'm glad you like that. At least it was something pretty cool.
    90:40
    You've got to find a publisher to work with you. Well, Todd's got a publisher, so maybe I'll talk to his guy after he writes his 10 books. We could publish it on Amazon. Yes? Oh, by the way, so if you ask one question, you're not getting a second one. All right. Double dip in this.
    90:59
    From the comic book, would you go to a live-action movie? Well, if you want to play the guy in the movie, go back to you. You've got to try to find somebody to hold their phone. I can't even hold my phone like that. It hurts my hand. If I auditioned for that part, I couldn't do it. Double-jointed or something. All right. Anybody else? I'm going to wrap up. Anybody else? Okay.
    91:24
    I have... What about the... What was the thing there? One more glass. All right. That's good. If anybody wants anything, they can come up front. If they want to push the sign, something, whatever.
    91:36
    What? I'm still going to Texas. There you go. See how easy that is? All right. Everybody, thank you. God bless all of you. We appreciate everything. Thank you.