Episode 324: Dan Bitterlich

Pinball Profile·podcast_episode·33m 57s·analyzed·Dec 1, 2021

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.035

TL;DR

Dan Bitterlich on building competitive pinball communities in Ontario and Vancouver Island.

Summary

Jeff Teolis interviews Dan Bitterlich, a veteran competitive pinball player and league organizer from Ontario who moved to Victoria, BC and built a thriving pinball community from scratch. The episode traces Dan's journey through multiple Canadian pinball leagues (TCPL, Topol League, London League) and his efforts to establish competitive pinball infrastructure in Victoria, including developing unique league formats, securing public locations, and fostering community engagement through events and charitable initiatives.

Key Claims

Dan was instrumental in introducing Jeff Teolis to competitive pinball through their involvement in the London, Ontario pinball league around 2014
high confidence · Jeff describes Dan as 'the guy who really got me hooked on competitive pinball' and explains how they met at the London league and carpooled together
TCPL (Tri-Cities Pinball League) in Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge has been running for over 20 years and uses a unique format where players play six machines twice each with cumulative scoring
high confidence · Dan and Jeff discuss the league's longevity and distinctive scoring system that determined winners by cumulative top scores across six machines
When Dan moved to Victoria, BC in 2018, there were only two rated IFPA players on the island and very minimal pinball infrastructure
high confidence · Dan states: 'when I got here, there were two ranked people on this island, myself and a fellow that I would meet shortly after I got here' with 'five IFPA events'
Victoria's first pinball league night in September 2018 attracted 29 players, exceeding Dan's expectations of a dozen
high confidence · Dan recounts: 'Maybe we'll get a dozen...We had 29 people out the first night'
Within the first year of organizing in Victoria, over 110 different people participated in various leagues Dan established
high confidence · Dan states: 'within the first year, we had over 110 people, different people playing in the various leagues we had'
Shamanus, a town of 2,000 people on Vancouver Island, may have the highest per-capita concentration of public pinball machines in Canada with approximately 18 machines across two arcades
medium confidence · Dan notes: 'I actually think they might per capita have the most public pinball machines in Canada because it's only 2,000 people and I think they have about 18 machines'
Victoria has complex liquor laws that restrict alcohol consumption near pinball machines, making barcade models challenging compared to mainland BC
high confidence · Dan explains: 'in most cases here, you can't have a beer near a machine' and 'in Victoria, it's even worse' with licensed/non-licensed areas in billiard halls

Notable Quotes

“Those carpool rides were actually just as much fun for me as the actual playing of the pinball because my eyes opened up when you were telling me about these tournaments, this thing called pinburg. The history of pinball, I learned so much from you, Dan.”
Jeff Teolis @ ~5:30 — Illustrates how Dan's mentorship introduced Jeff to the broader competitive pinball ecosystem beyond casual play
“I don't play in leagues for points. I play for the people. I play for the different machines to get a chance to play some of these things. The points, if they're there, great. If not, I'll still play in leagues.”
Dan Bitterlich @ ~28:00 — Encapsulates the community-focused philosophy that has driven Dan's league-building efforts and resonates with grassroots competitive pinball culture
“You've got to be able to separate [players in scoring]. So that's when I sort of created that proportional system that we use now, 10 to one. And it's dependent on how many players are out.”
Dan Bitterlich @ ~14:30 — Demonstrates Dan's evolution as a league organizer, adapting scoring systems to accommodate growing participation from small (4 people) to large (30-40 people) events
“We had all this posts and stuff out there. And I'm like, maybe we'll get a dozen. You know, maybe we'll get really fortunate and we'll get a dozen because I've got like about six or eight confirmed. We had 29 people out the first night. Wow.”
Dan Bitterlich @ ~33:00 — Pivotal moment illustrating unexpected community response to Victoria pinball league launch and turning point for local pinball development
“If something like a translate always goes to them, it sort of takes away the fun for the other people. So...the winner gets a trophy, every other prize is done at random and I think that made it fun for everybody.”
Dan Bitterlich @ ~30:00 — Philosophy on inclusive prize distribution reflecting community-building priorities over competitive hierarchy in casual leagues
“God bless the hosts for doing it because you make sure the machines go well, you're providing food and drink. So these people who host events and pinball tournaments, we have to tip our caps to them because we're nothing without them.”

Entities

Dan BitterlichpersonJeff TeolispersonRandy WhitefordpersonTopol LeagueorganizationTCPL (Tri-Cities Pinball League)organizationLondon Pinball LeagueorganizationVictoria Pinball CommunityorganizationPinball Dave

Signals

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community_signal: Dan systematically built competitive pinball infrastructure in Victoria through grassroots organizing, growing from zero rated players to 110+ participants in first year through Pinside outreach and strategic partnership with venue operators
high · Dan posted on Pinside, secured locations (Powerhouse, Quasars), launched first league night with 29 unexpected attendees, expanded to multiple locations and venues within 12 months
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event_signal: Pinball Profile podcast functioning as platform for grassroots league inspiration and empowerment, with Jeff explicitly encouraging listeners to replicate Dan's model in their own regions
high · Jeff directly addresses listeners: 'There are people listening...saying oh I wish I had a league...Do what Dan did and put information out there on Pinside'
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sentiment_shift: Strong emphasis on community-centered rather than competition-centered league philosophy, with deliberate prize randomization to ensure inclusive participation and fun for non-elite players
high · Dan: 'I don't play in leagues for points. I play for the people'; Jeff: 'winner gets trophy...every other prize done at random...that's the kind of atmosphere I want'
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community_signal: Vancouver Island identified as emerging competitive pinball hub following infrastructure development, with expansion from single location (billiard hall with 4 machines) to 50+ machines across multiple venues operated by committed operators
high · Powerhouse, Quasars, and Substation operators grew collection from 8-10 to 50+ machines; Canadian Flip Out selecting Powerhouse for first show; new locations opening in Shamanus
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Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.102

0:00

it's time now for another pinball profile i'm your host jeff teels you can find everything on pinballprofile.com past episodes all your subscriptions check us out on facebook we're also on twitter and instagram at pinball profile email us pinball profile at gmail.com today a bit of an origin story and hopefully a chance for you to meet somebody that's very important to me in my pinball career, if you will, the guy who really got me hooked on competitive pinball. And it was just a casual thing. Let me introduce to you Dan Bitterlick. Dan, how are you? I'm fine, Jeff. How are you? Good to talk to you again, my friend. This is the guy that I was living in Burlington, Ontario. Dan was living just outside in Oakville, Ontario. And somehow, someway, I found out about this pinball league in my hometown of London, Ontario. Went to it. Dan also went to it. Now, it's about an hour and a half, hour 45, two hours if Dan's driving, away from where we live. But it was my first exposure to competitive pinball in the form of a friendly weekly or, I guess, once a month pinball league. And, Dan, you knew about this, and you also had played in other leagues like the famous Topple League, the Toronto, Ontario Pinball League, which has been going on for over 20 years, and even the TCPL, the Tri-Cities Pinball League. So you were kind of my go-to guy for being the veteran of competitive pinball. Well, thank you. That's quite nice for you to say. Yeah, it was interesting times. I definitely did enjoy London. I think we were sort of at that period of time that just wasn't – you had to drive for pinball when that was going on. You really did have to sort of stretch. There just wasn't as much going on necessarily locally. Yeah, for me, this is 2014, and it was, again, the first time I had played a pinball machine in 15 years. It had been that long. I didn't know people had them in their homes. And when we saw this great collection at Ray's, 11 wonderful classic Williams machines that I knew from back in the day, and it was just fun to get to play these. I couldn't believe that somebody had these. And then you and I were talking more and more, and we realized we could probably carpool, which made a lot of sense. For sure. But those carpool rides were actually just as much fun for me as the actual playing of the pinball because my eyes opened up when you were telling me about, oh, you know, there's these tournaments, there's this, there's that. There's this thing called pinburg. The history of pinball, I learned so much from you, Dan. Well, again, that's really nice. Yeah, I guess I've always been somebody that sort of dives into stuff. And pinball, for me, actually, I was sort of a little opposite to you in that in the 90s, I didn't really play that much. I was through school and starting a career. So that was actually sort of a dark period for me in 90s. So when I was started back up in about 2005, these machines were all new to me or mostly new. Like I played Addams Family once or twice, but I hadn't really played a lot of pinball in the 90s. So Nick Angel, a local guy up there, I went to his house, my first ever meet. And I thought, wow, everybody in this league has 40 machines in their basement. Of course, that wasn't the case. By the way, Nick Angel is somebody who owns a Magic Girl in his basement. I mean, he has a collection and then some. True, very true. No, and a great guy. But it was just this whole idea of like, wow, you know, this guy's opening up his house. And we got down there and I still remember that first night there, you know, somebody telling me that they had, I think it was two machines. And it was like, well, why would you ever need two machines? You only need one machine. What are you talking about? And lo and behold, you know, I ended up with eight or ten, I guess, at the max. But that's all part of what we deal with and the reality. But, yeah, it was great meeting a community. And I had a lot of friends that played a bit. So I did a lot of recruiting when I started with Topol and bringing different people out. And Steve Martin and a few other people that would become regulars out there in the pinball community within Toronto. Toronto certainly was a good base. But when you live in Toronto and they still have the Toronto Pinball League, It's wonderful. They meet on Monday nights. But because you might have some locations on the east side or some in the north or some in the far west like Mississauga, the radius is, you might be talking two hours in between, and that's during rush hour traffic. So it's difficult, depending on where you are, to go to these types of things. Whereas there was this other league that you mentioned, this TCPL that you and Randy Whiteford, our good friend, were running in the Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge area. and that was kind of once every four weeks on a Friday night. And it was a unique league. Here's how it works and still does to this day. You play six machines and you play them twice. So it's kind of a best score. It's not direct play. It's kind of at the end of the day, if there are 20 players who had the top score out of their two attempts, and then that would be the top points, and then you would do that for each of the six machines. That would determine who wins the night, and there would be six nights in the league, and then you'd have playoffs. It's still, to this day, the only time I've played in a league like that, and I like the uniqueness of it, whereas a lot of other leagues, and we'll get to the league you're running, are a lot of direct play. So that Topol League we talk about, you've got four games, and you're playing directly with the same group, and how do you do? Well, I won on this game, I came second on this, I won the other two games, so that gives me X amount of points. You probably did pretty good with three firsts and a second. And then the next week you would play someone kind of, I guess they call that Swiss, someone who also had that kind of success. And you go on and you go on. So those are some of the kind of leagues that we see out there. There are a lot of those best score things. And I know there have been selfie leagues that are similar to that. But there is a lot of uniqueness. What made you choose what you did for TCPL and also what you're doing out in Victoria, BC? Well, oddly enough, we actually have something similar to TCPL out here because I did like it. Randy initially started TCPL I was in the first year but Randy had already set up the system when I got there of playing twice a night now their first nights were like four people when I started playing with them which would have been about halfway through the season we got up to six or eight it was a very small league so two times playing the games wasn't a problem what we did do is after year two I think I finally had to tell Randy we can't use your scoring system because he had a scoring system of just 10 down to one, depending where you came in on a game. And at one point when you were playing in Kitchener, I mean, I know you still do, but we were getting 30 and 40 people out. And I'm like, no, we can't have, you know, 20 people scoring one point at the bottom of the list. You've got to be able to separate. So that's when I sort of created that proportional system that we use now, 10 to one. And it's, you know, what the difference between each player is dependent on how many players are out. If you look at any kind of tournament, you'll see that there's that kind of range. No one gets zero if you're playing in a tournament. And if you're in the bottom four or five, there's different points based on where you finish. So that's what you're describing. Yeah, yeah. I just wanted to make sure that there was a difference at the bottom. Because, you know, we had some nights with 20 people out, and it was like, well, you know, first player was getting 10, but then everybody from 10 to 20 was getting a single point because it was set up for a much smaller number of people. That's good that you made the change as the numbers grew and they did grow. I mean, this is something that happened back in the day. There was a waiting list. It was based on seniority and things like that. So that's how popular kind of pinball was and still is to this day. But certainly when I was just getting my feet into it, I was like, I got to be on this waiting list. I'm all nervous. What if I can't get in? So you start looking for other events and other tournaments. And I think that's one of the important things that has changed, right? The amount of things that are being run now allow people to not necessarily travel as much, although people still do, but it's allowed for people to have choice now. And back then, you're right, there were basically three leagues in southern Ontario. So if you wanted to play pinball and you weren't in London or you weren't in Toronto, Kitchener was really your only choice. So we had over 40 people in somebody's basement that really could fit 10. And that was during the summer sometimes London got so big that they had so many requests they had to do two shifts So could you imagine being a host You got here 25 people coming in for the first shift and then another 25 for the next shift. That's a long day. It's difficult, and God bless the hosts for doing it because you make sure the machines go well, you're providing food and drink. So these people who host events and pinball tournaments, we have to tip our caps to them because we're nothing without them, and I wouldn't be in this bug if it wasn't for those people. And it's great that people share their collections with us. That was the neat thing because with a league and going to different places, you always got to see machines that you may have never seen before. It's been years. And that's something I certainly like. And so I bring this up because nowadays, boy, there's so many different leagues all around. But here in Ontario, we've talked about Durham. We've talked about Bluffs. We've talked about Maple, Pinup. There are so many, and I'm probably forgetting even more. But the reason I bring this up is, Dan, you retired a few years ago at a young age and moved to B.C. on the beautiful Vancouver Island. You're in Victoria. And there wasn't much of a pinball scene there. I know how much you enjoy pinball. So how did you get pinball up and going in Victoria? And you're a big part of it. Yeah, well, thank you. Yeah, I was startled, actually, when I got here and I realized how little pinball there was. I had talked, I guess, when we were at Pinnberg together to some of the BC guys and sort of was asking, you know, I'm going to be moving to the island. And people have to understand that although it's only 25 miles off the coast, it's a totally different world on the island. And you have to get a ferry, too. So it sounds like. Yeah, and it's like $200 by the time you take a car back and forth. So, you know, jaunts over to Vancouver aren't cheap. You know, I was talking to people there and they're going, well, there's nothing really going on. And I think when I got here, there were two ranked people on this island, myself and a fellow that I would meet shortly after I got here. So, or rated people, I'm not sure what the appropriate term is for, but that it had five events, five IFPA events. So, we tried sort of doing the thing that had happened in Southern Ontario. I wrote a little message to everybody on PIN side that I could find that was on Vancouver Island and owned a machine. And I probably got about a dozen people. And most of them responded back. But nobody really understood the idea of a league or even just get-togethers. And we ended up having one event here sort of at my place. It wasn't an IFPA event. It was just let's meet and greet and sort of meet people. And we had eight people here total, you know, and it just wasn't really clicking. But then I got fortunate. The one fellow that I had met that was the other rated player, a friend named Jason, that we'd been playing back and forth in our collections. I had five machines out here and he had eight. So one Friday we'd play here, one Friday we'd play there, and back and forth. And I kept hearing about a guy that had sourced machines for people called Pinball Dave. And Jason knew him but didn't know him well, and I just never met up with him. And I was coming back east, I remember this, and then I just heard Jason saying, Hey, before you go, Pinball Dave has invited me over. Do you want to go over and check out his collection? And it was around that time that I had found out that there were four machines at a location on the island now. And the odd thing was none of us knew that. Like, you know, these three people, myself, Jason, and Dave, none of us knew that one of the billiard halls had actually put in four machines. That has to make it easier when there's a public location because it's got to be awkward for a stranger to go to somebody's house that they don't know at all. Maybe they don't have a friend that they can play with. But, you know what, if I don't know anybody who likes pinball and I like pinball, I'm more comfortable probably going to a location. Well, agreed. I agree wholeheartedly. Again, I guess because of how I had come into it in Ontario, I just sort of assumed, well, if you have a collection, you sort of, you know, invite people in because that's sort of what Topol did and what we did with Kitchener. But you're right. You're 100% right that having public locations make it a much easier thing. And so I tried to approach these people. I mean, and when I tell this to people that know me now, they're like, well, how in the world did you get cold feet? But I walked into the bar and I just didn't feel right talking to them there. So I sent them an email at like midnight to sort of saying, hey, you know, I've run some pinball leagues and I'd like to maybe create something. Would you be interested? And like five minutes later, I get an email back from them. Yes, please. You know, when can we start this? And I got very fortunate. One of the things that exists in Victoria to a large extent, probably more than most places have been, are microbreweries and things like this. And they had a great relationship with one of the breweries here that would do advertising for them and everything else. So they created a poster campaign for me that went up on posts all over downtown. They supplied all sorts of swag prizes and stuff that we could give away. And the bar itself and the manager, Johnny, were just really, really helpful to me. So, you know, I make a quick trip back to Ontario. It's August. I come back and right this September of 2018, we're ready for our first night. But I haven't gotten a lot of response. Like I've had all this posts and stuff out there. And I'm like, maybe we'll get a dozen. You know, maybe we'll get really fortunate and we'll get a dozen because I've got like about six or eight confirmed. We had 29 people out the first night. Wow. And, yeah, it blew me away. I was bouncing off the walls. So that's the thing. You started by posting on Pinside. You found out about different locations. The reason I want to bring this up is because there are people listening to Pinball Profile right now that are, I've heard them say it. Oh, I wish I had a league. Oh, I wish there was something in my neck of the woods. Well, there might just be. Oh, yeah. Do what Dan did and put information out there on Pinside. Maybe have one or two games. By the way, you don't need to have a lot of games to have a league. Our good friend Ron Hallett, I think, plays in a league in his neck of the woods, and there might only be one or two different machines on certain locations. Of course, Ron's got a lot, but it just takes that kind of little sample to get people hooked and show some interest in maybe spreading the word. I mean, here's this place, four machines, not a heck of a lot, but look at that, 29 people on the first night. That's amazing. Oh, yeah, and I think within the first year, we had over 110 people, different people playing in the various leagues we had because we got lucky and a second location opened up with 20-ish machines. You know, I had no knowledge of that at all when I started things. Right before we started, there was a little article in the paper saying that, you know, a retro arcade was coming. And I was like, oh, wow, this is great. So I got in contact with them right away and said, hey, please consider me for, you know, running some pinball stuff in there. And they've been really good to me, too. And they've actually grown to three different locations now in the city that they've now got. But it doesn't take a lot. It's exactly like what you said, because I think back to Randy, because I mean, I came into the Kitchener League halfway through. But those first three or four nights, they had four people and they didn't know each other. None of them knew each other. They sort of met on a bulletin board, like a pinball bulletin board out of Montreal, the Macaboard. And, you know, each one had a couple of machines. So each one would host a night and and that's all it takes. And it's amazing. I've got a lot of really good friendships out of these things. and it's incredible. It sounds more involved than it really is. And the thing is, when you're driving it to, you can drive it to what you want. Like the Kitchener League was always sort of, you know, at the time, especially at the beginning, was, you know, much more sort of non, not about the competition, but about just hanging out, you know, because it gives you a sense of community, right? That's the great thing about leagues, because I'll say this right now, I don't play in leagues for points. I play for the people. I play for the different machines to get a chance to play some of these things. The points, if they're there, great. If not, I'll still play in leagues. I've played in leagues for a few years where even if I won the leagues, the points won't matter. I've had some success where they wouldn't even show up on my card. It doesn't matter. It's, again, about the different people you meet, the different machines you get to play, the thrill of competition, even if it's just for fun. I think you and I have always played loony throwdowns here in Canada, the dollar throwdowns with Randy, and those were more fun than anything else. You might, on a bad night, lose maybe, maybe $10. Oh, well, I can still make my mortgage payments. You know, I've still got food on the table. It was really just about the one It was the fun and I still get a kick out of that kind of stuff So that the great thing about leagues It social It a little bit of competition It variety It whatever you want Yeah it also educational right I mean as you said our meeting brought you into competitive pinball, right? So you knew what pinball was and all that, but now you're one of the people that have been in the league a lot. So now somebody that's new that isn't really aware of how much pinball there really is. There's Chicago. There's all sorts of different conferences and shows and tournaments and everything else. So you're now the guy telling the new people about that. And that's part of the process too, right? That's part of what makes it grow. It is a great community. I'm sitting here at my microphone looking at a picture of yourself, Randy, Steve Martin, and Roger Sharp when we went to Pinburg in 2015. And you had told me the stories of who Roger was and how he saved pinball. And there he was. And we all got this nice group shot. I got Roger to sign it the year after. Well, Roger's a guy I now call. When I call him up, I'm like, hey, Dad, hey, son, how's it going? Because I'm kind of the son he always wanted based on what he – I love those episodes you do. They're fantastic. I remember the first time I met him was at a signing at Expo because one of the things we did for TCPL, again, we had different types of prizes. So we had a guy that was sort of a photographer, and I had him take some pictures of my Barracora. and so you know we did an enlarged picture of just one of the eyes of the uh on the off the back glass and i brought it up to roger to sign and he goes what is this and i go that's barracora he goes oh well you know that is you're right you know and i'm like yeah and i go and i explained i'm like oh we give prizes away that people can frame you know and it's you know it costs us a couple bucks to get an eight by ten printed up and so you know if you don't mind signing it then and it'll be a prize for somebody that wins or wins a door prize or something at one of our events. And those were fun.

The Canadian Flip Out show (formerly Vancouver Flip Out) will have its first event at Powerhouse arcade in Victoria in June 2024

high confidence · Dan states: 'the first spot that it going to be at will be at the powerhouse in June of 2022' [Note: This was recorded likely in 2021, making June 2022 the stated date]

Jeff Teolis @ ~19:00 — Acknowledges the often-unrecognized labor and resource commitment required from private machine owners hosting league events, core to grassroots pinball infrastructure

“It doesn't take a lot. It's exactly like what you said, because I think back to Randy, those first three or four nights, they had four people and they didn't know each other...Each one had a couple of machines. So each one would host a night and that's all it takes.”

Dan Bitterlich @ ~25:00 — Demonstrates how small-scale, organic league formation (4 players with home collections) can bootstrap regional competitive pinball communities

“There are people listening to Pinball Profile right now that are saying 'Oh, I wish I had a league. Oh, I wish there was something in my neck of the woods.' Well, there might just be. Do what Dan did and put information out there on Pinside.”

Jeff Teolis @ ~23:30 — Direct call-to-action highlighting Pinside as infrastructure for grassroots community organizing, positioning the episode as inspirational model for listener empowerment

“They've gone from eight or ten pinball machines at the beginning. Now they're, I think, over 50. Now they're not all out. There's a few still in storage or that they rotate in and out. But they've been hugely committed.”

Dan Bitterlich @ ~45:00 — Illustrates operator investment and expansion in Victoria's public pinball infrastructure, demonstrating economic viability of location-based pinball

Johnny Z'sorganization

Powerhouse Arcadeorganization

Peacocksorganization

Substationorganization

Canadian Flip Outevent

Forever the Flipcompany

Shamanusorganization

community_signal: Venue operators investing substantially in pinball machine acquisition and maintenance (Powerhouse/Quasars growing from 10 to 50+ machines), indicating commercial viability of location-based pinball in British Columbia

high · Dan notes operators 'gone from eight or ten pinball machines at the beginning. Now they're, I think, over 50' with rotation system and continued expansion

competitive_signal: Swiss-style direct play (Topol League model) and cumulative score formats (TCPL model) coexist as viable regional tournament structures, with different communities adopting different approaches based on local preferences

medium · Jeff compares formats: 'Topol League...four games...direct play...TCPL...play six machines twice...best score...those are some of the kind of leagues that we see out there'

design_philosophy: Dan evolved league scoring systems from simple tiered model (10-1) to proportional model scaling with participation size, addressing scalability challenges as leagues grew from 4-8 to 30-40 participants

high · Dan explains: 'he had a scoring system of just 10 down to one...we got up to 20 people...no, we can't have...20 people scoring one point...that's when I sort of created that proportional system'

event_signal: Canadian Flip Out pinball show (formerly Vancouver Flip Out) announced with Powerhouse Arcade in Victoria as first location for June 2024, representing formalization of regional pinball tournament infrastructure

high · Dan states: 'It's no longer Vancouver flip out. It now Canadian flip out. It going to be rotating show. And the first spot that it going to be at will be at the powerhouse in June of 2022'

licensing_signal: Local licensing/regulatory constraints (Victoria liquor laws restricting alcohol near pinball machines, stricter than mainland BC) create venue challenges but not insurmountable barriers to location-based pinball growth

high · Dan notes: 'in most cases here, you can't have a beer near a machine. And in Victoria, it's even worse' with licensed/non-licensed areas requiring drink service protocols

market_signal: Small-scale private pinball collections (2-10 machines) sufficient to bootstrap competitive league infrastructure with 20-30+ initial participants, suggesting latent demand for competitive play access in underserved markets

high · TCPL origins: 4 players with home collections, each hosting one night; Victoria initial response: 6-8 confirmed became 29 attendees first night

community_signal: Neil Hodge (Forever the Flip founder) positioned as rising community figure and connector making industry contacts at major shows (Indus), representing younger generation of pinball brand/apparel entrepreneurs

medium · Dan describes Neil as 'fantastic...so energetic...full of energy' who 'contacted carrie wing already and danny peck' and made multiple industry connections at shows

18:51

I think, again, it can be different things. And when you are running a league, you can also decide how you want it. If you want it to be loony throwdowns or dollar games, that's great. And if you want to remove money altogether and just do – we do most of our stuff as door prizes now, right? So there are always prizes for the winners. And again, we're fortunate that we've got sponsors within the breweries that give us really nice sweatshirts and all sorts of different things. But we still have over half the prizes that we get are given away as door prizes. So it's just random. I love it. If you're there, you've got a shot. And our translate is always that way. We are a stern army. And our translate, that was one of the rules when we got the translates. It was like, you know what, those are always going to be random. So, you know, we don't have because there's basically three or four guys that are generally finishing top of the mark. I shouldn't just say guys because Carrie Hill is an amazing player and she's always fighting. And they're usually at my detriment, knocking me out of round after round after round. But, you know, there's these this group that's generally going to win. So if something like a translate always goes to them, it sort of takes away the fun for the other people. Yeah, I did my whole pinball profile where, you know what, the winner. Here's a winner's trophy. Here's your points that you're going to get for Whoppers. every other prize and I had a lot were all done at random and I think that made it fun for everybody it didn't matter and it just that's the kind of atmosphere I want and the leagues that I've been associated with you know you pay a fee that goes to the host you pay a small fee that goes to the league for for things like trophies and for the dollar fee that's about it there's no cash I've never played a tournament really with cash on the mind it just I'm there for the enjoyment and the competitiveness if there's no money that's fine by me too so I know that's the case for a lot of leagues and certainly states and countries where that would be considered illegal. So it's never been about that. But you mentioned some of these people in Victoria, and I got to know quite a few of them because while we were in this pandemic, there was the ICR. That was the only thing we could do. Right. And we brought you back for the ICR. I set up our little London and TCPL league, and I said, hey, we're going to do this if you want to participate. And boy, oh boy, we did well. You brought in a few people, Kerry and Ashley and some others. And I think out of our participants, if there were 64 people that made the playoffs out of, I don't know, 400, I would say a good 20 of them were from what we did. Something like that, you're right. And then I noticed you did it again. So you kind of got that experience and you spread it out to Victoria and your leagues out there. And I would assume that got more people interested in pinball. It did. And we've actually grown now. We've just started another location north of the city. So everything that we've run up until now has been pretty much in Victoria proper. We're about 350,000 people. And as you go north on the island, there really hasn't been much pinball. But there is a place in Shamanus, a little town just sort of north here, sort of like Stratford.

21:50

You know, it's a place that puts on plays and things like that. and they've got two arcades there. I actually think they might per capita have the most public pinball machines in Canada because it's only 2,000 people and I think they have about 18 machines between these two arcades. And the fellow there, he and I started talking and now we started running stuff up there and I took a note from you. I ran five different tournaments on single games so that everybody would get rated on the same day because I made mistakes when I got here. And that's something else I should say to anybody that's looking to run tournaments or whatever, that you're going to make mistakes. That's fine. It's a learning lesson. But I learned that you're going to pay the five bucks anyway, so just get it over with and get everybody rated so that we brought about half the players from Victoria. We wouldn't always be coming up, but we added value so that there was some value there for them because they were all new. This way, they now, going forward, will be able to run events and they're going to compete with us. And one of the things we also did was we created, and this was sort of taken from one of the Toronto leagues, was we have a wrestling belt for the Vancouver Island champion. And now we're including them. So we use the IFPA points, but it's for the island residents. And it's just something, again, to give people something to aspire to. You mentioned some of the locations. I know out that way there was Peacocks, Quasars, and the place you play every Wednesday night, Powerhouse. I've seen what Powerhouse looks like, that lineup of games. And our friend Julie Dorsers was just out there. She had a great time there. I can't believe how it has grown and grown. Remember, this is just a few years ago that you were there and you thought it was you and one other person with pinball machines. And now look at it. No, I agree. Like it was, I found a couple of private collections too now. But in general, those, yeah, like there was just nothing, period. everybody would refer to this place called Johnny Z's, which had been an arcade from about eight or nine years previous. And when that closed down, basically everything closed down. And there are sort of weird liquor laws here, like the barcades. I don't know if they're ever really going to work. The liquor laws are different than they are even in Vancouver. So people listening to this program with a couple of Canadians are wondering what the liquor laws are, and they're assuming a minimum five drinks. Is that what the liquor law is? No, that's not. But in most cases here, you can't have a beer near a machine. And in Victoria, it's even worse. Like the billiard place that we play at, they've got areas that are licensed and non-licensed. So like waiters or waitresses have to actually bring your drinks to you if you're crossing over an area. It's just crazy. What if you had long, long straws?

24:34

I'm just saying there's ways around this. There probably are. You're right. But, you know, the other problem is the pinball machines aren't their moneymaker, right? This isn't Pocketeer Billiards or something like that where, you know, so I'm just so happy. I'll play by whatever rules we've got to play with. But you're right. Like, I mean, the guys that are behind Quasars and Powerhouse and now they've just created a new one called Substation. You know, they've gone from eight or ten pinball machines at the beginning. Now they're, I think, over 50. Now they're not all out. There's a few still, you know, in storage or that they rotate in and out. But they've been hugely committed and they've been really good guys too. And that's actually going to be a location for the first show ever on the island in June of the coming year. The flip out will be there. Vancouver flip out? It's no longer Vancouver flip out. It now Canadian flip out It going to be a rotating show And the first spot that it going to be at will be at the powerhouse in June of 2022 Wow Yeah So I don know what our involvement will be I mean I'm going to offer to help because we've got manpower and things. And we've done a lot of charity events since we started. That was also one of the other things I really have always sort of liked. And so we've tied into a couple of comic cons and different things like that and raised money for charities. So yeah, I guess we've got the most experience, or we would, of running events on the island. I definitely don't have experience of running any type of tournaments at a big show, not like Eddie or any of the folks in the States do. So we'll see where that goes. Well, Dan, you certainly have been to a lot of shows. I know I recently saw you at Indus the last time they had that event. You made it down to Southern California. In fact, if I recall, You introduced me to Neil Hodge, and Neil is the guy behind Forever the Flip. Incredible pinball wear, a nice focus towards women's pinball. Tell us about Neil. Oh, yeah, Neil's fantastic. He was a first-dayer, you know, and he's just so energetic. He had never been to a show before, and he and I had talked, and I had been to the Indisc in 2019. That was my first one, and then I had come to this one. And I just sort of said, hey, you know, if you really want to freak yourself out, come to a show because all he he i mean he's actually from hamilton originally but you know his pinball really was sort of what we were rebuilding here or we're building here in victoria and so we got down there and um yeah he was just non-stop the whole time just going on and he was just loving it and he made contacts and in general he's just a guy that's really out there like i said he's just full of energy so he contacted carrie wing already and uh danny peck who ended up being at our hotel. So, you know, when we came down in the morning for breakfast, half the time she was in the breakfast area too. So we'd chat and he would chat and do her. And, yeah, Neil's definitely very pro the women's game, as are we. Like my vice president is Hayley Williams. I've always believed that to keep the game alive and to keep it moving forward, the women have a very important role to play. And I also understand that, you know, at times you're going to need slightly different environments, and I understand why. And I let our women drive that. So we've got a very healthy group of probably about a half dozen to maybe eight or nine women that play events and are incredibly good players. We hope the plan right now is to hold the next BC Provincial Championships, actually the first ever women's championships here on the island. We're hoping to. That would be very nice. You certainly have some wonderful people there. You mentioned with Neil and with Danny Peck, and the reason I bring those two people up is because they've been guests on your podcast. That's right. Dan has done this Vancouver Island Pinball Podcast, VIP. You can check it out on Spotify and wherever you find your podcasts. I think Anchor and other places, too. What got you into the podcast? Well, it was just sort of something fun. I've just always reached out and the friend that I've got on there, Daryl, who does the tech tips and sort of does all the technical stuff in the background. He'll set up my computer for today's chat with you. He was retiring, I guess, in August a year and a bit ago. And he was just like, we got to do a podcast. We got to do a podcast. I'm like, I don't know, Daryl. I mean, yeah, I know some people. I mean, I've been fortunate enough over the years to go to shows and to meet people and just meet a lot of really interesting people. And I guess, you know, with COVID hitting and everything else, it was just like, hey, you know what? We built this great thing and we're just coming into sort of our second year, you know, with the leagues here, the VPL. So we sort of created, that's one thing I'll just divert real quick here. One of the things that I wanted to do was create an overall body when I created the league. So it's actually Victoria Pinball Leagues is our overall body. And the reason for that is just to ensure that we don't sort of have league nights blocking out other league nights or anything like that. Just continue the growth at a maximum level for everybody and for the businesses too and everything else. It isn't about competition. It's about trying to grow it as much as we can. That's good that you say that because here in Ontario, I mentioned Topple's a Monday night. TCPL is a Friday night. Loppel is a Saturday night. Bluffs is Thursday. Everyone kind of has their place so that you're not competing. And if you're crazy enough, hand up this guy and you want to play in the mall, you can. So I'm glad that you do that in Victoria. Yeah, it was just sort of a thought coming again from back east, especially the last six months that I worked while my wife was already out here. I was playing pretty much every night that I could because, you know, there was nothing to do at home. So I would head out and I played in Guelph with you and played in the City League in Toronto as well. Played everywhere I basically could. And so I thought, you know, this is a good idea. And it's a very strange thing being somebody who has seen a lot of leagues and then you come into a new area and there's zero, you know. And so it was just sort of, okay, what do I want to do? And I just didn't want to get it adversarial or anything like that. I just wanted to make sure that our whole goal was to grow. And it's worked brilliantly. And that was the same thing with the women's. Like originally we had the women's league all set up to go almost immediately. and then like a week before, two of the women that were running it were like, you know, we're just nervous. We're just starting in the other leagues. Can we delay it a bit? And I go, yeah, of course you can. You know, you just tell me when you're ready, and then I'll file again. And basically I just do the admin work for them, right? You know, like you've got results. I'll put them in. You guys do your rulings. You guys set your dates. You guys set your structure. If you want ideas, I'll give you a few different ideas that you can use for a structure, but you guys pick it because, you know, and they have fabulous nights. I've score kept for them a couple of times, and I've said it a few times on our podcast. I'm envious because they're laughing, they're dancing, they're just having a really good time. And it's like, yeah, this is cool. It's about competition. You're keeping score, but it's just having fun. And yeah, I love it. Absolutely love it. You don't come back if you're not having fun. Dan, you are the Dr. Frankenstein of making pinball monsters. You did it with me, with competitions. you do it wherever you go growing leagues growing the community you've done it out in victoria and you've even sampled into the podcast world with the vancouver island pinball podcast check it out it's always good to talk to you and i can't thank you enough for being such a good friend and getting me hooked into this wonderful hobby one more side note i got to bring this up so my first ever game was lethal weapon three and dan said oh you know it's a good starter game that's good it's good uh you know but you're gonna get more than one and i'm like oh geez i don't know you You were right. And then I got a few more, and then a few more, and I said, I'm capped. And what did you say to me? You said, well, if you get rid of that couch, you could put two or three more. Dan, the couch is gone.

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Oh, that's too funny, my friend. The couch is gone. Yeah, it's one of those things that happen. I mean, I remember just really briefly we had a cold room that my wife convinced me, you know, we should insulate that and you could have more room. And her whole opinion was, oh, you'll spread out your machines. I'm like, nope, I'm going to fit more. it's it's it's the truth um you know i i can't thank you enough for the amount of enjoyment that you've brought me when we've hung out and uh plated events but also for everything you're doing for the community like this podcast is amazing um it really was a trendsetter as it came out and it definitely was part of the inspiration for us to do a podcast and and that's definitely helped with my sanity during covid for sure having something that you know we could do every three or four weeks and just put out there and, and know that we were reaching out to these players that, you know, currently couldn't play at that time now. And, and so, yeah, it's, it's been a great, great time. I look forward to when we can play together again, my friend. That will be someday soon. I'll have to check out maybe that flip out. Cause that was a fun tournament the last time I was there. Right back at you. Thanks for the compliments. Keep up the good work, Dan, and we'll talk to you soon. Thank you. This has been your pinball profile. You can find everything on pinballprofile.com. Check out our Facebook group. We're on Twitter and Instagram at pinballprofile. Email us pinballprofile at gmail.com. I'm Jeff Teolas.