Episode 25 - Operator Spotlight: Inner Orbit

Wedgehead Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·48m 22s·analyzed·Apr 8, 2024

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Analysis

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TL;DR

Wedgehead operator spotlight with John Dozier on route operating, community building, and game economics.

Summary

Alan from Wedgehead Pinball interviews John Dozier of Inner Orbit Pinball in Springfield, Missouri. John discusses his 10-year journey operating pinball machines on a route, becoming a partner at a local arcade, and building a thriving competitive scene in a small Midwestern town. The conversation explores operator perspectives on game selection, earnings, modern vs. classic games, and the role of operators in community building.

Key Claims

John has been operating pinball machines since 2013-2014, starting with Star Trek at a board game store.
high confidence · John directly states: 'Might have been 2013, 2014 when I kind of started.'
John operates approximately 20-25 total machines across 3 locations, with primary focus on two bars: 417 Taphouse and 1984 Branson.
high confidence · John: 'I would say it's close to 20 25 that I've got out. It's basically 10 and 10 between 417 Taphouse and then 1984 Branson.'
It took approximately 5 years for John's route to feel sustainable financially.
high confidence · John: 'It's been about five years where it's felt like it's kind of sustainable.'
John's income is approximately 50-50 split between arcade work and route operations.
high confidence · John: 'I probably like incomes 50-50, like the arcade or routing.'
Springfield has approximately 8 pinball locations with around 60 machines on location for a town of 170,000 people.
high confidence · Alan: 'I'm looking at the pinball map right now and it says that springfield has eight locations and about 60 machines on location' and 'springfield's only a town of about 170,000 people'
Modern Stern games play significantly longer than classic games, making them less suitable for tournament play during weekly league events.
medium confidence · Alan: 'if I put godzilla in we're there all fucking night' and discussion about games like Jaws playing for 45 minutes.
Jaws had the best initial month earnings of any machine John has operated.
high confidence · John: 'Jaws um had it like the best initial month I've ever had'
South Park earns roughly 60% compared to new Stern games despite being themed as a top-tier IP.
high confidence · Alan: 'South Park is famously not a good pinball machine' and John states South Park 'earns like a WPC game' (60% range) rather than modern Stern earnings.

Notable Quotes

“location pinball kind of sucked around here. It was the typical laundromat that was half working. So I guess, yeah, it started out just from that cool opportunity and snowballed to what it is now.”
John Dozier @ early in episode — Explains the origin story of Inner Orbit Pinball and the motivation to create the local pinball scene.
“I probably like incomes 50-50, like the arcade or routing.”
John Dozier @ mid-episode — Demonstrates the viability of combining arcade employment with route operations as a sustainable income model.
“if I put godzilla in we're there all fucking night”
Alan @ mid-episode — Captures operator frustration with modern Stern game length impacting tournament scheduling and player availability.
“I think it's our duty, I think, to throw them out there every once in a while at least just to give people a taste.”
Alan @ later in episode — Articulates the operator philosophy of exposing communities to classic games despite lower earnings.
“Stern knows their market the manufacturers know their market they're selling games right now but i'm hoping that we'll get more people out and i'm hoping that as people get into pinball and they go out on location they play pinball maybe they buy a machine for their house”
Alan @ late in episode — Expresses concern about market dominance of long-playing games and hopes for future variety in game design.
“So he's really helped a ton too, I think. That's awesome. And like, did he approach you about running some of these events?”
Alan @ early-mid episode — Highlights community volunteer (Trent) stepping up to organize tournament events, crucial for local scene growth.
“WPC when when John says WPC to listeners, he meaning Valley Williams game from the 90s. WPC is like the driver board set.”
Alan @ late in episode — Clarifies terminology for new listeners unfamiliar with pinball hardware generations and earnings expectations.

Entities

John DozierpersonInner Orbit PinballcompanyAlanpersonWedgehead Pinball Podcastorganization1984 Bransoncompany417 TaphousecompanyMetagamescompanyBrandonperson

Signals

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business_signal: Sustainable pinball route operation requires ~5 years to become financially viable; many operators maintain day jobs initially. Hybrid models (operator + arcade partnership) are increasingly common.
high · John took 5 years to feel sustainable, now partners at arcade (50-50 income). Recommends: 'Unless you got a killer spot, I think it would be kind of difficult to just jump in and abandon a steady job.'
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community_signal: Operators face tension between profitability (new Stern games earn better) and community building (classics and tournaments require shorter play times). Tournament directors are volunteer positions with low recognition.
medium · Alan and John both note they personally prefer classics and shorter games for tournaments, but acknowledge new Sterns earn better. Alan: 'being a td is uh i mean being an operator is a pretty much thankless job.'
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community_signal: Springfield, Missouri scene has grown from virtually no pinball to 8 locations with 60 machines and multiple leagues/tournaments through grassroots operator effort and community volunteer enthusiasm (Trent organizing events).
high · John and Alan discuss 5-8 year buildup, now planning 'the most events we've ever had ever for ifba this year' with consistent leagues and themed tournaments.
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design_philosophy: Modern Stern games (especially those designed by tournament pros) play significantly longer than previous eras, creating tension between home collector preferences for depth and operator/TD preferences for reasonable tournament runtimes.
high · Extensive discussion about Stern hiring top players and making 'really deep dense rule sets' that 'play really long.' Alan theorizes home buyers drive length preferences; John confirms Jaws ~45 min play times.

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.145

0:00

1, 2, 3, 4, Operator, Operator, Information, Information, Give me Jesus, Give me Jesus all the life, all the life, Operator, Operator, Information, Information, I'd like to speak to a friend of mine, a friend of mine, oh, prayer is the number, faith is the exchange, information is the freedom, Jesus is the name, Operator, Operator, Information, Information, Please give me Jesus. Give me Jesus all the life. Oh, I'm operating. Information. Hello, everybody, and welcome to another episode of the Wedgehead Pinball Podcast. My name is Alan, your host of the Wedgehead Pinball Podcast. I'm running solo this evening as my co-host Alex is out sick, but I'm joined by an operator out of Springfield, Missouri. His name is John Dozier, and he owns and operates Interorbit Pinball, previously Missouri Pinball. How are you doing, John? I'm great. How are you? Wonderful, man. We've never met, but we follow each other on Instagram, and we talk quite a bit about operating pinball, and I thought you'd be a great guest on the podcast because you run a route in a small Midwestern town. So I want to hear your perspective on pinball, and I guess the first question I really have for you is, what made you start operating pinball machines, and when did you start? And do you operate only pinball, or do you do other amusement devices as well? Might have been 2013, 2014 when I kind of started. My buddy Brandon got the opportunity to operate at a board game store, Metagames in Springfield. He was good friends with the owner. And I think he put a Star Trek in there maybe first. And then I kind of tagged along with him and his family. His brother and dad have games there now too. And it was mostly because location pinball kind of sucked around here. It was the typical laundromat that was half working. So I guess, yeah, it started out just from that cool opportunity and snowballed to what it is now. And you're all pinball? Like 90%. I kind of somewhat recently dove into like mini claw machines. And just because I had heard about how well those earn, just to kind of prop up my pinball earnings a little bit. And do they, for the listeners, do they earn? Uh, yes, it's very location dependent. Um, okay. Like the arcade that I am a minority partner in and work at it. I have a candy claw there that crushes, but I have another one at a bar that doesn't do 60 bucks a month. I mean, it just kind of dependent on it, but the maintenance is nothing. So that's the appeal for sure. Sure. That's cool. So how many locations do you operate in and how many machines do you keep on route so i would say two spots are mainly um that on that metagame store that i mentioned earlier i have one game in there currently just because brandon and his family are the primary operators of that one and i would say it's close to 20 25 that I've got out. It's basically 10 and 10 between 417 Taphouse and then 1984 Branson. I've probably got 10-ish on each spot. Nice. I see that 417 Taphouse and 1984, they're pretty much right across the street, right? Is that true? Like on the map? So kind of. So the one across from the street is the original 1984 they have been around 18 years i think and they're a free play arcade so they're yeah you could throw a rock and hit each other from those two locations branson is about 45 minutes south oh okay second location okay and you operate at the the one further away from the 417 tap house yeah okay that made sense i was looking at it and i was like i mean we put you know my business partner still runs a route all over the portland metro area then we have wedget but i was still looking i was like damn that's like did you feel as though they cannibalize your earnings at either spot since they're so close together but i guess they're not even your machine so well and i have had a game at that location before and it's just a totally different vibe it's more family friendly at the free play arcade right next door so i'm sure there are there's some crossover but didn't seem too related and i guess the next question i have is you've been operating for about 10 years correct you said 2013 2014 that would put you at the 10 year mark that do you still keep a day job or is operating your full-time gig so my day job is working at the arcade in branson oh nice yeah i mostly work the counter but i do the tech work there and um last june i became a partner there just by luck and and how integral you are to like i mean you have a lot of games there and you work on the game so it's like you're a very useful partner to have around i would imagine for sure yeah yeah yeah and uh ron and the other owners from the 1984 in springfield um are the other other owners and yeah i think exactly what you said they expected to be a little bit more involved and had to do a lot more maintenance, but I was there and kind of just worked into the fold like that. But I think I used to do web design full-time right out of high school and kind of hated the desk stuff. And my wife kind of pushed me to do pinball. And initially it was, I'm going to try to find all these games and just like flip them. And of course you're at the mercy of someone and that didn't really work out. But Yeah, all pinball. I probably like incomes 50-50, like the arcade or routing. That's cool, man. How long have you been sort of working at the arcade and routing games full time? Like, I imagine you didn't jump right in and just go full bore and just try to make it on Coindrop on a route. Right. How long did it take you to get there for the other listeners thinking about starting their own kind of route in the same way? Sure, yeah. Um, it's been about five years where it's felt like it's kind of sustainable. Um, that's when I've had the job at the arcade is the five-year mark. I didn't really do it for income initially. It was just cool opportunity. I needed space. I don't have a ton of space at home. I actually have zero working games in my house just because the projects are here. Right. Yeah. Unless you got a killer spot, I think it would be kind of difficult to just jump in and abandon a steady job. But maybe not. I don't know. Well, I think part of what I want to talk about on this podcast more is talking to more operators. And the first two Operator Spotlight series I did, we focused on the electric bat. And they have their own arcade. And they have a second location. And they're doing very well. But they don't really run a route. and uh sure the pops pinball guys in boston they do run a route but we also spent a lot of the time talking about their new kind of flagship location i'm very interested because my business partner wrote he's been an operator for like 20 years and he still runs the route you know like he still has a route they're all his machines that and so he still runs the route to this day and like we're partners on wedgehead route running is like it's it is pinball operating but like you said about the free play arcade it's just like there's so it's so different from having your own arcade right like there's it's better and worse in so many ways right like it's easier to get into right because you could just have the games and you could find a local business that'll let you put them in and then you just offer to you know maintain it give them a split or whatever so i think that's like an easy jumping off point it's also like you could dip your toes in the water and it doesn't have to be a full-time job if you don't want it to be. It could be like you could put a couple games in to a location in your house, and now there's pinball in your region, and you're supplying it, and you can get a little bit of cash on the side, or it can become your full-time job, and you can make it full-time as a route, or you can go to the point where you own an arcade or you become partners in an arcade like you've done. And I just want the listener to kind of understand that because I think what we're seeing in pinball right now is a great resurgence of pinball in general, but what most people talk about, and especially on podcasts, is they talk about their home collectors. They're the inside people. They're people that buy games for their houses and they collect them and they go to shows and all that kind of stuff. And there's nothing wrong with any of that. You know, I think there's a lot of people that are sitting with games. And I talked to some of these collectors and it's funny because you'll be in a thread on Reddit or you'll be on inside or something and they'll be like, you know, I have to buy this. you know like i have to buy all these games because there's no pinball within an hour of me or two hours of me sure yeah and i always tell these people i'm like you can change that you literally have everything you need to change it right now like you could go change that right now it sounds like you and your buddy and his dad like it sounds like you guys started a scene from obscurity like i'm looking at the pinball map right now and it says that springfield has eight locations and about 60 machines on location but i don't even have your your other arcade location reflected in that but springfield's only a town of about 170 000 people right so to have 60 machines on location that's pretty good right like and i'm and i think the new people like in our league don't really get that i mean for this population like you said there's so many games and you would have to go to a much larger city to get even 60 and there's a lot of good options too like uh there's a tent shop that just opened up that they've got like all le machines and then there's 1984 with classics and we're trying to do i think we've got two leagues currently and we're gonna have the most events we've ever had ever for ifba this year probably that's just like you said you kind of have to will it into existence it's not gonna it's it's not within this last couple years it's felt like it's really taken off but it's been five eight years kind of to build this up to feel like something totally it takes time and it's you know like you go from a place that doesn't have pinball and then you're providing it and there may be some people in that community that are have been exposed to pinball like oh thank god we've been dying of thirst in this desert and you brought us water but there's some people that have never even seen pinball before or don't know anything about it and you got to build up that community so it's like you got to kind of teach people to be interested in it. And you do that by running leagues or tournaments or events. And I think it seems like you're doing a good job of that. Do you want to talk about any of those that you do or anything that you see success or you've seen help grow your local scene? Consistent leagues are probably the biggest impact, but there's a really enthusiastic new guy. His name is Trent. I think he started playing less than a year ago and he made it 90 days straight playing pinball just because he wanted to get good. And he's played probably more pinball than I have already. And he's been doing these really cool themed events where, like we did a Christmas sweater tournament with giveaways and stuff. He's doing a May the 4th tournament for Star Wars, a 420 tournament he's doing. I mean, I'm pretty introverted, so I'm not like mixing in the fun. Is it my strong suit? Sure. So, but I feel like people really gravitate towards that. So he's really helped a ton too, I think. That's awesome. And like, did he approach you about running some of these events? And, you know, like you as the operator and being like, hey, I'm trying to throw more events and, you know, or was he pretty self-sufficient? I do a lot of the back like match play and IFPA submissions but I think it was he probably heard me complain about how much i hate running events which is why he volunteered his that good services so it kind of yeah yeah i mean any i'm still enthusiastic but i don't have that enthusiasm for like competitive play like i used to so to have somebody like that to kind of take it and run with it is awesome yeah being a td is uh i mean i think being an operator is a pretty much thankless job but being a td is is pretty close i mean you're as a td you're donating your time and in some cases with big tournaments and you have lots of moving parts you're sort of donating sometimes even your ability to play in that tournament right so it's like usually you get into it because you're like you like competitive pinball but it's like if you're running all the events then you don't even really get to play in them so it's it's better if the for a for a scene if multiple people in the scene throw different tournaments so it's not one person doing all of it unless you hate playing in competitive tournaments then and you're naturally extroverted then you know maybe you should be the person doing it but you're right it sounds like trist helping you quite a bit there oh yeah he can take him as long as he wants to run them yeah it sounds good to me but yeah i guess I see that, and you mentioned it, but really what you and I, I think, sort of bonded on was not only that we operate games and we like to talk shop, like we're doing now, but I see that you like to operate classics as well as modern games, which I'm a fan of. you know my co-host Alex who's out this episode but like I mean we talk about it on the show a lot like we we love classic games sure yeah and so I just want to ask you about like what makes you choose the games that you choose to operate and then what are your sort of best earning games and do you have any surprising earning games that you have on location outside of like new sterns a lot of what I get is just personal preference honestly because I want these in my collection and luckily the price points of classic games line up with what I would like to spend. So it's kind of a... Totally. Dual purpose, yeah. I mean, I can pick up something cheap off Craigslist Classic, and it's awesome in tournaments.

14:17

Kind of getting to the point where I want to even cut down the new stuff even more because of events, just because they take so long to run events on. I will beat that drum for a long time, man. That's a common recurring theme that I tell people. I'm like, it's real interesting. These new Stern games, they earn well. People get really excited to play them. I think overall they're good games. You and I have talked about our different preferences. Like I remember you had spoken about getting your Jaws and how much you loved it. And you were like, what do you think about it? And I was like, yeah, it's good. But, I mean, it plays forever. Like just forever. Sure. Forever in a day. and I'm just like Stern keeps hiring some of the best tournament players in the world to go work there and they keep making these like really deep dense rule sets and it's not so much even just sort of the deep and denseness of the rule sets is that they also play really long I mean you can as an operator I guess bastardize them but I know I don't think a lot of I mean I don't personally we have an episode about setting up pins and we sort of go into like settings and stuff that you can do but it's like i don't really like to i like to keep them pretty much factory settings other than you know the tilt's a little bit tight and they're steep but i don't really go in and like bastardize them usually to make them really hard but i'm just like out of the box they just play really long and i i think it's very interesting how they're like you get all these top level tournament players and they get to go work at a company and the games they make play really long like really long which i find interesting because i would think like oh they're tournament players they if anyone has an appreciation for keeping an event moving along you would i would i guess i would just think that it would be shorter playing a little bit more brutal and i think that might show how much power the home buyer might have at least from higher ups because if a game is brutal like turtles they don't sell them and yeah i would personally love to find of turtles but they're kind of hard to find now yeah just because they didn't buy them initially so they also came out in the wrong part of covid because they came out when very true right like so it's like there was that big boom of home buyers and people with extra money but it was like that first part of covid when everything was in shutdown and everyone was nervous are they going to get laid off from their jobs all this kind of stuff like so i think that that hurt their sales and now it has a reputation as a very difficult game. I do think you're correct in the sense that, like, the homebuyers are kind of driving the bus right now, and manufacturers are certainly hearing them. I also think that tournament players are trying to be more cognizant of, like, when Keith Owens is designing a game, or Tim Sexton is coding a game, or Raymond Davidson, or any of those guys, right? I think they're trying to be like, all right, well, we're top 100 players. like we're great players what's easy for us is hard for regular people and so i think sometimes they sure they over correct in my opinion by making the games i think a little bit too long playing that's like sort of my average take on the new ones and i just thought it was interesting that you brought it up with your tournaments and running classics because i do the same thing we do a weekly league called howdy partner and we have a lot of people show up like we get to like max capacity we're getting you know 45 50 55 people show up to these and they they play on teams and like when i get more people showing up like i don't put sterns in i just can't i mean it's just they'll play too long just frogs it down i just can't do it like if i put godzilla in we're there all fucking night and i know people want to play it but it's like man that's a great game to play by yourself in an arcade you know i don't know if that's a great game to play in a tournament and I know a lot of tournament players will be like oh you're so wrong right because the rules are so good and there's so many different strategies and all that kind of stuff and I'm like I don't disagree with that but everyone has like you know a lot of tournaments you know weeklies and stuff take place some people have to work the next day you know they want to be out at a place for maybe three hours or so and go home and get a good nice rest and go to work the next day it's like they're not all multi-day you know pinball festival tournaments right where people fly in for him and it's like i think the runtime needs to be considered by all tournament directors and i just wish that there was a i just wish that i guess i wish that there was more of a focus on making some of each you know like i wish there was room for some in the market for like some shorter playing games because one of my favorite sterns is you know black knight sort of rage pro yeah because it can be if it's set up right it's brutally hard and fast playing all the shots really close in they're all easy to make and the rules are simple but you miss a shot and the ball's gone and i like that oh yeah so i'll put that game in or like we have ghostbusters like i'll put ghostbusters in this ghostbusters is you know a shorter playing stern right yeah i just wish that we got a little bit more variety as far as like play times or games that were just maybe a little bit more difficult but you're right i think it's i mean stern knows their market the manufacturers know their market they're selling games right now but i'm hoping that we'll get more people out and i'm hoping that as people get into pinball and they go out on location they play pinball maybe they buy a machine for their house as their skills improve what happens is you go from being like oh this game's so hard i can't i can't get anywhere on jaws to getting to the point where you're like oh man i could play jaws all day and not that there's anything wrong with that sure him in particular 45 minutes right yeah exactly and so it's like then you start looking for variety and if you're looking around and there's no variety as far as like everything is this 30 40 minutes log i'm just questioning of like that's not been ball to me that's not what i seek out now sure and with the classics i mean i don't people aren't exposed to them really so i don't think they know if they like them or not without people like us putting them out there because like Like, the bigger vending companies or operators aren't really going to put those out because they really don't make much money at all. Totally. But, yeah, it's kind of our duty, I think, to throw them out there every once in a while at least just to give people a taste. I think that's what you and I talk about, too, is, like, where it's, like, I think we've said those words to each other before where it's, like, I feel like it's, like, out of a sense of duty. And what's funny is now it's, like. Yes, yeah, yeah. at wedge and how it's like all the regulars they they all play the classic games because they know i'm going to put it in howdy partner and they're going to have to fucking play them so they either do well on a howdy on one of them and now they have an affinity for that game because they did well in a tournament on it or they realized that they were just exposed to it and had more fun and they're like oh i didn't realize a game without ramps could be fun right like or a game without modes could be fun and that sounds crazy once you're into classics like me or you but it's not how i started either obviously like when i started i played attack from mars like 15 20 years ago and i was like oh this is great then right if it didn't have multi balls and ramps and modes like yeah i wasn't particularly interested in playing it but as i played longer and longer and i think that's fine and totally yeah i don't think that the classics nowadays are really anyone's gateway game like it's not the one that's you're like oh i don't play pinball i'm just gonna walk up to alien star and now i'm a pinball guy right like i don't think that that happens but i do think that you can be like oh i like jaws the movie here's the jaws pinball machine oh i'll play it oh this is kind of fun oh i like this now i like pinball oh this company makes a lot of these games i like star wars or whatever and then they get into pinball and then you can go further i think i feel like you it's easy to go back in time the longer you're in the hobby and you can get an appreciation from games of different eras but you do need operators that will operate old games for that to even be possible like you mentioned it's i asked you you know what games are your best earning games and you're like well it's not the classics they go yeah i mean right that and that's the problem with operators and why you don't see them on location is like they're cheaper to buy but they're also older so they're in typically more disrepair or they have more wear they have simpler rule sets and they just won't earn on location they'll probably you'll have probably more mechanical and electrical problems with them than you will a brand new game out of the box right so that's that's hard math oh for sure yeah for people to like reconcile they're like well i could buy a new stern i can unbox it it's going to earn well and it's going to be really reliable on location i don't know what your experience is but we buy a lot of sterns and oh i've had almost no issues with sterns yeah i mean you have to like rebuild flippers and you know the scoop switches break and you know but it's like and it is funny to see um you know the home collector market i don't know if you if you recognize this as well but it's like the home collectors will a game will come out and they'll be like you know they'll have to replace a coil stop or something and they'll be like you know like what am i paying seven or eight thousand dollars for you're like well that's just shit buddy like you know what i mean like i I was like, it's like a $5 part and it takes like less than five minutes, right? Like to fix it, but they're not prepared to work on any games. And I think Stern does a really good job of being very reliable. I don even think my business partner knows how many new Sterns he bought and operated but it a few dozen if not i mean he probably over 50 less than 100 over the years and like we had two ship with dead node boards one with like a dead cpu out of like 50 or so but then we get i mean we go through a distributor we talk to the distributor stern gives us you know they get you the parts out and you keep running and the rest of the games i mean once they're up and running i mean they earn well and they're they last long i mean and and the earnings typically have good legs i mean and they have good resale value if you need to get out of one you know so that's why people buy and operate sterns on location that's why if you're going around and you're seeing places with sterns that's why they do it right they they earn i mean do you have do you have a metric like of the games you operate right now do you know which one's earning the best like is jaws the newest game is that the game that's earning the most or or what what is it for you yeah jaws um had it like the best initial month i've ever had and foo fighters was it initially uh foo fighters dropped off really hard though um i suspect jaws will kind of settle under godzilla but jaws has been doing really well it's kind of what you would guess honestly as far as like titles earning well Jurassic Park still does really well. Godzilla does well for me, but not as good as like I hear like Kale and Rachel say. I'm sure that they just have like some hardcore pinball people. And for a little town, I think we've got four on location. So it's just saturated too. If it's a recognizable title, Ghostbusters, like you mentioned, mine does really, really well. Yeah. At the arcade, it's the top out of 30. Ghostbusters, I think that's a very good, because our Ghostbusters, I mean, obviously like we're free play model right now at Wedgehead. We have been for the last three years or so. Like I said, my partner sells a route like Ghostbusters earns and so does Star Wars and so does Game of Thrones does pretty well. I've never ever had one of those. I'd be interested to see what's interesting. I think about those games are you're talking about like top tier a list licenses, right? So I think there's a lot of pinball people where those three games I just mentioned are divisive. Some people really like them, but some people really dislike them. And they're all Dwight Sullivan-coded games. Yeah, especially Star Wars. Right? Yeah. But it's funny because on location, as an operator, they do so well. They do so well.

28:33

WPC when when John says WPC to listeners, he meaning Valley Williams game from the 90s. WPC is like the driver board set. So he's saying like games like from the 90s made by Valley Williams. So, you know, Adam's Family, Funhouse, Attack from Mars, right? Games like that. And what you're saying is, South Park, it was made by Sega, so it was a rival manufacturer. It actually became Stern. So it's like, it's really the same company as Stern now. Gary was in charge at the time, too. You were expecting it to earn like a new game, but it earns more like a 90s game. Which, I mean, it is a 90s game. Right, which I guess you should expect. Yeah. But what do you mean when you say like, you're like, it earns like a 90s game for the listener or for people that are thinking about operating games? Like, sure. Try to describe what you mean. And you can use like percentages. Like maybe it's like, you know, like, I don't know what you what your 90s games do relative to your modern sterns. If it's 50%, it's 60% or whatever, what you've experienced on your route. Yeah, I'd say it's probably in that 60% range. I mean, some dip to 50, like No Fear doesn't particularly earn well, even though it is a good game. But I imagine Adams would get to 90%. I mean, it could exceed Stern. So it's still pretty game dependent. But like the Doctor Who's, the Fishtails, those seem to kind of earn 60-ish of a new Stern, like maybe even 50. So I guess in my head, there's kind of these little weird tiers like that. No, I think when you said that, that's why it piqued my interest because, like, I think we all think about it like that, like as operators. And, right, obviously as an operator, you're looking in the coin box and you know what games earn and what don't. And I think there's some people that look around and go, oh, what happens with the variety of pinball machines? And you go, well, what happened is they don't do well on location anymore. Like, those games used to be the A-tier games. and now in the bally williams game now it's the stern games right those are the games that earn on location and what happened to a lot of the bally williams games because they don't make them anymore they made a couple remakes of some of them but there's a lot of them that cost what a new stern would cost or even more right like so if you were to go out and buy one like you can go out and buy a twilight zone but that's you know ten thousand twelve thousand fourteen thousand dollar game right like oh yeah right like it's a very expensive game and i talked about this on the podcast in the episode with rachel and carol from the electric bat and i was like yeah you know what's funny is like twilight zone is an amazing game that true pinheads respect and love and it's a very expensive game sought after by collectors but you put that game out on location and it just doesn't earn that well like and so when you're an operator and you have limited funds are you gonna buy a game like if you can buy a new stern pro right for just under seven grand or whatever are you gonna buy a game for basically twice that that's gonna earn half as much and that's why people buy new sterns that's why it makes sense as an operator to do it right like but what you're saying is you're like when i asked you why you choose to buy games you're like well sometimes it's just games i like and what i want and i mean i think we're the same way it's like my business partner and I are very passionate about pinball as you are and for us we're like well sometimes it's like feels like hammering you know a square peg into a round hole but it's like we're gonna make it work like sometimes it's like we're gonna have the new games that that earn money and keep the lights on but there's gonna be some games for us and I think that there's like always like a good mix to have and I really like locations that mix it I understand the economic side and why people buy new games because of the earnings potential like and that's always been true about operators like operators forever you're operating in the 50s and 60s in the late 70s when the solid state machines came out and you had those ems they had to fucking go because your best earners they're gone they're not earning shit now same thing you get you know after firepower and black night the game changed so if you're still operating you know a skateball or whatever people like what is this shit like like the game feels different even though it's only like a year or two before that and then you get into the late 80s and you're getting regular multi balls and then you get into the 90s and you got like adam's family you get modes and and stuff i think lights camera action was the first game of modes adam's family is an early game and then you get wizard modes and you get those mechanical toys and all of a sudden those games from the 80s they're they're fucking old all right right like then you get the new games that have the lcd screens and they got Stern's got Insider Connected. So it's the same thing that happens. It's the churn of the business and why operators always have to buy new games. The game itself didn't change. And it's not like those games still don't have their fans, but they're not going to earn you. And if you're running it as a business, you got to be conscious of like, you know, what makes money? What do people want to play? And you got to have some of those games. If you're, just be honest with yourself, if you're strictly doing it for money, then yeah, go for the new Sterns. But if you just want to build a cool collection and start routing games and having stuff that you want but want other people to play it, it might make more sense to grab three classics for the Stern just to kind of build up a lineup at a little brewery in town or something. So I think you could do it either way. Just be honest. If you're doing it as a business, there's nothing wrong with it. Go for the new Stern. but there's another option too and do it more as a hobby and see where you want to take it from there which i want to i also want to ask because i'm curious when we talk about different regions of the country and that's about like individual game pricing like how do you what's the kind of standard price per play for say a new stern for a bally williams or say for like a solid state classic like a cheetah or something like do you what are what are your what do you price your So it's kind of a difficult question because the arcade in Branson is kind of its own animal. Regardless of what it is, like the cap is 50 cents. And then a lot of the classic stuff is a quarter. That's so cheap. Yeah, so it's – and it's like – it is. So – and what's crazy is some people still come in and like are upset that we're charging for pinball plus the admission for like the arcade side. and it's just like you have no idea how expensive these are it makes no sense yeah but so yeah there it's it's it's different um but like for my stuff i do independently um i'll just do the standard dollar or three plays for two dollars on sterns some of my older stuff i will drop down to 75 like i have my jurassic at 75 oh really um your stern jurassic yeah yeah so that was more of a panic in the moment like it was dropping off and i was like oh people just don't want to play this thing and then now i can't i feel bad raising it back up so it's kind of like locked in there i probably won't do that with my others um totally but um metagames that they will they will only do 75 cents they won't do a dollar um i guess we just feel bad charging because we remember us being players wanting to play on location even though it totally worth a dollar a play there still that like little tug of guilt of making it affordable sure like the classics i would i used to run at 50 cents or 25 but now i at 50 just because of the maintenance issue like i'd rather get less plays on it and the people who really want to play it will still play it totally um i guess the only thing cheaper is like an em you just can't really go above that uh like a quarter yeah i yeah i'd say a dollar is pretty typical that's good you're in the normal ballpark of like what pinball should be i i'm gonna do a whole episode about pinball economics because i have a lot of thoughts on this we have the same portland metro area it's like we have about like portland's like 640 000 people the portland metro is about 2.5 million people live in the area and there's currently like 247 pinball locations with a total of like 981 machines on location so like there's a lot of that's crazy like a lot like a lot of pinball yeah so what happens in portland is there's still a lot of like there are some operators that try to like kind of race lower like lower their prices by like a quarter from everyone else to try to like draw business so it's like we still get that in portland and i think it's crazy like just because like you know black knight 1980 was the first game to be like recommended from the manufacturer to charge 50 cents for and you know in today's dollars that's almost two dollars a play right and that game did very well and it's so weird that right like like we'll be offended at those prices now but it's yeah it doesn't even keep up with inflation at all no and it doesn't but you couldn't for i don't think you could do two dollars i don't think so either but i think like i i just use that as an example of being like it should be a dollar like a new stern machine yeah oh yeah it should be a dollar a play there should be no bitching and moaning about it but there is and so you know and the problem with pinball and the heads and tails of it is like when you're a new player it's very expensive because you're very bad when you with the better you get the cheaper pinball gets because when you get good you can get extra balls you can play for longer you can get replays you get high scores will get you more replays right so and that sucks because i wish like i could charge less for a new player and more for an experienced player like i wish that you could do that because it's like sure it's the hardest thing to get people over the hump i think about pinball is like they get nervous to like you want to play like oh i'm not any good and they're like embarrassed to be like oh i got to put money in i got to like oh and it went so quickly and like i don't want to keep doing this because there's a very tactile feel like, ooh, I'm not good at this. Why am I doing this? I just put a dollar in and it's gone. I put another dollar in and it's gone. That feeling of like, what am I getting out of this before pinball gets its claws into you and then you become addicted. Right. Yeah, and so I think just operators across the country are still dealing with this problem of how to price games. But I think a dollar a play is what a new game should be. Because even at that point, it's going to take you, if you have a huge arcade that's doing huge numbers, you know, I've heard arcade owners be like, I can pay one off in six months, right? Break even.

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And I'm like, you know, I think even it's like at Wedgehead, sure, but we do free play, so we don't measure it like that. But if it's on a route, it probably takes, you know, a year to two years to break even. But that's before you're talking about splits and, you know, because you have to split with your locations, right? Like, and so it's just crazy. And then maintenance and parts and all that kind of stuff. So it's a huge investment in time and energy and, you know, not nominally money as well. You gotta love it to do it. You gotta love it. Right. And that's, that's why it's like, you know, I think, you know, what makes a good operator is you gotta have passion for pinball because like you will make some money and you do have to care about what makes money to some extent to do it. But you gotta love pinball, right? Because you're not doing it for the money. like even though we just talked about money i'm talking about money because it's like i want to talk about i want the listener to understand i get so many questions about it which is part of the reason why i started the podcast so i want to talk to operators like you and i just want to like kind of illuminate it for the listener and for anyone interested and if you own games at your house and you're considering taping leap it's like you know look at john he's done it in springfield you know like you've created a whole scene there that didn't used to exist in a small midwestern town right like you're looking around you're like oh man gee i really like pinball but where do we get to play pinball and and really the answer is well we should just build it and anyone listening to this and is in the same situation should be able to do the same thing if you're looking around on the pinball map and there's nowhere near you to play pinball or the quality of the games isn't there and you've been a collector you could go buy games and you like to tinker and work on games you should be operating some of those games or that's my take is like i want to see more people especially hobbyists people that are passionate about pinball i want to see them starting local scenes around the country for sure yeah well and and i just cold emailed a bunch of places like it it doesn't take a ton of effort just to kind of stir up some stuff and there's other people in your area that feel the same way and would love to support a pinball place um yeah so sometimes it's got to be you even if you're an introvert like john even if you're not the guy that thinks you're the guy right like you it sounds like from talking to you you're like i'm not the guy but you are the guy you're the guy you had it had to be you like It had to be you and your friends starting operating machines, and now you have 60 machines in a town full of 170,000 people, and they're maintained by people that care, and you have a variety of games, and that's so rare for a city your size, and that's awesome. But it's all because of people like you, you know, your local friendly neighborhood operator. So I just wanted to have you on the show and, you know, just kind of chat with you about it, and I hope you had a good time. The last question I usually ask people is I have two more questions I want to ask you and then we'll end this episode. I want to ask you, how do you collect feedback or tech alerts for issues on your games? And what are your operator pet peeves from customers so that we can try to put it out there and hopefully some people will listen and alleviate some of these bad behaviors? So I have these little reverse static cling QR codes that I put under the glass for people to scan and it sends me an email. They're not super well used. I mean, they might be too small, but that's what I try to do. The bar is pretty good at letting me know if people complain. And a lot of people have my contact information that are playing there, so that helps a lot. But at the arcade, I'm usually at the front desk, so that's awesome. But, yeah, I would love to implement what you guys do with the text line. And I think that'd be the most direct way to do it because it's a less step than scanning, make an email, write out, try to explain some stuff. What are some of your operator pet peeves? Do you have any from customers? Any like drinks on glass or, you know, kicking games around? Or is there anything that you – eating pizza or chicken wings and then just like – Oh, man. And I had some, this is kind of a tangent, but I had somebody put shredded cheese all over my Bond. And then they finger painted in it. And then I found the bag of cheese underneath the game. I just wish you could have seen it. I have no idea what was happening. Yeah, it was crazy. So, like, the beer and stuff doesn't really bother me. I would say it's more like the frustration, like, shake the games off their legs stuff that bothered me. and i think my tilts are pretty generous i don't set them up super tight and that's how i get paid for it i guess um i might need to tighten them up but that's probably about it yeah just the here's the downside line you tighten the tilts you're just gonna hear about it they're just gonna bitch about it i'm speaking from experience oh for sure but i'm always like man i'm not doing it for people that are just like nudging a game reasonably we have people in the portland scene that will just drag a machine to hell and back across the floor and go, oh, that's just what I always do. And you're like, that's why I have to set the tilt site. It's because those people are going to come in and do that. And I'm going to be like, well, that's a tilt, right? Like that's what the tilt Bob is there for is to teach people what the, the rules of engagement are. Well, you mentioned the, the tech line feedback. It sounds like you're in a position where it's like the scenes small enough and the people that know you best have your personal phone number. And like, that's always the best too. I don't think I've mentioned it. We just did an episode about how to talk to an operator, but I don't even think I mentioned in that episode, but it's like, you know, I get the majority of my great feedback from like a handful of people, like the same people, right? Like the same regulars that I know, they know me. they still usually most of the time use the text line because i have it set up but i set up the text line because people have phones people text right like and i also wanted i wanted a way to easily be able to like ask them a follow-up question because sometimes you get feedback and you're like i don't even know what this means because they're a well-meaning person but they don't know maybe the lingo or whatever and i'd like to ask a follow-up question but i didn't i was like oh if i just had their phone number right like if they texted me and then i had their phone number i could text them back and i could ask one question that would help me so yeah we used to what do we call it i think it's called switch up it's like an app that you can get but on your phone and it works well for any operators out there listening but i think a qr code works probably just as well you know and i think you're just probably experiencing a lot of like people know you now so like i don't even need the qr code because i'm just gonna go talk to john he's right there yeah right like so that's what it is yeah so it's like that and that's great or i'll see him at league next week yeah exactly yeah john it was a pleasure having you on the show um it was great to talk you know running around and and hearing your experience and glad to hear you've been doing it for 10 years and that it seems to be going well for you and you recently did some kick-ass new merch uh the t-shirt that i bought from you which is pretty sweet i'm always I'm always happy when I see rad merch. Like, not to throw any shade, but there's a lot of questionable in-wall merch out there, and yours is rad. Sure. So it's like, I always love seeing. Appreciate it. Thank you. Yeah, good work on that. If you see John in person, buy one of his shirts. I don't know if you sell them online, but I'll encourage listeners to follow John. Shoot me a message. Yeah, he'll probably send you one. It was great talking to you. For the listeners at home, I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you're in the Springfield, Missouri area or going through, feel free to stop at one of John's locations. For everyone outside of the region, go support your local regional operator, whoever that may be. Play some pinball in its natural habitat on location. And until next time, good luck. Don't suck. Operator, give me ear. Information, information, give me long distance.