The Pinball Show Ep 160 BONUS: Additional Pindustry News: A Visit To Spooky Pinball & Stern Pinball Visiting Costco

Pinball Show Patreon Feed·podcast_episode·18m 51s·analyzed·Sep 11, 2024

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.031

TL;DR

Spooky expands factory; Stern pursues Costco retail and office rental despite pricing skepticism.

Summary

A bonus Pinball Show episode discusses Spooky Pinball's new factory building and ongoing game development, along with critical analysis of Stern Pinball's strategic moves including a Costco partnership for a Jurassic Park Home Plus Epsilon machine at $4,999 and a new $499/month workplace rental service called Level Up Your Office. Hosts praise Spooky's incremental improvements and upcoming titles while skeptical of Stern's market positioning and pricing strategies.

Key Claims

Spooky Pinball has a new factory building with equipment setup complete
high confidence · Host and Greg Bone visited Spooky HQ a couple weekends ago; they filmed Looney Tunes and Texas Chainsaw Massacre featurettes there in October/November of prior year
Stern Pinball announced partnership with Costco to sell Jurassic Park Home Plus Epsilon at $4,999
high confidence · Hosts explicitly state announcement; exclusive to Costco, not the Stern distribution network
Stern launched Level Up Your Office workplace rental service at $499/month including game, maintenance, setup, delivery
high confidence · Hosts discuss pricing and logistics concerns; unclear if monthly or year-long contract required
Spooky's upcoming games (X-Men, Avatar confirmed; others unspecified) show incremental quality improvements
high confidence · Host states company listens to community feedback and improves each subsequent release; mentions 'every subsequent game is objectively better'
Spooky Pinball operates on lower profit margins than other manufacturers
medium confidence · Host opinion: 'margins on spooky pinball machines are not as good as other pinball companies'
Jaws received new 'The Shark is Broken' topper mode and 8-bit mode as recent updates
high confidence · Hosts discuss new topper content; Insider Connected features; topper costs $9.99
Local operators offer pinball rental/maintenance for $200-$300/month, undercutting Stern's $499/month offer
medium confidence · Host states 'in-home game rentals without maintenance for like $200 to $250' and notes local operators likely cheaper than Stern
Spooky will delay launching new titles for six months post-X-Men release due to IP deadlines
medium confidence · Host states 'they going to hold off six months for launching' and notes 'IP people have already got deadlines'

Notable Quotes

“every subsequent game that they release is just objectively better. Like they care so much and they're focusing so much on what they can provide the pinball player and collector and hobbyist”
Host (unnamed) @ ~8:30-9:00 — Key praise for Spooky Pinball's design philosophy and responsiveness to community feedback; suggests competitive advantage in quality iteration
“I love fucking packed pinball machines that are eye stunningly beautiful... maybe the best value in the entire industry. I'm not saying that lightly because, quite frankly, the margins on spooky pinball machines are not as good as other pinball companies.”
Host (unnamed) @ ~10:00 — Endorsement of Spooky's value proposition and implicit criticism of competitors' pricing; acknowledges Spooky's lower profit margin model
“quit with this home edition stuff. It's too expensive for the market you're trying to penetrate. It's not going to work. It's a waste of time.”
Dennis (co-host) @ ~15:00 — Direct criticism of Stern's home edition strategy; sets up debate about market segmentation and pricing
“this feels like an American pinball decision... It seems super incompetent. Like, where's the thought? Like, this is not a legitimate update. This is not a serious effort.”
Dennis (co-host) @ ~24:00 — Harsh criticism equating Stern's Costco move to American Pinball's strategic missteps; suggests lack of due diligence
“I would absolutely not consider the idea of a home edition model unless it was half what they've currently got at the max. That's $2,500.”
Dennis (co-host) @ ~17:00 — Specific pricing critique: suggests $2,500 maximum viable price point for home edition, far below current $4,999
“why doesn't Stern just use local operators? In fact, Stern's probably contracting with the local operator to do the maintenance. So they're just padding the monthly fee.”
Dennis (co-host) @ ~28:00 — Insight into Level Up Your Office logistics and profit padding; suggests inefficient business model
“They're trying to bring it into your workplace, too... for the price of $499 a month, Stern Pinball will bring a pinball machine rental into your workplace.”

Entities

Spooky PinballcompanyStern PinballcompanyBugperson Greg Boneperson Luke PeterspersonDennispersonAmerican Pinballcompany

Signals

?
manufacturing_signal: Spooky Pinball completed new factory building with equipment setup; repurposed space for content production prior to full operation
high · Host visited HQ couple weekends ago; filmed Looney Tunes/Texas Chainsaw Massacre there in Oct/Nov; social media pictures show new setups and rigs
?
product_strategy: Stern Pinball formed exclusive distribution partnership with Costco for Jurassic Park Home Plus Epsilon home edition at $4,999; separate from authorized dealer network
high · Official announcement; exclusive to Costco; real wood playfield; Insider Connected feature included
?
product_strategy: Stern launched Level Up Your Office workplace rental service at $499/month including game, maintenance, setup, delivery
high · Formal announcement; pricing and service scope stated; hosts question viability and margins
~
sentiment_shift: Hosts express strong skepticism and frustration with Stern's home edition and workplace rental strategies, comparing approach to American Pinball's criticized decisions
high · Repeated criticism: 'incompetent,' 'not a serious effort,' 'wasting everyone's time'; suggests pricing too high ($4,999 vs. recommended $2,500 max); questions market fit
?
code_update: Jaws received new topper mode 'The Shark is Broken' ($9.99) referencing mechanical shark failures during filming; includes 8-bit mode and system malfunction mechanics
high · Host praises mechanic as 'clever' homage to film production; describes gameplay loop (hitting shots to fix broken system) and visual feedback (scrambling UI, erratic flippers)

Topics

Spooky Pinball facility expansion and production capacityprimaryStern Pinball home edition pricing and market strategyprimaryStern Costco partnership and retail distribution channelprimaryStern Level Up Your Office workplace rental serviceprimarySpooky Pinball upcoming game releases and code qualitysecondaryJaws topper modes and Insider Connected featuressecondaryHome pinball market segmentation and gateway strategiessecondaryManufacturer margins and pricing strategiesmentioned

Sentiment

mixed(0.35)— Hosts are enthusiastic and impressed about Spooky Pinball's factory expansion, game quality, and energy/culture. However, strongly critical and skeptical of Stern's strategic moves (Costco home edition, workplace rental). Criticism centers on market fit, pricing, and perceived lack of strategic thinking. Jaws code updates receive praise as 'clever' and 'genius.' Overall tone leans negative on industry strategy but positive on Spooky's specific efforts.

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.057

Warning, the following episode contains adult language and screaming goats. Listener discretion is advised. Thanks again for the ongoing support as a Pinball Show Club member. Enjoy this exclusive TPS content and make sure to visit the Pinball Show Club Discord to chat about the bonus material. Dennis, let's talk about some more pinball industry news. Yay! Like Spooky Pinball. Did you know that Spooky Pinball has a new factory building? And they were showing pictures off, they were setting it all up and everything. I do know, but to be fair, don't they have a new building like every two years or something? They just keep – it's like a complex over there. It's very confusing. Yeah, they have like a compound. Compound. It's like a cult. Yeah, it's a compound over there. I went up there this last couple of weeks, a couple of weekends ago. Yeah, they're building. They've got a new building. Now, I saw pictures of all the stuff in there, all the setups and the rigs and stuff like that. I seen that this week in pictures, social media. Prior to that, that's actually where we filmed the Looney Tunes and Texas Chainsaw Massacre featurettes and sizzle reels. So they had it built but hadn't set it up yet. Okay. So at the end of last year, I think November is when we – October is when we filmed those. But they had that space just built, so we used that space to set up a studio kind of thing. And believe it or not, we may or may not have been up there with our cameras a couple of weeks ago in that same kind of space. So yeah, it was weird seeing the picture. I was like, I was just up there and none of that stuff was in there. That's crazy. So they work quick over there. So yeah, Greg Bone from Straight Down the Middle and myself, we visited the crew up at Spooky Pinball a couple weekends ago. We did a live stream. I know you didn't see it, but some of the listeners may have. And if not, go back and watch it. God bless those young guys. They're the ones that make me feel like, I used to feel like I was somewhat on the younger side in this hobby, but no I'm just like another old man now. They're young and poor. Bug, like he was so interested, Dennis, and us playing this because he didn't want us to stream a game. He's like, "Now let's let's play a board game about movies." So he had to some blockbuster movie thing where you there's different [unclear]. The problem is bless his little heart he's got so much energy. He's like a Labrador, right? He's just young and vibrant and all this energy. And when Greg and I started filming at like 7 in the morning and when we're taking a break at 6 p.m. to get something to eat for the day and to stream with them, they thought my brain was going to work. And I was like, "Bug, he was getting frustrated because I wasn't learning the rules of his new board game." And I'm like, "Board games, yeah, it can be." He was sweet, so he didn't like, he was just trying. And I was finally like, "Bug, dude, like, fuck. My brain is gone. Like, I'm not even, I'm lucky I'm here. I'm going to, you know, chug some beers, and we're going to have some fun." And at the end of it, I think Spooky Luke and Greg, in a very tacky machismo way, had an arm wrestling competition. Oh, my God. That's the most Wisconsin thing I've ever heard. This was so like a frat party bullshit, and it was nice because we haven't done that in so long. So, yeah, it was so much fun, as it always is, hanging out with them. And all I can say is, you know, we got X-Men, we got Avatar, we got all the – I just have a big smile on my face because I cannot wait until everybody, you know, also sees what Spooky Pinball is working on, because each and every title, I think I can say this, I'm not giving away anything, but every subsequent game that they release is just objectively better. Like they care so much and they're focusing so much on what they can provide the pinball player and collector and hobbyist that I'm proud to see what they come up with this next time because they're probably, they listen the most to like what people like. If they're criticized on this doesn't have this or I wish this had like, they're going to try on the next time to put it in there. So they're bringing, I mean, if we're talking about a battlefield and, you know, even though they're not launching right now, I think smartly, nobody needs to launch right now after X-Men. They going to bring the heat and it man they giving you a lot but are they going to hold off six months for launching because back in the main episode you were like I think people need to hold off six months I said yeah they going to be upset for the next six months That's true. That sucks. It sucks. But Snowball's already rolled, and the IP people have already got deadlines and stuff like that. But, man, I'm excited. I like – I'll say this. Don't get mad at me, Bug or Spooky Luke. I love fucking packed pinball machines that are eye-stunningly beautiful. I'm always a sucker for that at maybe the best value in the entire industry. I'm not saying that lightly because, quite frankly, the margins on Spooky Pinball machines are not as good as other pinball companies. So it's not like I'm trying to sell some of these things. It's just as a hobbyist, fucking cool stuff, man, they're doing. Oh, and future games that they're doing. I might have got a peek at something. Oh, my God. Let's talk about Stern Pinball. We didn't get to cover everything in the main episode. No, there's too much. The main episode is already too bloated. They freaking announced that they're working with a partnership with Costco. Not Sam's Club. Oh, no. Nope. Nope. I prefer Sam's Club myself. Well, very Walmart of you. Picking nits here. They're creating Jurassic Park Home Plus Edition Pinball machine at Costco for $4,999. Just let it die. They wanted it to live. Oh, my God. Look, no offense, Sam's Club, Costco, and all the rest. Stern. I know it's paywall. Stern, Denison. Yes. Thank you for paying for the Patreon, first of all. Secondly, quit with this home edition stuff. It's too expensive for the market you're trying to penetrate. It's not going to work. It's a waste of time. Penetrate. Quit. It's wasting everyone's time. Just stop it. Stop it, Stern. We talked about this on our Happier Hangout, didn't we? Last month. You know, I feel like I whine about this a lot. Probably. So the Plus Edition does add real wood playfields. Nobody in the market at Costco cares. Zach, they don't care. They don't care. We did talk about that at our Happier Hangout. Because I said, wait a minute. Of all the people not to care, the Costco people. So save yourself some money and don't have a real wood playfield. No. You should have a crappier wood. MDF that. Yes. And then the Insider Connected is cool. That's pretty cool that they put that in the home edition. That's just going to appeal to the hardcore people to buy it, though. Like, oh, no, I got to get my value pack badge for being the first person to open the baby's first pinball machine. Home plus unboxing badge. Yes. Yeah. $4,999 in Costco. I mean, yes, I like that they added that as a feature, but the game is too expensive for what they want. And it's still like more expensive than pool tables. It's like the most expensive thing for the game room. Why not just buy a pro? We've talked about this. Why not go the other way if you're really trying to sell to that market and that crowd? Yeah. $4,999 is not going to do it. If anything, you need to strip more out and get it. Not full size. That's what it takes. Get it down to $1,999 or $2,999. That's the only, and even then I have hesitation as to what it's going to be able to do. I think the absolute, I would absolutely not consider the idea of a home edition model unless it was half what they've currently got at the max. That's $2,500. That's a lot of money for people to spend at Costco. $2,499. Just figure it out. I'm starting to see something there. But at $4,999, I don't get it. No. I just don't see that. But if they committed to a certain unit purchase, though, then yeah, absolutely. If I'm Stern Pinball, I would do that. Why not? I mean, I'm just I it's like they keep trying this, but they never change it up enough to really feel like it seems. So this seems like shareholder appeasement tactics where no one's really thinking it through. They're not coming up creatively with much else. So it's like, well, what if we take the thing and we do the thing? But with the Costco thing and throw an Insider Connected and, oh, gosh, I don't know. What else should we do? Well, my designers all wish it was made out of wood. Okay. And there you go. Something that still nobody wants to own. Like, did they not focus group this? Because it sounds bad. They think that this will bring more people into pinball. It never has. Why will it now? It's hard to measure that, though. It really is hard to measure that. I measure it in my gut. In my gut. My gut says that you have really lost touch with where most consumers who are going to Costco are financially what their houses would be like. Some people buy stupid shit from Costco, though. This is a huge – Let's agree on that. Yeah, sure, absolutely. Big screen TVs that are overpriced, cars. This takes up a lot of space, too. I mean there's just a lot about this. Logistically, I feel like they didn't think anything through on it. Who's going to set it up for them? Exactly. That's tough. All that's tough. Refunds, returns. It's just too complex of a machine. That would be tough. I do think that it is smart to try and figure out a way to get the idea to other people to consider the idea of owning a pinball machine in their home. This approach is just too expensive, and they need to move more toy-like in a way. It's got to be steps. You've got to ease it in. It's not substantially different enough from their lowest product. Honestly, they would have better success doing, in my opinion, doing a pinball-style arcade one-up with virtual versions of the existing Stern games and use that as their gateway. I won't disagree there. That's where back in the day when they had that partnership with Pinball Arcade. No, I understand. But again, it's about getting people familiar with the idea. And then they start exploring and they start learning. "Oh, these things really exist." And then they find out how much they are and they get sticker shock. And then they're like, "Well, maybe if I save up, I'll be able to get a pro." And then they do that. Or maybe they start with a used game. And then in a couple of years, they get a pro. And then the next thing you know, they're on the LE list for X-Men. With the advancements in technology, I still think we can gamify something with better components that more mimics the feel of a pinball machine that you could sell for $2,499 or $1,999. Oh, yeah. No, there's also... I mean, I still have in my garage the built virtual cab where I've got things that actuate so it feels like the flippers are actually flipping and stuff. All those components are basic stuff. And if you're saying we get one node board per game or something, there's some stuff you can do to still keep a building. And they could use the node board to power a lot of that stuff. Exactly, yeah. So I'm not mad at this because to each their own. I mean, I agree. My tone is incredulous because it feels super – oh, this is mean. Oh, whatever. It's Patreon. It seems super incompetent. Like, where's the thought? Like, this is not a legitimate update. This is not a serious effort. Yeah. I just don't believe it. It's the same feeling I get sometimes with American Pinball's, like, choices. Like, what are we doing here? That's probably the best analogy, and we could have saved ourselves, like, five minutes of discussion. And it just said, this feels like an American Pinball decision. This is exclusive to Costco and to Stern Pinball to sell, not to the Stern Pinball Distribution Network. I understand, but it's still like, who's supposed to buy this? It's not where it's at at the price it's at doesn't seem to work. I will say executive management reminded the distribution channels that the pro premium and LE models of their products do remain exclusive to their authorized distribution network. And they have hopes that it's going to create a nice referral system to us exclusive dealers and authorized distributors to sell these to these newly hooked Costco pinball players. Look, they're trying to bring it into your workplace, too. Did you hear of Stern Pinball's Level Up Your Office? Not until this morning when we were getting ready to record. Did you know, Dennis, for the price of $499 a month, Stern Pinball will bring a pinball machine rental into your workplace. And it includes, for $499 a month, the game, maintenance, setup, and delivery. So I guess you sign a, I don't know if you sign a contract for just monthly. Maybe. Or if you have to sign a year agreement. I don't know how that works, but $500 a month to get a pinball machine in your workplace area. Again, this is kind of the same thing. I'm not mad at this. Maybe they're just boundless resources over at Stern Pinball. I just don't know if the resources tied up here are worth the squeeze. Here's the thing. This isn't like I could see, especially places with larger staffs that have like big, you know, I have break rooms and stuff that this like could make sense. Here the problem with it is, there's been, I haven't refreshed my numbers recently but it got kind of big in the pandemic. Long story short you can probably find a local operator who will let you do this for less per month. $300, yeah. Right. So, like, we had, like, in-home game rentals without maintenance for, like, $200 to $250. So I think you'd be able to find someone that would do this for less than Stern's doing it. So why wouldn't you just use the local operator? In fact, Stern's probably contracting with the local operator to do the maintenance. So I was wondering that like who does there's no way they're sending out their engineers across the country to do this. So so they got to just find someone nearby and pay them. And that's probably part of the padding in the monthly fee. Honestly, the most like as a business, I think the most cost effective thing is for you to buy your own game and then contract with someone to do the maintenance. And the second option would be to go ahead. Like if you want a rotation to do the lease or do the rental thing, excuse me, with a local op. This would be like the last resort option. Yeah, it's interesting to me because as they present it here, I'm just now thinking, as we're talking about this, like, I guess I could do that. Sure. Yeah, I mean, if anybody's interested, I guess I could do that. It's not much different than running a route. Because I sell games to people and we maintain them. And if they need set up, we find somebody to set them up. Like, I guess I could do that. Sure. If anybody's interested. But again, though, the squeeze here, is the margin there? I think this is more of an experiment. If you sign up for six months, maybe. But delivery alone can be pricey, especially if that delivery person is doing the setup. That can be pricey. And then what's to say if they tear up the game? How are you going? How does that work? I'd like to read the contract. Sure. It would be interesting. But this doesn't seem to require a huge outlay. Costco does. Like, they're stuck with a whole bunch of home pins here in a year that will not have sold. If they have to pre, maybe they don't. Maybe they don't have to commit at all. I mean, are they not already in the stores? They had to build a bunch that aren't going to sell. They had to build a bunch that weren't going to sell. Maybe they give them, you know, terms. Oh, I mean, I'm not saying that Costco might be on the hook for it, but Stern had to put in a significant outlay to do this. Yeah, sure. There's no outlay here. If no one signs up for this, Stern loses nothing other than the staff time to develop the contract. Yeah, so that's $49.99 a month. But at $9.99, a one-time $9.99, you can actually get a Jaws topper. And with that Jaws topper, they have a new mode called "The Shark is Broken," which is very clever. What a tip of the hat there. Talking about the production of the Jaws film or films but primarily the first film where that damn mechanical shark kept breaking down so much that they couldn't even capture it on film a lot. So that's why they had to do the suspense of the Jaws theme and thinking this shark is there rather than the shark really being there. It wasn't Steven Spielberg's brilliance. No, it was out of necessity because the damn shark was broken all the time. But out of that kind of stuff comes genius. So they pay tribute to that in a special topper mode titled "The Shark is Broken." And, listener, what's really clever during this challenge mode, if you will, you're trying to get the system back up and running, the shark, if you will, the mechanical shark. So you're trying to fix things by hitting the correct shots and the time available. And you'll even see the system do wonky things that it's not supposed to do. The system meaning the pinball machine. So you might flip your little flipper and the pop bumper pops. Or on your UI LCD screen, you'll see it scrambling because it's really messing up mechanically. It's got some screws loose, as my grandpa would say. That one. That guy right there's got a couple screws loose. So that's cool they just keep I'm telling you with this Insider Connected and shit man this coding crew they're getting it they're really getting it. So I wanted to talk about that as well. Have you been able to play any of the extra modes on Jaws yet? Not what the topper modes or topper mode or the 8-bit mode or no. I have not played that either. God people only the regular. Only the regular modes. People are still freaking saying, like, it's one of the coolest things ever. But I'm like, it's just an extra mode, people. But, man, they are loving it. All right, Dennis, they can turn it off, right? Yeah. Bye-bye. Peace.