Episode 339: Kim VanderVeen, Texas Pinball Festival

Pinball Profile·podcast_episode·17m 34s·analyzed·Mar 9, 2022

Analysis

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TL;DR

Texas Pinball Festival returns after 3-year pandemic hiatus with record pre-registrations and expanded programming.

Summary

Jeff Teolis interviews Kim VanderVeen, organizer of Texas Pinball Festival (TPF), about the return of the event after a three-year hiatus due to the pandemic. Kim discusses the emotional toll of canceling in 2020, community support that kept the event alive, current pre-registration numbers exceeding 2,500 (double the 2019 baseline), and the extensive lineup of vendors, tournaments, celebrity guests, and special events planned for the March show.

Key Claims

TPF was last held in 2019; cancellation came 12 days before the 2020 event due to pandemic
high confidence · Kim: 'It was 12 days' before the show in 2020 when everything halted
Current pre-registrations exceed 2,500, nearly double the ~1,200 from 2019
high confidence · Kim: 'We're well over 2,500 pre-registrations at this point. And so that's almost a double, again, what we had done for 2020. So we had about 1,200 ready to go'
The pinball community chose to keep their money rather than request refunds during pandemic cancellations
high confidence · Kim: 'the pinball community at large said, keep our money, we want the show to come back, and they bought all of the merchandise that we had already purchased'
Most vendors held their booth commitments through the three-year hiatus
high confidence · Kim: 'Most of our vendors did the same. They were just like, nope, we're going to hold on right with you'
Sylvester McCoy (actor from Doctor Who and Tolkien productions) was scheduled for 2020 and is returning for 2022
high confidence · Kim: 'Sylvester McCoy has agreed to show up. I know you had him scheduled for 2020 so that's nice that he be there'
Scott Denise's homebrew pinball design was spotted at TPF and later became the TNA commercial pinball machine
high confidence · Kim: 'I'm pretty sure that's what happened with Scott Denise's [original]. Yes. In fact, you're right. Absolutely. It did with TNA'
TPF features 40,000 sq ft, 400+ pinball machines, held at Embassy Suites and Frisco Convention Center
high confidence · Kim: '40,000 square feet, 400 plus pinball machines, all kinds of events and tournaments'
Scott Denise is working on sound design for Multimorphic's Weird Al pinball machine
high confidence · Jeff: 'He'll be actually working on that multi-morphic Weird Al with the sound'

Notable Quotes

“It was heartbreaking, actually. There were some tears and we just, you know, we love the show and we love putting this show on.”
Kim VanderVeen @ ~10:30 — Emotional impact of canceling the 2020 event on organizers; demonstrates personal investment in the event
“the pinball community at large said, keep our money, we want the show to come back, and they bought all of the merchandise that we had already purchased. That was incredible.”
Kim VanderVeen @ ~16:45 — Community support that kept TPF financially viable during pandemic; demonstrates pinball community loyalty
“We're well over 2,500 pre-registrations at this point. And so that's almost a double, again, what we had done for 2020.”
Kim VanderVeen @ ~22:00 — Record attendance indicator; shows event has grown significantly despite hiatus
“It still surprises me that we're the destination. They're not coming for something else. They're coming for Texas Pinball Festival, and then they do other things while they're here.”
Kim VanderVeen @ ~58:30 — Reflection on TPF's status as a must-attend pilgrimage event for pinball enthusiasts worldwide
“For me, it's really just about staying organized. And if I can't stay organized, I get overwhelmed really quickly.”
Kim VanderVeen @ ~50:15 — Reveals operational challenges; Kim handles pre-registration database, merchandise inventory, and logistics for 2,500+ attendees
“They're not coming for something else. They're coming for Texas Pinball Festival, and then they do other things while they're here. That's amazing.”
Kim VanderVeen @ ~58:30 — Demonstrates TPF's positioning as a destination event in the pinball calendar

Entities

Texas Pinball FestivaleventKim VanderVeenpersonEdpersonPaul McKinneypersonJeff TeolispersonRobert HarrispersonChristopher Franchiperson Scott Deniseperson

Signals

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community_signal: Pinball community financially sustained TPF through pandemic by refusing refunds and purchasing pre-ordered merchandise, enabling event recovery
high · Kim: 'the pinball community at large said, keep our money, we want the show to come back, and they bought all of the merchandise that we had already purchased. That was incredible'
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event_signal: Texas Pinball Festival returning after three-year hiatus with record pre-registration numbers (2,500+), nearly doubling 2019 baseline
high · Kim: 'We're well over 2,500 pre-registrations at this point. And so that's almost a double, again, what we had done for 2020. So we had about 1,200 ready to go'
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design_innovation: Scott Denise's homebrew pinball design discovered at TPF was commercialized as TNA Pinball, establishing TPF as a discovery venue for commercial development
high · Kim: 'I'm pretty sure that's what happened with Scott Denise's [original]. Yes. In fact, you're right. Absolutely. It did with TNA'
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market_signal: TPF positioned as mandatory destination event for global pinball community, with attendees traveling from Australia, England, Canada, and worldwide specifically for the show
high · Kim: 'All over the world, yeah. I'm only in Canada. That's no big deal. But I mean, from Australia, from England, from everywhere, because they know this is the show'
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community_signal: Christopher Franchi created artwork for TPF 2020 merchandise, indicating his involvement with event design prior to known Stern-to-Spooky transition

Transcript

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0:00

it's time for another pinball profile i'm your host jeff teels you can find everything on pinballprofile.com all your subscriptions past episodes and more we're on twitter and instagram at pinball profile emails pinballprofile at gmail.com and don't forget to check out our facebook group it is march it's an exciting time of year for pinball and you can't say that over the last couple of years because of what's gone on in the world, but it's back. The Texas Pinball Festival. Thank goodness. Looking forward to that in a few weeks and joining us right now, one of the organizers, Kim Vanderveen. Hey, Kim, how are you? I'm doing well. How are you? I'm good. And I think you just got back from Florida too. So hope you had a nice vacation before you really get busy over the next few weeks. We did. It gave us a chance to just relax. Is that always the plan right before TPF? Just to, okay, we know it's going to be nutty over the next little while and certainly chaotic during the actual event, but just kind of, okay, let the hair down a little bit and relax. Well, not exactly. We start our stuff for TPF way back in October, so there's always stuff to be done. But when we're in Florida, I don't have access to all the TPF stuff, so I can't do anything or do as much as I want to do or have to do for TPF. So it kind of forces me to take a break because I'm not physically able to handle some of it. Well, I think you need the break because it is such a big operation with you, with Ed, with Paul McKinney. If we think of what happened, the last show was three years ago, 2019. I was there. It was a lot of fun. And it was basically a week or two before the show in 2020 when everything came to a halt. Yeah, I think it was 12 days. That's devastating. And I know, I think I was talking to Ed about this. You had to kind of wait until the governor said, okay, these things can't happen right now because there's obviously insurance policies and cancellations and this and that. I can only imagine how difficult it was to pull the trigger and say, you know what, we can't do it in 2020 just based on the pandemic. What was that like? It was heartbreaking, actually. There were some tears and we just, you know, we love the show and we love putting this show on. And so when we had to pull that trigger and say, no, we can't do it this year for, you know, multitude of reasons. You know, having to tell everybody that was, it was heartbreaking. It was probably not easier, but at least more understood in 2021 when it couldn't happen. At least you had a little more time to make those considerations and alterations as opposed to, like you say, 12 days. Right. So in 2021, we kind of had a drop dead deadline and we were like, you know, if things haven't really, well, first of all, we didn't start on our normal timeline, which is in October. So we just kind of held off trying to see what was going to happen, what the governor was going to do, what the president was going to do, what everybody was going to do. And so in January, when it wasn't looking good, we just said, okay, we just going to call it off and we're not even going to get started in this one. So. I know a lot of the pinball community certainly supported TPF. I got a great shirt. This is really nice, a black three quarter sleeve with blue sleeves. baseball jersey. I really like it from TPF in 2020. And I thought that was a nice, first of all, collector's piece for myself. It was great artwork from Christopher Franchi, and it really helped TPF. And I have to assume the pinball community was a big help in keeping this going. They were. And I've told several people. So like I said, it was heartbreaking when we had to make that decision. And personally, I had a lot of concerns, right? Not just not having the show, but also the state of the customers wanting their money back, how we were going to handle that. Because of the way we run the show, we use that money that's given to us at the beginning with the pre-registrations and the t-shirt sales and all that stuff to put the show on. So a lot of it had already been spent. And so when the pinball community at large said, keep our money, we want the show to come back, and they bought all of the merchandise that we had already purchased That was incredible It was a crazy feeling to know that there were so many people behind us and trying to make sure that this show could come back I can imagine what it was like to be in your shoes to be in Ed when that happened how scary and vulnerable you really were at that time But because of the community's love for the Texas Pinball Festival, for how this show has grown and grown, and you get people from all over the world. All over the world, yeah. I'm only in Canada. That's no big deal. But I mean, from Australia, from England, from everywhere, because they know this is the show. And it would have been a tragedy if it didn't happen through no fault of your own through this pandemic. And we were able to keep it going. And that's why I'm so excited for what's going to happen in a couple of weeks. And I bet you are too. Yeah, and I think everybody is. So the vast majority of people held their tickets over. So we had all of those. And so we didn't expect a lot of pre-registrations for this year. We figured all those people, they already had their tickets. They were just going to wait and they were going to come. We're well over 2,500 pre-registrations at this point. And so that's almost a double, again, what we had done for 2020. So we had about 1,200 ready to go, and now we're over 2,500 pre-registrations. And who knows with the walk-ups too. I mean, this is going to be great. And the reason why people go is 40,000 square feet, 400 plus pinball machines, all kinds of events and tournaments and everything you can possibly imagine. Video games as well too. So it has it all there at the Embassy Suites and Frisco Convention Center. had a look online and again texaspinballfestival.com big vendor list i think that's one of the things that surprised me the most when i go to pinball events because i'm a tournament player i'm fascinated by the tournaments you've got great ones there and uh in fact colin mccalpine is talking to us about what's going on uh for the tournaments on final round you'll hear that tomorrow on the pinball network but what i like about texas pinball festival is you don't even have to play any tournaments there's so much going on the vendors i've never seen before too so So you really have everyone kind of funneling in to Texas for this big event. Absolutely. This is huge. And again, it wasn't just the customers that held their tickets over. Most of our vendors did the same. They were just like, nope, we're going to hold on right with you. And they did. So I'm just happy that I'm going to get to see everybody again. It's been so long. Well, Kim, it's a win-win, right? Because the vendors know that it's great exposure. You just mentioned 2,500 pre-sale tickets, almost double what it was before. And then all the walk-ups too. So they're going to get great exposure and probably some good sales as well too. So why wouldn't they want to lock in their spots? Absolutely. Some of the events I noticed on the calendar, it's going to be nice to see Jersey Jack there with Jack and Steve Ritchie, now an employee there. Steve's always a lot of fun when you get them in Texas.

9:45

But a lot of people really enjoy them. And it's one of my favorite booths as well to go in and see Jeff and all of the machines that he has set up. He restores them so nicely. He's done a couple of ours too. The passion of pinball players and collectors just never ceases to amaze me because, yes, it's easy to get a new game in box if you can just throw down some money and do that. But the details, the mods, the recreations, and the restorations of things you thought might be in the old pinball graveyard. I love seeing these 40, 50-year-old machines just still going strong. And you certainly award that as well. Oh, yeah. They do a great job. And some of those older machines, they look as good as they did on day one, if not better. We try to make sure that we notice, that they know that we notice, that they're doing a lot of work on these machines. and it's not just, you know, it might be their passion, it might be their hobby, but all of us can appreciate that. And for them to bring it out so that we can appreciate it is amazing. Our exhibitors are awesome. They definitely are. You'll see awards for the best original pinball machine. And some people might have these in their back pocket, like they haven't really said anything. They've been kind of quiet on pin side and then they're going to surprise everybody at TPF. That's always a pleasure too. So you award that for best original as well. Mm-hmm. So we've revised this Best in Show Awards list a few years back to try and cover, well, to award more where we could, but we try to cover specific areas. And the Best Original is always a fun one because, you know, people have great ideas. And when they can pull them off, it's just awesome to sit there and watch them. Like, you know, you want that one to be made so you can purchase one for yourself. But some of the originals, you know, they're one-offs and they just look great. and just being able to play one or sometimes just see it is enough. That's one of the interesting things about these originals. And you just mentioned it. Maybe they do get a little knock on the door from one of these pinball companies. Hey, how'd you like to mass produce that? We could throw this license on it. And maybe they saw it at Texas Pinball Festival. Well, I'm pretty sure that's what happened with Scott Denise's. Yes. In fact, you're right. Absolutely. It did with TNA. For sure. And I have one of those in my house now too. There you go. And a lot of people do. It's a great game, great sound. It is. Everybody's fans of Scott. He's wonderful. And he'll be actually working on that multi-morphic Weird Al with the sound. So another reason to check that out. Best custom pinball, that's another award. You know, when you go to shows, for me as an outsider, I look at, okay, I want to play some pinball tournaments, check. Texas Pinball Festival has that. If it's a show, do they have a nice variety of vendors? You can definitely say that about Texas Pinball Festival. I haven't been to many where you would have more, if any, in fact. and maybe because I'm a little chubby, I like to know that there's some good food around, and you've got all those food trucks out there. I think that's great, too. Yeah. I can just stay right there. Oh, yeah, and all the hotels, too. There's tons. Yeah, we have quite a few in the area. The one that is directly across from the convention center is actually closer to the convention center doors than our own hotel that's attached. I always thought that was fun. Fans of Tolkien and fans of Doctor Who will be excited. Sylvester McCoy has agreed to show up. I know you had him scheduled for 2020 so that's nice that he be there and signing a lot of autographs Yes we were pleasantly surprised to find out that you after what happened in 2020 he was willing to come back This year I think there was a little bit of conflict as he's finishing up a movie, but I think the time's just going to work out perfect. He's going to finish up his movie and then come on to our show and visit us. You've had a lot of great guests over the years at TPF. We started out with Elvira, of course, and then Lou Frigno with The Hulk, Sam Jones, John Rhys-Davies. They've all been great to have at the show. And the crossover into the pinball world is what we're looking for. And every one of them has made that happen for us. Yeah, that's fantastic. And I see the lineups for the autographs and a lot of photos you see on Facebook immediately after Texas Pinball Festival. You see a lot of the profile pictures changed to some of these special guests. So it's got to make you feel good. Oh, yeah. No, we do like that. I mean, it's a lot of hard work to put the show on. And the fact that everybody enjoys it as much as they do. And, you know, we don't really hear a lot of negative. We spend so much time working on the show. And when we get positive feedback, it just makes us so happy. It makes our day. We just kind of sit back and go, okay, we did a good job. What's the hardest thing about running the whole festival, if you had to nail it to one thing? That would be difficult to say. Is it Ed? actually he helps me get through a lot of it um so we all kind of have our little section and we try not to step on each other's toes um and and we do that pretty well so mine is you know the website i do ed and i together we do merchandise inventory you know getting it out to the people shipping holding it up in the packing it up in the boxes um then i take care of the database and all of the pre packets, pre registration packets, all of that stuff. So for me, it's really just about staying organized. And if I can't stay organized, I get overwhelmed really quickly. So I have some help in that area. And Robert Harris is one of my biggest helpers. He's with me almost all year long. And I'm constantly and sending him a message going, I think I messed something up in the database. Can you fix it? So he helps me a lot with that. But just staying organized and making sure that we're not creating duplicates of anything and that we have everything that everyone's ordered and make sure that we don't run out of any of that. Sounds like you have the heavy lifting, all the pre-registration. You just mentioned there were 2,500 people that pre-registered, and here you are looking after that. And I know Robert's helping you out, but wow, you've got a lot on your shoulders. Yeah, and this is the crunch time, right? So we're about to shut off the online store as far as merchandise pre-orders and guest registration because we're about to go to print. So once that happens, the time is pretty short. You don't want to go to print too early because things can change, but you don't want to go too late because then you won't have enough time to get it all back. And plus, everybody is saying you've got to add two or three days or a week to your order time to make sure you get it back in time. So that kind of worries me a little bit, too, to make, you know, not until it's at my door. Am I satisfied that I've got it ready to go? And yet you're taking time to talk to me on Pinball Profile. I feel guilty. Maybe I should let you go.