Changes I am not thrilled with

cueandcushion

cueandcushion

Cue & Cushion_STL_MO
Silver Member
With the decline of business we are now considering adding more 7 foot tables and taking out the 9 foot tables. This in order to put in league play.

Guess we have finally come to that point for our place. We prided ourselves on being a pool room with mostly 9 foot tables. Guess we are in the dinosaur age with our line of thinking. Everyone wants to play 8 ball on a bar box.

Not sure how I feel about this yet....only time will tell. :frown:
 
Many rooms have gone this direction so don't feel bad. But IMO you need booze to go along with it for the leagues as well.
 
When 90% of your income is retail. Then booze is usually a negative...not a positive addition to your business model. Its like having a bar at Ethan Allen Furniture. Alcohol ups the a**hole factor by 500%. Definitely not ready for all that drama.
 
cueandcushion said:
When 90% of your income is retail. Then booze is usually a negative...not a positive addition to your business model. Its like having a bar at Ethan Allen Furniture. Alcohol ups the a**hole factor by 500%. Definitely not ready for all that drama.
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Craig, I thought the same thing when I opened my room, However, I have found that by only selling beer only there is not really a problem. In fact the profit margin is pretty dam good. The Best thing to consider is selling Draft, best profit margin out there.

If you are going to have Leagues play from your place, it is almost impossible to keep teams wanting to play for you unless you sell beer.

Either way Craig I hope things pick up for you!!!!!!!

Take Care.
 
Yes

I have been kicking that idea around for a month or so, I only have 8 tables, one 9 ft can be replaced with 2 bar boxes. Craig im still trying to be a pool room first and its getting harder to do all the time.

Good luck to you.

highrun55

mickey
 
If you want to run a successful business you need to be able to make changes. You need to provide what the customer is willing to pay for.
 
sdbilliards said:
If you want to run a successful business you need to be able to make changes. You need to provide what the customer is willing to pay for.
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Donny you certainly have that right, and Craig from Cue and Cushion is living proof of that. He dad opened that room in the 60's, and do to their deversity they have made it all these years. If fact, do to my miss spent youth at his room and also doto his father I went on to open a room myself.

Take Care
 
sdbilliards said:
If you want to run a successful business you need to be able to make changes. You need to provide what the customer is willing to pay for.
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Yep, we've always done that. I also believe you have to keep to your true values in that equation also. Just because customers would be willing to pay for nude massages in the back doesnt mean I want that happening in our room. The "bar" atmosphere that saturates our sport is a strong reason people come to my room...to get AWAY from that. The drunk drama, the smell, the cra**y playing tables. So we are making sure our atmosphere doesnt turn in that direction. Some people love that environment, some hate it. We make our living off the folks that can leave it behind most of the time.
I want to serve free hot food, or have nicer tables and more room for our Mo8Ball league if I can. I want to take all the complaints that players have about their current home bar and see what I can do to combat that.

I wont know until a year after we start how well we did in accomplishing this transition. Will depend on how people like this upgrade to the St Louis bar box environment. I do know we will make more effort than 90% of the places we are competing with. Thats all my rambling for the day.... :grin-square:
 
cueandcushion said:
Yep, we've always done that. I also believe you have to keep to your true values in that equation also. Just because customers would be willing to pay for nude massages in the back doesnt mean I want that happening in our room. The "bar" atmosphere that saturates our sport is a strong reason people come to my room...to get AWAY from that. The drunk drama, the smell, the cra**y playing tables. So we are making sure our atmosphere doesnt turn in that direction. Some people love that environment, some hate it. We make our living off the folks that can leave it behind most of the time.
I want to serve free hot food, or have nicer tables and more room for our Mo8Ball league if I can. I want to take all the complaints that players have about their current home bar and see what I can do to combat that.

I wont know until a year after we start how well we did in accomplishing this transition. Will depend on how people like this upgrade to the St Louis bar box environment. I do know we will make more effort than 90% of the places we are competing with. Thats all my rambling for the day.... :grin-square:
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Perhaps, some Diamond 7-footers would distinguish you as a serious players pool hall rather than a bar.
 
Hate to see it happen. When I see a room full of bar boxes & no 9 foot tables, I look for a different place to play. More & more places seem to be going with bar boxes these days.:frown:
 
I don't mind 7 ft tables just as long as there are a few 9 ft's too. Running a good league is great for the game. The more people playing the better.
 
I personally don't like playing Bar Boxes.
rant.gif
 
WalkerInTN said:
Hate to see it happen. When I see a room full of bar boxes & no 9 foot tables, I look for a different place to play. More & more places seem to be going with bar boxes these days.:frown:
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Unfortunately, that is where the money is. People dont WANT to pay for 9 foot tables. 7 foot tables you fit more people in a square footage and that means more pool revenue and more drink revenue and more food revenue. People with zero business sense still think a 9 foot table should cost the same as a 7 foot....then they shop strictly price to play pool. Then when they want to play on a 9 foot they wonder where all the 9 foot pool rooms went.:confused:

Our room IF we make these changes will have 3- 7 foots, 1- 8 foot, 2-10 foot Billiard tables, 1- 10 foot Snooker table, and 10 - 9foot tables. That may change...who knows.

And when you HAVE to deal with drinkers day in and day out, without the option to walk out the door....beer IS a bad thing cocobolacowboy.
Im too old to deal with alcoholic drama. :frown:
 
WalkerInTN said:
Hate to see it happen. When I see a room full of bar boxes & no 9 foot tables, I look for a different place to play. More & more places seem to be going with bar boxes these days.:frown:
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Me too...

I prefer a serious pool hall, that does not serve alcohol, does not play karaoke, and has 9 foot tables. Big bonus if there are snooker or especially billiard tables.

Getting harder to find nowadays...
 
cueandcushion said:
With the decline of business we are now considering adding more 7 foot tables and taking out the 9 foot tables. This in order to put in league play.

Guess we have finally come to that point for our place. We prided ourselves on being a pool room with mostly 9 foot tables. Guess we are in the dinosaur age with our line of thinking. Everyone wants to play 8 ball on a bar box.

Not sure how I feel about this yet....only time will tell. :frown:
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as you might know i'm a successful businessman, I understand your business very well, well enough to be in it, and my hats off to all of you guys out there in the room biz. this might sound a bit harsh and i'm certainly not being disrespectful so please dont be offended.

my advice:

Fvck being nostaligic, that dosent get the bills paid, sadly the Govt, the times, regulators, the economy has pushed us all into doing things we dont want to do to survive. So forget the pride of ownership like all big tables(I feel like you about big tables-7' boxes are a joke) Back to my point because of the times we cant be senemental about anything we do in business anymore, I dont like it any more than anyone else, but If you dont change with the times the changes in time will eat you up and you'll be working for someone whoi has made those changes and adapted to what will sell.

It suks I hate it I lost $50,000,000 thisyear in net worth and millions/yr in income this year when We had to close down our business because we couldnt adapt any longer to the market we were open 11.5, economy etc. My partents feed store is still going after 40 years in N. Ca I stil have piece of in a indirect way, i take no income from it, but were adapting there and it stings like a bitc'h. I have came up in business my whole life my parents were horrible business people, i loved them dearly but could see their mistakes when i was 5 years old, i'm a prodigy in business you might say-I ont say that often, i dont want to seem like i'm bragging,

If I owned a pool room and didnt own the building I would hate being in the business and try and negoiate my way out of the lease if I saw D-day comming, that happened to me on 2 retail NNN lease store fronts-pet stores, I lost them when I was 25 years old, I was doing a million /ye in business when I was 22 started with $9,000 2 years before that, the economy went down and so did I, I learned alot be your land lords friend if possible. If you cant negoiate a deal then I'd dump the 9' tables and replace them with used 7' boxes and fire up as many leagues as possible, and every promotion possible, I know its easier said than done, but if the urrent modle isnt working I dont see enough change to "Wait it out" I trie that with the 2 pet stores, It hurts like hell but the faster and more decisivve you move(not over reacting) the better you might come out, make frinds with the land lord!!!!
 
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cueandcushion said:
Fvck Nostalgia.

Make money.
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Sad but true, it really breaks my heart, seninmentally I love pool rooms with 40 9' tables 5 10' tables 2 12' tables and 3 7' bar boxes, this is Ames mister. thats where my heart is, If I was making 10M/yr I would open a room like that and so what if I lost 500K/yr add big $$ to tournments etc and enjoy the loss like a guy with a big yatch-boat. Doing it for the love of players, pool, action, everything. Sadly I dont make 10M/yr-someday I will and do just that open a room that loses $$$ but makes me happy.

But that might be a while, I have had that thought/dream for years. I'd buy the building and a apt building next to it so the players could have a place to live-that move right there would keep it alive, have some tables with feed's for free so everyone could sweat the action and some without incase the players want privacy. It would bury every room in the country. Imagine a 150 door apt building next to a room like that, Game over Fatboy'd Billiards would be the spot!!!! profit be damned.


but bck to reality, I didnt mean to sound harsh, I feel for you guys out there, I lost my primary biz this year and that wasnt the first time, but nothing lasts for ever if your mking $$$, my dream room it wouldnt matter. I wish you all the best and if I can help with advice from biz man 2 biz man, I'll be glad to help. I have been real close to several room owners and know the biz real well, I own lots of realestate-none of my tenants are pool rooms but I know how land lords feel too-I'm scared of losing tenents. So again I didnt want to he a hard ass, quite the oppsite I'm offering any help I like but like any biz you have to stay tough, PM me any time, I'm not the solution for anyone but talking about things might make a good idea pop up that could help any room owner, I'm just trying to help anyone I can-If I can. Short of loaning $$$, I have my hands full there, currently.

best of luck gentalmen

eric
 
Fatboy said:
Sad but true, it really breaks my heart, seninmentally I love pool rooms with 40 9' tables 5 10' tables 2 12' tables and 3 7' bar boxes, this is Ames mister. thats where my heart is, If I was making 10M/yr I would open a room like that and so what if I lost 500K/yr add big $$ to tournments etc and enjoy the loss like a guy with a big yatch-boat. Doing it for the love of players, pool, action, everything. Sadly I dont make 10M/yr-someday I will and do just that open a room that loses $$$ but makes me happy.

But that might be a while, I have had that thought/dream for years. I'd buy the building and a apt building next to it so the players could have a place to live-that move right there would keep it alive, have some tables with feed's for free so everyone could sweat the action and some without incase the players want privacy. It would bury every room in the country. Imagine a 150 door apt building next to a room like that, Game over Fatboy'd Billiards would be the spot!!!! profit be damned.


but bck to reality, I didnt mean to sound harsh, I feel for you guys out there, I lost my primary biz this year and that wasnt the first time, but nothing lasts for ever if your mking $$$, my dream room it wouldnt matter. I wish you all the best and if I can help with advice from biz man 2 biz man, I'll be glad to help. I have been real close to several room owners and know the biz real well, I own lots of realestate-none of my tenants are pool rooms but I know how land lords feel too-I'm scared of losing tenents. So again I didnt want to he a hard ass, quite the oppsite I'm offering any help I like but like any biz you have to stay tough, PM me any time, I'm not the solution for anyone but talking about things might make a good idea pop up that could help any room owner, I'm just trying to help anyone I can-If I can. Short of loaning $$$, I have my hands full there, currently.

best of luck gentalmen

eric
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Hey Eric,how about just having a big added tournament?I think if you did an added 25K-50K added tournament once a year in Vegas or wherever you would be the toast of the town for sure.Players would come out and have a blast,maybe make the entry non existant or stupidly cheap and get some of the money back from sponsors,not much money back I am sure but you never know.Its a good start and I know your love for the game is there,just got to reach in your pocket. ;)
 
cueandcushion said:
Our room IF we make these changes will have 3- 7 foots, 1- 8 foot, 2-10 foot Billiard tables, 1- 10 foot Snooker table, and 10 - 9foot tables. That may change...who knows.

And when you HAVE to deal with drinkers day in and day out, without the option to walk out the door....beer IS a bad thing cocobolacowboy.
Im too old to deal with alcoholic drama. :frown:
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That is STILL a pool hall in my mind... even if you have a few kid's size tables. :D I empathize with your feelings about alcohol.
 
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