The BCA Trade Expo begins on Wednesday. What are the best pool halls to visit (near the convention center which is near the French Quarter) for the attendees? Is there any pool hall with carom tables?
New Orleans pool halls?
- Thread starter Bob Jewett
- Start date
I have met Joey on several occasions at Buffalo's and Lacy's and both were great.
I have not gotten the chance to get to the new Buffalo's but I hear its awesome.
Lacy's was new when I was there last and fabulous with Diamonds everywhere, they even had a Diamond Bigfoot.
Buffalo Billiards
Buffalo's is the place. Lots pf parking and lots of places to eat. The place has action day and night for every level of player.
Buffalo's is the place. Lots pf parking and lots of places to eat. The place has action day and night for every level of player.
Junior Nationals will be held there but no other tournament. You may be able to get a visitors pass to go watch that if you can find someone you know there that would get you a pass at the BEF sign-in. Normally it's a industry only event, but I have been able to get a pass for a friend before for Jr Nationals. Unfortunately my son just got too old for that, my first year in like 5 or 6 years that we are not going to Nationals with him.
Keep in mind the general floor has been off limits to those with Jr Nationals passes for most of the time and is only opened up during certain hours for the kids to mingle and check things out. It used to be open fully to them but there were complaints from some vendors about disturbances the kids caused. Because you know, kids that love pool you don't want to have around.
Where is the new one? I'd hate to end up at the old location.
Action 24-7-365 they never close.
5029 Bloomfield St, New Orleans, LA 70121
Phone: (504) 835-0173
5029 Bloomfield St, New Orleans, LA 70121
Phone: (504) 835-0173
Thanks for the suggestions so far. Is there any carom table in town? Perhaps at a Vietnamese place?
I see that Lacy's is non-smoking. Is Buffalo's also non-smoking?
No, it’s smoking....I got a friend who complains about that.
Why would the event even be industry only? Why not let in the public. Does it really have that much business?
When the event used to be held in Vegas and they had the two huge Men and Women's events attached, was it industry only then too?
Never understood the limitation. Is nothing "geared" at all to the public?
I don't know how the show floor was setup when they had the pro events, that was before I knew how it was setup. The BCA trade show is there for business to business sales, so the vendors from China, etc... are there for making deals with the buyers. I would guess the reason the show is industry only is that they deal with wholesale purchasing and prices as well as trying to make deals with buyers. If there were 200 people off the street milling around and taking up their time, they may lose possible orders, say if a potential buyer walked away from a booth where 10 pool players were taking up the sales people time.
I agree a bit with the vendors shutting off the area from the kids, there are often some pretty roudy ones that were left to wander around, but really they don't cause too much of an issue. In fact, several of the buyers where talking to kids and wanting to sponsor some of them. Our NE group had a family of like 4 kids that were running around and a group of people from China were walking around talking about sponsoring them. Nothing really came from that, and the kids since quit playing.
Super Billiard Expo is probably the biggest, maybe only, show that is similar for the general public.
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The vendors are set up to sell wholesale, for the most part. The nearest you get to retail are some custom cue makers. I think the vendors are looking for $10,000 sales, not $10 sales and some of them think talking to the public is a waste of time. Maybe there is a sales tax issue, if you remember New Jersey
. I know Nevada wants to see sales tax from vendor retail sales.The show has never been open to the public so far as I know. I vaguely recall that it may have opened once for the last day, which usually turns out to be half a day as the booths start breaking down then.
Thanks 's for the reply. I guess I will just have to go get a good meal and a bottle of wine instead.
Ok thanks. Didn't think about the Chinese or the like being over to conduct industry to industry sales. Was thinking more small scale like OB Cues trying to sell to a pool hall to stock their cues, or Diamond showing off new lights for their tables, things like that for example. Ones of these days I'll try out the Expo in Philly.
There are pool hall people there as business, as well as bars. All the major retailers like J&J, Imperial, etc.. are there. A lot of the items there not only pool stuff, there is general bar stuff, jukeboxes, video game machines, ping pong, shuffleboard, furniture, direct manufacturers of basically generic cues also, like the Chinese brand that Jayson Shaw is with now.
Last time we were there we picked up a mid-range Butterfly ping pong paddle for my son for about $10 cheaper than you can find online, and tried out some new shafts from McDermott. Also talked to the OB guys about making a jump/break and demand for them, and there is one out now. I guess I'll take the credit for that :wink::grin:
Its like the difference in the SHOT show and a standard gun/sports show. One is all industry and the other is geared for public sales.
