I think this is an awesome idea and something I would like to do. It could sort of a Route 66 type thing where players go do "The RoadTrip." Kind of like going to Mecca or something and its sort of a rite of passage when you either hit the road or are retiring to a life of chilling and playing pool.
Does it make you wonder if there is not something these long surviving and even thriving rooms have in common.? I know when the COM came out and a lot of new rooms were opening those had something in common and it was what caused their demise.
I was playing a little pool back then and my wife and I would went to dozens of these new rooms as we ran around in our RV. You would walk in, take one look around and we would look at each. You knew right from the start the place was terminal.
If you can do anything more add and subtract you can see the numbers didn't add up and it did not take long. Many were gone within a couple of years, others changed hands a few times before finally succumbing to the reality of the numbers.
These closings are usually attributed to the decline in pool as the bubble began burst. This is partly true but a larger truth was, they were poorly planed without realistic business plans and could not survive in any declining market. In fact some with their sky high rents, requirement for too many employes at any one times due to a bad layout, over priced locations and it required business to be over the top good to have anything left over for the owners, anything less and they go straight into the red.
Then add to that ridiculously high prices that lets face it, they "Needed" to get to just to feed this money devouring monster they had created. In the end pulling the plug was the only alternative they had to put these suffering rooms out of their misery. They could not produce the revenue they needed to stay open in anything but the best of time.
This should have been evident before they invested the first dollar and for some reason was not. They get so caught up in the project they lose sight why they are doing this in the first, to make a profit. Many of these rooms were just plain bad investments.
). The Lucchesi's are fine hosts as well.
