Okay. I know that I have been MIA for the longest amount of time.

I've been working really hard with some friends about some business ventures.

I can't really go into too much specifics since it's still a work-in-progress.

All I can ask is that you imagine a lounge/bar with an eatery and has gaming consoles and computers for entertainment.

I need the community's help in this.

This is not a joke. This is a friend's dream on the line.

I would like to know what everyone, specifically, would like to see in that place that would make them continue to be a frequent customer.

Right now, the general consensus is that people would want: in-depth game coverages of tournaments, tournaments hosted at that place, good food and alcohol at reasonable prices, events (not sure what kind in particular), and a relaxing atmosphere with good music.

I would love to ask you guys what you all would like to see specifically to keep you guys as paying customers.

We're already implementing a reward system for multiple tournament winners and whatnot.

Currently, I am writing this business proposition with a target date sighted for December of 2013.

Please support me in providing advice or responses.

Thank you so much in advance for reading this post.

Definitely reward regular customers. Could be like sandwich shops that reward customers with a free sandwich after they buy 10 sandwiches. Instead, they get a free hour after x amount of paid hours.

If your place serves food, that means you'll have tables and chairs. An excellent opportunity to try and snag some table top gamers (D&D). You may need to cater towards them more, though. Sweeten their rental time up a bit. Things like free pitchers of fountain drinks. Otherwise, they have no reason to leave the place they've been table top gaming at. Also, their area should be quieter than the others.

Mexican food. Seriously. Taco and Fajita bars. The food cost is pretty minimal and you can basically charge whatever you want. Plus, it's Mexican food. It's pure yum.

A couple of BYOC (Bring Your Own Computer) LAN rooms. Rent those out to groups. When not rented out, they could be the table top gamer's room. Nice, quiet and private.

If you had a gift shop/store, you could sell a small line of popular comix, t-shirts, (Gamercide stickers), etc. Plus, you could hold bi-hourly raffles and use things from the shop as prizes.

That's all I have off the top of my head. If I think of any others, I'll post them. Best of luck to you and your friend!

One word of advise though, gaming and alcohol dont go together well in a tournament style place... Ultra competitive types mixed with alcohol, and most likely losing = stuff broken and calling cops, not good for buisness. Tournament days should be alcohol free.

Definitely reward regular customers. Could be like sandwich shops that reward customers with a free sandwich after they buy 10 sandwiches. Instead, they get a free hour after x amount of paid hours.

If your place serves food, that means you'll have tables and chairs. An excellent opportunity to try and snag some table top gamers (D&D). You may need to cater towards them more, though. Sweeten their rental time up a bit. Things like free pitchers of fountain drinks. Otherwise, they have no reason to leave the place they've been table top gaming at. Also, their area should be quieter than the others.

Mexican food. Seriously. Taco and Fajita bars. The food cost is pretty minimal and you can basically charge whatever you want. Plus, it's Mexican food. It's pure yum.

A couple of BYOC (Bring Your Own Computer) LAN rooms. Rent those out to groups. When not rented out, they could be the table top gamer's room. Nice, quiet and private.

If you had a gift shop/store, you could sell a small line of popular comix, t-shirts, (Gamercide stickers), etc. Plus, you could hold bi-hourly raffles and use things from the shop as prizes.

In that kind of environment and area that we're planning on opening the store, I think we're sticking to electronic gaming rather than cards and tabletop. We're trying to cater to a specific target audience rather than general card games and board games. Although, I do agree with you that certain tabletops like Warhammer would generate revenue.

The venture that we're aiming for would be more of a lounge/bar rather than a game store.

The entertainment would be a convenience.

As for food, we were planning on easy finger foods. I can understand the taco bars and whatnot, but we wouldn't really want to feed full entrees seeing as how it might get messy to clean up.

C'mon, we know how people can get when it comes to cleanliness in a stranger's environment.

Our idea is that when we hold events or tournaments, people who win multiple events or tournaments will be rewarded with a unique identification card.

The more cards you win, the better the prizes. We were planning on something like a "Wall of Fame" where you have your own picture and name shown to everyone who comes in to make you feel special.

If we were able to get bigger, we were planning on hosting game coverages like E3. We have a few connections to E3 and events like that so we were planning on even sending someone to an event like that if they won enough tournaments. That's still under discussion.

We're planning on rewarding people who are frequent customers by the amount of hours that they come. The more that they come (at a certain number of hours) then we'd lower the price by a bit to give them an incentive to continue being a frequent customer.

As for events go, I've asked a small pool of people how often they would want to attend an event.

A lot of people have said once a week or even twice a month.

I'm really hyped about this idea. I'm doing my best to research and scout out perfect locations.

I've been away for so long working on this goal.

I would really love more feedback from everyone to know what kind of shop they'd like to see to make them frequent customers.

One word of advise though, gaming and alcohol dont go together well in a tournament style place... Ultra competitive types mixed with alcohol, and most likely losing = stuff broken and calling cops, not good for buisness. Tournament days should be alcohol free.

I actually said the same thing to the other guys about that idea.

My suggestion was that there would be a drink limit on tournament days.

We're also gonna' have a security group sent to be trained for the job. Some of our closest friends are from the Army, Navy, Marines, etc.

Currently, we're thinking up a brand name, logo, and acronym for the place that would roll right off of the tongue.

For uniforms, we're thinking about making it something game-related to entice people to come.

'cause y'know.. sex sells. lol.

As for events, what kind of stuff would you guys like to see?

Someone mentioned cosplay, but I think that's catering towards the Anime/Otaku side versus those who are just casual/hardcore gamers.

As for events fps, fighting, and sports games tend to get the biggest draws. You could even time the tounaments to coincide with their respective seasons for sports. Other than tournaments there are real world events that coould bring in people like draft days for football, championship games, and if you could get a live feed from a gameshow on a big screen that would intetest gamers... Enough draw and you might be able to get ea sports to help with maddenoliday. Something my friends have done the last several years is every big release we have a release party where we get drinks and food and get together for most the day playing the game. The gears beta and gears release were the two biggest... We spent over $150 on food. If there was somewhere we could have gone with a couple tv's where we could have done that that served food it would have ben pretty cool.

To go along with sports games you could host/rent out Fantasy draft parties or rooms, create a package that covers catering and a room for the draft, some rooms would just need to be a projector or Internet ready others you could create a draft board. Just something else to think about.

Someone already touchedon this but you'll need to have a very, very,very strict policy about there being no food/beverages near the computers. Otherwise I imagine you'll lose a lot of money on people spilling drinks on your electronics.

Also, I admit to skimming.

When you go to staff this make sure you have people who are very knowledgeable in the games you're offering. If someone is experiencing a problem or has a question it'll be super frustrating if the staff can't answer it.

Also, I admit to skimming.

When you go to staff this make sure you have people who are very knowledgeable in the games you're offering. If someone is experiencing a problem or has a question it'll be super frustrating if the staff can't answer it.

And people who have a good attitude about it. You don't want, "*sigh* you just have to push the A button there, come on now.", but a more friendly, accommodating response.

This sounds like a pretty cool idea, but location will be a huge factor. There aren't a huge amount of establishments like this, but then there often aren't always enough people in enough areas that might be able to support them vs. just gaming at home.

Other ideas:

You'll need male staff. You're a female gamer, (I assume by your pic) so you understand that no matter how knowledgable you may be, some males (who will probably be a huge majority of your crowd) won't respect you regardless. Don't fill your bar with hotties, make sure there are male staff too, not only to make it equal, but for your safety.

Offer other bar games: Pool,darts,etc.

Make it under 21 friendly once and a while, maybe two times a month or whatever. Have a "Teen night" or what have you. This way you can attract the crowd that isn't allowed to drink once and a while.

Other ideas:

You'll need male staff. You're a female gamer, (I assume by your pic) so you understand that no matter how knowledgable you may be, some males (who will probably be a huge majority of your crowd) won't respect you regardless. Don't fill your bar with hotties, make sure there are male staff too, not only to make it equal, but for your safety.

Offer other bar games: Pool,darts,etc.

Make it under 21 friendly once and a while, maybe two times a month or whatever. Have a "Teen night" or what have you. This way you can attract the crowd that isn't allowed to drink once and a while.

My picture is just a female, but I'm a guy.

Anyways, I was taking the time to read all of the feedback that I have gotten from you guys.

I think we might be catering towards the majority of the genres you guys have mentioned, but I think we might leave out sports as the genre.

It honestly might get too hectic when it comes to alcohol and sports fans.

As for drinks and whatnot near the systems, that's also a very good pointer. Spills will be our biggest concerns when it comes to PC hardware. For consoles, not so much since the console would be far away from the controllers.

I was thinking of utilizing a drink limit when it came to tournament nights.

I believe my friend doesn't want to allow little kids (not sure the age limit though) running around.

This type of place would be catered towards older teens to adults as a more relaxed and late-night place.

We might allow kids during the day time, but I believe at night is when our business will mainly thrive.

We don't really see a place for late-night hangouts in Atlanta (aside from clubs).

So we're attempting something completely unique to give us that outstanding feature.

As for staff, we're planning on getting female waitresses and male waitresses.

Certain people will be knowledgeable regarding certain genres. Face it, it's pretty tough to know every single minute detail regarding everything. It's damn near impossible.

We're even planning on taking it a little step further with hands-on lessons if you really want to be better at certain games.

(E.G. have a high ELO player teach someone who wants to learn how to become better at League of Legends)

Little things like that.

Honestly speaking, I'm not sure if that'll be a free service or just a small fee. Either way, we're trying to find unique selling points that no other place has offered.

I've pitched this idea to another site as well.

An example of an event would also be "Speed Runs". We could pit a certain number of players to see who could complete the game the fastest on a given console.

Prizes will range from certain things once we have it finalized.

Would stuff like this sound fun and attract gamers to be frequent customers?

When I said a alochol free night Iw as thinking more highschool age. Obviously you don't want 10 and under going around, but if you think about what age group has the most dedicated gamers I'm going to say College and below.

double post double post

**** yo udouble post!

TRIPLE POST? WHAT?

-was a double post-

So.... I was recently told that I needed tangible data to prove to potential investors that we are serious and are doing research regarding the targeted market.

If possible, can I get everyone to answer a quick 10 question survey?

Thanks in advance.

Survey

1. Do you consider yourself a hardcore gamer or a casual gamer?

2. Is there a place that you can visit dedicated to providing gaming services near you?

3. If no, would you be interested in seeing a place much like a bar or lounge that provided gaming as entertainment?

4. If yes to question 2, what do they do that you think stands out?

5. What kind of specific games would you like to see held as tournaments?

6. Would you like hands-on lessons to become better at said games?

7. Would you be interested in game coverage events such as E3?

8. What kind of events (e.g. Speed Runs) would you like to see at said places?

9. For one of many rewards, do you feel it to be worth mentioning if you were placed on the “Wall of Fame”?

10. How do you feel about using a card as “in-store currency” where it tracks your purchases and hours there to give you incentives such as discounts on items or rental on equipment?

Survey

1. I'm a hardcore gamer in the sense that I game a lot and play almost all types of games, but I'm not serious about being competitive or achievements.

2. If you knew where I lived and asked me that I'd think you were joking. The Calaveras County area has nothing of the sort, or even close.

3. I would definitely be interested in a lounge type environment where people could hang out and game. I don't get out much and it would be a good opportunity to meet people with similar interests in person.

4. No to question 2.

5. The games for tournaments I think I'd like to see would be fighting games (like Street Fighter or Soul Calibur), shooters (Halo games, and not my usual thing but CoDs and Battlefields make for decent tournaments). Maybe even racing games, but I have zero interest in sports.

6. Depending on the type of game, I might be interested in hands on lessons. Fighting games in particular can have very tricky button inputs and maneuvers, and learning how and when to activate them might make it easier to do matches against more skilled players.

7. E3 coverage would be neat if I happened to have a day off during some of the days. A more social environment to share your thoughts on the announcements, and see what interests others.

8. Not sure what kind of events I'd like to see. Speed Runs would be good though. Tournaments, and days where people could face off (or play together) in Guitar Hero or Rock Band style games may be fun.

9. The Wall of Fame could be a good idea for regular customers as a sort of badge of honor. Achievements seem popular, if you could somehow keep track of it, having achievements for the establishment that you could track might be cool too. Like number of visits, games beaten, tournament winnings, etc.

10. In-Store currency I'm not sure about, but if it lets you decide how much to put on it when you want it could work. Like say I'd enter the place and say I can set aside $10 or $20 for the day, so long as that currency doesn't expire for use later as well, it'd be fine.

Other ideas:

You'll need male staff. You're a female gamer, (I assume by your pic) so you understand that no matter how knowledgable you may be, some males (who will probably be a huge majority of your crowd) won't respect you regardless. Don't fill your bar with hotties, make sure there are male staff too, not only to make it equal, but for your safety.

Offer other bar games: Pool,darts,etc.

Make it under 21 friendly once and a while, maybe two times a month or whatever. Have a "Teen night" or what have you. This way you can attract the crowd that isn't allowed to drink once and a while.

I say allow teens during the day/afterschool hours but, at evening, it's mainly 21+ for booze.

Maybe hold like events like local tournaments with certain games.

Location, Location, Location.

Some things that you might wanna factor in:

Proximity to

-college campuses

-fast food restaurants/malls

-interstates

-bus stops/train stations

-cities

-Dave & Busters/Bars/Casinos

Location, Location, Location.

Some things that you might wanna factor in:

Proximity to

-college campuses

-fast food restaurants/malls

-interstates

-bus stops/train stations

-cities

-Dave & Busters/Bars/Casinos

I feel that this is going to be our biggest obstacle (ignoring the fact that we won't be seeing profits in the company for a minimum of three years) in this business venture.

We were hoping to open up near the Mall of Georgia area. Regardless of how bad the economy is, the business there is constantly booming and thriving.

It's also right off of the I-85 exit so traffic would hopefully be able to see us from the interstate.

We've also noted that word of mouth and social networking sites will be our biggest advantage to advertising.

Right now, this is all hypothetical. We're in the brainstorming stage.

This is something we want to create for gamers by gamers.

I say allow teens during the day/afterschool hours but, at evening, it's mainly 21+ for booze.

Maybe hold like events like local tournaments with certain games.

This is going to be a tough issue.

I was thinking that exact same thing actually since not many people like to drink during the day time.

As for Kevin's concern, the card will electronically monitor the amount of money you spend. It will not expire, and the more money that you spend there, the more we'll try to give back as well in discounts. This is still a work in progress.

We're thinking about adding in "Tiers" for customers.

For example: If a person were to come rent equipment (e.g. console or computer) for 200 hours, at $10 [for easy example purposes] an hour. He would instantly get bumped up to the next tier and receive a discount at $9.50 or so. Granted, these are not actual numbers. We haven't worked that out yet.

As for tournaments, we're planning on handing out unique cards to winners of tournaments (much like a keepsake). That'll just be one of the many rewards though.

We're also thinking about people who win tournaments frequently. We'd like to showcase their achievements with a "Wall of Fame" that would encourage people to know that they are good players. In a given time, people could even ask them for help or tips and tricks.

We want to establish a community where people know each other through couch gaming like it was in the old days.

Survey

1. Do you consider yourself a hardcore gamer or a casual gamer?

I'd say I'm casual.

2. Is there a place that you can visit dedicated to providing gaming services near you?

No,lol

3. If no, would you be interested in seeing a place much like a bar or lounge that provided gaming as entertainment?

I'd take interest, sure.

4. If yes to question 2, what do they do that you think stands out?

N/A

5. What kind of specific games would you like to see held as tournaments?

I think your general public should decide this. Have them offer options and vote towards the end of the month.

6. Would you like hands-on lessons to become better at said games?

I doubt I would ever,ever use something like this.

7. Would you be interested in game coverage events such as E3?

I don't take interest in most of it now so n/a

8. What kind of events (e.g. Speed Runs) would you like to see at said places?

9. For one of many rewards, do you feel it to be worth mentioning if you were placed on the “Wall of Fame”?

Only if you get my good side

10. How do you feel about using a card as “in-store currency” where it tracks your purchases and hours there to give you incentives such as discounts on items or rental on equipment?

If you make it so you can look up people's cards in the event they lose them that'd be cool.

Make sure you have enough capital to go at least a year without profits.... Too many new buisnesses go down because no matter how popular they didnt start with enough and are forced to close. Similar place to what you're talking about closed down here after 8 months. It was right by the mall, and very popular too.

You may want to look into the whole liquor/beer thing before you get your hopes up because a liquor license itself is not cheap, think it's around 500-700,000 dollars here in PA.

Also, I think some states require you pass a liquor law test.