Video Game Bar - Need Opinions

[Ty]

So, I'm working through the process of purchasing an Asian Restaurant and Karaoke Bar. I'm looking at making it more lucrative and money making and the thought of a Video Game bar conveniently placed in my head. The TVs are all there, the tech is there, its private booth Asian Karaoke. So, since this is a community with lots of gamers and probably would be similar to the market I'd hope to tap into, I'll throw some ideas at you.

1) Imagine if this doesn't apply to you and your not a super-geek like me. Right now in your city, there's a couple comic book stores but only one business that caters to the geek crowd (by offering dungeons and dragon game nights, magic the gathering playing night, yugioh playing nights etc). How could a business access you as a customer?

2) The wrestling crowd, in the city there's no place that caters to you. The movie theatre shows wrestle mania and summerslam and both sell out. Would you go to a place that shows Monday Night Raw on the television and serves the appropriate food with it (wings, beer, pizza, and such)

3) To the gaming community, if a video game bar opened up, what would you expect from it? Retro gaming, next generation gaming, or other. Would you attend a place where you can sit in a booth with other people playing games, ordering food, and whatnot.

[T-Bonizzle]

Think of it this way. Why would a consumer go out to your establishment when they can do the same activity at home? Why do people go to a restaurant? To eat food they typically can't make at home. If you want to do this, is the market there? What can you provide that the customer can't already do for free on their own?

[Cory]

Alright, just recently graduated with a BA in Business Admin, Major in Marketing, Minor in Management....so I too have though heavily about being able to start and run my own business. However, your offering something that is an incredible niche...as its likely one of a kind?

- How profitable are these comic book stores? It seems like most comic book stores have a small, but dedicate base of customers, and a high customer retention. With you adding higher costs than a standard comic book store providing food/drink, and odds say a much higher electricity bill, could it still be profitable?

- The wrestling crowd thing is something that could be worth looking at, but like Bone said there is a lot of aspects in this business that make me question "why go out and do this when I can do it at home". Do the shows that the movie theaters sell out, or are their 1/3 full? That would be a quick gauge to see if you offered all the PPVs/Shows is there a niche of people who will spend money to see these events. Plus you'd have to acquire rights to show WWE PPVs which is more $$$

- As a Youtube gaming commentator, I think I have a good feel for the gaming community. For me to want to go elsewhere to play video games, I think first of all you'd need tournaments with prizes kinda thing to draw people in. Most gamers are casual and wouldn't really find the appeal, and you also have to figure with newer generations of systems, kids predominately play them. I cant see parents taking their kids out to a video game bar for dinner, and teenagers who could go by their selves aren't always the safest demographic to use as a base...so much can influence their opinion of a place. Sure you can get the hardcore gaming nerds, but you want to attract the casual gamer as well...if you place gets the stigma of a nerd hub, casual gamers may stray off because its not a popular thing to do and peer pressure could take over. Now something nostalgic and retro sounds cool to me, and would appeal to the mid-late 20s, early 30s crowd which I think would be successful.

But I dont know your community. If you say there is a strong base, and you can use facts to provide a successful looking business plan, go for it. I think the concept could work if you for sure know the niche market is there, but its always tough going all in on a niche. A niche can be very successful and can have great longevity, but it can also peak and never grow and falls along the same aspect of a trend...I can die out and people move onto the next thing.

[jagilki]

It's NOT just video games, but... The Zombie Orpheus people (Gamers, JourneyQuest, ETC.) have mentioned a place in Seattle and even featured it a bit in the Glitch series called AFK Tavern.

http://www.afktavern.com/

[Chris Shields]

Cory and T got it pretty much spot on. Why should I spend the gas to drive to your place, to spend the money to get stuff to eat and play games? There has to be something special about it. For the gaming stuff, tournaments can be a big draw, but you can't have a tournament every night. Wrestling, the 2 biggest PPV's of the year may sell out at those theaters, but those are PPV's, and even if people are paying 10 bucks a ticket, and 20 bucks for some food and a drink, they were still saving 30 dollars, getting to watch it on a huge screen, and feel like it was something special. RAW is just a weekly thing that I don't have to pay for and can watch in the privacy of my own home where I can pause it if I've gotta go take a piss or I wanna grab a drink. Video games, unless you've got a mountainous library of games, why should I come in there and play? Also, what if there's one game I really want to play, but you've got a group of assholes that are hogging the machine?

All of this said, I am by no means saying it's a bad idea. Do I think it could be successful? Yes. Are there a lot of questions that have to be answered and figured out? Yes. If you can figure out the logistics and the details, more power to you. My big suggestion, don't ever underestimate the power of cheap booze and live music. I get that you want to find somewhere for the communities that you fit into, but you have to be willing to tap into other communities and revenue streams. You may not want a bunch of meathead wannabe UFC guys in your bar, but those roided up douchebags will pay to watch events and they drink like fish. In business, sometimes you have to do some shit you don't want to do, or else you'll never be able to do anything you want to do.

[Stoner]

https://www.google.com/search?q=Barcade&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&channel=np&source=hp

[Black Republicans]

The key is the games.

One thing with "nerds" they aren't sociable people, like some of the responses that you've heard are why do that elsewhere when I can do that at home.  Those aren't gonna be good candidates, because just about everything can be done at home.  I think I'm a weird hybrid, I do all the things that people would consider nerdy, hell, I'm dying to LARP once I can find a place...but noone would even remotely think I'm a nerd.

I think to be successful, you need the Hot shooting game (Call of Duty, TitanFall, etc) and all the sports games.  You almost want a sports bar feel (unless you just don't) to bring people in.

There was a local sports bar in my area and I went to them with an idea to host a Madden tourney.  He didn't want to do it, because he couldn't see the vision.  I paid him $200 and he agreed, well, he made a couple grand that night from the turnout.  Now he does one every year.

What you may want to do is have a ranking system, anybody who thinks they are good at something wants to prove it, and if you had weekly tourneys, or offline leagues for a game like Madden or 2k, you would make money hand over fist.

I know this is a little all over the place, but my Spurs just won game 1, and instead of watch it for free at home.  I went out to the bar and paid WAAAAAY more for 6 Coronas and 12 wings that I have in my deep freezer.

[Krazy]

I have seen straight gaming bars in my area fail mostly because they are PC it was Everquest and whatever fad FPS that year. I am with the last post get the big name games. Madden, UFC 2k4 (just played the demo and it flows nice but the AI is a bitch), and FPS will work. Also, get the trivia for the bar that draws people in plus people will play and drink.

[Kirk]

One of the major problems you're going to have is the set-up of your bar. The Asian style karaoke rooms will be too similar to the experience you get at home. How many people can you fit in one of those rooms? From my experience, they're usually designed for 6-8 people to be squeezed in on one sofa. If people do go for the tournaments, they will find that they are isolated from most of the other players and it just won't seem any different to playing against others online. If you want people to come to your bar, you'll have to give them an experience they can't get at home. Kinects and Wii-Us would bring in casual gamers, but are the karaoke rooms big enough for them? What are the TVs like? Most people who can afford to go out to a bar to play computer games probably already have pretty good TVs at home, so they won't want to play on the cheap ones you tend to get in bars.

You have a lot to think about before you go ahead with this.