121 episodes tracked since 2023 about →
Episode 80 - Rural Operator Spotlight Series
PodcastAnalysis updated 3d ago59 min listen
Highlights
- Marcus started with one beat-up Earthshaker in a dive bar and grew to 40+ machines across three locations in and around Susanville, CA
- Finding a trustworthy location owner and keeping machines well-maintained is essential to rural operator success
- Non-bar locations are preferable for building rural pinball scenes because bars exclude minors and families
- Five machines is the optimal target for a league location to ensure rotation and spare capacity
- Deadpool Pro has accumulated 6,500 plays in nearly five years at Marcus's location
- Wedgehead Pinball Bar will never implement Stern Insider Connected leaderboards
- Modern Stern games at high-traffic locations require flipper rebuilds every 4-6 months
- Pinball machines from professional operators are often in better condition than home-collected machines despite visible routing
- Marcus's annual Lassen Pinball tournament occurs first weekend of June with 32 machines and 64-player cap
Notable quotes
“Like, fucking Field of Dreams, if you build it, they will come.”
“One thing about rural community is that you're not in a hurry to do much. That's good.”
“They're even cheap pinball machines are expensive so i can always understand people being scared to put their personal games out in public...they were made to be put on location so put them on location.”
“I'd much rather buy a game from an operator i trust and respect than from a random home collect.”
“You have in the notes to keep the keys to the machine stay with you...you still take that side of the business seriously.”
“skin in the game right”
“in a small town you want i want to keep the doors open on this business...you're invested in the business as well...you don't have a backup location”
“fives are really to me that's like that feels like a pinball location i love locations with two or three games like little bars and stuff but five feels like this is a spot where i will go play pinball”
Entities
- Stern Pinball· company
- Lassen Pinball tournament· event
- Susanville, California· event
- Deadpool Pro· game
- Earthshaker· game
- Godzilla Premium· game
- Portland, Oregon· location
- lassenpinball.com· organization
- Pinball Junk Drawer· organization
- Wedgehead· organization
- Alan· person
- Alex the Waterboy· person
- Marcus· person
- Stern Insider Connected· product
