5 Easy Promotion Ideas for Your Family Entertainment Center

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Family Entertainment Center operators are always looking for ways to add value to their products and services to keep guests coming back for more fun. One of the easiest ways to do this is by setting up promotions that can help you drive return visits and increase customer loyalty. 


It's important to consider what type of promotion to offer, when to run it, and what you hope to achieve from it. Should the offer be a discount or a free game with purchase? Is it a one-time event or a long-term promotion? What are the goals: attracting new customers, optimizing guest experience, increasing revenue?

 

Some examples of low-cost, high-value promotions you can easily implement at your FEC are:

  1. All You Can Play package, or Guarantee of Fun, offers your guests access to a specified number of redemption games, prize games, classic games, attractions, or any combination of the above.
  2. Bounce-Back-Offers are unique add-ons to your sales offers, such as a birthday party. The free gameplay automatically activates for the next day (or a designated future date), so guests must make a return visit to redeem and reload their card for more fun!
  3. "Daily Free Game" is an entitlement to play one (or more) games, rides, or attraction during a visit. It's typically low-cost for you and has a high perceived value for your guests. Once there, most guests will always spend more on what you have to offer.
  4. Bonus play is complimentary play value placed on a card, most commonly used as an incentive to entice higher card loads by a guest.
  5. Offer coupons that can be added to a sale that discounts the price. Incentivize guests with "Purchase XYZ, get 30-Minutes Free Play, 20% Off A Meal, or $5 Free!" People expect and appreciate value deals.

Another great way to encourage repeat visits and build guest loyalty in your FEC is by implementing a loyalty program. Rewarding existing customers with access to discounts and concessions further foster the relationship with your guests and keeps them returning for more.

Operators who have promotions in their facility consistently report higher guest satisfaction and increased sales. It's simple logic: when the family has fun together, and parents feel that they have received good value for their money, they are likely to spend more and return soon.

The Embed system enables you the flexibility to set up endless combinations of promotions, which add value to your products and services to keep guests coming back, which future-proofs your business. You’ll even have the capability to run unique promotions at different times on different days that you can preset in advance or in real-time.

All of these promotions (and more) are possible and easy to implement with the Embed system and have the power to transform your business.

Ask us how to get started today.

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If you are looking for how to hire a general manager for family entertainment center business, you must prepare a set of interview questions for your prospective candidates to assess if they are the right person for the job. This will also enable you to check if an applicant is a good fit for your company culture, your team, and your business. To help you ask the right questions that generate the answers and outcomes that you hope for, we talked to Embed's very own Kash Ahmad, Chief Management Consultant in Operations at NASA. Ahmad has over 25 years of extensive experience in the amusement and hospitality industry, including recruiting general managers for top family entertainment centers in the business. Choosing the right general manager for your FEC is crucial to ensure that your company culture has a steady footing: "A good leader can make all the difference. Different employees work differently depending on the manager. Taking the time to make the right selection for the manager you’re going to bring on board is essential. If you bring in the wrong person who doesn’t believe in your culture or plan, does not care about your employees, or doesn’t care about the business that much, it can really move your culture backward," emphasizes Ahmad.

Where Do We Hire a Good General Manager?

Talent can come from everywhere. However, finding a culturally good fit for your family entertainment center's general manager can be quite a challenge. Company culture and values carry great weight in choosing leaders such as GMs for your team. Settling for just anybody can discourage good employees, run guests out the door, and cripple the energy to go to work. This is one of the reasons why you have to take into consideration where you scout for this role. Before you can start, you have to be prepared with some of the key aspects of the job hunt, such as the general manager's role, responsibilities, and the required skills and characteristics. To help you search for the right place for your FEC's next leader, we talked to recruitment and hospitality veterans David Curtis, Senior Director of Talent at Dave & Buster’s, and Beth Standlee, CEO & Founder at TrainerTainment. Here's where you can pool prospects for your FEC's general manager:

What are the Important Skills & Qualities of a General Manager?

Looking for how to hire a general manager for your family entertainment center? There are specific skills, qualities, and characteristics that you need to be on the lookout for. Whether you have a mom-and-pop FEC or are already scaling into a chain, hiring a general manager is necessary and beneficial to keep your daily operations in check, your staff in their best professional shape for your guests, and your business in its most innovative and successful form yet. To help you on your talent acquisition journey for this vital role, we talked to David Curtis, Senior Director of Talent at Dave & Buster’s, Beth Standlee, CEO & Founder at TrainerTainment, and Embed's very own Kash Ahmad, Management Consultant in Operations at NASA. According to our industry experts, the following are the non-negotiables when it comes to hiring a general manager: