How to Do a Market Feasibility Study for FECs

Starting a family entertainment center can be a daunting task. There are several facts and figures you have to lock in, and a couple of studies you have to secure to make the business venture a possibility – or prove otherwise.

Capital and funding are crucial necessities to begin business operations. If you are planning to open a single location, family-owned FEC, your own financial resources should be enough to operate, depending on the size and type of FEC you are trying to start.

A family entertainment center or family fun center comes in different shapes and forms. Your dream of starting your own business comes with a lot of work, studies, analyses, and of course – costs. Let’s zero in on an arcade game business idea.

Amusement Expo 2020 – we were all on top of the world. And then we got on the plane to go home and immediately the world shut down due to the coronavirus pandemic. As the market begins to reopen after our industry's most challenging year on record, we couldn’t be MORE EXCITED to celebrate the return to Amusement Expo 2021 in Las Vegas.

The modern business has become a data-driven environment. Data has changed drastically in the last few years due to advances in technology, in this case family entertainment center technology, that has increased the amount of data there is to collect whilst also enhancing the ability to collect it. Smartphones are a great example of this, giving business all different types of information such as search history, locations, and personal data among other stuff too.

After months of being cooped up in quarantine, consumers are excited to gather outdoors in a surge of domestic fun as cities loosen restrictions and FECs reopen. Now more than ever, there will be greater emphasis on the guest experience, but in the new normal, what does the essence of guest service look like?

Game card readers, just like game cards and RFID wearables, aren’t the future of FECs they’re the present (not the new normal, the old normal). They deliver an unequivocal boost to customer experience, whilst simultaneously assisting businesses in minimizing costs, driving revenue. Period. Not convinced? Read on...

The time for using coins, tokens, and tickets in an FEC have passed, accelerated by the need for contactless , cashless payments. Technology advancements in the family entertainment center software & hardware have created guest experience innovations that have improved many different aspects of FECs. Customers now anticipate arcade debit card systems, FEC kiosks, wireless readers, contactless and cashless payment technology when they enter FECs, meaning it is imperative that your venue meets their expectations.

Marketing is an important part of the business; it's what reaches your customers and raises brand awareness to bring them to your business (there is some truth to the saying "out of sight means out of mind"), and as such, it is critical for you to develop a marketing component of your FEC business plan of how to bring these customers in by raising awareness, running promotions that bring them into your business and keeps them coming back (keeping your brand "top of mind").

There is no debate. Arcade play cards, games cards or amusement cards or whatever else you want to call them, are the alternative to coin and token systems, not only creating a modern feel for arcades or family entertainment centers, but easing the consumer journey. In a technologically progressive world, things that lag behind stand out, and not in a good way. Arcade play cards and its accompanying cashless technology offer basic benefits to your arcade, meeting basic customer expectations. Personalization Consumers' personalize everything. Therefore, personalization of game cards is the norm, it gives your venue's brand uniquely designed cards and ensures customers associate the amusement card or arcade play card with your brand immediately. It also secures the coveted share-of-wallet (or wherever they store their card), they will be reminded of your venue and the experience thereof. This regular exposure to your brand increases top-of-mind familiarity with the brand and the likelihood of repeat visits. An awesome game card design also draws attention from other people and creates word of mouth advocacy (peer to peer). Customer Loyalty and Retention Customer loyalty is an important FEC components and becomes crucial in a competitive market. Family entertainment centers often operate in quite competitive markets, with many different types of businesses fighting for the same customers. Having a collectable game card (something the consumer wants to keep) for a venue is a strong reason for customers to return. Game cards are also loyalty cards, being used to reward return guests. This is a great way to keep customers coming back and getting continuous benefits for doing so. Ease of Transaction Most people use some form of tap and pay mobile device or credit or debit card technology. This means that any business that doesn’t adopt basic cashless technology stands out in a negative light for wasting the consumers' time with outdated processes like tickets and unhygienic coins and game tokens. Immediacy to game play is an inferred expectation of any consumer. The ability for consumers to easily tap their amusement card or arcade play card and start playing games enhances their overall experience and keeps them spending more at your venue (any wasted time is loss of revenue for the FEC). Additionally, it means consumers don't lug around bags of coins and recounting them to check how much they have left; no one has the time or patience for that! Lastly, the game card has the tickets each customer wins embedded in the card (a cost savings for the FEC) and allows customers to keep saving tickets without having to store and track them and lose them. This means customers have the ability to set their sights on a prize and keep coming back until they have enough tickets saved for a grand prize. This is a great way to drive return visits and ongoing revenue generation. Track Your Customers Compared to the traditional coins and token system, the ability to track your customer’s activities with a game card is unrivaled. Through amusement cards or arcade play cards, and the underlying systems that accompany it, you easily identify the spending and consumption patterns of each individual customers. This means you can easily adjust your FEC business plan and marketing strategies and identify what times of the day, week or year you are most busy and when you are not. You’ll have a much better understanding of when to focus your promotion efforts and likely have the ability to contact individual cardholders to keep them coming back. Keeping Your Business Running Coins and tickets are a chronic problem for arcades: unforeseeable hidden operating costs of repairs due to ticket dust and coin jams, not to mention the loss of revenue due to game down time. They severely limit operations and negatively impact business revenue. And the manpower before and after operating hours to collect, track, count coins and tickets is not only costly but exhausting. The whole system is tough on the business and creates a negative consumer perception of your business. Improving FEC Security Coins and tokens in arcades also present an inherent security risk to your business. Nothing can realistically stop customers just walking out with any unused tokens and whilst you can afford to lose a handful, over time a continuous loss of coins creates limitations on your business. Less coins in the rotation will mean that you may run out of coins at some stage, making you spend more time collecting coins out of machines and money on replenishing them. Another issue that may potentially arise is the fact that outside coins can be used in your machines. This isn’t likely to be an issue for most FECs, however if it is, it can be quite damaging and lead to a significant loss in revenue. Getting rid of coins and tokens all together eliminates this issue and greatly improves the overall security of your FEC. Conclusion Game cards are not the future anymore, they are the present. Operating with coins and tickets is becoming too outdated and costly for a family entertainment center to consider. The cost of switching over from coins to cards is outweighed heavily from the cost your business incurs from the loss of customers and machine repairs. And here's the best part, the Embed system pays for itself and generates a 10-20% revenue increase. Contact us today to explore the Embed solution for your business and what the Playwave game cards can do for you as a FEC owner operator.