I have been considering opening a net cafe; but not the coffee serving, beatnik gathering type place - something more geared towards gamers. Figure evening gamming and mid day "teach the elderly how to use the PC" classes should cover the bills and hopefully make me a paycheck.
My background is accounting/business, most places I would say Im an advanced computer user - but I'm a n00b compared to all yas. I sat down this weekend to try to create financial projections and found myself dumbfounded. Would I be further ahead going Dell or sweet talking my friends into building 10 pc's? Servers...I know I need one but thats about it. How do I find information about site licenses? I found many consultants who will tell me - after I pay them, but no free info.
Other questions that hold me up from even making my business plan involve games and systems. What would be the best games to start out with? I was thinking Halo, BF2 and UT to start out with but feel I'm limiting myself only offering shooters. I can see gamers willing to come play if I offer decent systems - but what about consoles? Would any of you leave the comfort of your home to play on a 360, X-Box, PS2 or (for the humor of it) Gamecube?
I found a place called igames.org and most of the net cafes that have web sites link them. Has anyone heard of or been a member this place? Just wondering if it is worth my $125 up front and $20 a month to see what information they have.
Thanks for reading my whole stinkin post if you made it this far. Please, comment - even if all you have are game suggestions; any and all information is appreciated.
I am a little torn about Game Centers. I feel like it is one of those businesses you do because you love it and maybe along the way you will make enough to survive. In all honesty, I wouldn't count on it. I imagine they have high failure rates.
Here are some things to consider. Your target market is fairly young. I would say 14-20. Their income is somewhat limited, but the good news is most, if not all of it is disposable income.
Your best money would be made through special events and tournaments. IGames would be a great way to help the tournaments. If I remember correctly, it allows you to set up shop as a qualifier for bigger tournaments like the Cyber Athletes Professional League.
As for the PC's, this becomes very tricky if you ask me. If you let your friends build them, then you are tied to your friends being available to help keep them running in tip top shape. However, it will be a lot easier to upgrade certain parts of the machines as new games require bigger, better, faster hardware.
But, if you buy Dell's, you can hold them accountable for fixing any hardware problems you might encounter. This buys some piece of mind if you ask me. The downside to Dell's is upgradeability and optimization. Some of the Dell's will be upgradeable, but you may have to do a complete hardware turn around faster than building them yourself.
I am torn on this myself. On one hand, I have the skills to be able to maintain all of these systems. On the other hand, I do not want to waste all of my time working on PC's. In the business world, I am sold on Dell's. Raze and I work for the same company. There are thousands of PC's and whenever we dealt with a group that went with non-standard equipment (ie not a Dell Dude), it meant trouble.
I hope I am explaining this well.
Buying a Dell is about buying a certain standard and having the piece of mind knowing that a big company stands behind there equipment.
Building it yourself means getting a little more bang for your buck up front, but it could mean more expense in the long run through attrition and maintenance.
And keep this in mind. Every PC that is not working is lost revenue per hour. With a Game Center, that is very, very important.
Halo 2 will probably be a big draw. Having XBox 360's might even be a bigger draw than the PC's.
On to servers. I would say the number of Hardware Servers needed would be proportionate to the number of PC's you expect to have. Most hardware can handle 1-8 games of varied sizes. Once again, the Dell factor comes into play. No server equals lost revenue times the number of computers not in use.
Some other ideas to make revenue include offering your own vending machines or snack bar. And another idea would be offering printing services like a Kinko's. If I had a Game Shop around that I frequented, I would definitely use it over Kinko's if it was convenient. :-)
I like the Internet training class for Seniors. The real trick is to design a place that appeals to the younger generation without alienating the Seniors. If you can pull that off, you may increase your ability to make a profit.
Another idea that comes to mind is the Ladies Night theory of a Bar. The idea is if you can get the ladies in the place, the guys will follow and they will spend more than enough money to make up for the loss of the ladies. With your target market, I would dare say the same concept would work. Get the girls and the fellas will follow.
I would be happy to go into more details with you or review your numbers. Raze would also be an excellent resource. He knows more about PC's than anyone I know.
While I agree with Atomm 100% on the Dell vs Home builts, i.e. Dell will unltimatly be cheaper, it seems to me in a game center you would need to give people (gamers probably early teens to late 20's )a reason they need to come to your place. Maybe this is where some custom machines comes into play. by custom I am talking the case mod community. you make these neon machines and it attracts the gamers away from their capable machine at home.
as for me personally, I woudn't have a use for a place like this because I have the income to build myself a rig that does what I need it to, also now that I am old and married, I have too many bills for spending money in such ways. However I could see myself going to such a place if a handful of buddies went and we had a quasi-lan going on.
Hmm indeed I agree with Bubba in that Dell's wouldn't coach me out to play at a Game Center.. There was one in Milford back near Detroit that when I checked it out they were using just Dell machine's.. they had a couch with a big flat screen and one console system up front.. along with a vending machine in the back with sandwhiches and drinks.. but the place has since gone out of buisness..
I'm more for going with having the machines custom built.. have them made with cool customizeable towers.. eye candy is important.. And for the kind of high level performance you prolly want for games like BF2 considering how much of a hog it is.. I would think its your best bet.. Most custom machine hardware-wise come with excellent warranties if your buying from the right companies.. Companies like ASUS offer 3-yr warranties on many parts.. Maxtor as well.. Corsair having a lifetime warranty on it's RAM.. AMD 64 processor's have a 3-yr warranty as well.. Those are your core components..
Your dealing with machines in an environment that is just for gaming.. If you do the classes thing you might have something to do with Office as well.. But if worse comes to worse with some sort of software conflict.. you can easily just reformat because your not dealing with machines that have personal files on them..
As Far as Games.. you may even want to consider WoW.. considering how addicted those players are to the game if there was a place they could all gather that might be appealing..
Thanks so much guys for the input. I did some asking around and found that; of the people I know - no one would go to such a place in this town 🙁 I have however recently learned of a theme park that might be coming to a small town near me - and the grand canyon. They won't be breaking ground for at least 2 years so now I have time to get a serious plan together and something of a deadline to keep me motivated. Yaay tourists....gotta love people away from home ready to spend money.
On the Dell vs build, while I have never built a box from the ground up myself I am sure I can do it, I can read directions hahahaha. I have no worry at all about being able to troubleshoot and replace broken cards and drives myself as I do this at work quite often. Its just the building my first box on my own that scares me - I've never had to actually put anything on a motherboard - just pop out a part and pop in its replacement. I have also never had to shop for parts â I just call our âcomputer guyâ and he sends me what I need. I said have a friend build it because I have 2 good friends that are both far more advanced that I on the realm of hardware. Im just kicking the idea around right now and you guys seem to be a good place to start where I wont be hounded for progress. I donât want to get my friends sold on the idea and then decide I donât want to do it.
As for box mods I had been kicking around the idea of building the boxes - but only making the dvd drive, headphone/mic jacks and usb ports accessible to the users. Somehow containing the rest behind a wall....or maybe some plexiglass so that my 'youthful' target market won't be messing around with the machines.
While I have never had a problem with any of the Dells I have gotten the downtime if one does break will hurt. Don't you have to send to whole pc back for repairs? If I build them I can keep spare fans, cards and drives on hand. Then again Atomm made a strong point. I donât want to spend my whole day playing maintenance guy.
I think I'd have to go with lighting or other easily changeable visuals to change the look of the place. In the day time it would be more of a business/learning center....at night flick the neons on and its frag time. Im afraid if I go crazy moding the boxes themselves grandma wouldn't be interested in learning because that "glowing monster" looks nothing like the wal-mart model she picked up to email the kids.
I was definitely considering having office on the pc's. Most of my time at work that Im not doing my job Im training some smuck how to use excel or word â or my personal favorite âhow to log on to windowsâ. The business center like functions were in my vision also. The only thing I really want to steer clear of is serving food. I don't want to have to deal with all the health regulations. A soda and snack machine should do me fine. I also won't have people getting mayo all over the keyboards.
The reason I don't want to have WoW as a 'launch title' is the monthly subscription. I have thought about offering free MMOs at start up though. I have been a steady player of one for 2 years now and its really not that bad. Alot of the people in my game are playing from net cafes too. Its actually part of what got me thinking about this opportunity.
I have never been to any sort of public business center or gaming center. I am now planning a trip to Vegas and touring the places there. Right now my idea is in its infancy, more of a day dream.
I still am completely clueless as to site licensing. Youâd think since they are something for sale it would be all over the internet. Unfortunately google is NOT being my friend for finding this info. I suppose I still have much to learn in shopping for software.
Atomm, thanks for the gracious offer of going over numbers with me. When I have something that resembles a more complete projection I will be taking you up on it. That could be a year away though. I suppose I jumped the gun looking around for suggestion and help because I havenât really decided if I want to dedicate my life to this. Fourteen hour days sounds nasty but the corporate monster is really burning me out fast. I want to take my time planing this out and make sure I answer as many what ifs as I can.
Cliff notes/new questions â
I am a wussy, starting my own business scares me and Im going to go about it slowly and methodically.
I have no clue what Im doing, hopefully after I visit a few places I will have a better grip on what I actually need to know.
How long is the turn around for getting a broken Dell back up?
Is putting the guts of the pc behind a wall retarded or thinking ahead?
After some research I have found that DSL and dish network are the only high speed connections available at this time in both areas I am considering. Most of my gaming would be LAN, but is DSL broad enough to support the browsers/solo gamers if I start up with 10 boxes?
Monthly subscription gamesâ¦.anyone else have an opinion?
Ok I believe I have rambled on long enough nowâ¦.once again thanks so much for the input! I canât express how much it is appreciated that you guys not only read my posts but also provide feedback.
Dell has always shipped me the parts in less than 24 hours. If you have a tech come out I don't know how long but I know that have some "next day" plans.
Putting the PC behind a wall seems like a good idea, but along the grandma lines, as much as the neon beast will scare her, she may need to see the beige beast to get over the idea it's a monster. I tutored a bunch of old women on computers for a while and that was their biggest hangup. Once they got over the machine being this evil beast they picked up the computers quick.
As for site licenses, everyone works different and it's never anywhere near as tranparent as individuallyy buying licenses at staples... on purpose. Find a local company that deals software and they should be able to do site licensing. If it's for MS products, they have a link to Volume Licensers somewhere on the page.
Bear in mind no matter what anyone tells you, DSL and cable are different everywhere so although Cable may be faster in my town than DSL that doesn't mean the same to even Sarge who is just 2 towns away. As for The Dish network, last I knew ALL satilight connections where very laggy because of the time it takes signals to and from the satilights. Also I know the one that I dealt with, I beleive your upload was at 56k. I think since then it has changed so both upload and download go through the dish, but they are still inherently laggy.
Depending on the bandwidth of the DSL, you can support many many boxes. Some DSL may not support even 1 box very well.
The idea of being a training center in the day and a game place at night seems very complimentary in usage, however Bear in mind those would be very expensive boxes for Word (but still effective).
As for building your own machines, it's not too big a deal. Alot of people are getting away with it. I still honestly beleive that some of us who have been doing it for years upon years upon years have a leg up, but that gap is closing. One bit of advice I would give it that now a days everyone thinks they know what they are doing, but well I never find too many who do. I will say however I think the guys here at GRB all seem to have pretty good heads for this stuff, many of us have been doing it at least quasi-professionally for a long time. Take advice from whoever gives it, but don't always trust it. But honestly I think building your own will make you more prepared to deal with a broken machine once/if you get going.
My experience from having lived and worked for a bookkeeper part time until I was 20, all businesses take alot more effort than people ever imagine they would. That said good luck.
How long is the turn around for getting a broken Dell back up?
This depends on the warranty plan you pick. You can get onsite in 24 hours. Also, Dell offers an additional, anything goes warranty. If someone spills a pop on your computer and it fries, they fix it. Just something to consider.
Is putting the guts of the pc behind a wall retarded or thinking ahead? I really think this is a bad idea. Here is why. Most games require CD's. CD's require physical Access. I wouldn't want to spend my day changing out CD's all day, especially with people who have ADD (like me). Heat becomes an issue. What type of enclosure are we talking about. Also, the further you extend the video cable, the great the chance of having a degredated signal. With Gaming, the last thing you want to do is introduce a problem in the video signal.
Here are my thoughts on Plexiglass. I had a buddy from LAN parties who had a complete plexiglass case with full Blue Neon inside. It looked really cool. His comments on the plexiglass box was it was a mistake. As hard as he tried, he couldn't keep the darn thing clean. It always had finger prints on it and up close, it looked like crap. I thought that was very telling.
As for the build it vs. buy it. I'll pose this question to everyone here. How many times have you had a problem that took you more than a week to fix on your computer? How much time did you spend having to troubleshoot the problem before you finally figured it out?
I can tell you this has happened to me twice. After working for a company that has a huge Dell contract, I am sold on the idea of letting them take care of it. It may be the looks that grab the users, but it is going to be the performance and stability that keeps them coming back.
im gonna chime in on this kinda late...I am one that has been putting together a well made business plan for such a place (Gaming Center). Ive worked closely with Dell on getting 20 of dells gaming machines..They gave me a HUGE discount in the buisness writeup if i agreed to purchase these machines and also thru in 24 hr on site for 3 yrs..to boot...It would cost close to 30k to get there advanced gaming machines built and shipped to my location...Vs about half of that to build them myself...Now if you take into concideration...building the custom neon boxes yourself...your looking close to the dell prices..minus the support...Dell in my opioion is the way to go..and i will be doing so in the future...I have a friend in a surrounding city that has had a gaming center open now for 6 yrs..and he makes around 200k a year from this business...thats excluding what it costs to run day to day operations..So a good living can be achieved from these centers...But as Atomm mentioned i believe...The demand has to be there...therefore location is critical in making it last and get thru the necessary growing pains...
My advise is to do as i have done and make and take your plan to the next level and most of all...take all the time you need to perfect it..You only get one shot at making it work or failing at it...So make it your best!
Something else to keep in mind. Use the Small Business Association through your local Chamber of Commerce. You can get a lot of sound business advice for free. As a woman, you are going to be elligible for even better financing opportunities. The SBA is the place to learn about all of this.
I lot of women/minority/disabled owned business get favorable financing as well as preference for some government contracts. So if you are a disabled minority woman you are golden 😉
Thanks for the words of encouragement and information EFLethal. Im on a constant roller coaster about getting this thing going, but its always at least in the back of my mind.
As for the SBA I think I know more about that site then their webmaster hahaha. I actually had a lot of assignments in college that made me go there. Still thanks for the direction, it is indeed one of the best business start up informational sites around.
I am a woman, not a minority....I'm wondering if PS2 addiction is considered a disablility. I now have 90 hours racked up on Dragon Quest 8. The game has stolen my life, in fact right now Im itching to go home and check out more of the world with my new ability of flight.
On a side note, the reply notifications aren't working again, at least for me. I hadn't even realized anyone else had replied to this thread. So sorry Im slow to respond - I've had to like work at work the last few weeks 🙁
burnout_goddess wrote: On a side note, the reply notifications aren't working again, at least for me. I hadn't even realized anyone else had replied to this thread. So sorry Im slow to respond - I've had to like work at work the last few weeks 🙁
I guess that leaves you no choice but to stalk our boards.
Absolutely go with Dell or another name brand for both the PCs and the servers. Get the business type warranty with 24 hour response time. The extra warranty is very cheap if purchased with the systems.
I have used Dell's warranty 3 times over the past 5 years. They essentially dispatch the tech with any part that may be needed to repair the system. The extra few hundred bucks you pay is worth every penny, when you have a server drive go down, and they show up and fix it with all the proper parts in hand.
And for the kiddies.... MUSIC! Make sure you have then tune into Gamersradio while they are fraggin!
If you do X-Box or console games, make sure to have comfortable seating such as couches, and large TV/Monitors (preferably flat screens) for them to play on.
A snackbar is a great idea as well. You may even offer free popcorn to the patrons as a snack. Just salt it up good and they will surely pay the $ for a drink 🙂 It sounds funny to think that way, but all these little gimics are designed to bring in more $ flow.
Then the stuff everyone forgets about. Have extra of everything on hand. Mouses, keyboards, controls, monitors, high quality (gaming) mouse pads etc... Kids are especially rough on things that are not theirs. So expect to be going through them at a good pace.
Nothing worse than having a functioning PC that can't be used due to a broken mouse.
Then you will need a software package tied to the PC's which will bill by time. There are many cybercafe type programs out there. But it of course is another expense.
My partner and I had actually drawn up a business plan for this exact thing. But after looking at the capital needed and the soft market in our area, we decided against it. Which is another good point. There are many marketing firms which will give you detailed demographics pertaining to the business you are looking to start. I would suggest if you are truly interested, you get these documents to see if there is even a need for such a business in your area.
The extra stuff on hand made me think of a way to go with Dell, but spice it up a bit. Change out the Mice and Keyboards for something a little more flashy. One of the Gaming Mice like Logitech or Razer. Also change out the keyboards with something flashier. You can jazz things up by spending just a little bit of money on side items like this.
Also, look into Zboards. I wouldn't start with them, but once you are up and running, buy 1 or 2 for the more popular games and see if they take hold. From what I have seen people either love them or hate them. But the key is the people who love them are fanatics about them.
Extra peripherals is definitely in my plans. The only place to buy electronics in town is Wal-mart and Radio Shack. I figure I should also be able to increase income retailing the things you just can't find in town. EB games did just recently open a store here - but its a mini store in a strip mall - not really much other than games. I still worry that I am spreading myself out too much incorporating extra things such as retailing.
I've done a little demographic research myself on free sites (citydata.com etc). TCA-ECF, did you find the information provided to by a fee based marketing company included useful information beyond census and income levels?
To get any info that is worthwhile you will need to pay a company for it. Demographics is good to collect stats on age ranges and income.. But the marketing companies will have all the good data such as, what people in that area tend to buy and use for services in that area as well.
Your location within town could be critical. Whom are you trying to attract in town, and where do they live, work, or go to school? Can you locate near the mall if that is a popular place to go? Near a high school?
This type of business seems to me to be a destination and not something that most people might spot as they were driving by and decide to stop so location on a high-volume road isn't a must, but it make sense that you would locate where you can be conveniently accessed.