Is paintball being promoted enough in the UK?

[Tartan Blaster]

People always come up with that 120 quid argument.... Do you have any idea of the logistics involved? Sure, the site owner pays a lot less for his paint, but he has to pay rent for the place where he stores his gear, his field, his staff, his vehicles to get the gear on the site, maintenance on markers, the markers themselves, laundry costs for the coveralls, goggles and so on....
I know for a fact that many of the smaller sites are struggling, because they barely break even. The price of paint the punters pay is NOT the problem.

yet I do doubt that you will find any site charging those kind of prices filled to capacity weekend after weekend and some weekdays too (even if they advertise like hell like df does). The thing is that currently commercial paintball is hardly even sustainable at current prices considering those prices just eliminate any chance of repeat customers and such. I think if sites lowered there prices to more reasonable levels people would be shooting alot more of it and also coming back more which in the long run would increase revenues. For many sites owners are still thinking
not enough cash = jacking up prices
because that isn't how it works.

 

[Buddha 3]

yet I do doubt that you will find any site charging those kind of prices filled to capacity weekend after weekend and some weekdays too (even if they advertise like hell like df does). The thing is that currently commercial paintball is hardly even sustainable at current prices considering those prices just eliminate any chance of repeat customers and such. I think if sites lowered there prices to more reasonable levels people would be shooting alot more of it and also coming back more which in the long run would increase revenues. For many sites owners are still thinking
not enough cash = jacking up prices
because that isn't how it works.

How is a price unreasonable if it'll only make you break even?
And I know plenty of sites that are filled to capacity every weekend over spring, summer and autumn AND get tons of return customers.
I always get a little frustrated having these discussions with people. You guys mean well, I'll admit that, but you really don't have a clue as to what it costs to make a site work. I do. And going paintballing as a punter for a day is NOT expensive. Try carting. That'll set you back at least 15 quid, and you only get to drive for what? 30 minutes?
If you all are so damn convinced that people won't make the switch to getting their own gear if they think a box of paint costs 120, then how come I see it happening all the time? How come you started playing? How come the guy that told you you could play started playing? Your arguments hold no water... The only people that complain about the prices of paint are tournament players, many walkons don't care...they are only more pleased to find out they have to pay less than they thought.

Here's what often happens: Punters come and pay for a certain deal, usually this includes X amount of paintballs. They go and play. They like it. They want to play some more. They buy an extra box of paint. Let's say 10 people buy one box, that's 200 paintballs a person. This'll allow them to play something like 2 games more. Site owner gets the money, and has to pay his marshalls more, because they have to keep working longer. Lower the price of that box of paint might mean you will sell more paint (probably won't even be that much). Yes, you will have a higher turnover, but your costs will go up a lot more, because all of a sudden, your marshalls have to work even longer to ensure all the paint bought gets blasted...
See where this is going? You guys are thinking about this way too easily, just as a lot of site owners are, but that's a different discussion... Try to see the real and big picture.

The price is not the issue guys, get over it. The issue is facilitating those who wish to play on a more regular basis. THAT is what's going wrong.

 

[KitsuneAndy]

yet I do doubt that you will find any site charging those kind of prices filled to capacity weekend after weekend and some weekdays too (even if they advertise like hell like df does). The thing is that currently commercial paintball is hardly even sustainable at current prices considering those prices just eliminate any chance of repeat customers and such. I think if sites lowered there prices to more reasonable levels people would be shooting alot more of it and also coming back more which in the long run would increase revenues. For many sites owners are still thinking
not enough cash = jacking up prices
because that isn't how it works.

The site I work at charges £6 per 100, or £25 per 500.

The package that includes 1000 paintballs costs £55.00 for a days play.

The site is generally full to capacity (about 250) every weekend through the summer and we do see the same groups over and over again. So why should the site owner consider dropping his prices when all it means is that he takes home less cash at the end of the day?

 

[KitsuneAndy]

The price is not the issue guys, get over it. The issue is facilitating those who wish to play on a more regular basis. THAT is what's going wrong.

Agreed.

At our site there is a monthly walk on, £20 walk on fee, BYO paint or £30 a case, 15 woodland fields to play. No sup air, but it's still great fun and a great atmosphere.

However, the days are not advertised and although we might see the same customers coming again and again paying full price for paint every time, they'll never find out about the walk on's unless they either ask, or happen to get one of the marshalls that plays at them.

 

[andyrik]

if this sorta thing is happening all the time and this is how you want paintball to stay fair enough.
but the popularity of paintball will rise at its normal rate, nothing more.
the only thing that annoys me about THESE sites is:
a)the guns are crap, so to have a good day you HAVE to buy more paintballs, the delta force i want to it was rare the gun shot streight.
b) you cant buy your own paintballs outside and bring them in but rather pay rip off prices.

yes the owners have lots of money and yes they may book up but you wont get many people wanting to progress further into paintball so the overall popularitly level stays at a steady rate.

its taking newbies for a ride in a way. ones with less money
this is why sports such as football are popular, they can easily be played and DONT COST AS MUCH MONEY. Those who are lucky enough to have alot of money or a job can get into paintball and thats all.
so its really how popular people want paintball to be.
but the costs at these sites are terrible for people of an age around 12-16, who dont have alot of money and want to get into the sport as it appeals to them most (as in when advertised in towns, its the younger ones who it is appealing to)

it would appeal to more people if the prices were cheaper.
thats MY opinion

 

[Liz]

b) you cant buy your own paintballs outside and bring them in but rather pay rip off prices.

You obviously haven't read what Buddha wrote - the cost to a site owner for someone to play is much in excess of the cost of the game fee, and they have to make up the difference from the paint. For those who haven't seen it in the past, here's the list of costs to the site owner before a ball is shot (not comprehensive, just what comes to mind at this time of a Sunday morning!) :-
Land rental (or rates, cost of purchase of the land etc if owned which is rare)
Site maintenance (fields, staging area etc)
Toilet cleaning/emptying, OR water & sewerage bills
Insurance
Paint/kit storage
Telephones
Advertising
Stationery
Running the site van/vans
Equipment purchase including guns, goggles, overalls etc
Equipment maintenance & cleaning e.g. replacement lenses, overall cleaning
Food, tea, coffee, cups, sugar, spoons, rubbish sacks etc
Refs - at least 1 per every 15 customers
Agency fees if a booking agency like Ministry of Paint, Go Ballistic or similar is used

As you can work out, that comes to a much higher amount than the usual £10-15 game fee, and the money has to come from somewhere. That somewhere is the excess charged on paint. Depending on the individual site it usually takes about 500 paint shot per customer to break even, and a typical rental customer will shoot an average of 5-700 paint in a day. Out of that massive profit on up to 200 balls the site owner has to pay his or her own wages.

THAT'S why you can't bring your own paint to a site set up for rental customers.

 

[Robbo]

Liz, and at the same time gal, me and you both know plenty of guys who own sites who ain't exactly skint ........

The potential to earn plenty of money is there and is dependant somewhat on how well you run the site.
The three main determinants in how much you earn with a paintball site are catchment area, quality of site (how well you tun it) and level of local marketing.
These 3 considerations underpin every Paintball site in the UK and if you ain't earning money, then for the most part, you only got ureself to blame.
We all know the product is extremely attractive but if people don't know it's there or if they turn up and it's not packaged right, then you are gonna make jack sh!t.

And to give people an idea of just how our site owners think, I once mentioned in another thread we should do the following and I know you are able to do this as well as me Liz because you been around ever since I can remember :- Go back in ure mind 10 years, take a walk through Sidcup (Doug's site), take a walk thru Niall's site, in fact take a walk thru virtually every site that was around 10 years ago and get an average feel for what they offer in terms of facilities,, prices, variety of Paintball options, safety, toilets etc etc etc.
Once you have that average 'feel', jump forward into time and now go round our sites......getting the picture Liz???

It's hardly changed one frikkin bit, the level of investment is zip, the customer consideration levels remains virtually unchanged, facilities (availability of walk ons) have actually contracted. toilets...oh my god....I'll say no more..and the list goes on gal.... it's no good us looking for excuses to give our site owners a back door when their inability to run a business properly is staring us in the face every time we visit the average site.

And this can all be explained by the phrase I often use when describing the guys we have as our portfolio of site owners, 'Del boy businessmen', that's all they are. The 'money in the back pocket brigade' without about as much business acumen as a pork pie.

Sure we have to factor in legitimate business concerns but not at the expense of ignoring the real shortfalls.

 

[NorthIrish]

a)the guns are crap, so to have a good day you HAVE to buy more paintballs, the delta force i want to it was rare the gun shot streight.

Ok, feel free to flame me on this, but this is how i understand it.

The balistics of a round projectile are never truly accurate, that is one of the reasons that guns use bullets rather than round shots.

Because of the way that paintball are manufactured it is impossible to get them consistantly round every time. Any deviation from a perfect sphere will again affect the accuracy (so add this to the above)

most sight guns have a larger bore barrel to cope with the varying sizes of paintballs. Maybe you could suggest that your site buys a freak kit for evey rental marker, see what that does to the cost of a days paintballing. a small ball in a larger bore barrel will not be as accurate as an accurately matched ball and barrel (so add this to the above 2 points)

if the gun needs cleaning this can cause the ball to spin in flight as residue can cling to one side of the ball, affecting its path. (some balls can be seen to be doing loop the loops) (add this to the above 3 points)

some ppl are just bad shots. (the most common cause)

Every weekend i get guys moaning about how inaccurate the site guns are where i work. Usually i just pick up a clean gun and start dropping shots on a barrel about 70' away from the safe zone. They are usually convince that its operator error from that point on.

 

[NorthIrish]

just another thought on the subject of paint.

The site owner could buy top of the range tournament quality paint and maybe it would lead to more accurate shots, but again this will put up the price of paint.

Its also usually too brittle for site guns, so is more likely to break in the gun and stop it firing. Generally we've found that as long as a customers gun keeps on firing they're happy.

we have made the mistake of selling tourney grade paint to customers once and it was a nightmare. as well as a constant queue of guns to clean during the games it kept breaking in hoppers and pots etc as the customers went about the normal business of commando rolls into bunkers etc (or just being plain clumsy). That lead to a lots of jacked off customers accusing us of deliberatly selling them 'crap' paint as a marketing ploy so they would buy more......

so, what ya supposed to do?

 

[trenzo]

im sure the first time you went paintballing you shot as little as you could as you felt it was the right thing to do? its not like of the brake a punter is gonna blaze to the 50 whilst his back man is keeping a lane down the tape etc... you get people that shoot 20 shots a game cause they try and conserve there ammo....

Also how else is a site gonna make money? Too think of it simply, a site is basically a place where you can buy paintballs and shoot them at your mates, all its doing is selling paint to cover all the costs of running it, its all been previously mentioned. how else could they get the money? if you put the walkon fee up then that will put everyone off for sure as when people pay that they do not physically have anything to show for it.

And back on topic, i think that paintball is still growing in the uk. i have not been playing it for as long as some people here and im sure some of the wisers ones will correct me if im wrong though i am guessing if you compared uk paintball now to what it used to be 10 years ago you would be supprised how it has grown so much, take the UK masters for example!

i personally think we are just growing still but we all want to be on a par with the americans as they are ahead of us and we all think it looks better. i bet they went through this stage when they were growing up.