BallReviews
General Category => Miscellaneous => Topic started by: txbowler on November 27, 2012, 10:35:30 AM
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I think if you asked bowlers why they bowled league, they answer was to win the league and make a profit. And by a profit, they mean cover their costs of lineage and prize fund paid during the league year.
Now, as we all know, lineage has probably doubled, tripled or more over the past 20 years. League fees and prize funds have not.
So in previous decades, you had a $15 league where $5 went to lineage and $10 went to the prize fund. Well in today's prices, that same league probably pays close to $10 in lineage. So the league fees would need to jump to $20 a week just to be at same level as they were in the previous decade.
However, you are now paying $5 more per week or approx $170 (34 weeks x $5) a season and getting back the exact same prize fund. Less bowlers are being profitable. More bowlers are losing money and eventually quitting.
The work leagues that existed in the 80's and 90's have gone away for the most part leaving fun leagues and money leagues, but the money leagues are going away as it is it harder and harder to make a profit. Thus the bowler loses interest.
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Most leagues you don't even get 70% of what you put back in if you win the league.
I've bowled in many a league where if you won, you were not even close to what you paid in total.
I look to win back the amount I put out in prize fund. The lineage is what it is and you got something for it, 3 games of bowling. The prize fund on the other hand is the gambling money on you and your team. I like to at least cover that with league winnings.
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Try that here in the Dallas area with the competitive bowlers and you'll get an empty league. The competitive bowler's in the area that I know of, bowl for profit including their lineage. In some leagues, that profit may come through side action and brackets, but they aren't there if there's not a profit potential at the end of the league.
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Linage is too high to bowl for profit here. We are are $20 to $25 in some leagues and there are not enough teams to have a large enough prize fund.
I bowl in a 16 team 5 person league that pays $17 a week and to win the league you get $165 - $185 per man.
Put $600 in and get $165 - $185 back out.
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If leagues only exist for the bowlers to make a profit, then it is impossible for them to continue since not everyone can profit. From my experience, the main reasons leagues exist is to have an organized competition between bowlers where you can bowl with friends while having a few beers if you desire. As a small bonus, if you do well enough you might break even at year end. Bowlers who are in leagues looking for profit are the minority and are not the cause of leagues declining.
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If leagues only exist for the bowlers to make a profit, then it is impossible for them to continue since not everyone can profit. From my experience, the main reasons leagues exist is to have an organized competition between bowlers where you can bowl with friends while having a few beers if you desire. As a small bonus, if you do well enough you might break even at year end. Bowlers who are in leagues looking for profit are the minority and are not the cause of leagues declining.
True, not everyone can make a profit or break even. But, when lineage was cheaper, more bowlers came closer to that. As lineage as increased, more league bowlers lose more money. I'm not talking about fun beer leagues and mixed leagues. Those seem to do ok in some areas of the country. But the competitive leagues are where the drop off is happening in my opinion.
I hear it around the area in the leagues I am bowling for bowlers who bowl. I am not bowling this league next year because I don't make any money in this league.
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I think the money is the big issue with some league members. Why not keep the costs low as possible. Charge for lineage, secretary costs, and a banquet (if your league still does that). Those that want to bowl for money can create brackets and any kind of side action they want each week. Those that don't stay out and enjoy their bowling. W
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I think the money is the big issue with some league members. Why not keep the costs low as possible. Charge for lineage, secretary costs, and a banquet (if your league still does that). Those that want to bowl for money can create brackets and any kind of side action they want each week. Those that don't stay out and enjoy their bowling. W
Interesting post. So in a typical league in a house with $3.50 a game league lineage, that's $10.50 a night, plus say 50 cents for secretary fee so that's $11.
You have one group of bowlers who want costs kept down, so with it, $1 prize fund and $12 a week, you lose the bowlers who want a prize fund and quit because there's no money to be made by winning the league therefore costing too much.
Then you have the other group who cannot afford $20 a week so they quit because the league costs too much
And therefore, one way or the other, league bowling declines because it costs too much.
Then I guess I have my answer. League bowling is declining because of the increased cost over the years.
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I agree prize fund amounts have not kept up when compared to total cost. But what you also see are leagues with not enough competitive bowlers to vote a prize fund system that would give the league champion a chance to break even. I bowled in one league that had a league rule stating at least 60% of the prize fund MUST BE POINT MONEY.
I also bowl in a men's league (you would assume was "competitive") that never votes for a prize fund that would put a higher amount of the prize money to the higher placing teams.
The problem is bowlers don't want to be shut out. Bowlers want to walk away with something, so they will continue to vote in prize funds that distribute the money across all members in a way where the winners of the league cannot come close to breaking even.
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Combine what Txbowler has theorized, with the increased cost of gas,food,etc... and you get alot less people finding league bowling affordable. Not only is bowling more expensive but eating & drinking at the lanes has gone up considerably. In days long past most people had enough time and money to get home from work (eat quick dinner) or eat at the lanes (cause it was affordable) and head to the lanes for a nice affordable night out with the guys/gals. I also think the commitment to bowling 28-36 weeks has been a deciding factor nowadays.
I bowl 1 night a week (down from 2-3 in yrs past)
$25 per night, bowl 4 games ($7.00 lineage, $18 prize fund, no sec/tres fee)
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The mention of the past or the good old days as we like to call them. I recall few leagues where bowlers really cared about the money. It was the competition and love of the game. This would also be when averaging 190 was considered great and an 1800 all events in a tournament won you good money. Ah, the good old days....:-)
Txbowler and I bowl the same league. Small house that is a half hour drive from Dallas. We had 16 five man teams just a couple years ago and now 9 teams of trios. Oh, last year was 14 teams so this is in one year. We still don't know what happened, but the most common denominator appears to be money. Lack of trust regarding side action, the same teams dominating every year and to keep the top teams interested the league is heavy to the top side on prize fund. Had a couple teams with financial issues that were forced to forfeit points last year, so quite this year. Combine that with the high fuel prices last August and it became real easy to just go somewhere else or just not bowl. This was a highly competitive league where from the 80 bowlers there were as many as 1/4 on a given night that either were current or past members of the PBA and in some cases tour guys would sub in on teams occasionally. Not bad for a 16 lane center. Since the center tries to keep lineage down best they can, majority of weekly fees goes to the prize fund and add $100 a team for franchise and wasn't too bad. Strke fund ran into a lot of money and generated the majority of complaining if one team got more shots than another, even though there was a big difference in money spent weekly by those teams or bowlers. Rambling, but just an example of a league that has been affected by whatever the current mentality is compared to the past.
So, fact is today it is all about the money and if I don't get mine then maybe someone cheated? I hope if this is the trend it changes sooner than later. I bowl the league and am the secretary, so guess I am going to get a little extra, but I just like bowling with the guys on my team and against guys like Txbowler. We also travel to tournaments together and our two teams have won our share of league titles and a few tournaments. Hard part is once they have gone, how do you convince them to come back and how do you get the few that stayed to give it time so you can try and get others back to the league next season?
What can a center really do...advertise? where? the local bowling paper is only read by a part of the league bowlers and they are already bowling. Most new teams and bowlers are actually recruited by other bowlers and word of mouth. If bowlers talk about how great a league is, then others want in. If negative talk starts then it just runs off the ones on the fence and keeps new bowlers away. Its a tough question. But the league issues and bowling decline in general kind or run together into a big problem if your league is the one on the decline.
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I also bowl in a 16 lane house in east TX. The men's league gets smaller by the year.
Same teams win most year and are heavily stacked. When I lived in Vegas most leagues had a team cap. Some years you had to trade the players around to stay under the cap. Seamed to work to keep the teams some what even . And the leagues stayed full . Maybe houses should look it this way to try to give more teams a chance to win . You might not be able to bowl with the same 5 guys every season. but it might help keep teams even and leagues full .
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I bowl in a Monday morning league with very low cost linage, yet the areas of concern for league health seem to be the side action and the end of year payout. What the majority of the league does not seem to realize (or they do, but it doesn't click) is that only the top two or three teams (out of 16) are the only ones who come close to making all their money back, plus a little. Also, side action has seen a slow, but steady decrease, during the past three seasons.
The idea I bring up every year in the league meeting (which is laughed at and shot down) is that we should drop the cost of the league to just cover linage and secretary/treasurer's pay. For example, say we paid $21/week to bowl (no side action included) and of that $8 was to bowl and $0.50 was for sec/treas. My suggestion is to drop the weekly fees from $21 to $10. For a 33 week season, that is a savings of $363 a season for each bowler and more than 75% of the league would recoup at year's end. But, that "money at year's end" stigma is the way it's been done "forever" and there's no need to change (that's what I hear).
Now, my contention is that with lower weekly costs, it could be easier to advertise the league, the league could have a higher competition to cost ratio, and more bowlers could get into the side action pots. These advantages might not pan out, but an attempt should at least be made. They won't even try it for a half-season and see if the lower cost benefits pan out.
I just like to bowl for the fun, beer, friends, and competition. That combination seems to be in the majority for this area.
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I bowl in a Monday morning league with very low cost linage, yet the areas of concern for league health seem to be the side action and the end of year payout. What the majority of the league does not seem to realize (or they do, but it doesn't click) is that only the top two or three teams (out of 16) are the only ones who come close to making all their money back, plus a little. Also, side action has seen a slow, but steady decrease, during the past three seasons.
The idea I bring up every year in the league meeting (which is laughed at and shot down) is that we should drop the cost of the league to just cover linage and secretary/treasurer's pay. For example, say we paid $21/week to bowl (no side action included) and of that $8 was to bowl and $0.50 was for sec/treas. My suggestion is to drop the weekly fees from $21 to $10. For a 33 week season, that is a savings of $363 a season for each bowler and more than 75% of the league would recoup at year's end. But, that "money at year's end" stigma is the way it's been done "forever" and there's no need to change (that's what I hear).
Now, my contention is that with lower weekly costs, it could be easier to advertise the league, the league could have a higher competition to cost ratio, and more bowlers could get into the side action pots. These advantages might not pan out, but an attempt should at least be made. They won't even try it for a half-season and see if the lower cost benefits pan out.
I just like to bowl for the fun, beer, friends, and competition. That combination seems to be in the majority for this area.
Reducing the cost to just lineage and expenses seems like a good way to increase the side action. After all, the bowlers will have more money to "gamble" with, so why not. But in reality, I bet most of the bowlers who don't get into side pots don't because they can't compete. All this does is give the better bowlers more money from side pots and the rest of the league now gets nothing instead of something at the end of the year. But if it works as you say, then I will say I was wrong.
In my men's league, I am usually in the top 5 in average and can't compete in the side pots. I don't even break even. So why would I put an extra $15 into side pots only to lose that money also?
Perhaps there are just too many leagues. At my center (40 lane house) some nights there are 3 or 4 DIFFERENT leagues going on at the same time. They all start within 15 minutes of each other. WHY ARE WE DOING THIS???
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I bowl in a saturday league in a 60 lane house. We currently fill the lanes (5 person team 60 teams). What I have noticed is 3-4 years ago, there was a waiting list to get in the league. Before that a very long waiting list(have heard people waiting 2-3 seasons to get in). Now, even though we fill the house, there is a periodic request from secretary if a person can be found to fill out a team and the waiting list has pretty much dropped to zero. There is plenty of side action (what I think keeps most coming back).
I myself have cut back to only 1 league this year due to finances. I really do enjoy the sport but can not afford $20+ dollars a league for 2-3 leagues, especially since the wife and kids bowl league also. When all is said and done we are paying $60 a week for 36 weeks. Not bad by some standards I guess but it is all I can afford.
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My Theory on the Decline of League Bowling;
Money, money, money, money!
Oh, and greed!
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Is it really fair to think that you should make a "profit" from bowling. You are going into a business, using their equipment for 2-3 hours each week. Would you expect to go the movies for free? Would you expect to go to a batting cage for free?
In the past, maybe that was possible, and I think that set a wrong expectation. There is always a cost for doing something. I think people need to look at are the making a profit on the amount they are paying to the prize fund every week. That is the additional money over the cost of playing. They used to run golf "leagues" where I grew up in PA during the summer. In that situation would you expect to make enough to play golf for free? The answer was no...they expected to pay greens fees, reduced fees from if they were playing on their own, but they expected to pay. Bowlers need to get over the fact that there is a cost for bowling. If you look at what you paid into the prize fund for the year, did you get back more than that. Also, how many teams should be above that criteria? Should it be just the winning team, the top 5, the top half? I think bowlers also have unrealistic expectations on how many teams should "win", or make a profit. I think there needs to be a shift in attitudes and expectations.....but as we all know, as bowlers that is almost impossible to acheive.
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Is it really fair to think that you should make a "profit" from bowling. You are going into a business, using their equipment for 2-3 hours each week. Would you expect to go the movies for free? Would you expect to go to a batting cage for free?
In the past, maybe that was possible, and I think that set a wrong expectation. There is always a cost for doing something. I think people need to look at are the making a profit on the amount they are paying to the prize fund every week. That is the additional money over the cost of playing. They used to run golf "leagues" where I grew up in PA during the summer. In that situation would you expect to make enough to play golf for free? The answer was no...they expected to pay greens fees, reduced fees from if they were playing on their own, but they expected to pay. Bowlers need to get over the fact that there is a cost for bowling. If you look at what you paid into the prize fund for the year, did you get back more than that. Also, how many teams should be above that criteria? Should it be just the winning team, the top 5, the top half? I think bowlers also have unrealistic expectations on how many teams should "win", or make a profit. I think there needs to be a shift in attitudes and expectations.....but as we all know, as bowlers that is almost impossible to acheive.
Absolutely agree with this assessment. I hear all the time that it cost $xxx per year to bowl. I think some people don't even know what they actually put into the prize fund and can not separate the two "fees" of lineage & prize fund.
With the cost of doing business these days, there is no way possible to bring the lineage down to what it "used" to be.
One of my leagues we put in $402.50 into the actual prize fund, last year we finished in 5th place and I came home with more than that. My other league we put in $385, I came home with over $500 finishing in 2nd and 14th in each of the halves. Both of these leagues a pretty evenly spread money wise, so i'm guessing first place made a decent "profit" on their contribution to the "prize" money
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Is it really fair to think that you should make a "profit" from bowling. You are going into a business, using their equipment for 2-3 hours each week. Would you expect to go the movies for free? Would you expect to go to a batting cage for free?
In the past, maybe that was possible, and I think that set a wrong expectation. There is always a cost for doing something. I think people need to look at are the making a profit on the amount they are paying to the prize fund every week. That is the additional money over the cost of playing. They used to run golf "leagues" where I grew up in PA during the summer. In that situation would you expect to make enough to play golf for free? The answer was no...they expected to pay greens fees, reduced fees from if they were playing on their own, but they expected to pay. Bowlers need to get over the fact that there is a cost for bowling. If you look at what you paid into the prize fund for the year, did you get back more than that. Also, how many teams should be above that criteria? Should it be just the winning team, the top 5, the top half? I think bowlers also have unrealistic expectations on how many teams should "win", or make a profit. I think there needs to be a shift in attitudes and expectations.....but as we all know, as bowlers that is almost impossible to acheive.
I agree bowlers shouldn't "expect" to win back all of the money put into the year. But for me, a good judge of prize fund distribution I feel is fair is if the 1st place team does win back their money. Obviously, not everyone will win the league. And hopefully, not everyone "expects to win the league. But if no one wants to take the challenge and chances to make more than they put in with the possibility to take home a lot less, then bowl a league with no prize fund.
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This came up about 4 years ago during a league meeting. The winning team was getting something like $5 more per man that the last place team to "make it fair". A small percentage of the league wanted to raise the weekly fees(prize fund) to allow for more return at the end of the year. I suggested that we just eliminate the prize fund altogether, which everyone thought was crazy. I think the winning team was getting like $65 a person. I did the math and it came out to like $10 more than what you paid INTO THE PRIZE FUND. $10 whole dollars. Yet, NOBODY but me saw the logic in eliminating the prize fund.
But, what can you expect when in the same league, you have 160 and under bowlers voting against increasing the handicap percentage.
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This is true. I play hockey and in leagues. A fall league for example is 16 weeks and costs anywhere from $350-$450. If your team wins the league, you get a trophy. No money, nothing else. You are paying for the ice time and the officials.
Could you imagine bowling leagues operating like that? Would a $10 per week league pull in more teams with no prize fund over a $20 per week league where you make back some money?
These are the questions that need answering.
Is it really fair to think that you should make a "profit" from bowling. You are going into a business, using their equipment for 2-3 hours each week. Would you expect to go the movies for free? Would you expect to go to a batting cage for free?
In the past, maybe that was possible, and I think that set a wrong expectation. There is always a cost for doing something. I think people need to look at are the making a profit on the amount they are paying to the prize fund every week. That is the additional money over the cost of playing. They used to run golf "leagues" where I grew up in PA during the summer. In that situation would you expect to make enough to play golf for free? The answer was no...they expected to pay greens fees, reduced fees from if they were playing on their own, but they expected to pay. Bowlers need to get over the fact that there is a cost for bowling. If you look at what you paid into the prize fund for the year, did you get back more than that. Also, how many teams should be above that criteria? Should it be just the winning team, the top 5, the top half? I think bowlers also have unrealistic expectations on how many teams should "win", or make a profit. I think there needs to be a shift in attitudes and expectations.....but as we all know, as bowlers that is almost impossible to acheive.
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How tired and old this topic is. If you're looking to make money or a "profit" from bowling league, you're not very bright. As said before, leagues are an organized way to have teams compete for a "championship". Money is and always should be an after-thought. You want to make money, that's what pots are for.
What ruined leagues? Nothing. Just the lower average bowler getting wise to the higher average sharks dipping into their wallets every week.
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How tired and old this topic is. If you're looking to make money or a "profit" from bowling league, you're not very bright. As said before, leagues are an organized way to have teams compete for a "championship". Money is and always should be an after-thought. You want to make money, that's what pots are for.
What ruined leagues? Nothing. Just the lower average bowler getting wise to the higher average sharks dipping into their wallets every week.
Hey Daddy. You have your opinion, but you'll find just as many people who think the sandbaggers dip into the higher average sharks is also a problem.
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The one thing any league needs that has a prize fund is "donators". If your donators, quit, then the league dies. The key to any league is to keep the donators coming back.
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Jesus. Who cares about this crap? Bowlers whine about more stuff than in any other sport. Who the hell plays hardball or softball in league with hopes of getting rich? Do golfers bitch as much about $300 drivers as much as bowlers bitch about $175 dollar balls? How about those $350 bats, Joe?
People who bitch about USBC are the ones that can't even be bothered to go to their annual league meeting before the start of the season. They just sit back and let everybody else setup everything up so they can come in, shoe up, bowl, bitch about there's too much oil or too lttle oil without once trying different hand position or spot on the lane, then leave. They bitch about getting jobbed for $19 every year, they piss that away every month on lottery tickets that don't return a dime.
There's more than enough tournaments one can compete in if one is looking to make money. There's more than enough leagues to find one that will suit what you're looking for. If you don't like the way bowling is going, volunteer to coach or help coach the high school team or other youth bowlers. Show them the right way to do it, tell them what bowling used to be and should be about.
Do anything you want but for crying out loud, stop bitching about it! "I hate the conditions", "I hate the cost", "I hate the USBC", "I hate the league rules", "I can't make enough money bowling in a recreational sport", blah, blah, blah. Notice all the "I can'ts" in there? That's the problem with bowling. Give it a rest.
Hopefully that makes it clearer for you.
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Daddy,
You may not care, or you may be tired of reading about this, but you did choose to read this topic. There are bowlers and people who read this board who do care and are looking for ideas to help grow leagues, tournaments etc. There are people who lives in parts of the country that cannot find leagues or tournaments of their choosing. So maybe they look here for ideas, or for other people's mistakes not to repeat or ideas to start on their own.
If people quit because they were mistreated and want to whine about when asked; they were asked. They didn't start a topic that said I'm going to whine about bowling.
Thanks for participating!
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Perhaps you can explain to me how coming on to a ball reviews site is helping solve any of the "problems" facing bowlers. You're comment about jackpot "feeders" tells me all I need to know about your particular perspective. You go on and beat this dead horse. Not interested.
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Perhaps you can explain to me how coming on to a ball reviews site is helping solve any of the "problems" facing bowlers. You're comment about jackpot "feeders" tells me all I need to know about your particular perspective. You go on and beat this dead horse. Not interested.
Actually there was a post about a league that grew with a new format that I myself had never heard of that sounded interesting that I may bring up at the next league meeting.
As for me personally, I am usually a donator at tournaments and side action but I still compete so don't try to judge me by my comments on this board. I am one to play devil's advocate just to get a good debate or conversation going.
Conversation and debate may discuss and rehash 1000 bad ideas, but if one good idea comes out of it, then in my opinion it was worth it. If I had to guess, you would disagree.
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How tired and old this topic is. If you're looking to make money or a "profit" from bowling league, you're not very bright. As said before, leagues are an organized way to have teams compete for a "championship". Money is and always should be an after-thought. You want to make money, that's what pots are for.
What ruined leagues? Nothing. Just the lower average bowler getting wise to the higher average sharks dipping into their wallets every week.
Bingo, we have a winner here...
Today in bowling there are two types of bowlers...
People who win POTS...And donators...
And most who win are the under 30 types who have ball speed...And drink beer...
So the house caters the shot to their style...
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to much drama. men chasing league members wives. price keeps going up on everything. and the winning amount is staying the same.
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Someone was referring to my posting about our new league format
"Actually there was a post about a league that grew with a new format that I myself had never heard of that sounded interesting that I may bring up at the next league meeting."
Since last season our league went to a progressive scoring system. In this system you are not directly bowling head to head with the other team on your pair , but the whole league each game. We have 32 teams in our league an How it works is after each game the team with the highest total pins for that game get 32 points and 2nd most 31 etc. down to the 1 point for the lowest handicap team game. After the 3 games are done we get points for total wood also, 32 for most pins down to 1 for lest total pins for the night.
I had never heard of or participated in a league like this before, and it is different from what I had been used to , but I like bowling in a "big" league better than when we got down to 16 teams a few years back.
Now if I could only win the strike jackpot which is up to over 1200 bucks currently....oh well
Brad
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to much drama. men chasing league members wives. price keeps going up on everything. and the winning amount is staying the same.
What??? What city do you bowl in? No one around here brings their wife
to the bowling...{ except for mixed leagues }...
So the only chasing I see are married men chasing single hot babes that hang out
in the bar...lol
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I stopped bowling this year.
$20 per week. $12-13 of that was lineage.
35 weeks.
That's $700 per year. I think we got around $80 back.
So basically I paid $620 for 105 games. That's close to $6 per game.
Add in another $10 for food. Another $5-10 for drinks.
It's supposed to be about having fun and some competition, but I got tired of hearing this every week - "guys, we have to stay on pace. We start at 6:15-6:20 and we HAVE to be done at 9:00. The center needs the lanes for the $10 all you can bowl customers...it's in our contract!"
If the center is going to charge our league $12-13 for lineage and then rush us out for the high school and college kids to come in and chuck house balls down the lane, they can have them.
I used to say that I could spend my $20 per week going up there and practice bowling and get at least twice the amount of games, but they raised their open bowling rates to around $5 on the weekend, and I think almost $4 during the week.
Ceiling tiles are still dirty and stained....same with the carpet. Paint is still dingy. Lanes, seats, tables, scorers and everything else are still from the late 80s or early 90s. TV still has crappy reception. Employees are still lazy and act like you are bothering them.
Haven't bowled since the end of last season.
Every once in a while my kids ask about going bowling on the weekends. It's cheaper to take them to the movies or Chuck E. Cheese. It would take right around an hour to bowl 3 games and cost me at least $50-60 (more if they charge for the kid's shoes) for the bowling and another $20+ for food......for an hour!