Ron I am in Montreal and i have talked with you in your forum a few times, and nice to see your writing for 7-10 split magazine as well. Welcome! I will share a few methods we have used to bring high school bowlers to our centre.
A private school close by the centre comes in every tuesday morning at 10 am and has students bowl for 45 minutes. we give them 10$ per lane with shoes included for the students. they come in bowl for 45 minutes and then hang around, and eat food at the resto. it's easy quick cash for us and they don't complain much thankfully. also this season we will be doing the same. but instead we are teaming up with the school's athletic dept and students can now pick bowling, swimming or weight training as alternatives to standard gym classes. this way just showing up and bowling earns them credits for gym and they don't have to wear the shorts, or run laps lol. many of the girls have picked this alternative. on average we have about 80 students bowling, each we it's a different grade. also we host many day camps in the slow summer months so we never have a slow season.so we have about many 45 kids of various ages show up and bowl for a bit and we provide them with an area to store there bags and eat lunch. we have 4 party rooms which serve many purposes. for the day camps, also for many childrens birthday parties as well.
my centre features:
72 lanes(36 ten pin , 36 duckpin lanes)
4 themed party rooms,
large arcade( loud too, about 1200 square feet)
large bar(1200square feet, bar is closed when the students bowl)
a large billard hall, 1800square ft)
and we are five minutes from chinatown and all the major attractions and night life.
we are also open 24/7 and we never close at all. in 12 years since this ownership group took over we have not closed once. restaurant services, the arcade and bowling is avaible at all times.
we do have leagues but they have stay steady for the last 5 years or so. but open play has doubled.
Thanks, and by the way i do night shift and you would be surprised by the number of people that want to bowl at 4 or 5 am .lol
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Visionary bowler, I see the future!
Tim Thompson, Visionary Bowling Products Proshop staff For Canada.
