Soo .... I'm just trying to extrapolate on a recent Pinside Poll I started regarding what folks could afford annually in regards to their annual "pinball budget". https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/poll-nib-games-what-can-you-afford
After 200 votes, the results are:
45%: Simply cannot afford a pin at 6k or higher
20%: Can afford one pin at 6k or less
11%: Can afford one pin at 8k or less
7%: Can afford 1-2 pins (roughly a $15k budget annually)
17%: Can afford as many games as they want as long as they love the game/theme
I tend to think many people who are actively interested in pinball and will consider buying a new pinball machine in the next year (or in any given year) are on Pinside (albeit not necessarily as active as others on Pinside.) BUT ... in the spirit of being conservative ... let's say that just 1 in 50 people who "may" want to purchase a NIB pinball this year were on Pinside in the last few days and particiapted in this poll. So for every 1 person active on Pinside I'm suggesting there are 49 others either not on Pinside (or did not participate in the poll) or who simply aren't a pinhead and may just buy a game for their gameroom OR are an operator and make up some number of that 49. Seem like a somewhat reasonable approximation? So that would mean there are possibly 10,000 pinheads and/or people considering buying a NIB game for their home (or business or route) this year. That would work out to roughly ...
4500 folks who simply cannot afford a 6K+ pinball game
2000 folks who can afford only a 6K pinball game at most
1100 folks who can buy at most 1 game at 8K
700 folks who buy 1-2 games (or roughly a 15k pinball budget)
1700 folks who could potentially buy more than 2 pins at 8K or more
I don't think we've really ever had 2 new 8K titles come out at roughly the same time but I suppose it's possible this year with the release of Hobbit in December and (hopefully) the announcement/release of Stern's newest title (TWD?). I think it will be interesting because ..
At best ... given these conservative numbers ... there are potentially only 3500 people who could afford an 8K game (and yes, of those 3500, maybe 500 people/games are OP's).
JJP is obviously trying to sell 1500 Hobbit LE's whose price now stands at $8,000.
Stern will likely announce an LE version on their next title and if it's like ST there could be around 800 of them at $8,000.
Now then ... there are a half dozen other "boutique" shops taking pre-orders on 8K+ games in 2015.
My thoughts/conclusions:
- There simply aren't enough folks who can afford 8K+ games - and i don't think operators are too keen on buying too many games at 8K+ either
- I think this explains a lot in regards to the limited sales of Hobbit to date (albeit yes, many more may order/buy when the game is released and shipping)
- The sweet spot in pricing seems to be around $5500-$6000 for a game
- Stern has an advantage in offering games (like Iron Man VE) at sub 5K prices. Nobody else is offering games in this price range. Stern still owns the market in this price range.
Which company/boutique shop closes it's doors first? Which one changes their busines model to sell more affordable games? What else does this say about the future of pinball? Thoughts??