Exposure like this can blow your business up. I remember waiting in line for over half an hour for a gyro from a shop in the Cleveland's Westside Market and hearing the server talking about how things had exploded after being on "The Best Thing I Ever Ate". She was saying that they always sold through as much product as they could prep, usually hours before the market closes, She was talking like she almost regretted all the attention.
Thanks for posting this. My DVR is set.

Thanks for the heads-up....recording it now

Thanks for the post, love Directv's playback feature, I almost missed it!

Looks far from "best thing I ever ate"

Been there a few times as I travel to Omaha and to a small city about an hour West (past Wahoo) for work from time to time.

I feel bad for the mother. She seemed like a very nice lady.

I just missed the show but I have the DVR set for the next showing at Midnight tonight.

I played there once. Didn't eat anything though. Machines were in good order.

It was nice to see the kids playing at the end

They made the place look really nice, huge change since I was there last year. Looking forward to stopping by next time im home in the Big "O"!

I drive close to Surprise, Nebraska (not Arizona) when I'm there as well.

I can't speak for their food, but they have a great selection of pins. I dropped in twice during the holidays.

Yeah, yeah, yeah... but what about the watch selection?

Just a few blocks from me.
Went there afterwards - looks better but they did absolutely nothing about the noise. It gets LOUD in there and there is nothing to absorb the noise. Plus they got rid of the cheese bread off the menu - one of my favorites. Pizza tasted different... not better, not worse... just different.

Watched the re-air at midnight. Glad they kept the arcade, surprised the didn't build up the wall to cut down on the noise which was the hosts major complaint initially.

On my only 2 visits to Omaha I specifically went to Bene's for the arcade. Ordered pizza and drinks each time and thought it was good. Never had any of the other food items... now after watching this think I might have to include mushrooms next time!

Never seen this show before, for being on the food network I was surprised there was very little food content.

I also only live a couple blocks down the street...drive by there everyday to and from work. The place does look better, but like paulyb18 said...it should of been more about the food and not about the family disfunction (we can all see that on Thanksgiving when we see our relatives)! Hopefully this will give them a boost in sales (they were closed last night...probably because of the show).

So, how does it work on a show like this? Do you reach out to the show or does the show reach out to you in order to be on it?

You contact them.

http://www.restaurantimpossible.com/

The #6 combo is a supreme large pizza, 2-liter of coke, and a submariner Rolex.

It seemed like Kitchen Nightmares on a strict budget to me. Irvine didn't really address any issues aside from airing the family's dirty laundry and a horrible redcoration. That being said, I hope it works out well for the for the family.

I would think STERN PINBALL would want to partner up with them since they seem to have quite a few of their newer titles! Great Advertising!

I watched too, while it was interesting and I hope they turn it around,
being a pinhead I wish they would have shown more coverage of the arcade.

I agree that they could have closed in the arcade a little to cut down on the noise.
Nice to see a woz on location, working and clean.

Roberts right though. Cant run a business with ownership being all over the place. Friends, coworkers or family it has to be on the same page.
He is also right that a restaurant wont take off as an arcade. Love pinball but get that stuff out of the place!

I missed it but what was the place's issue that it needed to be on the show? I heard cash issues?

I thought their fries were spendy and nothing special. Pizza was ok. The arcade kinda brought the place togethor, gave local families a reason to go

An italian/pizza place just up the street from me had this show there recently to do their makeover.

We eat there regularly so we asked if the menu was going to change. They said the show would change it, but they were just doing it to get the free renovation and as soon as the show was gone the menu was going back to normal.

It has gone back to what it was. It was good, no reason to change that.

Stern may not want to do that since Jack himself proclaimed that Bene's is an "unauthorized" JJP distributor.

Funny story, but it's all pretty sad in 1999-2015 America- promoting yourself on a reality show. It's pathetic, really.

We go there pretty regularly. We've tapered off a bit, but still go in once in a while. We've only been there twice since the remodel.
I can't say that we were a huge fan of the remodel and the revamp. We loved the retro decor. What you don't see in the show is that they had a lot of 70's and 80's movie posters up. I'm guessing that they had to take them down before filming due to copyright?
The remodel just feels a bit hollow. They did need to get the pins out of the main restaurant area, which they did.
They did a lot of trickery with the menu. We actually loved their original cheese sticks. They replaced them with 'cheese planks' which are just some other kind of cheese stick that they smashed and sprinkled something on. You used to get 8 cheese sticks, now its 6 planks. I think our bill only changed by about 3 bucks their direction. They dropped medium pizzas and only do the large now, and now do a traditional cut instead of the square cut they were doing. Still unsure how the pizza measurements shook out, if the new large is their old medium or something. But I can respect that they needed to make some changes to keep the doors open.

At the end of the day, we still like going there. But its more about the pins than the food now. The last time we went was the only time we didn't eat and just went in to play pins. There aren't many places to play around here anymore. Bobby keeps the best selection of newer pins, while a place across town has about 10-12 older pins. When we go to the other place, there is almost never anyone else on the machines. (its a bowling alley). We favor Bene because Bobby keeps up with his machines. I've only seen one out of order one time. He gets new titles in pretty fast. All the recent Stern titles he's had in shortly after release. Bobby is the absolute nicest guy to talk to. I've seen some of the stuff people post here about him, and really don't know what he did to deserve it - but thats not been my experience with him at all.

I didn't know about any of the family drama. Which is actually a good thing. They are always professional. I hope they get it all worked out. I'd hate to see this place go away.

_{Post edited by TireFryer426: typo}

He has represented to the world he was a stern dealer and is/was NOT. I learned that the hard way. This is a small hobby and I doth care how bad you need money, don't rip people off.

Good things come to good people.

I asked because I was curious if his trying to buy and sell pins was one of the drains on the pizza place's cash flow.

I think Big John Billards and Beercade has a finer selection of pins, but they are bars...so maybe not the best place for kids.

The episode is being re-run on the Food Network Saturday (Feb. 21) from 2 to 3 PM.

Business MUST be good, there was a walking dead, a star trek LE and a wizard of oz, all three made long after the recession of 2008.

I found that to be incredibly odd based upon the context of the episode.

I also love that when he turns everything off at the circuit breaker, they play "boop" sound of a pinball machine booting (how is that possible if you just cut the power?)

Some screenshots:
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I like Bene's, they have good food (except the cheese bread is now gone..boooo!). WTF are Cheese planks?
The noise there is awful - and a lot of that noise is from other diners. They really need something to absorb the noise and not amplify and reflect it.
New remodel makes it look a bit drab. I liked the walls full of old movie posters. Didn't like the pins in the restaurant, though -- seems that only "grumpy" people sat at the tables near them and complained when you played those machines. Plus I sucked at playing IM anyways.

Other issues - their location leaves something to be desired. Although they're easy to get to from Maple street (one of the main roads) - they are still off the beaten path. Most restaurants are near 156th and 168th, nothing other than businesses at 120th except for the 'we are never open' restaurant two doors to the west from them.
AND - their skinny parking lot SUCKS. More than once we decided go to Bene's and the lot was overflowing - gave up and went elsewhere. Small parking lot shared with a Karate type school and the we are never open restaurant. When there's an event at the karate school, forget parking.

For me - big Johns is a bit out of the way (I know ... that's a pretty minor issue). They have a good selection of machines but don't maintain them as well as those at Bene's. Never been to Beercade - gotta try them someday.

Ed

You don't need cash to buy new pins.

No, you don't, but it would be a pretty poor business choice to charge nearly $20k in credit when your business has already been losing money for over 4 years.

I wish I had something similar to Bene's near me. The Arcade is about 1.25 hours away, which is doable but not conducive to a random spur of the moment trip. A pizza place with pins would be awesome. Need to track down a rerun of this and watch. Good luck to Bene, hope it works well.

In Omaha for work and just stopped by this place. I was really impressed. Most of the Sterns are LE's. I actually had never played an X Men LE until my visit today. And my favorite - a Williams IJ. Was the nicest one I have ever seen. Almost seemed to be too nice to be on location. The owner is clearly passionate about pinball!

I thought the same thing when I first dropped in, this was before the remodel. Nicest pins i've played on location anywhere.

+1 on the IJ.

Watching it now. I haven't seen anyone offer to sell Robert a Rolex yet.

Just watched this. Best of luck @BenePinballs!! Hope I can make it back to OMA soon enough. Hope you retained Robert's dishes. That chicken parm broccolini looks awesome.

Just googled this place since I am going to Omaha for work and it looks like it is now closed. That's a shame. Wonder what they did with their pins. That IJ was the nicest I have ever seen.