LTG : ) Show back Friday night. 10pm please.

LTG : )

This was our first time at EXPO. For us we enjoyed the show a lot. There are some things that I think could improve the overall experience. Being new to the show we were unaware of all the different times things were open and closed. Maybe put signs that clearly state when things are open so we could better get a handle on things? We arrived very early Friday morning around 3:35AM and paid the $25.00 to get in the game room and at 6:00AM we were told we had to purchase another $25.00 pass. If things were explained more clearly, or the hours stated clearly, we wouldn't have been so upset. The other thing was have some carts or dolly's available for people that do purchase games. It was difficult to do without. Had they been readily available, we would have left our game until early Sunday Morning when we left for home.

Thanks

1). Have games available in the Free Play area during the day. Having this area open at 6pm was my biggest single complaint about Expo this year.

2) Arrange to have pin shipping available for anyone that wants to buy a pin at the show. I read somewhere that shipping was available, but none of the sellers seemed to know about it.

3) Get Staples or some office supply house to sell tubes for translites and boxes and tape for parts. I bought far less than I wanted to because there were no packing materials available. I did end up going to the post office, but it was such a hassle that I won't do that again. Go one step further and provide a central packing/shipping service. I wasn't the only person that wanted this. Chances are, if you don't drive to Expo you'll want to ship stuff home.

4) Set up some round table sessions for general discussion on specific topics - advice, tips, etc. have a moderator, but not just presentation/question format. Maybe have a Friday lunch set up like the banquet where people can just talk among table mates.

5) Find some way to encourage vendors to provide better Expo specific deals. Give everyone some "funny money" as part of the Expo package only good in the vendor area, either specific dollar values or % off coupons. Offer some sort of Groupon-type deal where cost is split with the vendors.

6) Beef up the auction. It almost seemed to be an after thought. Provide a catalog/list of the major items in advance. Have some items on silent bid throughout the show. This will allow people to plan (and go to the bank if needed). Make it clear if it is cash only or if checks and/or cards are OK. I would have gladly bid on more items, but I didn't have enough cash to do so (though I was very happy with what I won). Raising over $16k for Make A Wish was wonderful, but you should have been able to hit $50K easily.

7) Get Stern to do an official Q&A show, much like Jack did with JJP. Doesn't have to be just Gary (and probably shouldn't be just Gary, as everyone will just expect him to announce something major). Maybe this year people would have just vented about unfinished code, but the lack of any type of official session really upset a LOT of people.

News on Star Trek was expected at the Launch Party, but there was no "launch", just the same machines moved from the free play area. If I was marketing for Expo or Stern, I would want some sort of talk/presentation and swag (other than a flyer) available or even raffled. T-shirts, posters, etc. Stern branded, co-branded whatever. A wonderful opportunity to market to the target audience most likely to buy/play/promote/evangelize a new pinball was simply squandered.

Both the Expo and major vendors are major draws. Have someone that understands marketing market.

8). Have some sort of daily news update sheet posted in a prominent place. Use it to squash rumors or for vendors to make announcements.

Game hall open as much as possible with volunteer techs.

Seems that aside from the games area, which I personally thought was fine, people want you and Pinball Life to get things settled. If Rob Anthony doesn't attend next year, that's at least a 1/4 less new parts stock. Marco doesn't bring anything but trusses, banners and several Sterns to shows it seems. Nothing wrong with that but they're a major parts source. I'd expect more that Super Bands.

And if there's any way to convince retailers (Pincades, GAP, etc.) to have the games they have for sale on the exhibit floor instead of in the vendor hall, that would be nice. Pincades had some in the hall, but they were pretty junky (and I'm not talking title wise). The decent stuff was not open to those who were not looking to drop major coin.

Big thanks to you, Rob Berk, & team. I know I had a good time!

I would also say, the EXPO deserves a MUCH better website with lots more information available. I will manage and take care of the website for free if you reach out to me Mike.

One thing for me is maybe not starting stuff so early in the morning? Since the free play room is open at night and many of us like to play late into the night, having stuff start super early is a bit brutal. I survived but stuff starting a lil bit later would be great. This was my first year though and I had a great time!

What game is being remade next year? Please advance notice.

I wish the vendor hall had earlier hours.
Better tech team for down games.
Hot Masseuses with chairs selling 20min massages for $25
They would make a killing.
And if there was proper drink vendor that would be great.

The lack of food and drinks was terrible. We never found even a soda.

Open at noon on Friday and lower entry cost

policano: yes, I definitely missed the soda pop guy this year! I'd buy several every year to stay quenched and was surprised not to see him there.
D

More big lebowski babes in short little bowling skirts walking around with the twin peaks girls - make this happen everyday.

D

Onsite snack/drink vendors.
Doors open to freeplay area more often.
More tech help in the freeplay area (have qualified visitors sign up for shifts as simple tech help to do things like free stuck balls)
Fewer games behind tables in the exhibit hall.
More vendors with parts for sale. I came looking for many things, and left with very little of what I was looking for.

Good onsite signage is always appreciated. IE in front of each major area. Of course, this should be on the website as well.

Exhibit Hall hours...
Free Play hours...

Thanks

problem with this is most people wont be giving their keys to people they dont know. I'll let friends have keys since I know them and their skill, but not just anyone.

I arrived Friday night around 630pm, and parking was insane. I am not sure if there could be any offsite lots with shuttle options, but the parking lot was 100% full, including the neighboring lots. Cars were being parked in the middle of drive aisles because there were no conceivable spaces left, legal or illegal. After driving for about 10 minutes through a full lot with dozens of other cars racing for spaces, I finally parked illegally. I figured a ticket would just have to be part of the cost of going to expo this year. (I didn't get a ticket)

Nevermind

I would like you to apoint someone who can put together 12 good working machines and put them in there own room for different types of small tournaments. I know you think there is already plenty of competition going on but it is becoming a very big part of pinball's resurgence and most shows have more tournaments then your's.

This is how it should be, IMHO. Like valet parking. Keys for games in the freeplay hall should be checked in to some kind of a secured location so that they can be available as needed to get games back to working, unless owners really want to hang out with their games the whole weekend.

MGC's game hall did really well with a volunteer staff watching over things. I know Mike isn't a big fan of volunteer staff, but it seems like something should be tried.

Right.

I'm not talking about letting volunteers loose with a soldering iron to replace board components...

But having the keys in an area that would allow someone to remove the glass to fix a stuck ball, or to tighten up a loose or stuck flipper bat? That doesn't seem outrageous at all.

I do agree with concessions of some sort. There should be a concession stand selling specifically food and beverage, even if it was only snack related food. It would be better than nothing.

I've not been to expo, so take this with a grain of salt.

I think the "fix-it" room, and the maintenance volunteers at these kind of events is an awesome idea. I would be willing to donate 2 hours of my time at these things to keep games running and even kind of give a running commentary as I fix things. I'm not the best out there, but I'd be willing to help.

Fun contests would be neat too, like a flipper rebuild speed competition, or an on-site design workshop where people get together and do the concept for a pin in the session.

I agree as a vendor we had no clue what time was open and what time is closed. This vendor hall open all night is the dumbest thing I have ever heard. I think the hours for vendors should be as followed:

Thursday 5pm to 10pm
Friday 5pm to 11pm
Saturday 10am to 4pm then 6pm to midnight (closed and load out for all the vendors and are driving theses 6 to 11 hours drives).

Also, open the Exhibitor Hall on time Saturday when you say it's going to open. If the guy's on the microphone in the next room can't get it done in the times allotted then unplug the mic! The hallways were full while someone ran around telling everyone to be quite and was being rude.

STRONGLY AGREE! I MEAN STRONGLY AGREE!

Also, have a room layout for vendors before load in of the show the day before.They also make software to help with this and keep down confusion. It would help the vendors/show host and electrician.

At least set-up drink stations. I am not talking about water buckets on a stick. Hire people to have drink stations. You see this all the time in show halls. They have a bartender and serve Beer/Wine/Soda and water. Whoever you hire is contracted and they keep the money on the sales. If handled right you could negotiate 10% of the revenue yes the drinks are more pricy but so is Disney! Also, in one of the side rooms set it up with a outside vendor to have food many companies would be very happy to make the cash flow might even pay for the room them selves. Or do like Texas have food trucks come by. FYI: The food off theses truck is very very good.

That's just my input. You asked.

MI Expo has a nice arrangement for tech/keys.

All games get a sticker with a number applied to the playfield glass. This number is written on a key tag, and the keys with thier numbered tag placed on a peg board behind the registration tables.

For each work shift, there are a few folks that volunteer as techs. They each get a hang tag with their name on it, and when they go to work on a game, they put their hang tag in place of the keys to that game on the peg board. When done working on the game, they bring the keys back and retrieve their tag. That way, it is always known where the keys are.

Works great for keeping the games up and running.

Later,
EV

he promised that for this year and it didn't happen? shame, shame.

If you want to save Expo from its ultimate demise.
IMHO

#1>> Squash whatever beef you have with PBL and work out a mutual agreement that gets him to come to the Expo and ask him to bring all those great games with him. This may mean you need to actualy provide an incentive for him to come.

#2 >> Your incentives for people to bring good quality games for free play are obviously not working. You have a core group that bring a good chunk of games and that is because theya re committed to making expo fun (thanks to them). I heard numerous complaints about lack of accessability for load-in, no help for load-in or load-out, issues with people not being able to keep machines till late on Sunday so penalized. These are the people keeping expo alive IMHO and these free play games are what bring regulars in the door even at the prices of $25 per person.

#3>> Don't lie to people! I asked if Predator was there and available in the vendor hall on Thursday when I arrived at 10pm. You told me yes, so I spent $50 for me and the wife to go in only to be severely dissapointed. That late in the evening and no Predator and I would have just gone up to bed to be ready for brawl the next morning if you had just told me thr truth or told me you did not know.

#4 >> Your website is awful and needs to be updated.

#5 Get MORE New Sterns and New JJP games there and availabel for play in the free play area

#6 Make a rule that any game in attendnace needs to be avaiable for play. Almost all of your vendors had games protected behind tables and not even available for play. The one exceptionwas the guy with the SafeCracker who was welcoming everyone to come play and check it out.

hmm maybe I missed something we where able to play Saturday mid-morning I thought it was around 11-12. But yeah leave that area open as much as possible with more pins.

Also would love to see a much better spread from the major manufacturer's. Stern's was okay but even that seemed small. JJP only had 3 machines there and I could not tell their area apart from any other vendor area.
Love to see more parts people with actual tables. Some shared tables but did not always man the merchandise. I'm not sure what vendor's have to pay but if its a cost thing consider reducing it or a 2 for 1 table deal to incentivize the smaller vendors. This was our first time there, but I was surprised not to see PBL, BAA, Pinbulbs etc.
It would be neat to see a few of the High End restore people setup there, HEP, McCune, Bryan Kelly etc.. They probably don't need to advertise but shoot I would give them a free table because I would just like to talk to them lol.

This was my 1st expo and probably won't be back. I express the same as many other folks. Have games and vendor rooms open during the day and more often. I really didn't want to sit in seminars all day and listen to people talk. Have drinks and snacks available. I thought the parts selection was almost nothing. I was expecting all kinds of parts and pieces to buy from all kinds of folks. I guess you need to do a better job of encouraging the pros to bring more games for people to play and sell. I planned on staying 2 nights and left after one. What I hear there is a beef going on among pinball folks that don't attend. Get it fixed and then play pinball!!!

A few barrels of various home brews free for all pinsiders to drink.

Dancing girls in cages in the free play area

More arm wrestling tables

The PBL thing is like a taint on the show because it becomes an "us versus them" situation. I think Terry has a great thing going with his open house. It is not realistic to get him to do a booth. There should be an effort to get rid of the bad juju by talking it out with him, and making the PBL open house a part of expo, not unlike the stern factory tour. This will require some very mature discussion from both parties, but the goal here would be for a net positive to the expo, and right now the status quo is a negative. And I'm speaking here as a guy that has supported your position, Mike, but I think it's time to find a solution and bend backwards to make it happen.

That's what I'm saying. Simple stuff. Flippers, broken wires, etc. Draw the line at anything in the back box or anything that requires major disassembly.

Obviously, volunteers should be somewhat qualified.

That's too cost prohibitive; the only BBB arm wrestling table was at the PBL open house.

Cash bar/snack bar in the exhibitor's hall.

Free Play area open all day, every day.

I agree on some of this but #6 as a vendor our games come to show off product. If you were playing and someone walked up and bent over the machine to look at the product, then you would be mad that they are interrupting your game. That is what the game area is for. Matter of fact one games we sold, the buyer was so glad that people couldn't play it and run up the game plays on it. As they are HUO games. Now, if everyone played them they wouldn't be HUO games anymore would they? Also, vendors are there to sell and help their customers. As a vendor if the Event told us that our games had to be on free play or else? We will take the or else every time. FYI: We have been told that and as a paying booth space vendor we have said then we won't come. We are not trying to be mean about it, it about showing off our product that happens to be in the game. We could remove the product out of the game which one of my guys has mentioned and leave all the games behind, but I feel if I were a buyer I would want to see it in a game. So, we bring them. We are not a pinball dealer or we would bring a game to play. It just so happends that our product goes into the game. So, we will have to disagree with you on this one.

#5 is subject able is hard to blame the Event holder as they have no control over that. What are they to do hold them a gun point and say more games or do not come. What would happen if Marco said then we won't come? you just lost 8 games off the floor that are set to free play. Also, the newest games Stern puts out.

#1 you hit this on the head. They need to learn that vendor pay to be there, They need to learn to service the vendors not the other way around. Do not get me started. LOL

One of the gripes I have is the aforementioned overpriced retail pins that aren't on free play.

Might be cool to have a seminar on 'how to play pinball', get one of the really great players to demonstrate and talk about how to play. I was surprised at how many people stepped up to play my game, and I could tell within 30 seconds if they were skilled or not (and I am talking about the people who at least knew how to start a game). Flipper techniques, and maybe a little bit on understanding strategy. Could be nice to have an advanced seminar on strategy for a specific, newly released game. I'm a pretty good player, and understand the strategy of games where I know the rules (e.g. start this specific mode before this particular MB, start mode X first, since it then sets up . . ., etc), but watching a video like this, showed me you can take it to another level.

Better info on what is going on. Seems quite a few people have commented about "'wish they had X', or 'did not know the schedule' and it actually was there -- but more info about things would help. More specifics on the times and what is and is and is not available, sometimes it is a little vague. Having a poster with just info on the exhibit all and games room times, pulled out from the full agenda, would likely help.

Better descriptions on Seminars would also help. I also think you would get more people signing up for seminars if they had more detail on what they are really about, and getting that out a little sooner. I know a lot changes, but more info, and sooner, the better.

Also think there is an opportunity for workshops vs seminars. Mentioned to Gerry from multimorphic that it could be cool for a two or three hour workshop on using the P-ROC, or more specifically the PROCGAME framework, where attendee comes with a laptop and get hands on experience on how to get started, maybe even get to hook their computer to a game to see it put a ball in play, hit flippers and register some points . I could also see workshops on repairing games, circuit boards and maybe even learning how to read an EM schematic.

Ok, so I accept that I paid $25 to walk in and can't play your games but how about this: I was considering buying some alternate plastics for my SM from one vendor. I was leaning over the table to try and see the plastics on the machine. The people running the booth wouldn't even acknowledge that I was there. Couldn't get a good look at the games safely back in their cozy little booth. Not buying their product, not now not ever. If I could have walked up and played one game on their machine they probably would have had a sale.

and what happens if the other person accidentally pops the glass? who cleans it, and pays to replace it? I do let other people have keys to may machines, but the people I let have them I know and trust.

Sorry, you had a bad experience with a vendor, If we sold plastics we would have talked with you. We are not sure what the $25.00 covers. We would assume that is access to the play area. If they are charging to get on the floor with the vendors. Maybe that needs to be changed after all vendors are paying to be there. In Texas the vendor area and play area are the same, so it would be hard to gauge. Sorry you had a bad experience. Of course playing our games would not help you gauge our product.

How about a map of where the vendors in the hall are located ?

I would like to see the vendor area open at 5:00 instead of 6:00. One more hour to sell product would mean more work, but it would also mean more sales IMHO.

I think you missed 96% of my point.

In addition to what everyone else is saying which I mostly agree with, I would also add:

1. Have FREE shuttles/buses to the Stern tour. Why charge? Why make this hard with tickets and checking tickets at the door, etc. It normally is free to tour the Stern building anyway. I can't tell you how many people ordered a Stern pin because of the tour! This tour should be FREE regardless.

If you are trying to recoup your cost for the school buses then have Stern sponsor that and pay for it. Seriously, bringing hundreds of potential buyers to see your place should be a no brainer for Stern. Make it FREE and make it easy.

2. Get the free shuttle to the airport right and stick with it. I "tried" to use the free shuttle this year. It was a half hour late getting us to the show which I can live with, BUT somebody decided to cancel the 10AM shuttle back to the airport and told no one. And your site STILL clearly showed 10AM. So we all had to take an expensive cab last minute to the airport once we figured no shuttle was even coming. That was frustrating.

And it was mentioned may times before but the opening and closing and opening and closing of the exhibit and game halls at various times is very confusing to figure out. Try to keep it open the entire day. Again, make it easy.

And by Saturday I would say about half of the free play games are turned off because they broke down from getting heavily played since Wednesday. I would really hate to show up on Saturday to play pin that is for sure. What a waste.

Don't change the hotel/airport shuttle at the last second. While waiting for the 10:00am shuttle to the airport on Sunday I was told by the hotel that there was no 10:00am shuttle and the next one would not be until 4:00pm. The website clearly says (and this has been the schedule for the last 2-3 years):

A bus is also available from the Westin North Shore hotel back to O'Hare airport at these times:
Sunday Oct 20th, 6:00am; 10:00am and 4:00pm

I could not find Mike to ask why this had been changed. So I ended paying $40 for a taxi. Of course the hotel could have been wrong, but I was there until 10:15am and there was no shuttle.

Any explanation for this Mike?

Yup! Me too!

I would like to see some other tourtment formats. Something like pinball golf or some single ball tourneys.

There were plenty of HUO games in the free play hall. Expo won't kill those or your machines. As for people looking at the product while someone might be playing, lookie-loos happen on location all the time... no worries.

I have no problem with your desire to not share your games, but don't pass off silly excuses as justification.

I don't think there would be the pressure of vendors to share their games for free if the freeplay area was better stocked.