Play Meter

flexible with the times.
PLA Y METER: What would you say has been the
ecret to your uccess, if there i one?
BEREST": That' a very difficult question to
answer. This i still a business you have to work at.
We as operator can't run like General Motors; we
can't push button. You really have to go out in the
field . I come to conventions and everybody sits
down and everybody's dre ed in a suit and tie; and
talking to people, you have to think everybody's the
greate t operator in the world.
We all have our pitfalls . You come into one of our
hop and you'll ee a mess on location. You'll see
the average operator on hi own truck because one
of hi men didn't how up. He' out working. This is
hi uccess. You have to work. The day you turn
your back to it i the day you have to do one of two
things: you either have to ell your busine or you
have to decide that your profitability is going to fall.
o I think the secret of success is really just work-
ing at your bu iness and understanding it fully,
not ju t to the point where you see income and
you're ati fied. You have to recognize where your
profit is. I find that a lot of operator --including
my elf at one time--don't do that.
PLA Y METER: How do you approach your own
profit situation?
BEREST": I equate profit with the bottom line.
We're not concerned about volume. Or we're
concerned to a degree but sometimes more is less. I
find that I am not concerned today as much with
growth as I am with taking care of existing
business. For example, we had the opportunity a
while back to pick up a new location, which was a
diner, for music. Diners in some areas are probably
quite good in terms of music revenue. In Connecti-
cut I have ju t never been successful operating in a
diner. And you're talking about maybe $14,000
worth if equipment. My partner and I sat down and
we decided instead to take the same dollars and put
them back into our existing route, to kick our games
up, to buy new games or possibly music.
I've got good equipment on my route. I have not
neglected the bread and butter of my business,
which is still my music, my shuffles, my games, my
pool .tables. This is to me of utmost importance,
keepIng my bread and butter or my prime pieces of
equipment in the be t possible shape I can. I think
we as operators can lose sight of t he bread and
butter. I talk to many operators and we talk video
games, we talk about cocktail tables. I'm not
basically opposed to them but I'm interested in
them only at such time as I have taken care of my
present business, I've invested the amount of
money I have to in my existing operation, in
keeping my games up to date and in making it very,
very difficult for competition. Theoretically with
better equipment, we would reduce our service. I
think that the problems to the customers are a lot
less. This, for us, is the way to go. We've never
really worried about growth. We all enjoy growth
but first I like to take care of my own backyard.
PLA Y METER: Growth then comes about as a
natural result or extension of taking care of what's
going on in your own backyard.
(See next page)
~~----------------~------------------~
THE LOGICAL...
LOGIC
Everyone is faced with the
problem of having old
video games collecting
dust in the warehouse
because people are tired of
tennis and hockey games
not to mention the fact
that such games are worth
next to nothing in trade.
Well now you can do
something about it.
RETRO-FIT your old
video game into the new
116 PAC".This new logic
board transforms your
dead video game into one
that offers six new
exciting games.
57