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CRAIG SINGER
Coinman of the Month
"I don't know anyone in the amusement business
that's smarter than Craig Singer," offers Abe
Susman, oumer of State Music Distributors of
Dallas, Texas.
"Craig Singer is an individual who lives up to all
his committments, and we regard him as a
businessman with a tremendous amount of
respect, " says Irwin H. Cole, vice chairman of Main
Bank of Chicago. "Although he is aggressive, he is
very consistent on how he operates. We have seen
him grow from one location to his present size.
Through him I have learned that most bankers do
not understand the coin-op amusement industry.
Bankers in general must start to recognize this is an
exceUent industry with a growth potential that's
unreal. "
"Back when I first met Craig Singer, " says Peggy
Wimberly, general manager of the Laguna Hills,
California Mall, "shopping centers wouldn't even
entertain the idea of having a family amusement
center. But I immediately liked the way Craig acted
as a person. He was very straightforward and
brought drawings along on his presentation.
Moreover, after he established his amusement
center, he showed us he could do the job he
promised. "
"When we put him in our mall four years ago, "
says Charles Upham, manager of the Parkdale Mall
PLAY METER, August, 1978
in Beaumont, Texas, "there was some reluctance on
the part of management to have an amusement
center for fear of negative factors, such as loitering,
but none of the bad effects have happened. He runs
a very clean operation. "
To many managers of shopping centers, Craig
Singer has become synonymous with excellence in
arcade operations. Second only to Aladdin's
Castles, Singer's operations now extend to 97
regional shopping malls, and he presently has four
more family entertainment centers under con-
struction.
He's only 91 but has truly already made his mark
on the industry as a whole.
A Chicago native, he had no amusement machine
background before he made his giant leap into
shopping malls across the country. After being
graduated from the University of Miami, Florida,
he worked for a while as an accountant and then
went to work for Corrugated Fabrication Corpora-
tion in Plainfield, IUinois. It would take quite a leap
of imagination to move from that to the coin-op
industry, but that's exactly what this month's
Coinman did.
In 1971 Craig observed that arcades (call them
"family amusement centers ") seemed to be the
wave of the future; so he got on the telephone and
systematically called every shopping center de-
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