Club Newsletter
Reviews of paintball stores, Adrenaline,
Flagswipe, Champions Paintball Supply,
Sgt. Splatters, Badlands, XO industries.
How to setup a good paintball Store
the proper way
PAINTBALL STORE REPORTS
LONDON
ONTARIO
FLAGSWIPE
This store is of course my home town store, and the one that I go into the most often.
I would like to say that I LOVE THE NEW STORE!!! This store
now has the kinds of things I said I was looking for in my article, it is
very well lit and laid out, definitely hip and cool.
As you enter, there is a sofa and coffee table compete with
paintball magazines, and a tv playing some cool paintball movie, turning
past that the store opens to a central glass countered area in the middle of
the room with amazing amounts of gear on the wall. You can actually walk
completely around the counter areas looking and touching the gear on the
wall. There are deals well laid out, and package kits featured in the marker
area. The counters contain the smaller parts, drop forwards, regulators,
gauges, tanks and the like.
To say the least I was very impressed. It's now the best example of how a
paintball store should look, frankly even better than my former favourite
Badlands, (better lighting, and you can touch most of the products without
summoning the always available assistance. Sorry badlands) Even better
selection than I have seen before of products as well. Lots of camo; packs,
tank covers, jerseys etc. And lots for the speedballers lots of new brands,
cool jerseys and bright colours. A
GREAT EXAMPLE OF WHAT A STORE SHOULD LOOK LIKE!
Addition to review Oct 2005 - Wow first, I love the new bushball
section, lots of Tippmann, camo and the everything the bushballer needs. But
on the other hand the prices are skyrocketing! A
mask I can buy at Adrenaline, or in Toronto for $80 is $110 at Flagswipe,
and it not just masks, it's the same with guns, tanks, accessories,
everything!
ADRENALINE PAINTBALL
I must say that I like
this little paintball
shop.
It's still
small without the huge
assortment of gear on
the walls of the bigger
stores. But I remember 5
years or so ago when
Flagswipe was the little
store with one tiny
counter. This is a well
laid out store, well
lit, well staffed and a
good variety of products
and great prices. They
specialize in Tippman
and bushball paintball
so maybe that's why I
like it. Check it out,
well worth your
business.
1050 Kipps Lane
TORONTO ONTAIRO
Badlands Paintball
Well what a change from the bad stores, Badlands Paintball they are well layed out with a large store, lots of stock, everything priced on the wall. A huge variety of paintball markers, and stuff for speedball and to my
surprise bushball players (camo stuff!!). If your in Toronto and you're shopping for gear, I wouldn't hesitate to recommend you visit them. In fact MY STORE OF CHOICE IN TORONTO.
SGT. SPLATTERS
Well I remember years ago. This was the first paintball place that I ever played at, amazing huge indoor field, lots of fun. And the paintball shop even a year or so ago was a well stocked well lit well run joint.
Unfortunately that has changed as far as the shop is concerned. The formerly large shop has been displaced by video game machines. It now resides in a poorly lit small side alcove that is the size of a walk in closet. The expert help that was there is now a
disgruntled disinterested youth who was more interested in eating his lunch than getting me the products that I informed him I wished to buy on the spot.
I do not recommend shopping here. DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME.
CHAMPIONS PAINTBALL SUPPLY
I think I told quite a few of you what a horrible experience it was to shop at Champions Paintball Supply. They had only the high end stuff, overpriced, a bunch of know nothing kids with no interest in selling me what I was looking for, because when I was in because they were trying to push a noobie guy into buying an Angel with Air for his first paintball marker.
Unfortunately it is worse than that. They have the worst website I have ever seen. All three of their past poorly maintained sites, were so far out of date for events and contact numbers, that I feel dumber having read them. E-mails to the contact people simply got returned invalid, phone numbers were incorrect. To top it all off this is the company that ZAP PAINTBALL has chosen to be their sole
Canadian distributor of paintballs. As a person who runs a club, I have tried to contact their owner Gino by phone and e-mail to buy a large order of paint, and have never got a response from him or his staff to this day. Now they have a new site. I give it a month before it's out of date also. Well not quite a month (amazingly more like 6 months), but this link is no
longer valid because this site too, has been ignored and abandoned by this
crappy store.) Store now closed, company has been formed from owners as XO
INDUSTRIES the owners and organizers of Skyball. So look for some poor planning and
bad websites from XO INDUSTRIES soon to come I'm sure.
BY FAR NOT ONLY THE WORST IN TORONTO, BUT THE WORST I HAVE EVER BEEN IN.
Here's the link to XO
industries. Not surprisingly it's under construction already, so sounds like
they're off to their same old selves as far as web design goes.
P.S. That was some nice planning for Skyball 2005 XO!
Sure it was not their fault but January 2006 is fine for next year but
NOTHING until then? Have it somewhere else, people will understand. Try the
ACC, the Exhibition (the cow palace), or wait till summer and have it at
Molson Park Barrie, Downsview park or some other outdoor location. I would
have come up with something before next year if I were in their shoes.
Oct
2005
SunyJim and friends went to
(OLP) Outer Limits
Paintball - Shakespeare
Ontario. at their
closing game "Halloween
Havoc" It was a Fun
Halloween Scenario game the
Ghost Busters vs the Ghosts
and Monsters.
Lots of great challenges,
and a great layout, our team the Ghost
busters dominated the day,
succeeding in capturing our
objectives, and ending the
day with a huge battle down
into the gully to attack the
Pirate and his minions
of Ghosts.
The only minor complaints about the whole day, was the organization was a
little rough and the CO2
filling was done without a
scale just by eyeball, yep
that looks like a CO2 tank,
guess it's done filling. WOW
dangerous! Other than
that, great field, when they
don't have a 150 players all
descending on them at once I
bet it runs really smooth. I
will definitely be back
again.
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What I look for in a
paintball Store...
I just want to start buy saying that these are SunyJim's personal views not necessarily the other members of the club. But as I go into each new paintball shop I am checking out not only what is offered and how much stock they have, but also how the products are displayed, and the staff knowledge and attitude.
What surprises me most is the quality of the stores. Paintball is sporting equipment, but the shops are never
laid out as cool and clean and well lit as a sport check, national sport or West 49. For an even closer example lets compare the paintball shops to Golf pro shops for a moment. Paintball equipment is about on par with golfing equipment in price, from very cheap $200 sets to $3000 for pro gear. That's about the same price range for paintball markers. Paintball shops, like golf pro shops, are usually secondary to the play field that is located there. The expertise needed by the staff that works there is somewhat similar. You need to know about fit and how the equipment functions to work in either store.
The clientele is even the same. Stick with me here. The statistics show that the average household income for a paintball player is $48,200, With that in mind the statistics also show nearly 90% of frequent paintball players are aged 12-24. The average age is 17.9 That means those parents who likely golf and spend that kind of money in a nice golf shop are the bank roll for the younger kids who play.
But that said, even the crappy poorly designed golf pro shop is usually thousands of times better lit,
laid out and presented than the average paintball store. A golf pro shop has carpet, a hung ceiling and nice spot lighting to attract attention to their high priced products. The staff is well trained in sales, not just in the equipment. A poor attitude will loose a $2000 sale in a flash, and the customer may never come back to give you a second chance.
I think there is a real opportunity here, the paintball store that looks like a nice place to buy equipment, hip and cool like snowboard and skateboard shop, West 49, or clean and sleek like a major sport retailer like sport check would not just sell to the people who play who may buy anywhere, but also to the parents who have the money to spend for their kids to play who are a little more choosey about where to spend their money..
My sales advice, or
just my two cents...
I was in sales for a while, and I sure did learn about product placement,
display lighting, and how important it is that your store sells for you
even when your not there selling for it. Have a deal on? Put one of the
track light heads illuminating it, put a funky looking sign to attract
attention and giving a feature or benefit, the savings and the price. Then
stack lots of them somewhere where the customer can't miss it.
The Staff should all be in 'uniform' even if that means company
logo golf shirts and jeans. That avoids the 'Do you work here? question'
that younger customers find so embarrassing. Also
don't forget to have the friendly staff working around the store pricing,
sweeping, and putting products out so those customers that are 'just
looking' can 'interrupt them' with a sale, or maybe even just so your
employees can overhear their questions or debate about a product, and jump
in to help them with their purchase.
Have the cool impulse
[no not the SmartParts ones ;-) ]
items at the cash
registers, key chains, pins, stickers, and the always in need items such as
lubricants and O rings, ready to be added on to the purchase.
In general make sure everything is neat, organized and priced. The
easiest sale to make is the one where the customers sell themselves.
Want more
sales? Try some cheap advertising, have stickers included with any purchase.
People will stick them on their car, gear bag or on the gear itself. What
better advertising can you get? I stick paintball stickers on my paintball
case and lots of my friends do too. It could be your store's logo.
