Business idea: bowling club
Bowling is becoming more and more popular thanks to its active advertising, tournaments, competitions with prize draws, gifts. Based on this, we can confidently say that this is a promising business niche that allows you to get a fairly high profit and pays off in 1-1.5 years, which is very attractive to potential investors.
Business Concept Stage
The first step is to develop a concept for the establishment.
Concept development includes the following points:
- Location of the establishment;
- Business plan;
- Project;
To open a club, you need to prepare a certain package of documentation, register an enterprise, obtain a property certificate, etc.
The bowling alley does not require a license and is not subject to specialized taxes.
Companies that manufacture equipment can help with the organization. In addition to equipment, companies provide concepts.
The main difficulty is the choice of location.
Not every room can be suitable for bowling and placement of play lanes in it. In practice, you can face the cost of redevelopment.
The bowling club concept plays an important role.
Costs without taxes
The game of bowling has a thousand-year history, it was played by the Egyptian pharaohs, but it still does not lose its relevance: some choose bowling as a sports training, the second - as a way to relax with friends or colleagues, and others - as an opportunity to spend time with the whole family. Investments in this business are quite significant - from 7 million rubles. But with a competent calculation of the payback, you can get out in 1-3 years. And the service life of the tracks is over 20 years. A bowling club business plan will give you a more holistic view of this project.
Resume
A bowling club business plan is being drawn up for the opening of a play area with eight lanes, a billiards area for six tables, a cafe with 100 seats with a dance area and a children's area. This is important, since the institution is intended for recreation of young people and visitors with children. According to various estimates, in Russia there are from 400 to 600 such clubs with a total number of tracks of more than four thousand. At the same time, the market needs make it possible to increase their number at least twice. World experience shows that the normal rate is about eight thousand tracks per 100 million of the population.
Note that some Russians see bowling not as a one-time hobby, but as an option for a weekly or monthly pastime with friends, colleagues or family, as the game develops team spirit, coordination of movements, accuracy and motor skills. The club is planned to be located in the city center (with a population of 100-500 thousand people) or in a large residential area close to shops, business centers or visited institutions. This way we will ensure the highest traffic and visibility of our club, especially when installing outdoor advertising.
Business will have a seasonality: an increase in bowling attendance is expected for the period from autumn to spring, during the cold season, when people spend more time indoors and not outdoors. However, in summer, there may be more interest in the cafe, where you can celebrate a wedding and graduation, visit a disco. Bowling clubs are quite widespread in cities with a population of one million, but in smaller cities there are often not enough entertainment centers where adults and children can relax, which means that in the future such clubs can be opened in neighboring cities of the region.
To organize an institution, we need to formalize a legal status, "individual entrepreneurship" with a simplified taxation system is suitable for simpler reporting.
The club is supposed to be financed from the profit in the previous period. At the start, funds will be required for finishing and decorating a rented premises with an area of 1300 sq. meters, for specialized equipment for bowling and a children's area, furniture for a cafe, for the purchase of food and an advertising campaign.
To implement the project you will need:
- Redecorate the space-style premises, rent a 1300 sq. meters under a long-term contract.
- Purchase and install special equipment for playing skittles: tracks, pinsetters (pinsetters), ball return systems, systems for maintaining cleanliness, balls and pins.
- Purchase and install equipment for playing billiards: tables, cues, lamps, balls, cues.
- Purchase furniture and equipment for the cafe.
- Purchase equipment and furniture for decorating a children's area at the cafe.
- Purchase food.
- Carry out an advertising campaign.
- Recruit staff: 21 people with appropriate qualifications.
Project Concept
The main target audience of the club will be people from 18 to 40 years old. In the daytime, the place will be oriented towards families with children who will like a children's area with an animator, a bowling alley and a cafe where a children's party can be held; to attract visitors at this time, it is planned to hold shows and contests for children. In the evening, the club will focus on the youth audience who can play bowling, attend a party or disco, as well as the adult audience who will play billiards. As the research of the leisure services market has shown, the most attractive for consumers are bar, cafe, disco, bowling and billiards ("Russian" and pool ("American")).
A 1300 sq. m. area was chosen as a place for the bowling club. meters, provided with a parking area, water and electricity. It is located in a densely populated area of the city next to popular trade, consumer services, and public transport stops. Thus, the institution will be visited by locals and people from neighboring areas who will come especially for recreation and shopping.
How to start a profitable bowling club
Bowling has remained one of the most profitable and commercially successful businesses in the entertainment industry for over 100 years. Every day, Russians leave about 27 million rubles in bowling clubs. Analysts say that the market is not yet up to the saturation point and that its potential capacity is at least 12 billion rubles a year.
The amount of investment to enter the niche of entertainment services based on bowling starts at 2. million rubles, which, combined with low competition, makes the bowling club business an attractive option for private entrepreneurs. It is important to understand that if you want to have a source of passive income, then the bowling business is not your option. Why? Read on>
The bowling club business plan implies the opening of a modern entertainment facility, which allows you to receive a stable profit from the organization of the game process and the sale of related services. A properly planned bowling center maintains a high asset value for 20 years and has low fixed costs, which helps to minimize commercial risks. The payback period of the project is from 2 to 4 years.
Our experience shows that the main target audience of an entertainment complex with bowling lanes are:
Companies of adults aged 23 to 45
Standards and Creativity
For a bowling business plan to be effective, it is important to find the right location for the bowling alley. It is a key element in entertainment business planning. When evaluating the premises, you can proceed from the estimated calculation of the minimum area of 100 sq. ... x number of tracks. The bowling alley itself occupies 52 m2, including a run-up area and a bowler recreation area. To accommodate related services and ancillary zones will require about the same. The optimal configuration is considered to be a room in which the length of the hall is at least 40 meters. It is formed by the length of the belt, the equipment service area, the players' area and the service area.
There are no franchises in the bowling business. The reason is that each entertainment business project is individual in many ways. Although there are general rules, approaches and solutions in organizing a bowling business, it is impossible to standardize (unify) a business with smiles completely. In my experience, my clients tend to be creative entrepreneurs. Such people are interested in doing entertainment business every day, they are passionate about it. Buying a ready-made bowling business plan does not always work. The indicators and recommendations of one taken region require adjustment based on the realities of the business environment in which your new project is located.
On average, a bowling alley operates a long 12-hour shift per day. At the same time, each track is loaded from 5 to 9 hours a day, depending on the season and day of the week. And the maximum number of guests on one track is 8 people. The more lanes, the higher the capacity of the establishment during peak hours. These indicators should be taken into account in the architectural planning of bowling. The new bowling equipment costs over $ 45,000 per lane. Used bowling equipment will cost an entrepreneur from 395,000 rubles to 1.6 million rubles for each bowling lane.
Entertainment business is always one of the most profitable ideas. Let's talk about how much it costs to open a bowling alley and whether it is profitable to do so. It may be too difficult for a budding entrepreneur to implement such a project, but for an experienced specialist, the difficulty will arise only in finding the right start-up capital.
Bowling is a widespread and rather ancient sports game. Archaeologists have found confirmation that the prototype of such entertainment existed in Egypt 7000 years ago. But only the Americans have succeeded in popularizing this occupation in recent decades. Thanks to them, this way of spending leisure time with family or friends has become fashionable.
Relevance of bowling as entertainment
Even with the economic crisis in the country, people are constantly spending money on recreation, games, cafes and interesting clubs. But with regard to bowling, the Russian market is considered undersaturated. There are many skittle lanes only in Moscow, St. Petersburg and some metropolitan areas in more distant regions.
If we talk about such a complex anywhere in medium-sized cities, then not every of them has at least one such entertainment club with a bowling alley. Therefore, this direction is considered especially profitable and promising. By investing in business development, over time, you can not only recoup the investment, but also significantly increase your annual income.
It should be borne in mind that a potential audience for visiting bowling is young people aged 20 to 35 years. Less often, such an institution attracts more mature representatives. But a lot depends on the format of the club, its focus, related services and entertainment, as well as the proposed rates.
Business Registration
To organize a bowling alley from scratch, you need to complete all the documents. To begin with, they go to the tax service and register as an individual entrepreneur or LLC. Since such a case will require large amounts of money, and the annual income may eventually exceed 60 million rubles, it is better to immediately give preference to a legal entity. Moreover, all investments can be evenly distributed among several co-founders.
You should also immediately opt for a unified or simplified taxation scheme and indicate OKVED codes:
If you intend to sell sports equipment, souvenirs or carry out other types of business activities on the bowling alley, then you should also indicate the appropriate codes in advance.
Gradually it is necessary to collect the following list of documents:
Project Summary
In this article, you will learn how to start a bowling club from scratch. The point is planned to be opened in Kazakhstan, in a large city with a population of 700 thousand. The project includes: a bowling alley with eight lanes, a recreation area, and a small cafe in the Snack & Bar format. The business is focused on active and family vacations. The target audience of the project is both adults and children. Bowling club age audience: from 8 to 45 years old. All economic calculations of the project are based on five-year reports of the financial activities of the enterprise, taking into account seasonal factors.
Major financial projects of the bowling club:
- Renting a bowling alley with an hourly rate;
- Mini-cafes in recreation areas.
The estimated amount of investments for the project will be 90,600,900 tenge. Most of these funds will be spent on expensive equipment - this will cover about 70% of the invested funds.
The project will be launched within four months. The plan for the first year of operation implies reaching 30% of the attendance rate.
Company work
The business plan of the bowling center implies the presence of a play area, a technical area (+ machine rooms), a recreation area and a cafe. The club's architecture should be located in a 720 m² building. Shopping and food outlets filled with people are located nearby. On the busy street where the premises is located, there is a very high traffic, as well as car and pedestrian traffic, which should qualitatively affect the occupancy rate of the point.
The head office of the enterprise includes the direct head of the company (director), who is also its founder and the head of the center. He also deals with business planning and determines the marketing policy of the organization. The second in the system hierarchy is the manager who is directly subordinate to the director and manages the activities of administrators, sales and auxiliary workers.
Form of business ownership during registration: LLC.
Sales & Marketing
To have something to compare with: there are currently three bowling establishments and three small gaming halls located in hotels and entertainment centers in the city (maximum four lanes). Direct competition is made by the only national network, or rather its branch, which has fourteen lanes and cafes; one bowling club as part of the shopping complex (10 lanes); and another small, separate club with eight lanes. Each of these three establishments has its own competitive advantages and disadvantages.
The main advantages in terms of direct competition with the first establishment are, first of all, very low ticket prices (taking into account discounts: from 1800 to 6000 tenge), advanced and modern equipment, a well-thought-out loyalty program and marketing politics. Among the shortcomings, one can note regular customer complaints about poor service and insufficiently fast service in a cafe.