A lot, done correctly, will produce exponentially an ever increasing new player customer base that in our experience has spanned three generations of players at our paintball park. Paintball teammates of mine from the early days have grand kids that now play paintball. All three generations having grown up playing at our park. All use, to this day, the birthday pass each year and every year they bring someone new who signs up!

The more players,… young and old who take part in this project will return like clockwork each year at the same time with more new players. It was one of our secrets to success at our paintball park in San Diego. The last sixteen years we were a “field paint only” park in Southern California when the concept was adamantly ridiculed as economic suicide. We ran for 23 years and made our families living off of it and made money every year, at up to a 46% margin the last 15 years.

So pay attention here to the way I say and try my way first before you change it to your way. See it work correctly as designed before you put your tweak on it. We will be installing a field & store owners Vbulliton forum here that will address tweaks and techniques of field, park and store ownership and allow all to contribute.

A lot of my tried and true techniques are cheap as this one is,… if you do it my way.

Here s the concept: Customers sign up after they are already a customer and this concept is important. You do not want to offer this the day of the game or even a week or two in advance,.. ever! You only allow the free game or whatever you offer, 6 weeks from now at the earliest. If they ask why?,… tell them cause it’s a gift not an entitlement. if they persist tell them you don’t want them gamming the system, if it’s the parents saying this do you even want them as a customer?

Anyway, they fill the card out at the counter and turn it in which is immediately filed into a date file. This card is a postcard size so its cheaper to mail. The recipient is mailed the birthday card at least 6 weeks in advance, (allows time to plan the party!) They in turn must invest in a stamp and mail it back to get it redeemed!

This redeemed card is then filed under the name not the birthday. The card clearly states they must make a phoned in reservation to use it. This card is often included with a pre-payment for a private group and field which is the whole point here.

There is no data entry with this! They fill it out front and back thereby forcing them to read everything offered and what is involved. This prevents kids from saying they didn’t know. Ignorance is no excuse, being stupid is,… are they saying they are stupid? Then they shouldn’t be playing paintball..

If they don’t use the gift card they wont get another. The card must be filled out each year cause last years was sent out and you don’t keep a record. You send them the only card on file. This technique weeds out the no shows and the lame excuses right away.
Don’t allow some kid who’s birthday is today to play for free. you defeat the very purpose.

Redeeming the card by mailing it or bringing it in is an important aspect of this technique. They must do something to get it. If you make it too easy for them to redeem you take away the value of the offer. If there is no value perceived there is no value received. We tried letting them call the redemption in and or register it online but what happens is people abuse the system with procrastination and then excuses and the pre-paid private groups from this technique diminish dramatically. Take the Birthday offer we have online,.. it’s the most popular feature we have but do you notice we don’t send them anything back by e mail? We send the info to you, you then send them by snail mail the offer and the proven process and results prevail.

Im including an example in a PDF doc. Print it on colored heavy card stock on your own printer in black & white. Buy a paper cutter and cut the cards out yourself.

Make it look official, it will get noticed. I used to make them look like my 1969 draft induction notice but the humor was lost on the unappreciated.

So welcome to my site. I have a lot more to say and a whole lot more tried and true techniques to make your business a success so stay tuned to our website here. We hope to have an RSS feed soon along with some appropriate bells, whistles and widgets to make this place informative, fun and easy to use.