Indoor AS Facility in Halifax NS, looking for helpful input...

[JadedKommando]

Hey guys its me JK. Just a quick synopsis on me so you know where the hell I've been all season;
1. Decided to leave the military after 20(ish) years
2. Took my retirement posting and moved my family to Halifax in the beginning of September
3. Halfway through September my wife calved baby #6
4. My retired mom and step dad sold everything and moved to Halifax to be closer to me and their grand kids.

My last day as a soldier Jan 7' 2015. And I figure, do what you know so I want to open a year round indoor and outdoor airsoft, paintball (actually reball), and souped up laser tag business. I was wondering if any of u's could help a brother out by answering a few questions I have...

My vision is to have the complex cater to all 3 combat sports. The indoor venue will have modular walls and building so they can be re-arranged for special events, or scenarios. Paintballer's will only be able to use reball at the site, keeping their costs way down, and the mess way way down. The laser tag guns I plan to use are not what the local Halifax business is running, the guns we would like to front are from a company in Australia called Battlefield live. They have a selection of short range sub machine guns (mock p90), medium range rifles (aliens pulse rifle), and long range weapons (aliens pulse rifle on steriods). The system will have live feed back as the games and props will be set up to imitate battlefield co-op modes. I also plan to offer shooting and self defence classes, training, tactics, and procedures at the squad or section level. If everything would magically fall into place it would be a 80,000 SF year round, day and night, indoor and outdoor complex. It would cater its games to all age levels and all skill levels. and hell I would even let u rent the dam place just like a hockey rink. If the airsoft gods would will it.
I don't want everyone to cream their pants on the idea, because it's nothing more than an idea. But I have to push for input to get solids answers on the venture.
So without being ridiculous everyone who gives a shit about the potential of having a site like this answer these 3 questions;

1. How much money would you spend on for a full day of airsoft (about 8 hours of rotating through), not including the cost of bb's. Just the entry fee? How much money would you bring with you in your wallet when you left to play airsoft for 8 hours?

2. If you could play in a well structured, objective based airsoft league that runs from 7-12 pm on a Tuesday night, would you and 7 of your friends pay a league fee to play in it? How far would you drive to get to that place?

3. Would you play on a Sunday night, in complete darkness but have a military style NVG strapped on you face, where it didn't matter if you used reball or airsoft guns to combat each other?

Please give me 3 minutes of you time and answer those questions in a response below. Also anything that you deem pertinent information to the success of such a business, or potential contacts for people I should get a hold of, please let me hear about it.

Cheers

[Red Dot]

1. $40 bucks would be my sweet spot, less is better of course as a cheap bastard.

2. Sounds interesting, would be interested. Drive wise hopefully under 2 hours round trip.

3. Hell yes that sounds awesome especially if NVGs are already included however I would like to just use airsoft guns not paintball/reball stuff.

Best of luck to you, I'm planning something of this nature in my area.

[Duilin]

be sure to post this on the NS forum, www.novascotiaairsoft.ca

[JadedKommando]

Originally Posted by Duilin

be sure to post this on the NS forum, www.novascotiaairsoft.ca

Done, and a added to a few other Atlantic forums.

[JadedKommando]

Originally Posted by Red Dot

1. $40 bucks would be my sweet spot, less is better of course as a cheap bastard. Tentatively I'm trying to top at $30 which would include 2000 balls, and it would be the same price for reballers.

2. Sounds interesting, would be interested. Drive wise hopefully under 2 hours round trip. 2 hours would definitely be the expected limit for driving round trip. Hopefully car pooling would come into effect for that kind of a drive as well

3. Hell yes that sounds awesome especially if NVGs are already included however I would like to just use airsoft guns not paintball/reball stuff. Just sending feelers for mixing up caliber sizes, the NVG's would be rented at a modest fee with a credit card to hold them

Best of luck to you, I'm planning something of this nature in my area.

Any success I have I would definitely be willing to pass on to you or anyone else who has the idea.

[FirestormX]

1) For regular play, I wouldn't want to spend more than $25, as opposed to $35. It may not seem like a huge difference, but here in Ontario there's places that are $35, and places that are $20. I have no problem going out every weekend and spending $20 on airsoft, but would not go out and spend $35 every two weeks. Human psychology's fun, eh?
I enjoy playing often, and would much rather spend $20 (for perhaps a shorter time), over $30.
Case in point, there's a field in here in Ontario that will charge ~$35 for a full day on the weekend (over 12 hours), and at other times $20 for ~4 hours. I would rather pay $20 for 4 hours. I may not be the majority, but I know there's a lot of people who feel the same way. ie "I'd like to get out more, even just for a few hours, but it's so expensive".

2) Hell yeah I would! Depends on how often, but I wouldn't want to drive more than an hour on a week day.

3) I wouldn't mind mixing calibres. Just remember how much more energy a reball has, and take that into account with your NVG.
You should also keep in mind, before you blow a ton of money on cheap NVGs, that cheap NVGs can take away some of the fun, once the novelty wears off. It's like playing a laggy video game with nice graphics. Yes it's novel and cool, but if you can't function with them, a player is likely to just opt to using a tac light the next time.

[JadedKommando]

Firestorm, Thanks for your response.
Let me ask you, would you be ok with a $30 admission fee, which included 2000 high quality balls (bb bastard or elite force). Then were able to play for 5 hours, with both indoor and outdoor games (I really want my outdoor field to have tunnels made with sea cans ).

For the league there would be a lot to work out but it would be every other week, and each time it would be a combination of objective based timed events, shoot circuits, and force on force play.

As far as NVG's go, I would build some kind lens protector for them, as well I'd be buying Mil Spec type (PVS 14 for example).

Thanks again,

JK

[FirestormX]

Admission:
From what I've seen of those I play with, it's difficult to blow through 2k BBs in a single sessions. As such, I wouldn't mind paying $30 for the inclusion of the 2k BBs on days when I'm low on BBs - but I wouldn't want to pay $30 every single session, and start accumulating bags of BBs I can't use fast enough.

There are those who have no problem blowing through 2k, but there aren't too many of them that I play with. Especially those who might participate at a tournament level.

So in short, a "forced" purchase of a bag of BBs with entry, would turn me away more often than not.

Tournament:
Every other week sounds like the ideal interval. I'd drive an hour every other week.

NVGs:
Geez, that's a pretty big risk and investment. I might be too scared to actually play with them!
You're going to need to spend a lot of money on mounting gear for them too.

All it takes is someone walking into a chicken wire fence that's out of focus for the NODs! *cough*shelledpants*cough*