Russ Van Natta, VP of Sales at Creative Works, explains how to set your price for your laser tag attraction.
Hello and welcome to another 360 Insight from your friends here at Creative Works, where we give actionable tips for your entertainment facility.
Today we’re going to about how much to charge for a laser tag experience, and there are a number of factors that we want to look at. First, is this a primary or a secondary attraction? Additionally, what is my competition doing in the area? And not just other laser tag businesses, but other entertainment businesses such as trampolines, bowling alleys, roller skating rinks, movie theaters, etc.
Ultimately you want to be in a place where you’re providing the most overall value in a way that helps drive revenue per capita up at your facility.
When we look at primary attractions for laser tag, we’re typically going to be doing a longer, more intense experience just by the nature of that being the main draw for your guests. That allows you set a higher price point per game; typically somewhere around $8 to $10 per game for a single game. Then you can scale that if guests buy multiples. So you might do $9 a game if they do a single game, then bring that down to $17 if they do two, and then $25 if they do three.
The same discounting applies when we look at a secondary attraction. You’re going to have that scaling, but you’re also going to have a lower overall price point. This is because there are so many other offerings in a facility that installs laser tag as a secondary attraction; it’s an up-sell opportunity rather than a driving force for traffic. So you might look at $7 for a single game and then $13 for two, and then $19 or $20 for three.
There is no definite right or wrong way to do this. We want to look at what your market can sustain, but these are some good starting points to help you figure out where you want to fall on the pricing scale.
Another thing to consider is what to charge when a laser tag is included in a party package. In a party package, you’re never going to price out each line item for your customers to see: your pizza per person, your laser tag per person, the cake per person, etc. But you want to make sure that when you’re putting together the overall pricing for a party package, laser tag should probably be somewhere around $5 per person, per game.
So if you’re doing a primary laser tag party where the guests have two games each, it would be $10 per guest for this portion of the package. Again, these prices will never be shared with the customer. But this formula can help you develop your party package pricing.
Usually you don’t need to price much lower than that because you’re turning laser tag into the primary draw of the party. You’ll make up for the discounts in the other profit centers that are included in a party package, like food and beverage and arcade cards. And beyond the standard party packages, you’ll have the opportunity to up-sell a lot of these items during the party itself.
These are some of the main things you want to think about when pricing your laser tag attraction. But obviously we take this as a case by case basis; we need to find out what makes sense for your market based on what the competitors are doing and what your attractions mix is.
If you have more questions on this topic, feel free to reach out to us. We’re always happy to lend some expertise whenever possible.