S&B/STL Game Co.’s Innovative New Machine Combines Two Game Styles
S&B Candy and Toy, and its sister company St. Louis Game Co., have a real winner on their hands – actually a two-time winner – with The Gateway. The patent-pending crane and cutter combo was honored with an AMOA Innovator Award and the association’s Operators’ Choice Award at Amusement Expo.
What makes it special is its unique combination of two popular game styles – a claw and a cutter – side-by-side in one location-friendly sized cabinet.
Company founder Brian Riggles said he got the idea for The Gateway about two and a half years ago. “You might not believe this, but I was recovering in the hospital from my first hip surgery, and I was reading RePlay, looking at the cutters on the Players’ Choice chart and thinking that they’re too big, hard to move and expensive.
“I also thought about the high-end prizes that bring in the most revenue, like a PS5 game system, for example. You just don’t need a big machine for that…and that’s how the whole idea started,” he explained.
“I returned to the office and started talking to everybody about it. Ron Blue said, ‘I think we can do that.’ I talked to Wes Alexander, an amazing designer, who took the ideas out of my brain and put it all on paper. It looked incredible,” Riggles said. “We sent it to the factory, and the result is amazing.”
Using their Junior Crane’s small footprint design (which measures just 20.5” square) for further inspiration, Riggles and his team figured out that the split game design could give 15” to each side and still fit through location doorways. They also designed The Gateway to be deeper and taller than the Junior to maximize the prize area. On the left, the crane side can hold about 750 rubber ducks; on the right, the cutter side is ample enough to hold 3’ jumbo plush toys, as well as the typically smaller high-end merchandise.
It’s a great-looking machine, too. The prizes are visible, it has a sleek, bold design and its colorful LED lighting offers 1,356 colors (all-American red, white and blue are pictured above). And picking up on the company’s hometown icon – the famous St. Louis Gateway Arch – is an LED-lit arch of its own that frames the machine’s printer, used to print coupons for players who don’t win the big prize.
Riggles said, that it’s popular to run rubber ducky cranes as winner-every-time, but you can’t do that on the cutter side where the prize is expensive. Instead, it vends a coupon that’s value is equivalent for the price per play. For example, if it’s $1 per play, the non-winning player gets a coupon worth $1 off a slice of pizza in the same strip mall. Operators sell the coupon idea to neighboring businesses, which is a revenue booster for all, he said.
“People are doing really well with the coupons because they’re getting more revenue out of their cutter. Customers feel good about playing because even if they don’t win, they’re basically getting their money back,” he explained. Operators can do likewise on the duck side should they not run the crane as winner-every-time.
“Nobody else in the industry can offer those three combinations of crane, cutter and printer. There’s just so much you can do with it. And to think, the whole idea came from being in the hospital,” he said with a laugh.
Riggles said readers should keep their eyes open for more innovation coming soon from STL Game Co. “During the development process for The Gateway, I came up with my next new idea, and I’m so excited about it. It’s a bit larger – 48” wide – and it’s going to be great for FECs. I wish I could give you more information now, but if the industry liked The Gateway, they’re really going to like this next one!”
To learn more, visit the company online at www.STLGameCompany.com or call 800-773-0531. Their candy and prize division, S&B Candy & Toy is online at www.sandbsales.com.