Anyone ever thought of opening their own site?

[Joefuski]

I have been thinking about it today and after much deliberation have decided that opening my own site would be a good adventure for me to partake in.

Anyone else ever thought of it or have any advice, regarding the legal side of it?

Joe

[Razur]

Re: Anyone ever thought of opening their own site?

There was a thread about it recently,
There is alot of legal issues, from what i read from it.

[Joefuski]

Re: Anyone ever thought of opening their own site?

I guess I should have searched for it first, my bad. I'll have a look for it.

Thanks

[Bluegill]

Re: Anyone ever thought of opening their own site?

I've seen a few threads about this in my short time here. The conclusion for most was that it was an extremely difficult task with heaps of legal issues and vague laws. Obviously insurances and cost of renting/owning/maintaining are quite tough... depends on your scenario really.

[Ajhayter]

Re: Anyone ever thought of opening their own site?

Biggest problem is insurance, and rentals.

You need rentals to make money in most cases.

Outgoings would be:
Rent (depends on site)
Taxes (whoa boy, this will sting)
Insurance (public liability, and specific airsoft insurance)
Electricity (people need to charge batteries and other stuff)
Water (people need drinks)
Food (people need noms)
Wages (you aren't doing this for free right?)
Gun Maintenance (the guns WILL break)
Site Maintenance (stuff WILL break)
Other stuff

Unless you have SERIOUS money available to get you going, I'd advise against it. That's not to say it can't be done, but in the current climate, it won't be easy.

The other thing is you will be competing with local sites. You are going to have to find a compelling reason to draw people away from their usual haunts.

Also, good toilets = happy customers.

[Kidjal]

Re: Anyone ever thought of opening their own site?

We help run our site which has started in the last year. Over 12 months, the site owner is only just starting to break even, let alone make profit. For the first few months, the insurance was costing more than he was making on green fees or rentals. Establishing ourselves as a known site for vetern players has been hard, and have survived largley on generating our own business with brand new players, encouraging rentals at cheaper prices, helping with UKARA.

Theres advertising, web presence, insurance, cost of materials and safety precaution. Also, understanding that it takes more than one or two people to run a site - we have a group o about 7 of us that run it between us.