Mods: I wasn't sure where to post this so please move if this is the wrong forum

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There is an acute dearth of pub leagues in my area; there is one good one and a few others which absolutely suck. I'm thinking of starting my own and want to hear from those of you who run them or have run successful leagues in the past. I know how to set up the league structure (points, etc) as there are Web sites devoted to this. What I'm interested in learning is

1. What kind of deals do you offer the pubs in exchange for your services? Did/do you charge them based on the number of players you bring in? Is it a fixed number or does it vary with participation? Do you charge a flat-rate sum or is it a % of food/drink sales?

2. Do you use semi-professional dealers or let players deal for themselves? Which is better?

3. How much should I be looking to spend on equipment, ie chips, tables, etc?

4. What is the most effective way(s) to advertise such a league to get it going?

5. What should my target be, ie just bars, bars & restaurants, etc?

Any advice appreciated. TIA!

I've got a friend who got into this business recently, so I'll share what I know about how it works around these parts...

Around here it's generally based on the number of players (or tables full of players) that you bring in. The going rate is somewhere near $50 per table of player -- so figure $6/7 a player. You're going to have a hard time selling yourself to your new customers, because they don't want you to entertain their customers -- they want you to bring in people from your pool of players already playing at other bar/league locations.

Players deal. You can't afford even semi-professional dealers. You can, eventually, afford some broke college kid who'll charge you $50 to sit in the bar and run your games for you as soon as you book two places on the same night.

Although they can be had for less, figure $100 for each good table-topper after shipping, and figure about 40c per chip once you account for racks and carry cases and some branding. My friend makes a little extra money (or at least makes a better sales pitch) because he puts advertisements on one side of the chips. You need 30 chips per player (figure 20 to start, plus color-ups, shrinkage). That's $10 minimum in chips per player, so after buying cards, you're at $200 for each table you want to be able to support. Good news is you'll only have 20-30 people to start, so you can buy more chips and tables on week #2.

Word of mouth. Invade other leagues. Advertise in the bars themselves. Craigslist. New Times or other local free newspapers.

Anywhere that they'll take you. My friend does a few corporate locations, because they get a corporate advertising/promotional fund that they can spend willy-nilly on Karaoke and Trivial and Poker, etc.

Welcome.

what Palimax said. (+1 to me)

BOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

Awesome thank you!

I used to work for a pretty successfull UK poker league...

www.thenutspokerleague.com

I must of visited around maybe 50-60 pubs just sitting having a drink with the owner and explain what it I was doing, see if there's a possibilty of running a night on one of the bars quieter nights, this generally works pretty well as well, Bar owners don't need much persuading of an idea which will make their bar busier...

The Company i used to work for is ran in a Franchise Buisiness Model

i.e different people work in the different venues, and split the money per player.. and the franchisee buys all the equipment from the franchiser..

when i used to work i got around $5-6 per player, which was split 66/33 between me and the boss....

I'm sure IANAL applies - but how does anyone "charge" the pub or anyone else to run the league? Generally the gambling rules from state to state "trigger" a professional operation as soon as one person or persons profit from the fact that a poker game is running.

Sarge

Yeah, this was a problem in the UK also...

what most venues ended up doing was putting on food or something or a raffle, instead off paying you... and laying the cost onto the players... A venue where i woprked would split the cost with the players, and sell raffle tickets for free beers or something to help them cover the costs....

you are essentially are providing entertainment services, because essentially i assume the league will be ran on a points system? As well, no-one pays to play poker, and although most venues ended up with a "side pot" no monetary gain was made ...(well... kinda ;p)...

Then the Main finals were held in a casino, where it was fine to play for prize money, ... although the UK is obv aLOT different to the US when it comes to gambling laws...