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Ep 156: The Future of Pinball with Seth Davis
PodcastAnalysis updated 3d ago1 hr 10 min listen
The President of Stern joins us to talk about inflation, price increases, putting games in the vault and the direction Stern is taking to make pinball more accessible to everyone
Highlights
- Stern has held prices flat for approximately 2.5 years and intends to continue holding prices as long as possible, with no imminent price increases planned.
- The Vault strategy was implemented because dealers reported it was too difficult to stock 20+ game options simultaneously, requiring portfolio consolidation.
- Most games entering the Vault have expiring licenses, effectively removing them from production beyond the 2-year minimum threshold.
- Metallica Remastered exceeds expectations with 'off the charts positive' reception from consumers and dealers.
- Stern makes manufacturing and product decisions approximately 2 years in advance, currently planning for 2026-2027 releases.
- Remastering an existing game requires approximately 80% of the work needed for a completely new game.
- Stern has experienced significant growth in the pinball market due to Gen X gamers aging into disposable income and home space to own machines.
- Seth Davis worked at Disney in video games and streaming before joining Stern; he also has prior manufacturing experience at GE.
Notable quotes
“we're figuring out what 2026, 2027 look like now, right? Because you've got to do all this work and all this setting up in advance.”
“It's a miracle every time for any manufacturer – and any manufacturer will tell you that... how tough it is for people to ship games, how hard it is to bring a physical product together with a digital thing and get it out into the marketplace.”
“There's a difference between all the games you have behind you and there's a difference in all the IP and the things that are coming up.”
“if I'm going to drain a shot, it's not because I can't see it. It's because I brick it, like I normally do.”
“Metallica was done right. Whereas, like, to juxtapose it with the Vault of Spider-Man – it wasn't super well received... it went in the wrong direction with Spider-Man.”
“I love pinball, which everybody sort of says, whether they're an enthusiast collector or not.”
“There's no eagerness to go out and raise prices or do anything like that. There's eagerness to keep them under control as much as we can.”
Entities
- Disney· company
- Flippin' Out Pinball· company
- GE (General Electric)· company
- Stern Pinball· company
- Pinball Expo· event
- Texas Pinball Festival· event
- Deadpool (Pinball)· game
- Elvira (Pinball)· game
- Iron Maiden (Pinball)· game
- Lord of the Rings· game
- Metallica Remastered· game
- Spider-Man Vault· game
- Star Wars (Pinball)· game
- George Gomez· person
- John Borg· person
- Josh Larson· person
- Scott Larson· person
- Seth Davis· person
- Tim Lee· person
- Vault Program· product
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