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6TheReveal_Intercard: Cashless Tech Transformation, Global Expansion and Growth in Amusements
Can you imagine a world where traditional paper tickets are a thing of the past, replaced by seamless cashless transactions? Step into the future with us as we explore Intercard’s groundbreaking advancements in the amusement and entertainment industry. Join Lynda Brotherton-Sherrod, Global Marketing Director, on an exclusive virtual tour of their state-of-the-art St. Louis headquarters, where innovation is at the heart of everything they do. From their pioneering debit card system to their unwavering commitment to 24-7 customer support, discover how Intercard is redefining the way we play and pay.
Travel back to the late 70s and 80s with Scott Sherrod - CEO, to understand the origins of Intercard, a company that started with copy control systems before venturing into gaming and amusement technology. Hear the fascinating story of overcoming technological and legal hurdles, including restrictive patents and initial resistance to cashless systems. Learn how customer feedback and market demands have driven Intercard’s evolution, leading to major technological milestones like electronic ticketing and loyalty programs in non-casino environments.
Get insights into the broader landscape of tech business ownership, with a focus on data security, company culture, and global expansion. Dive into the benefits and challenges of managing a diverse, multilingual workforce, and discover how Intercard’s technical innovations—from Ethernet and Wi-Fi to NFC and cloud solutions—have set them apart. Finally, we discuss the resilience of Eastern European markets, with real-life examples of overcoming adversity. This episode is a must-listen for anyone interested in the intersection of technology, entertainment, and global business.
Well, hey, gang, welcome to another edition of the Reveal. In today's episode, we are going to be exploring the world of cashless technology with Intercard, a pioneer in the amusement and entertainment industry. Founded in 1979, intercard has revolutionized how we play and pay, introducing the first debit card system for the amusement industry. Based in St Louis, missouri, the company has been at the forefront of technological innovation, from launching the first network system to developing innovative software solutions like the Edge mobile app collection, which allows for operators to manage everything from game sales to redemption inventory on the go.
Speaker 2:So Intercard. They pride themselves on offering technology and solutions that ensure entertainment centers, bowling alleys and even cruise ships can provide a seamless and engaging experience for the customers. Today, we'll learn how Intercard's commitment to 24-7 customer support and industry-leading expertise helps businesses maximize their operations and create unforgettable experiences for users around the globe. So we're going to start with a tour video of Intercard's facility in St Louis, provided by Linda Brotherton-Sharad, and then we will finish with a Q&A with Scott Sharad, their CEO.
Speaker 1:All right, so let's introduce Linda. She's the Global Marketing Director at Intercard Inc, managing branding, advertising and public relations. She has extensive experience in business communications and a strong educational background, including studies at the American University in Cairo and a degree in television journalism from the University of New Mexico. All right, let's take a look.
Speaker 3:Welcome to Intercard. Welcome to Intercard Door number two. You are now at the Intercard World Headquarters. Come on in. My name is Linda Sherrod and I am the global marketing director for this company, intercard. We are a cashless technology company. We have been in the market and the industry for over 30 years. In fact, we started in 1989. For over 30 years, in fact. We started in 1989. We service almost every continent in the world and we have over 4,000 customers. We call ourselves industry experts because we, unlike many of the competitors out there, are actually engineers. We're not operators who got into being software developers. We were asked in the 80s by one of the biggest game manufacturers to create a reader and we did. And ever since then we've been leading the way in the amusement industry. We've been leading the way in the amusement industry.
Speaker 3:I'm a little biased. I am married to the CEO, so I think his work is wonderful. But I also know firsthand, because I've been in the industry for 10 years, that I've seen that in order to be successful, you can't be all things to all people. We are engineers, technology technical specialists who work at making sure our customers succeed, because without the customer we don't exist. So when our customer is winning. We're winning. We don't do just the biggest, fastest, trendiest thing. We know what the customer needs to increase the revenue. We've been in it a long time and we love what we do.
Speaker 3:And what you're going to see today is our world headquarters. We have over a hundred employees all over the world. What differentiates us from our competitors is that we do everything under one roof, right here in America. We not only design, build, manufacture, but we take care of our customers all under this one roof. You'll find sales, you'll find development, you'll find engineering, you'll find quality assurance, you'll find accounting. You'll find our assembly line, our production. I'm going to take you around the office a little bit Again. We're engineers. We're not operators. That's the difference. We weren't operators who just jumped into this lane. We believe in the greatest technology. We call ourselves a technology company. There's a reason for that. I would never hire a lawyer to do surgery on me and I would never want someone to run my banking who doesn't understand the software that's running my banking. So here we go, follow me. Hi, steve. These are some of our engineers, our inventory and our production managers. We call this the fishbowl. As you can see, all of these tellers are about ready to ship out to customers. And this right here is I call it the pit, which means this is where all of our technical specialists answer your phone calls, emails, chatbots, everything you need. We have every single way to reach our technical specialists. Hola, maria.
Speaker 3:Now you're going to notice too, since we are in Missouri, we're kind of Kansas City fans. I like to think of our C-suites as the Patrick Mahomes and the Travis Kelseys Just saying, and I kind of like to think of ourselves as America's team now, since you know the Chiefs kind of are. So here's my favorite employee, rigsby. She's our champion. Hi, rigsby belongs to our install manager, shannon. Say hi, shannon, but Rigsby is our mascot and brings a lot of joy. Scott allows employees to bring their dogs to work, but this is also really exciting to us Skittles. They came to us first to integrate with them. This is, to me, one of the most exciting new options out there for our operators. We can't wait to fully integrate. These are our developers, our senior folks who make everything inside your readers and tellers work. Many of our employees have been with us for over 15 years, some as long as 25, close to 30 years. We're really proud of that.
Speaker 3:Let's go back out to the pit, as I call it, or your technical specialist area. This is John. He does shipping and receiving. Hey guys, this is the training room. I'm just going to open the door a little bit so you can see what we do. We believe in training our customers to make the most out of our system. We have a lot of bells and whistles that a lot of our customers don't even get to use because they don't even need it Instantaneously. Once you get a cashless card system, your revenue goes up by 15, even to 30%. So I'm going to open the door a little bit and you can see some of our training department.
Speaker 3:Let's come back here. Brandon, I want you to meet one of our technical specialists, mohammed Specialist Mohammed. He is one of our many Arabic speakers because we are the largest cashless provider in the Middle East. Come on back and meet the Customer Service Director. We're always busy around here Because we're international, 24-7 customer service. We believe in it. We have live technical specialists 24-7. We also have live online. We have chatbots, of course. Anything you need. We're here for you, because if the product doesn't work for you, we're not happy either, because when you succeed, we succeed. It's a collective All of these tellers ready to ship.
Speaker 3:We wanted to show you exactly how we do things, so I'm going to show you when people have problems with our system. The people are confused, have questions. You're going to find them right here. We wanted to, though, show you exactly how we build these, put the insides in, and I'm going to show you that in a minute as we walk through into the major production area. That's John, shipping and receiving. We've got Dwayne over there as well, doing inventory, hi guys, inventory, hi guys. And then what you're going to see here, brandon, is our cards department. Ethan and Jessica give us a wave, say hi to our customers. All right, let's keep going. All right, you're walking into.
Speaker 3:What you'll never really see in our competitors is where we put our technology. We assemble it right here. Anything needs tweaking, emergency updates, you name it, it's all happening right in here. You name it, it's all happening right in here. Hi, kenny. Kenny is one of our production managers. How long have you been with us, kenny? Five years, five years. Come on back. This is Dee. She's the assembly line manager, right? How long have you been with us? Long time, eight years, okay. So what you're gonna see is these women right here are amazingly detailed. They put the guts into the reader, and what you're going to see over here hello Bella um, what you're going to see back here is the tellers.
Speaker 3:So we're putting the guts in our tellers. We make sure that everything is done exactly correct and as the customer wants, because we have a lot of variations of the technology that goes inside of these tellers. Let's head back here. Let's go back. This is ourela, our Comptroller, and Kelly, our IT Director.
Speaker 4:Hi, I'm Kelly Blanch. I'm the Director of IT here at Intercard. I wanted to take a little bit of time and talk about service to our clientele. Scott has spent a tremendous amount of money in relation to service. We believe it's the most important value add to our client base. We have 55 employees that are under me that I control internationally. I firmly believe that is the most important thing from a business model.
Speaker 3:This is Katie, our new trade show coordinator and sales assistant. You'll see her at the trade shows. Come on back to Quality Assurance. Hi, gentlemen, this is the LBX Collective and we've got our senior Quality Assurance manager, who's been with Intercard for over 25 years 27 years, that's saying something. And can you say hello in Bosnian.
Speaker 4:Hello.
Speaker 3:But of course we don't stop there. There's Spencer, say hello. And then of course, Diego. You've probably seen a lot of the trade shows. And how do you say hello? What about French Bonjour? Oh no. And these guys are here to make sure the products that we design and manufacture are tested and ready to go out the door. And manufacture are tested and ready to go out the door. I can't stress enough how important these guys are to making what we do work well for the customer. Come on back, we'll see the c-suite levels. We've got our EE back here. But right here is our senior director of development, scott Bollinger, who's been with Intercard. How long? 15 years, 17, yeah.
Speaker 4:This is our.
Speaker 3:CEO, our conference call with one of our customers, and then I'm going to introduce you to our COO, eula Dreher, who's been with the company. Oh, most importantly, this is Pencil, our snapping turtle. Everybody is kind of into her. How old is she? She's like 25 years old. Yeah, old turtle. I like to show this. So this is what we call our museum.
Speaker 3:So that yellow reader that was made in 1989, 1990, is still in operation in some centers in Mexico to this day. They are built to last and I like to say we're best in class in that regard. We don't do what's trendy, we do what's going to serve our customer and a lot of new people. Operators who get into this industry think they have to have all the bells and whistles. The most important thing is you can keep your doors open, especially those seasonal places. So we understand all the needs of the different customers and operators that we work for. But, yeah, these are some amazing old relics. We've come a long way and we continue to this day developing our product to make sure it's state-of-the-art and best in class.
Speaker 3:And here is our COO, hugh LaDreer. I'm going to take you to our kitchen just because I can. Derek's made a little lunch in here, but this is where our team, including Patrick Mahomes, eats lunch and drinks a lot of coffee. Come on back out here. So Alicia, who's been with the company for 28 years, is on vacation this week. I'm sorry you missed her. She would have loved to have been here. We so appreciate LBX being here at the Intercard World Headquarters, and if you have any questions or would like to find out more about Intercard, just look us up online, intercardinccom. We appreciate your time, we appreciate your efforts in the industry and we hope to. If we haven't met you yet, we hope to meet you soon and you become one of our customers. Thank you.
Speaker 2:All right. So that was awesome. Thank you, linda, for that tour and, as we mentioned, scott Schirra is the CEO of Intercard and he's joining us today. Scott has significantly influenced companies rise as a leader in cashless technology across the global amusement and entertainment industries. Under his leadership, intercard has broadened its technological suite, including the iTeller and the iReader series, as well as the Edge mobile app collection, which has been pivotal in boosting operational efficiency and enhancing customer engagement across a variety of venues.
Speaker 1:And, moreover, scott's strategic focus on global expansion has solidified Intercard's position in international markets, particularly in the Middle East. The company has been a prominent provider in Saudi Arabia for over 25 years, reflecting Scott's ability to navigate and succeed in diverse market environments. This international success highlights Intercard's adaptability and Scott's effective leadership in maintaining strong customer relations and leading technological advancement. All right, let's welcome Scott.
Speaker 2:All right. Well, Scott, good to have you on the Reveal. This is awesome.
Speaker 5:Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, all right. Well, right on, let's just start off right from the beginning, or as far back as you can take us. Let's take us back to the 80s. Know, you started uh 1979, I believe, and so maybe expand on the origins of uh, expand the origins how you guys started doing what you were doing well, the genesis was 1978, like you said, and actually it was.
Speaker 5:Uh. The person who started was a friend of my father's. They went to college together, they were both electrical engineers at washington and and at that time my dad had retired. He was a VP for Harris Corporation doing their CAD CAM division and he was 48 years old and he wanted something to do and his buddy approached him and they became partners and then he eventually bought his partner out. But what they were doing was copy control for law offices and universities and there was some vending, but not much at that time. But over time it evolved, especially the copy control side.
Speaker 5:That went into Kinko copiers for a long time, yeah, and the advent of the internet eventually killed that market. You just don't do a lot of copy copying anymore. Most of it's just emailed out. But we did wander into the and I joined the company in 94, but my father had already in 92 had gotten involved in the gaming side of it Some casino activities, but a lot of it was video games. And actually that transpired because it was actually approached by a group to put it together and that's how it all started. It was an uphill battle at first in the gaming market. A lot of people uh did not want to put a machine, uh that wasn't taking cash onto their their video game.
Speaker 2:And there was also a lot of people who wanted to keep the revenues secret, you know for I was gonna say you know there's a lot you can do with that much cash flowing through an arcade.
Speaker 5:Yeah and internationally. We still get quite a bit of that, believe it or not. Anyhow, uh, that's where it all started and basically I joined the company like I said, it was in 94, I think For a while. I left in 2000. I came back in 2003 and was the CEO. My father passed in 2005. And the rest is history. We've been moving up and up and up. It's been a very positive and fun experience. Actually, we do a lot of stuff with technology and whatnot, so interesting.
Speaker 1:Very cool Very cool, it's awesome. So I mean, you mentioned you're kind of like your first reader. I'm curious Tell us, what did that first look like? Like what? It wasn't? Obviously a glowing thing.
Speaker 5:No, no, no, the first reader because there was a patent out there. It was called the Pellegrini patent and it was basically what's called a submarine patent in the industry, and what that means is somebody creates a patent. He doesn't produce any product for that patent. He just waits for somebody to produce that product and he turns his lawyers loose on him. So there was a patent in the industry I think it was 16 years that you could not have. It was either 16 or 13,. I forget that you could not have. Basically, an online system was patented by this guy. If you wanted to do an online system like we have now and everybody has now, you had to pay a royalty. So the workaround was what we called stored value, and the stored values were actually storing that information physically on the card. But it's not the world's greatest technology and there's a lot of headaches with it, and it proved. I mean, we got by with it, but I think it really crippled. What could have been in the industry if that patent hadn't been in place?
Speaker 2:I think it'd be a lot further with technology.
Speaker 5:as far as evolution goes, it's kind of like the dark ages. I pushed us back, humanity back, hundreds and hundreds of years.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh. Yeah, I can't imagine the data would be on the customer's card that they're swiping.
Speaker 5:It was. So you've got issues with. The card gets damaged, the card gets lost.
Speaker 1:Constantly yeah.
Speaker 2:It rubs against a magnet of some kind, yeah, anything.
Speaker 5:Right. But you got to realize back then too the network technology was not where it was or is today, so which is ubiquitous. Back then, if you were networking these readers, it was a slave host 485 technology, which is god awful, really a horrible way of going about it, and there was no cloud-based technology, there was no centralized database out there, so it kind of made sense and it didn't because these things were still somewhat autonomous at that time, if that makes sense.
Speaker 5:So from one location to the next they're not networked together right Back in the nineties. But if the information's on the card right, I can do that yeah, yeah, oh, so interesting, very interesting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, but like you said, there's lots of complexities with that, and so I mean obviously having this patent in place, you know, basically blocking the industry from moving forward. You have to find workarounds like store value. What were some of the other initial challenges? Moving into the amusements industry, you know, obviously there was like a hurdle, probably around cash, but like what were some of the other real problems?
Speaker 5:A lot of people didn't want to do it, you know, and the reality is, with the advent of putting credit card on a kiosk device, people won't spend 10 bucks or 20 bucks for tokens or quarters, they'll actually put $100 on. So what people would see is because it's a hard sell, you actually get a return, almost a 30% increase in your business at a location by just and that's not so much the advent of cashless, that's just the ability to use a credit card transferring money on something else. It was just a hard sell. I mean, a lot of people didn't want to do it. People didn't want to run networks. You know I went through. People were afraid of electronic tickets. You know, we had hybrids for a long time that were using a cashless system, but yet they were still using the paper tickets. Oh, wow, yeah. The fear was, you know, kids aren't going to understand. Well, they're the fast learners when it comes to technology, not us. But that was probably the biggest hurdle out there, I mean. And then the cost, because we'll go back to the system I was talking about. That was store value.
Speaker 5:So we had one of my first locations that was large was FunFest, which was a Neil Hoffauer location which spawned into main event. But he had an arcade. I think it was 130, 140 games. That was a 300 000 debit card system. That's a astronomical amount of money, man. Yeah, that's a lot. Yeah, that's a lot anyhow.
Speaker 2:So that's 30 percent lift in order to justify that right right, so it's cost prohibitive.
Speaker 5:Yeah, that's how well he was doing a phenomenal business there. So two things Mainly accepts a lot of people, a lot of pushback, and that still goes on in a lot of the foreign countries we sell in Not so much in the Middle East, but Europe is definitely pushing back on that concept of cashless. We do get a little bit of it down in South and Central America even.
Speaker 2:I find it so interesting that they are, because they're actually a really cashless culture and society there, generally speaking, going into restaurants and other places.
Speaker 5:you know town If you go to Sweden, right? Sweden's actually this place where their taxis do not take anything but credit card, right? Those are the same way. Some of the malls, the retail outfits are set up the same way. It's, it's, it's all credit card and credit card based. But I think it's the mindset of the operator, you know they think, uh, it's too much of a um a put out having a customer walk up to a kiosk, figure out that device and dispense a card. I mean that's so it's crazy.
Speaker 1:I remember when we flipped over to a card system and I personally was standing at the counter and I had a customer come up and yell at me because they were so angry that they weren't getting actual paper tickets anymore. I'll give you an example.
Speaker 5:A mother came in and I forgot the damn name of the place, that business, um. But uh, she came in and she had her, her five-year-old or maybe 10 year old, I don't know, but he had to go out and play the games and but she had to, you know, buy the card because she was so put out by that. She walked up to me because your card system sucks. Yeah, right, I know, yeah. And now everyone's like where?
Speaker 1:are my cards. I don't want any tickets like out by that. She walked up to me and goes your card system sucks. Yeah, right, I know, yeah. And now everyone's like where are?
Speaker 4:my cards? I don't want any tickets.
Speaker 1:Like yeah, it's completely changed. So I mean, things have evolved since the back in the day. I mean, obviously, with you, you added a lot of new things to the platform, but what's the main driver? How do you decide what features to add and what you're going to bring to market? How do you make those decisions?
Speaker 5:Well, that's all voice of the customer. So what we do is we sit down, we have round tables with the customers out there and discuss their needs and what they need and try and make sure those aren't one-offs, because a one-off is going to do any good and it's just another item that we've got to support and maintain that only one person is using. But most of it is voice to the customer. And you know, what I find is we understand technology and you have to understand what the woes of the customer is. So when they explain those, we have a talent of actually applying that technology to solve their problem. But you've got to know what that problem is first. Yeah, so you have to sit down and discuss it with people, what they're trying to achieve, and then you, you know, you build a model through software or hardware that that addresses those, those needs yeah, it's interesting, and are you working when those round tables just as a follow-up to that one?
Speaker 2:are they exclusively your customers or do you have people who are potentially other like competitor customers or even like, or even just people who don't?
Speaker 5:have a cash? Yeah, no, interesting idea. No, it's. It's all our customer base, yeah, you know, and some of our new people we're bringing to the table. You know I need these items to make me, make this work for me, so we'll take a look at those. You know features and and functions they want added to the system and we'll make a decision if we can do these or we can't. One-offs are we stay away from. It's just too costly. Yeah, totally.
Speaker 1:Can I just ask this have you had any really weird requests for features and you're like what requests for features and you're like what?
Speaker 5:You know no, not really. I mean even the one ops that people are asking for. You can see how it is valid in the way they're doing business, so I do that. No one's asked anything too strange, okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 5:And you never, you never know. Early on in the beginning, we used to get a lot of people wanted the customer loyalty programs right, so we would hop on that and trying to design it like a casino. Well, these aren't casinos, because we've worked in casinos. A good customer in a casino is there once a week or he's there every other day period. Right In our world a good customer is 3.4 times a year. So getting all this demographic information and having him fill it out.
Speaker 2:it just doesn't fly. Yeah, this isn't Caesars, where people coming and traveling on a regular basis. So you worked in a different capacity for the first six years. You were there 94 to 2000. And then you came back in 2003 as the CEO Right. What is you know, being in the CEO role now for the last 20 years? What is the most enjoyable part of that role, and how has even your CEO role evolved over the last 20 years or so?
Speaker 5:I think the most entertaining or exciting part of it is having actual control of the direction of where you're heading. As far as markets are concerned and new markets out there, we've had a great deal of success with that. It's been fun. Being your own boss, so to say, has its benefits, there's no doubt about it, but it also has its headaches. There's a lot piled on. You have a lot of responsibilities to your employees to make sure everybody stays employed and that everybody's happy with their job. And it benefits us in a car to retain these people because we have something invested in and this is a system sale. So, especially in the service side, you want to make sure that people will stick with you between five and 10 years.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you have an engineering background. I understand that right. Okay, how do you feel that that background influences your approach to how you service your customers and run the business at Intercard?
Speaker 5:I think it makes you more methodical and you pay a lot more attention to detail, because that's part of that engineering training, you know, and it has helped understanding technology and how to apply that technology, especially in the electrical world. Yeah, so I think it's been a benefit. I mean, it's helped me out. My dad was an electrical engineer. He was successful with the company going down that road, so obviously it was a good thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's interesting. You talk about being methodical. How does that help, especially when you have things you're dealing with a lot of data about customers, about your consumers and also about your customers? How do you guys handle things like security concerns and potentially data breaches and some of that kind of stuff? How are you guys thinking about that on a regular?
Speaker 5:basis as far as security breaches. We have a lot of third-party entities out there that hover above us in the cloud to protect us. There's some extra cash layout, but that is a paramount thing. It's happening all the time. I can't tell you how many times I've had a customer actually transfer his deposit or his final payment internationally to a fraudulent account. Oh wow yeah, we're talking big numbers too. So these are things you have to be cognitive of. We tell the customer out there you know you've got to be, watch what you do, watch where you've been, where you sign on. If you get information from us that says we've changed our wiring information, pick up the phone and verify that.
Speaker 5:But unfortunately, you know some naivety on their side, it doesn't happen.
Speaker 1:And in situations like that, are they ever successful at getting their money back? Or is it just gone? Yeah, that's it. Oh gosh, that's a hard pill to swallow.
Speaker 5:There's also scams going on out there.
Speaker 1:Oh right, we see it. We see it in other things too, right? You mentioned just a few minutes ago that you, uh you really focus on culture within the business. You've got a really um, you've retained a lot of your employees for a serious, uh, longer periods of time. I'm just wondering if you can kind of share some of the aspects that you have, um that you put into your culture that differentiate you Um well one, we're very flexible.
Speaker 5:Uh, I don't really we don't have a work and home policy, but we're very flexible. I don't really we don't have a work and home policy, but we're very flexible. People need time off. I don't hold them to the two weeks or four weeks for those who have four weeks, but we do think we have a very nice health plan and we also match. I have a 401 of 6%, which is pretty much unheard of in this industry. Wow, yeah, we do parties for the employees out in the parking lot. We do Christmas holidays. We spend a lot of money in trying to make the employee happy. We try and move up internally within the organization instead of hiring outside. Like I said, we're very flexible with what we allow them to do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's great. So you have a. You have a number of employees. When we were doing the tour with Linda, you know she she was introducing a number of different employees who are from different countries, who have a lot of really diverse backgrounds. I'm really interested to understand how you guys work to foster such an inclusive, diverse group of employees and team members.
Speaker 5:Well, if they were not originally from this country first generation or second generation we pretty much tried to lock on to them right away because we knew they had a skill set we needed, which was language. So that was definitely one plus behind that as far as you know, and you know.
Speaker 5:As far as hiring practices, I mean, we're pretty, it's a crap sheet, let's face it. When you hire somebody you really don't know what you're going to get into. But we are pretty fast to correct the problem if that individual isn't working out because it's affecting the whole. You know you have a person out there that's that's cancerous, so there's quick weed out and then the rest. I mean I've got viral. Spike has been with me for 27, 28 years and there's a couple out there who've been. There's two out there that have been here longer than him.
Speaker 1:Holy, that's a very long time. That's a lot of loyalty Fabulous. So with these people with diverse backgrounds, obviously different languages, this is opening up different avenues for some good multilingual support. How has that helped you expand into new markets?
Speaker 5:Well, usually in Central and South America, that's a mandate from anybody we're doing business with bilingual support. How has that helped you expand into new markets? Well, usually in Central and South America, that's a mandate from anybody we're doing business with. They have to have a core group of people they can talk to and communicate. So we have that Spanish speaking individuals here on staff, and so if you go to Europe, a lot of that is they and uh. So if you go to europe, a lot of that is they typically can find somebody who speaks english.
Speaker 5:Italy's a little harder. Russia was a challenge, but we did actually have a person who speaks russian, so that uh took care of alleviated that problem. We've got people who can speak chinese. Um, and you know, it's just. You evolve. You know, as you move into these territories, that need for support grows, and then you have to focus on hiring the individuals that can help you grow that market and and keep in mind the most important aspect of this business is support. Yeah, it's a paramount part of it, and and we spend a lot of money on support we have. That is our business biggest expenditure and what we spend on a yearly basis.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, no doubt, and I think when you talk about people being multilingual, I think they have to probably be multicultural as well, because I would imagine that it's. It's one thing to be able to speak Chinese or Russian, so knowing to understand those cultures and how they, the type of support they expect and so are you do you find that it's not just purely the ability to speak the language, but also the ability to, to connect with that, that culture and their, their needs and the way they look at things?
Speaker 5:Yeah, I mean I think that it's a fair statement. I mean definitely would help. You know, there's no doubt about it. Yeah, I mean, each culture has its own unique behavior and if you can make yourself a part simulate to that culture, it definitely makes the customer that much more relaxed doing business with you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. So what are some of the things? I was shifting a little bit over to your product and what you've developed and some of the things that you're working? What are some of the specific engineering or technical innovations that you and the team have created that sets you apart from your competitors?
Speaker 5:Well, in the beginning we were the first with Ethernet. That was 2003. We were the first with Wi-Fi. We were the first using a 32-bit processor. Believe it or not, that's a major jump in the world, because I was used to 8-bit. We were the first with the color display and that was from the advent of the phones, made that affordable. Finally, you know just a lot of firsts out there First using, I think, bluetooth even, and first using NFC. But at the time we put it together the RFID, it was just too expensive. The cars were still very expensive. They've come down significantly now, but they're still more than the mag stripe, the other technology side of it we did. We were the first with a cloud-based solution. That was in 2003. And that was, that was huge.
Speaker 5:All of a sudden you had a card you could use in any facility without any kind of headaches that you had with the stored value card, and it was effective and it worked. A lot of my competition does what I call a oh, it's a round robin or a polling method. So let's say I've got six locations and I'm location one right here and I walk in with a card, but it's not from that location, it's from location six. So they'll actually go out and pull each one of those locations. Grab that balance and pull it down, which you know sounds great. But you know what happens when you have 30 locations?
Speaker 4:Sure, yeah, it's going to slow down.
Speaker 5:Listen. Let's say that particular location is offline for some reason.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, totally.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 5:Lots of complicated issues there reporting something with the cloud, because now everything is right there on the cloud so you can pull everything back that you need and it's it's. It's a true enterprise solution. That's what I'm getting at. I have a database at each location that you have to maintain, which is a damn nightmare right, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So I mean your internet connection then becomes critical, right, it does. Now I feel like recently there was you guys had a big technical challenge and I'm just wondering if you want to share with us what that was and how Intercard faced it and dealt with that problem and resolved it.
Speaker 5:Well, we had an outage recently with that we had a provider who sold his system or his centers and did not His data center. Just to be clear not family entertainment.
Speaker 2:His data center.
Speaker 5:And then they proceeded to move it because he lost his lease. The new owner did pay the rent and didn't tell us. And you know we had issues and what we did to correct those issues is we quickly moved all the servers we had at that time into the new center. But you know we only support, we only really host one third of our customer base. The rest do it themselves. So like a Bolero they're hosting their own center and a lot of them have to do that for PCI compliance. So all the larger entities out there pretty much host their own, their own systems out there.
Speaker 2:Interesting. So yeah, and you know, at the end of the day you went as quickly as possible but really impacted. You know about a third of your customers versus. You know the ones that were hosting their own servers.
Speaker 5:But out of that third. I'd say one third of those were really actually affected because most of these people, the real killer here, was the point of sale itself. The system is designed to work offline without a connection.
Speaker 5:What happened in this scenario? This was an internet. We'd never dreamt this would happen. We didn't plan for it and certain versions of the point of sale were going bonkers on us, causing some problems. So most people only experienced it with the redemption side, and that's those that were actually offering redemption. So we have a lot of route operators out there that do do not have uh redemption capabilities. They just have maybe a uh some kind of vending device out there that's not have redemption capabilities. They just have maybe some kind of vending device out there that's vending to get the prizes.
Speaker 1:Gotcha.
Speaker 2:So when you look at the diverse set of features that your system has, do you have certain ones that are most popular? People are making a decision to implement and turn on certain features all the way, from things like reporting, all the way down to the actual interaction the consumer has with the kiosk or with the reader itself.
Speaker 5:Well, with the kiosk, I think, some of the unique things we have. We have the ability to sell packages on that, and so that's a big plus. So you can walk up and buy a package deal that's associated with an account that allows you to have $10 on the car, $50 on the car, and maybe you've got three gate accesses that allow you the Ferris wheel and the rollercoaster ride, and then maybe there's a segment of that that has an entitlement tied to it which may be a food item. So all being able to sell sold out of the kiosk, which is a yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5:Yeah.
Speaker 2:That's awesome.
Speaker 1:So what are some of the popular features of your cashless systems that clients find the most beneficial? What do they say that they're looking forward to the most when they get your system?
Speaker 5:Well, it's an uptick in sales for sure, but we're swapping out for another system. I would say supports one. The reporting is number two. If they have multiple locations, being centralized is a major plus for them. I mean, it just makes life that much easier. Like I said, it's a true enterprise solution. You can change your reader pricing at that time, mess with your teller remotely and you know all your reporting is centralized, so you have multiple locations telling you what they're doing. Revenue stream wise.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome. I mean, reporting was always the big thing for us as well. We just wanted to be able to create our own reports and, you know, figure out what they look like. So data is king, right, it is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you mentioned that on average, some people see a 30% increase when they implement a cashless system. From you know a cash base, right, Right, yeah, and so from cash system. But maybe there's a specific success story you could share of a customer who either you know maybe you were pulling teeth to get them to finally put in cashless and where they really increased their revenue.
Speaker 5:It's been so long I just don't remember it anymore. I mean you're talking, God, almost 30 years, but I'd say in the 2000s is when it kind of took off, but yeah, that was so. That is the stat, though. I mean, I guess there's a few out in the 2000s is when it kind of took off, but yeah, that is the stat, though I guess there's a few out in Spain right now that we have customers out there I forget the name of the locations, but yeah, they're seeing that increase now because they've jumped from cash into the cashless arena and they're using credit card at the, at the kiosk.
Speaker 1:Right Gotcha. So when you have like, when you're implementing a new system for a customer, I mean it's kind of scary if you're going from, like, using a cash system to cashless. Like there's a lot of training, new process, all that stuff that goes into place. What kind of training do you provide for customers? Like what's the handholding look like? Are you guys on site? Do they have to spend hours training before you install a system?
Speaker 5:It's both. So there's a training program, that we have process in place, so there's a pre and then there's a post, and then there's somebody actually on site, provided they want that part of it, but it is ongoing. The problem you have in this industry is that a lot of these individuals are that are employed by our event. Our customers are seasonal, you know. It might be a high school student or might be college student, but you know they're not there for long-term. Long-term for them is six months. So there's a lot of retraining that goes on all the time. It's it's it's perpetual, you know, and the owners typically know how to run the reporting, which is what's germane for them.
Speaker 1:Right, that makes total sense but they don't know how to install a reader and they don't okay you know, so do you have training systems built in, like where I, as an employee, I get hired, I would go online to a system and I'd go through like a set of training to kind of understand how everything?
Speaker 5:works. It is we have free training. You can sign up. I think we give everybody two or three hours a month free training, okay, customer, so you can sign up for that and be trained okay right and most people sit there for an hour. It's usually a 30 minute interval interval yeah, right, right.
Speaker 2:It's hard to hold somebody's attention that long so, all right, I know especially you can tell by the picture that's above your head as well that you're, you know you're a history buff. Um, just kind of, I'm just kind of curious, like the studies in history that you've done, uh, in the past, like how does looking back into the past and and things you learn from that, how does that inform how you think about the future, where you know where the, where the industry as a whole is going, where intercard is going, even if you want to get super philosophical, like where civilization is going?
Speaker 1:Oh boy, I'm looking forward to this answer.
Speaker 5:It's going to be good. But you mean applying what I've read in books to what I'm doing now? Yeah, especially because you look back in history right?
Speaker 2:Maybe the answer is there isn't anything, it's just really interesting and fun to read about.
Speaker 5:It's just interesting to read. I mean, I think history itself repeats itself. But getting any kind of uh benefit out of applying that knowledge to to uh inner card, I don't think so. Yeah, or maybe I'm doing it indirectly and don't even know that's a possibility too. But sit there and say, well, general Grant would have done it this way.
Speaker 1:It just doesn't pop into your head and you're like you know there's no, there's no, like Sun Tzu, you know you know, things coming and coming to mind OK all right, yeah, ok, that would have been really interesting if there was like who is this, scott, this? Is awesome reading a lot of history books lately oh, we're in a very interesting time as well, so many things are changing yep um, okay, well, I think you know what.
Speaker 1:we're almost at the end here. We have one final question for you, and I guess that question is how is Intercard planning to expand its global footprint in the coming years? Where are you guys going? What's kind of coming down the pipe one of the first in the Middle East.
Speaker 5:We have a huge footprint in there. In fact, I'd say we're probably the largest in the Middle East. We also have a huge footprint in South and Central America. We've got a fairly good following in the Pacific Rim, asian Pacific Rim and Europe. We'll see what happens there. It's tough, tough crap, but we're a lot of Eastern European. I'm sorry Eastern European countries. Right now, believe it or not, we have systems in the Ukraine and they're still dying.
Speaker 1:Really.
Speaker 5:Crazy Interesting.
Speaker 1:Life goes on, I guess. Hey, it has to, yeah.
Speaker 5:Somebody bought over there, bought a teller recently and their freight forwarder came and picked it up.
Speaker 2:So I don't even know how they get it in. Wow, yeah, it's remarkable, it's remarkable, it really is. Well, this has been really awesome. Scott, thank you so much for spending some time talking about the background of Intercard, and you know this has been great.
Speaker 5:Well, thanks for bringing me on, I appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Absolutely All right. Well, lbxers, this wraps up another edition of the reveal, so if you enjoyed this episode, go ahead and hit that like button and subscribe right, so you can see more reveals, more behind our doors, more sound offs with kevin williams, and we have lots of stuff always coming out and with that, stay tuned and keep kicking ass all right, bye guys bye.
