Good Neighbor Podcast: Cobb County

E75: Pinball Revival

• Milli M. & Bryan Broyles • Episode 75

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Step back in time and push play on nostalgia with Bryan Broyles, owner of Portal Pinball Arcade. Bryan shares how his evening hobby of restoring vintage arcade machines evolved into a thriving business that's now at the forefront of the modern pinball resurgence. With over 40 pinball machines and 30 arcade games spanning from the 1970s to early 2000s, Portal Pinball has become a destination drawing visitors from multiple states.

What makes Portal Pinball special isn't just the impressive collection – it's the community that's forming around these beloved games. Bryan reveals how the arcade bridges generations, with parents in their 40s and 50s introducing their children to the social experiences of their youth. "This was my social scene as a kid," Bryan explains. "We made our friends here." Surprisingly, today's youth are embracing the challenge, with the world's top competitive pinball players now under 24 years old.

The conversation takes an illuminating turn as Bryan discusses how Portal Pinball survived the COVID-19 pandemic as a non-essential business built around shared touchpoints. The creative solutions they implemented – from entrance hand-washing stations to sophisticated power management systems – didn't just help them survive but transformed their business model for the better. Above all, Bryan emphasizes what Portal Pinball offers visitors: "It's a great escape... literally a world under glass that you will be coming back to play again and again." Ready to experience the magic yourself? Visit Portal Pinball Arcade at 3335 Cobb Parkway in Atworth, where stress disappears and fun awaits with every flip, bump, and high score.

Speaker 1:

This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Millie M.

Speaker 2:

Hello everybody, welcome to the Good Neighbor Podcast. I am your host, millie M. Are you in need or are you looking for a retro arcade with games all the way back from the 70s up into the early 2000s? Well, one might be closer than you think. I have the pleasure of introducing your good neighbor Brian Broyles of Portal Pinball Arcade. How's it going, brian?

Speaker 3:

Doing really well and thanks for having us.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. We are so excited to learn all about you and your business. Tell us more about Portal Pinball.

Speaker 3:

OK, so Portal Pinball is like a retro arcade. We're bringing all the fun back and the nostalgia. So we have over 40 pinball machines and a little over 30 arcade games and some skeeball. So things for everything everybody do, for all ages, and we all are, excuse me, all ages arcade. So we get that asked a lot because people know that we have beer, wine, cider. But no, absolutely, we're completely family friendly and you pay by the hour. So there's no coins or tokens required.

Speaker 2:

Sounds good to me. So how did you get into this business? What made you say I'm going to open a retro arcade? That includes, you know, adult fun too?

Speaker 3:

I've started collecting at home. Obviously, I work a normal day job. I would buy these old machines and fix them up just for fun. In the evenings I would tinker on them People tinker on cars or whatever but I thought it was fun bringing these old 70s and 80s games back to life. I had a couple around the house. Of course, like anything else, you get more and more and more.

Speaker 3:

Then I started reaching out to some other friends that are in this hobby, like in Florida and the Carolinas, and they started opening places and said people are really coming back out and starting to play pinball again. So we're actually in a kind of a big resurgence for pinball. We have more manufacturers now than we did a long time ago, so it's kind of been a big resurgence right now. So there's an app that people have and they can look up where pinball machines are everywhere now. So it's like a community-based thing and it's just really fun.

Speaker 3:

And I got to the point where I said let's just try it. We found a small place in Kennesaw, worked with a landlord who was really, really nice and gave me a temporary lease just to try it for six months, which was a great idea, and it just, you know, people come out of the woodworks and we were kind of the only place back then in 2017, so people were coming from alabama. We had some people driving down from tennessee, so you really couldn't find at that time. We only had 20 something machines in one place, but it was really hard to find any place that had multiple machines like that, and after four years we moved here to atworth, uh, which is actually where we and found a bigger place and doubled in size and, of course, we built this facility out from the ground up the way we wanted it.

Speaker 2:

I am so glad people were able to find that space and I feel like the more technology advances, the more there is a draw to you know, nostalgia for sure. What are some of the myths or misconceptions about your industry, what you do or maybe your company in particular?

Speaker 3:

None I can really think of. I mean, I know, a long time ago pinball used to be in like CD bars and stuff like that. So I know some of the older people when their kids want to say, hey, I found a pinball place and they're like, oh, I don't know if I want to take you to a pinball hall, you know. But then they come in and they look around and realize you know, it's obviously family friendly. But yeah, there used to be like a gambling myth and a little thing to pinball back in the 30s and 40s and stuff. So it had a little bit of seedy history for a while, but of course now it's just all family fun.

Speaker 2:

Love that, love that.

Speaker 3:

That's a good question, because when we first started we thought maybe college kids would be a little more nostalgic, so we kind of focused a little closer to KSU there and I mean they still do, but it is not our I would say 40s to 50s, but don't get me wrong, they still bring the kids out. And now we're seeing kids enjoying pinball too, all across the nation Because, like I said, the top players in the world're seeing kids enjoying pinball too, all across the nation because, like I said, the top players in the world are all kids like that are under 24 years old goodness, goodness, and I could see it being a bonding experience like let me show you what my favorite games are, and that's what I tell people.

Speaker 3:

This is kind of that was my social scene as a kid. I used to ride the bike to the bowling alley, where there were pinball machines and arcade games, and that's where me and my friends kind of hung out. You know, we didn't have the technology, of course, so we all went to arcades and hung out and I think kind of that's what kind of parents are showing their kids too. This is what we used to do. We made our friends here.

Speaker 2:

We played this game also, also the kids realized wow, these games are hard too yeah, give a nintendo and xbox a run for their money sometimes. Yeah, give Nintendo and Xbox a run for their money sometimes no, continues here. Well, have you ever considered like maybe starting a podcast or doing some social media things to get the word out and bringing that community together?

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. I mean, we do obviously just Facebook and Instagram for most of our, most of our posts and stuff. But we used to do random what's called Twitch streaming stuff. But, um, we used to do random what's called, uh, twitch streaming so you could actually see a person playing the game, see the person and you could see the score. So there's three cameras going at the same time and, um, you can learn the machine a little bit. But now we have a state champion here in georgia. Every thursday he does live stream on a machine for two hours and he basically teaches you how to play that one machine, because they're all different, of course. So every Thursday he picks a new game and for two hours you can kind of tune in and watch him play. Like I said, he's a state and national champion, so he's a five fascinating.

Speaker 2:

I'm gonna have to get his handle and tune in, yeah absolutely so, outside of pinball, what do you like to do for fun?

Speaker 3:

Riding motorcycles I had to pick another hobby. I'm just kidding. You know, after a while, when you turn your hobby into a business, sometimes you need another hobby. So I picked up riding motorcycles, which my wife absolutely can't stand.

Speaker 2:

It's a scary thing. It's a scary thing, so let's switch gears a bit. Can you describe a hardship or a life challenge that you overcame and how it made you stronger?

Speaker 3:

COVID. It was tough for our business, so we learned a lot when we were allowed to open back up again. You know, people still weren't sure about touching buttons or coming in. We didn't, nobody knew. So all we did was try to make people feel more safe. And then, you know, we didn't know what to do. So we actually installed a sink as soon as you walk in the front door. People were washing their hands and had to put on a mask before they came in. Of course we had hand sanitizer everywhere, but just making it through COVID itself as a non-essential business like an arcade was just really really a struggle. So we learned to adapt. We learned that once everybody walks out, we pretty much started turning all the machines off, and that cut our power in half every month. So we started learning all these different things to survive, to get through that, of course, and then, once we built this new location we still kind of used those same features.

Speaker 3:

We had it built into the power now. So like we have switches right at the cash register where we can turn on every single machine in the arcade at one time and then when everybody leaves cause it's an hourly business, so sometimes you'll get tons of people for a couple hours and then it just disappears for a little bit and then you got more people again. So it's kind of in and out. So we've learned just turning that power on and off saves us tons of money that way.

Speaker 2:

And I'm pretty sure that once, just speaking from our own experience, is that once quarantine lifted, people were looking for things to go out and do.

Speaker 3:

People were traveling out of New York. They were still locked down. People were coming down towards Florida and stuff and we had people stopping in saying they were from New York and they just looked us up on that app I was telling you about, as they were traveling through and stop and play pinball, because the whole city was locked down. They couldn't do anything.

Speaker 2:

So yeah, yeah, I was in LA as late as 2022 and they still were like is it safe to come back?

Speaker 3:

They were putting their heads out.

Speaker 2:

Right, right, I'm like Atlanta's been in full swing for years. Well, please tell us, Brian, tell our listeners one thing you'd like for them to always remember about Portal Pinball Arcade.

Speaker 3:

It's always fun. I mean, it's a fun place. There's never stress, and if you do have stress, this is a place to get rid of that stress. It's a great escape, and that's what I tell people. Once you kind of understand pinball a little bit, it is literally a world under glass that you will be coming back to play again and again.

Speaker 2:

I love that, the great escape. I can't wait to come see you when our listeners want to experience that escape. How can they find you and reach?

Speaker 3:

you, we're at 3335 Cobb Parkway, suite 800. Here in Ackworth we're in the same plaza with Crunch. Fitness and Dollar Tree.

Speaker 2:

Perfect. Thank you so much for being with us today. Really appreciate you being on the show. We wish you and your business the best moving forward. I'll see you soon.

Speaker 3:

Thank you so much.

Speaker 1:

Bye. Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnpcobbcountycom. That's gnpcobbcountycom, or call 470-470-4506. Thank you.