Starting a SIM business-advice?

I own an indoor kart track that is set up as a members-only club and we've been in business 20 years. We recently traveled to another city to check out a new barrier system and while there, checked out some full motion Sims. We were wildly impressed and after a few months of research, we just bought 4 rigs. Our rigs have 3 Samsung 32" curved gaming monitors, Heusinkveld pedals, Heusinkveld handbrake, VNM shifter, Simucube wheel (F1 wheel and round wheel) and D-Box Haptic system (actuators) and Sparco seat. I'll post pictures when they are all set up but here's a pic of the one we test drove on our visit. Our rigs will have a GT seating position.  My questions are: When you have visited a commercial SIM business, what impressed you most? What did you not care for? What would you pay extra for and what was not worth it? Would you like to be able to purchase alcohol? Would you go by yourself  or with a friend or a group of friends?

I have not visited one, but would consider it if one were close.  The draw for me would be community racing - i.e. league nights, enduro races, etc. with all participants at that facility.

I would want to be able to purchase alcohol.

Side note:  I have that keyboard (actually 2 of them) and its the berkeleying devil.

I worked for a vendor that sold SIM rigs, they traveled to fairs, people lined up to try them out, there commercial space was a race shop, so they only showed them at a appointment only or for parties and they served houer d'oeuvres and drinks.  Have you checked with your local SBA or College to see if they can pull demographics. The demographics might be helpful in pulling in your marketing and retail strategy. 

If the rigs don't come with any actual sim software, check the licensing on whichever sim you use, some have restrictions on public use such as AC. For serious business use with high moddability I'd say you should be looking at rFactor2 or AC if you can make the licensing work. Automobilista is another very good one. iRacing has the best content quality but it can quickly become madly expensive compared to the others and I don't think the physics are quite as good as AC or rFactor2.

I've had at least a basic sim rig since I was a teenager and I've never had a whole lot of discretionary income so I've never been to a commercial sim business, I think I only saw one IRL once. I have sat in driving sims at arcades with other games like Dave & Buster's, Playdium etc (well, only one with actual sim software, most were very arcadey).

Keyboards with touchpads or trackballs are handy for sim rig controls - touchpads are less maintenance-intensive. Having a racing league would be a good idea, you could offer replay data/videos as an upsell or an unusual perk. Depending on the choice of software letting people join remotely with their home sim rigs could be an option, you could make that available to people with season passes for example. If you want to get deeper into it you could get your actual kart track modeled and add karts to the sim so people can practice the track virtually, and making the track + kart combo available for free might help bring in more customers - a lot of tracks are happy to get their models into popular sims for the same reason.

All the hardware has been purchased, I don't need advice on that. What I'm looking for are ideas for the facility. Do we need fans on the drivers or is keeping the room cool enough? Do we need a lounge where non-players can hang out? Food? Should the walls around the sims be black and without anything to distract or catch the eyes of the drivers? What features at a SIM place did you see/use that you liked? What was the pricing structure and what were the upgrades?

Would you like to be able to purchase alcohol?

What kind of question is that?  This still the GRM crowd?

loosecannon said:

 Do we need fans on the drivers or is keeping the room cool enough?

My experience at home has been that over about 15 minutes and you want to have a fan, so the answer probably depends on the amount of time folks would be driving.

My current sim rig actually has 2 fans that I run even though it's in a room that stays at about 20C.

+2 on having fans available...  PC and multiple monitors running put out a fair bit of heat.  If the driver's also working hard it can get hot.

I like the idea of having dark walls in the driver's vision beyond the screens.

I agree that some kind of league is a great way to generate interest, but 4 rigs makes for a small field.  Allowing outside drivers to join will probably be necessary to fill the grid.  

Having worked on engineering sims I have 2 pieces of advice.

1.  Fans.  It would be cool (no pun intended) if you could link them to vehicle speed 

2. Black out the peripheral vision areas to help prevent motion sickness.  Moving objects behind the screen that don't match what you think is going on can screw with your head.  

So I 2nd the above advice.

This is pertinent to my interests. 

I've only been in one motion SIM rig, but it was quite a number of years ago at the New York Auto show in the vendor area.   I think a session was $10, which seemed high at the time, but inflation...   The SIM was set up in a caged rig, so you kinda felt like you were in a real car, which was cool.  I'm not prone to motion sickness, so the non-moving background didn't bother me, but I can agree a black background would probably be good for a permanent install. 

I like the idea of a SIM rig, but considering how rarely I play the games I already have, I don't know how much use I'd get out of it.  I already have more hobbies than I have time for.   But going to a place where I could rent one once in a while is definitely something I'd consider.  Probably even more so than karting, which while fun isn't something I really seek out...

I don't have much advise, but visited the one at VW Autostadt in Wolfsburg. The room was very dark, my pictures don't do it justice. They had couches behind  each rig and had a big tv on top you could watch from the couch. 

They also had a mock setup where you could do a fit test

Rodan said:

I agree that some kind of league is a great way to generate interest, but 4 rigs makes for a small field.  Allowing outside drivers to join will probably be necessary to fill the grid.  

You could do bracket elimination style sprint races, time trials, etc.  There are ways to work with 4 rigs.  Have a "spectator" setup broadcasting on another TV for people to watch while they grab a drink and await their turn.  Lots of options.

Another note:  I expect primary uses would be road courses, but don't forget about drifting and rally racing.  DR 2.0 Rallycross is actually run in 4-6(?) player sessions
 

A note on motion sickness... 

Motion sickness usually results when there is a disconnect between what the eyes and inner ear are telling the brain.  If your eyes think your body is moving and your inner ear says it's not (and vice versa), nausea can result.  If the sim has motion, it will help to mitigate the issue.  It's always good to have a bucket standing by, though.

Before I retired, I was an emergency vehicle driving instructor, and the state built a simulator in a trailer that we took all over the state to provide training for agencies that did not have their own driving track facilities.  The simulator rapidly earned the nickname "Vomit Comet".  Enclosed area, not enough ventilation, no motion... We always kept a trash can with a fresh liner next to the sim.

Some folks are more prone to motion sickness than others.  My wife drives our track car with no issues, but can't tolerate a single lap on my sim rig without nausea.

In reply to ProDarwin :

I didn't think about drifting...  now that you mention it, I'm thinking that could be a BIG draw in a larger urban market with few actual venues.

I tried to go to this in Munich but it was closed the day I was in the city https://www.racing-unleashed.com/details/racing-lounge-muenchen

I like all of the fans, black wall, and overhead secondary display options.

As mentioned don't know how track liscencing and cars work but would love to have like in house versions of both local and national events. Anywhere from driving all the tracks near me in what might be my own car all the way up to doing a mini LeMans race in prototypes/ GT3 cars.

And to answer the OP questions:

Alcohol:  Sure, but not a requirement.

Would likely attend solo and with friends, depending on proximity.

I've been able to attend sessions on a few high dollar simulators. They are indeed fun and give people a chance to do things they normally wouldn't be able to.  I'm not sure if alcohol is necessary (I'm not a business owner in this segment so my opinion is worthless) but light food and drink would be a nice touch if it is going to be run similar to a kart track.  I don't know what you would be running for a program or where you are located but if you could put regional courses in that would be cool because everyone has probably at some point played a video game on Daytona,  Sebring,  Nuremberg ring etc. 

I would think keeping some sort of running record (e.g. monitor showing them) on site of lap records etc.  You can always add new tracks / cars, etc. so it could be ever evolving.

Having organized tournaments with some sort of prizes (even if minor) might be good (even silly t-shirts ).  They can even be lap time, over a period of weeks, tournaments.  Then maybe sort of on-site championship runoff with the leaders.  Doing it wheel to wheel would be fun, but introduces issues of fouls (running people off etc)

I just invested in what I consider to be a high end home sim setup. I am curious as to what nm the commercial wheel base set up runs. 

dean1484 said:

I just invested in what I consider to be a high end home sim setup. I am curious as to what nm the commercial wheel base set up runs. 

$45,000

Newton meters of force. Aka  nm.
 

Although yes I was also wondering what the cost was. I assume the 45k for all four setups?  I can see how that will make you money. What is the going rate to use a simulator?  
 

A friend and I were batting around the idea of putting together something that would both complement his driving school and could also be used for entertainment. 

Support bringing your own headseat. And have a way to keep your headseats really clean. I hate how gross they can be and would not want to put them in my face after some sweaty person with less than ideal hygiene.

dean1484 said:

Newton meters of force. Aka  nm.
 

Although yes I was also wondering what the cost was. I assume the 45k for all four setups?  I can see how that will make you money. What is the going rate to use a simulator?  
 

A friend and I were batting around the idea of putting together something that would both complement his driving school and could also be used for entertainment. 

LOL-no, that is per unit.  The place we are getting them from supply Formula 1 teams and Formula 1 drivers. Sebring race track just ordered 6 sims from this place and only 1 of the 6 is like the ones we're getting. The pedals alone are $1500 each then there's 2 steering wheels for each unit (one F1 style and one GT style) and those are $900 each, it all adds up fast.