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National Pinball Museum to close

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gryhnd:
Did a search, didn't see this posted elsewhere:

National Pinball Museum to close

Just five months after opening its doors to delighted pinheads and wizards across the D.C. region, Georgetown’s National Pinball Museum is being forced to close.

David Silverman, the Silver Spring man whose dream it was to share his pinball collection with the masses, said Monday that he has received a letter informing him that he will have to vacate his third-floor space at the Shops at Georgetown Park in mid-July.

ChadTower:

Well, if he put up $300k of his own cash, and had 200 machines running, clearly he's retired and has some money to burn.  Or else he's paying techs to maintain 200 games.

piecesof8:
I'm a couple hours south of there. Been meaning to make it up there to check this out, but it's another one of those things I just haven't had time for yet... Guess I might never get that chance now.

I haven't heard one good thing about the location - basically a long-dead mall with no parking. What I gather is that he got 2 years rent-free, sunk $300k into improvements, then the mall changed hands and the new owners are making good on the "we can kick you out any time we damn well please" clause in the lease. It's a bummer to see this happen, but investing $300k into a location and not checking the lease to see that they can kick you out whenever they want = serious long-term planning fail.

ChadTower:

--- Quote from: piecesof8 on May 24, 2011, 11:33:09 am ---What I gather is that he got 2 years rent-free

...

not checking the lease to see that they can kick you out whenever they want = serious long-term planning fail.

--- End quote ---


Sounds more like an educated risk he failed on than something he didn't notice.  2 years rent free is a pretty good tradeoff for a 60 day clause on an out of the box risky venture like a pinball museum.

Vigo:
Dumping 300k into a place that can dump you on your ass any given moment without reason seems pretty stupid. Any risk backed by education would say that this is a bad idea.

And I have heard many times over tactics of crappy outdated malls starting leases for dirt cheap, then once a renter dumps all their investment into it, the mall jacks up the rent 10 fold at the first lease renewal. I wouldn't be surprised if the mall tried to do that before kicking this guy out on the street.

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