How do you really feel!

My wife recently read my blog about Granite Bowl closing and told me that I kind of sugar coated it and should really say what I really think, so here goes. The Granite Bowl was build back in 1939 and was run by me for 10 years. Yes, I did have 3 other partners but none of them were day to day operation managers. Before me was the Higgins family. They ran it for over 40 years. It was run as a family owned business for most of those 50 years. Then it is sold to the current owner, that believed that I had no idea what I was doing. Even though sales went from 250,000 a year to well over a million during my tenure. When I purchased GB it's sales were 90% from league and tournament bowling. When sold it was 40% league and 60% open bowling. I worked very hard to get the college and high school age customers to come to the center. These are the people that had discretionary income to spend and would spend money on food and beverage as well as bowling. The 1st thing that current owner did was to drive away most of the 60% of open play which in turn drove down food and beverage sales. Now if you read any industry magazine open play is the future of the industry and most proprietors are working to bring this customer in and he was driving them away. So, it's no surprise to me to find him in his current situation. Now if you read the article that was posted in the local paper http://www.sctimes.com/article/20110818/BUSINESS/108170047/Owners-merge-bowling-centers-Southway-St-Cloud-s-lone-center you would think that his current move was for the good of the bowlers when in reality it was maybe his only way to not have to file bankruptcy. Now the real question is why would my brother actually lease his business to a man that couldn't make GB work. Even though South is a nicer center its location is not near as good as GB. The old adage is Location, Location, Location. GB is a much easier center to get people to come because of this. The cold hard fact is my brother could care less about the bowlers of St Cloud attested by the fact that since I have left both centers they have been in a tail spin and South has been allowed to fall into a dirty mess and  has been losing money every year. They are just waiting for debt to be paid off enough to sell to anyone and get the hell out. So, by leasing to the GB owner they can get money to payoff what they owe and the bonus is if it losses money it would come from someone other them. The loser of this is the bowlers of St Cloud. They are losing the best location for a bowling center and local landmark. They have an owner that is headed for bankruptcy and another that could care less about them. The winner is Great River Bowl which has continued to do things the right way with a combination of bowling, food and beverage. The only problem is if you live anywhere south of division it is a long way to Sartell to bowl and you pass many other entertainment options to get there. What really could happen is the closing of GB is opening the chances of Brunswick coming into town and create a bowling entertainment center. They have done all the work and have a model already drawn up for here. I would recommend the old Sam's Club or Walmart buildings. Great location with lots of parking. For the morons at South quit screwing with the customers and get out if you don't care!