Brad Gotfried, owner of the Titkitiki Bowling Bar, has fired 25 staff as he tries to figure out what went wrong. He has also slashed prices.
By far the best entertainment venue Sai Kung has ever seen, the Tikitiki opened last year. It is a spectacular place where Brad must have spent close to $100 million. Sai Kung people went to take a look. They liked the music, the decor and the straw-hatted African guards, but didn’t like the prices: $320 for an hour of bowling or $520 depending on number of drinks.
Residents voted with their feet and didn’t go back. One of the fired managers, who we’ll call Phil, said they told Brad prices were too high, if he wanted residents to be regulars. Phil said as well as over-investing on decor, Brad over-hired and over-spent on salaries. The recent firings became inevitable as business declined after the novelty period. Phil said, “Brad’s got all kinds of wheels going round and round in his head, but none of them are connected to anything.”
Recently Brad ordered prices cut to rock bottom. It is only $100 an hour now to hurl balls at skittles on weekday afternoons. It’s $200 an hour to bowl on weekday evenings and weekend afternoons. At peak times on weekends and holidays you pay $300 a hour.
The Tikitiki Bowling bar may be with us for a long time –a marvellous place it deserves to be. Rent is not an issue: Brad owns the building. He has seemingly inexhaustible reserves of cash. After Brad’s father, a Cathay Pacific Captain, died young, his mother married an American denim-manufacturing billionaire.
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