The initial pitch was an arcade with a restaurant to feed guests. Since video games were at the core of that strategy, I would expect it should be classified as an entertainment center first.
Is Chuck E Cheese a restaurant or entertainment center with a restaurant inside?
Submitted 8 months ago by RIP_Cheems@lemmy.world to nostupidquestions@lemmy.world
Comments
HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club 8 months ago
SpeedLimit55@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Entertainment, nobody goes there to eat pizza.
idealotus@lemmy.world 8 months ago
They’re apparently decently popular on online delivery apps, though they sneakily go under “Pasqually’s Pizza and Wings”
altima_neo@lemmy.zip 8 months ago
Is it sneaky though? Pasqually is one of the animatronic characters names.
bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 8 months ago
It’s a barcade, like Dave and Buster’s. Just a kid’s barcade.
Pat_Riot@lemmy.today 8 months ago
It’s a hookup joint for single parents.
Alk@lemmy.world 8 months ago
I think it started out the former and evolved into the latter. My source is like 3 neurons in my brain that were last accessed 15 years ago so pretty sure it’s accurate.
desmosthenes@lemmy.world 8 months ago
it’s a casino fundamentally so the later
Ghostalmedia@lemmy.world 8 months ago
The food isn’t for the adults. The beer is.
DampSquid@feddit.uk 8 months ago
The answer is yes.
richieadler@lemmy.myserv.one 8 months ago
Try to find the segment John Oliver did about it. Is hilarious.
Yaztromo@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Chuck E Cheese was founded by Nolan Bushnell — the same Nolan Bushnell who was one of the co-founders of video game company Atari (at one time, the biggest player in the home console industry). He started it in part as a way to promote Atari games and cabinets.
So it was both — and the “entertainment centre” part was always part of its “core mission” from its inception.
HoustonHenry@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Fun fact, they used to serve beer and wine (red AND white, out of a tap!)
son_named_bort@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Yes
Kolanaki@yiffit.net 8 months ago
IIRC, the original act for the animatronics had a bit about not calling it a restaurant because it was primarily an entertainment venue, it just also served food.
Melkath@kbin.social 8 months ago
Restaurant with a few overpriced arcade games in there.
Basically a 7/11 with a few arcade cabinets in it... but all they have is pizza and cheap beer.
altima_neo@lemmy.zip 8 months ago
Yeah but 7/11 has the magazines to ogle while your buddy is playing his turn on the r-type machine
Rinna@lemm.ee 8 months ago
What do you mean? It’s a restaurant, they serve pizza and have a salad bar. I’ve been there a bunch of times as a kid. It’s a restaurant man, what are you talking about?
RattlerSix@lemmy.world 8 months ago
There’s extra steps that have to be taken in order to serve food so they’re probably officially classified as a restaurant
Donjuanme@lemmy.world 8 months ago
As a kid it was an entertainment center, as an adult the pizza isn’t bad, but you get funky looks when you go solo XD especially if you want to play the games :-( don’t even go for the ball pit (this is for adults and kids)
RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Don’t they turn you away if you are not accompanying a child these days? Other than food delivery/pickups, of course.
Donjuanme@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Could’ve been that the hosts recognized me from having gone with the family a month prior? And I asked them if it was weird that I was just there for the pizza and they agreed that it was remarkably good compared to the other chain options around, but no, no discrimination for food purchases.
altima_neo@lemmy.zip 8 months ago
My friend had a hard time getting in, like 20 years ago. But he just wanted to play DDR.
guyrocket@kbin.social 8 months ago
If you call what they serve food, then I guess there's a restaurant with the video games and ticket machines.
hperrin@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Yes.
BlameThePeacock@lemmy.ca 8 months ago
I would say the primary reason for going there is the entertainment center, not the food.
linearchaos@lemmy.world 8 months ago
And if you took the food away kids would still want to go there. If you took the entertainment away nobody’s going there for the pizza.
steal_your_face@lemmy.ml 8 months ago
Its right there in the name. Charles Entertainment Cheese. Yes that’s his canon name.
xmunk@sh.itjust.works 8 months ago
I don’t know who you’re trying to impress. Most of us have been deeply soaked in the Bushnell-verse… I’m looking forward to the upcoming origin story movies.
db2@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Just don’t go for that night guard job…
DontTreadOnBigfoot@lemmy.world 8 months ago
That said, my kid got invited to a Chuck E Cheese’s birthday party recently, and the pizza was a hell of a lot better than I remember it being 15 years ago