Paintball Enthusiast Builds Epic Field in New Zealand

This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.

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Hey there, what's up? Well, welcome back. This is Side Hustle School and my name is Chris Guillebeau. Here we are approaching the end of the week as we round toward episode number 500. This is actually episode number 497.

Now here's a question for you today. How would you like to have your own paintball facility or field? Is that your deepest desire? Is that your wildest and craziest dream? Do you wake up in the morning and think, you know, maybe one day I can make something of myself and have a paintball field?

Well, if there's one person out there who fits those criteria, this episode is for you and for everybody else, including myself, I wouldn't want to have my own paintball field either. But either way, it could be interesting to learn this story behind a paintball business through the lens of today's featured story. Now, one of the best ways to find a Sadasil that's right for you is to ideate around the things you love. Today's story is a perfect example of this. It's about a guy in New Zealand, a pilot instructor specifically, who creates a paintball field and then rinse it out.

And yes, in fact, he does include a couple of tips for everybody out there who wants to start their own paintball field. So stay tuned, I'll bring you that story and those tips right after this quick thank you to our sponsor. [Music]

Craig Tyer always wanted to fly airplanes. Once he was old enough, he trained to be a flight instructor. A dream job, right?

Well, it was a dream job in some ways, but it definitely didn't come with a dream paycheck. At least in Craig's native New Zealand, teaching junior pilots was not a high paying career. Naturally, he needed a side hustle and it helped that he had some history with them, beginning with his first at age nine. Years later, while going through flight training, he played a lot of paintball on the weekends. Part of it was for fun and part of it was to stay fit.

After all, there's a lot of sitting involved in flying. Craig was living in Christchurch, New Zealand, and the tourist industry took a nosedive after a massive 6.3 earthquake. After a number of paintball fields went out of business, Craig determined to keep his beloved pastime in his city. So he began saving every penny he could to start his own paintball facility. How much does a paintball facility cost, you ask?

Well, in Christchurch, New Zealand, apparently it costs around $8,000. He began by buying 10 paintball packs from his contacts in Christchurch, enough gear for eight to 10 people to play, costing around $5,000. He also traveled around the country by plane, conveniently, touring different paintball facilities, noting his likes and dislikes. From there, he designed the paintball field of his dreams. If he built it, would they come?

Well, he started locally sourcing old tires, wooden pallets, and started building forts and barricades. He said he felt just like being a kid again, or at least a kid who was almost turning 30 years old. Craig leased a small portion of land from his grandfather. This portion of land bordered the neighbor's property. Therefore, Borderlands Paintball became Christchurch's newest up-and-coming paintball field.

Dun, dun, dun. His first point of advertising was a Facebook event page where he invited his friends. He then began putting on ad-hoc games with more friends, purchasing and testing additional equipment as he went. He also set up a small shooting gallery at local markets and school galas, handing out flyers as people played. Eventually, the games got too big for him to handle on his own.

Once he was trying to manage games with over 20 people, Craig knew he needed help. His sister, Vicky, jumped on board, beginning by working as a field referee for games. Vicky was doing a small business management course at the time, and Craig decided to offer her a share of the business. This was a side hustle, so for the first few years, Craig and Vicky mostly broke even. And whenever they did profit, they tended to invest right back in the business.

They got new equipment, they upgraded the fields, and they finally connected power to the field, installed plumbing and safety fencing. By the end of the third year, profits began to pick up. Those profits weren't large. They were around 500 to 1,000 bucks a month after paying for various upgrades. But again, for Craig and Vicky, it was a fun business they could run while both working full-time, mostly dedicating occasional weekends to Borderlands.

Last year, they were able to make about $1,500 a month, even in the off-season, mostly due to the addition of promotions and social media. Craig started a quarterly email newsletter and has been focused on optimizing his website, as well as generating scheduled content for Facebook and Google Ads. It's been a small investment, just $150, but that small investment led to a 300% traffic increase to their website. Craig says in this day and age, you simply can't just make a website and leave it, at least in that cutthroat New Zealand paintball industry. Now, if you're out there and you'd like your own paintball field, couple things you need to know.

Opening a paintball playground has some unique needs when it comes to insurance. Because of the nature of paintball, something about shooting these projectiles of paint, rapid fire and at rapid velocity, Craig recommends having legit liability insurance. At Borderlands, they also have a waiver the customer signs, as well as two referees in each game, and not to mention, which I'm gonna mention anyway, they always have a first aid certified staff member on call. Here's another tip, Craig recommends that you don't cater to the hardcore crowd. It's the birthday parties and bachelor parties that make up 90% of the income.

I think that's smart for lots of things, by the way. In all kinds of alternative sports or anything, it's a little bit different or unusual. You're gonna have this hardcore crowd. And that hardcore crowd is gonna be the most vocal. But just like Craig said, they are not the primary audience.

They are not the ones that make up 90% of the income. So good for him on figuring that out. Both Craig and Vicky still have their full-time jobs alongside running Borderlands. Vicky works for the electrical company and Craig has been able to live out a couple of his dreams. Continuing his passion for aviation and in the rest of his spare time, building a custom adventure van.

Traveling New Zealand and Australia with his partner and their pet ferret, as one does after crafting the perfect paintball field. [Music]

Well, I'm not sure what to add to this story, except to say, of course, congrats to Craig and to Vicky. I played paintball exactly once, if I'm not mistaken, maybe twice actually. And this is going back a long, long time. And I actually liked it.

I thought it was kind of fun. But I'm the kind of person that if I'm gonna do something like that, I actually am gonna be one of those hardcore people. I'm not just gonna be like the casual paintball player. And at the time, as I recall, like it was a substantial investment to make in terms of the gear, and also just learning about the stuff. And like, if I was gonna do it, I'd wanna subscribe to the magazines.

I'd wanna be out there every weekend. And all things considered, that wasn't what I wanted to do, at least not more than anything else. But it was fun. And speaking of fun, I think when you're gonna have a project like this, maybe here is something to add. Like it's important for it to be a money-making project, of course, this is why it's side hustle school.

It's also the kind of thing where at least in this story, like there is some money in it. It's a sustainable, legitimate, significant side income. But it was also a fair amount of work to establish it. So you only wanna go down that road if it's something that you really believe in, right? And so for Craig, this was something he believed in.

So when he's spending hours and hours, and he's able to kind of reflect and say, "Oh, why am I doing this? "Oh, because I don't want paintball "to leave Christchurch, New Zealand." If that wasn't his passion, if he didn't believe that, I think it might've been a hard road to go down. But you're not gonna make that mistake, of course, because you're gonna go down the road of something that you're excited about, and you're gonna find a way to make money with. That is my hope for you as we prepare to close out the week and go strong into episode 500 and beyond. Don't forget, inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is so much better.

Today's show notes, including your very own paintball tutorial, are at sidehustleschool.com/497. That is once again for episode 497. Thank you for listening. I'll be back tomorrow and every day. My name is Chris Guillebeau for Side Hustle School.

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