In this group photo of the Onesource Amusements team (from left): Gaby Sanchez, Alfonso Sanchez, Brenda Valdez, Amanda Scanland-Scholl, Jay Scanland, Katie Marks and Erik Murillo.
Building Business & Fun in Texas & Beyond
Onesource Amusements a One-Stop Shop in The Lone Star State
A family-owned and operated route business opened in 2008, Onesource Amusements provides Texas – and now other swaths of the rest of the country – with their coin-op needs.
Started by Jay Scanland, former president of Valley-Dynamo, the business is a family affair with his daughter Amanda Scanland-Scholl as the company’s marketing and CX manager.
With more than 400 locations, the route has grown quite a bit in these 15 years.
“We had a lot of little locations that were very successful at that time,” Scanland-Scholl said, noting Jay started with about 50 locations after approaching an operator and purchasing his route. “He saw opportunity to make great improvements with the jukebox. The digital jukebox market was a significant factor that helped him make that move. He saw an opportunity and he took that leap.”
The love for amusements goes back quite a bit further, to at least 1983, when Jay met his wife Colleen playing Defender at the largest arcade in Memphis, Tenn. – The Whiz (where the operator also worked during high school).
Onesource Amusement’s father-daughter team of Jay Scanland and Amanda Scanland-Scholl at Amusement Expo. If Jay looks familiar, he should. He was once president of Valley-Dynamo.
Today, jukeboxes continue to be the most profitable segment for Onesource, but they are a true full-service operation with video games, pinball, redemption, foosball, billiards, air hockey, ATMs, darts, photo booths and… are we missing anything?
The most common type of location on the route are places with a jukebox, pool tables and an arcade. Some favorites include Jurassic Park, Axe Master, Nitro Trucks and various basketball games. Onesource has also branched out into virtual reality in recent years.
“Placing the best equipment out there is definitely the best answer,” Scanland-Scholl said. The company mainly operates new product, but nostalgia stuff – like Defender, of course – also feature at certain locations. “We have everything.”
“Our goal is to take a basic game room and reimagine the perfect experience for both guests and the location,” she added. “We want their customers to keep coming back because they had a fun and memorable time. Our philosophy is simple – we want our customers to have fun.”
While their customers used to be solely in Texas, as of a few years ago, they’ve expanded outside the Lone Star State to include Nevada (starting out with locations in Las Vegas), Missouri, Florida, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Illinois and Louisiana. “We want to continue to grow more outside of Texas,” Scanland-Scholl explained.
Some of their partners, in and outside of Texas, include Sports & Social locations in the Dallas and Pittsburgh areas, Barcadia Dallas, BreWingZ in Houston, Holiday Inn Club Vacations, Cici’s Pizza, Green Acres Bowling in Tyler, Texas, and many other entertainment centers, resorts, bars and the like (and even corporate break rooms, too).
“We really want to make sure our clients are developing their core business,” she said. “There’s always a way to provide more entertainment and help people build more interaction.”
Of course, in the era of the pandemic and inflation, there have been challenges to getting that done efficiently.
“Currently, our biggest challenge is getting equipment when we need it,” Scanland-Scholl said. “There are games on backorder for several months and it can be frustrating to have to tell our clients that we can’t set the equipment for long periods of time.”
Change is the name of the game, though, and Onesource works to stay on top of trends and to remain at the forefront.
“We started counting quarters and now everything’s gone to card systems,” she said, noting that’s been the biggest revolution for the biz since 2008. “The future of the business depends on the innovation that our industry develops. With very few manufacturers, it’s hard to grow this industry. Our customers constantly want to be wowed and are not likely to play old games.”
Despite ups and downs and changes to the marketplace, one thing is sure to remain constant for Onesource Amusements – staying involved in the communities they serve.
One recent initiative is working to get a Pink Ladies Dart League running in Houston. “We’re really trying to reach out to the community.”
Another is their non-profit, the OSA CureCancer Foundation. In October, they helped out with the River Run Muddin For A Cure event held in Jacksonville, Texas, where they brought one of their boxer arcade games with all proceeds going toward the cure.
Visit www.onesourceamusements .com for more information about the business.
