On May 1st, the Pineville NC location of Paintball Central moves to 2233 Matthews Township Parkway, Suite J, Matthews,NC 28105 from its current location at 8700 Pineville-Matthews Road (Hwy 51) in Pineville (near Bally’s Total Fitness.) The store is promoting a Moving Sale where they are advertising everything 10% - 50% off. The sale ends April 24th. Click Read More for details…

“Days-ed” and Confused!

The new store will open the new location and close the old location on May 1st, but the sale is only until April 24th. Not sure I understand the logic there, but the whole move/sale seems a bit confused and a “moving” target. The original moving date was originally April 18th, but for some reason moved to May. Hey! Business happens! Then there was a misprint on their postcards announcing it with the wrong address. The sale is from April 15th to the 24th, but their moving date was the 18th? I was there on the afternoon of the 15th and they were just then putting up the sale signs and didn’t have any of the 50% off products displayed. I interviewed the store manager, Cody, and while he was very gracious about an interview, had said that the corporate marketing guy out of Greensboro would get a hold of me with more details and graphics before I published this. So far nothing.

Bargains? Maybe. 

Now all this may seem like I’m a bit down on the store, but I really just wanted to get the point across that this is not a paid advertisement. We don’t accept advertising so we can publish impartial reviews. They didn’t ask us to come and interview them and initially thought I was soliciting for advertising for the site. We’re not. Once we cleared that up, we had a nice conversation about the move and the sale. Cody claims that the reason for the move is to provide better access from the road, more room for products and to be in a nicer shopping center. When asked specifically what would be on sale, they were happy to give me details (hey! who doesn’t love free press?) I have added my computations for the amount of discount next to their prices. Check my math skills. I was an art major!

• XO Spectrum Paintballs $29 case (reg. $41.50) 30% off
• PM7 marker $550 (reg. $650)  15% off
• DM7 marker $900 (re. $1300)  31% off
• 48 cu. inch 3000 psi air tanks $55 (reg. $65) 15% off
• Tippman accessories 25% off
• Full Clip clothing 25% off

The sale item I was somewhat disappointed in hearing was all other guns were only 10% off. Ten percent puts them slightly below most of the competitive prices, but I am hardly going to burn the wheels of my car to get there for that. I had sort of figured that if this was a real “moving sale” that they would be drastically reducing prices in order to keep from packing and moving the merchandise. When someone told me earlier that they were selling at 50% off, I actually did go out of my way to see what the story was. What can I say? 50% is a good deal. The staff didn’t actually point out any items that were 50% off, but did say they didn’t have them out yet. I won’t claim to know anything about the quality of XO Spectrum paintballs, but that seemed like a good sale price and if you were saving your rubles up for a $1300 paintball marker, that seems like a helluva deal. I don’t know many guys that were, but then I don’t hang with the high-end speedball gang.

A Cog in the Machine

This store is just one of five Paintball Central retail locations which owns 3 “Sportsparks”. The other stores include Winston-Salem, Durham, Greensboro and Greenville. I have not visited  the other fields or stores, but the Rock Hill sportspark has some woods for woodsballers, but seems mainly focused on speed ballers and the prices seemed slightly higher than others in the area. The Pineville store is run very much with a “retail” feel. What I mean is that the ‘tone’ seems very detached and to the point. The staff seems very young (or maybe I’m just getting very old) and there seems to be no warmth or desire to create a positive customer relationship with people that come into the store. I watch their interaction with other customers. I am a regular browser at the Pineville store (maybe as much as once a week) since it is close to my house and I would bet money the staff doesn’t know my name, gun type, preference in play, or anything about me.  That’s not necessary, but in a world where Ebay is your competition, that’s an advantage that you should try and exploit. Maybe it’s because I am not their typical market, or because I am not a speedballer, but from others I have interviewed, it does seem to be that engaging their customers is not a focus. In a paintball market as small as this, that would be my top priority. Making the customers feel welcome, remembered and important. I get the same feeling from PBC, as a customer, that I do at Dick’s Sporting Goods. In other words, “what can I do to take care of you to get you out of here so I can do my real work?” Maybe they are understaffed. Paintball retail tends to NOT be a self shopping environment. It is very much a one to one customer assistance scenario (pardon the pun!) Maybe it’s the corporate culture. They are just one store of several in a chain. You don’t expect McDonald’s counter people to remember you. But then I don’t purchase $600 hamburgers either. McDonalds has a universal customer base and paintball retail has a much much smaller pool of local customers to draw from. Regular shoppers should be catered to. As a customer, I very much get the feel I am just a number when I walk in and forgotten as soon as I  leave.

The Bottom Line

The new store will be right down the road from the X-Treme Tactical store in Indian Trail and this could be a good thing. For paintball players. The competition may force more aggressive sales and bargains in attempt to capture market share. Maybe not. Manufacturers seem to be dictating retail prices these days with very little play in the range.

If you are looking to purchase some new gear, I would recommend you take a drive over to PBC’s store in Pinveville and give it a look. Anytime you can save money in this very expensive sport of ours, you need to try. They may have just the bargain you were looking for. They have a great range of Tippman markers as well as some BT and speedball (as if!) guns. Do your homework online at various resources and then see if they have the bargain you were looking for. Remember that while you may find something a bit cheaper online, there is that whole instant gratification thing of being able to have it right now versus whenever that Ebayer gets around to shipping it to you. Another consideration is the return policy. Check it out. Paintball Central only honors exchanges, NO REFUNDS. (A small sign was pointed out to me AFTER I tried to return my Apex barrel.) Thank goodness I wasn’t trying to return a $1300 marker!

I look forward to reviewing the new store once it is open and settled into (assuming they let me in the door after reading this!). Maybe in a new location, the customer service will be a bit more friendly and personal. It will be nice to see if the larger space will accommodate more scenario apparel and gear to offset their lean toward speedball.

For More Information…

Contact Cody or the store at (704) 752-9774 or email to cody@paintballcentral.com. The store hours are published as: Mon-Fri: 10am-8pm, Sat. 9am-8pm and Sun: 12pm-6pm.

Directions to Pineville location:
From I-85, Take I-485 West (Exit 48)
Go 32.5 miles to Pineville-Matthews Rd./Carolina Place Mall (Exit 64A)
Once you merge onto Pineville-Matthews Rd., get in the left lane and go straight through the stop light. Turn left, just after the Bojangles, into Tower Place Shopping Center. Paintball Central is just a few doors down from Quizno’s Subs.

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