The Zone Bowling is looking at a busy season this fall with two leagues going, new birthday package specials, an upgraded kitchen and bowlers looking to roll their ball down newly-installed bowling lanes.
The new lanes were installed at the beginning of August and have received positive feedback from patrons in the month since.
“It took them almost two weeks to get it all done (lanes installed) and finished up. I’m still tidying up things here and there and I’ve still got a few things to get ordered, but it’s coming together now,” said Cody Stanford of The Zone Bowling.
“The new lanes make things a lot better and smoother, and you don’t have to worry about your ball getting damaged going down a lane. That was a big part of it (why new lanes were installed),” he shared.
In addition to the new lanes, there are also some new faces at The Zone Bowling. Stanford recently filled all open full and part-time postitions, and is still accepting applications for seasonal help.
Birthday party pricing has also been restructured to fit the needs of groups of any size or age.
“The party packages were good for groups with a lot of people in them, but they weren’t working for smaller groups with just a few of your friends. So we are trying to accommodate that,” explained Stanford.
“Our packages before were for ten people, and so everything was built around ten people. So, now, we just have it (price) broke down per person.”
While parties have been mostly catered to children only in the past, Stanford will be implementing new ideas and expanding the kitchen to host parties catered to adults as well.
“We are also putting together packages for adults. We’re going to offer drink tickets for alcohol and tickets for food items,” he said.
“If you want to do entrees, we’re going to start doing nights where we make different things for everybody. We’re trying to expand our kitchen a little, so when we make dinner to-order, we’ll do chicken fried steak and things like that now. We’ve got a good kitchen crew, and we’ve changed alot of stuff, so the food’s really good now,” Stanford said.
Youth Bowling
Youth bowling started this past Sunday and will run for 16 weeks, followed by another 16 weeks in January.
“What that (league) does is get kids interested. I’m hoping to build this program up a little bit and take off with it. My whole goal is this; I want to start a high school team,” Stanford said.
“It’s not affiliated with the school or UIL, bowling is kind-of a weird thing. All the Amarillo schools have a team and Lubbock schools have a team– so, I’m trying to get enough kids in on it so that so we can just jump right in there and compete with them.”
Youth bowling leagues provide many scholarship opportunities as well.
“Scholarship opportunities are crazy. If you place in any tournament, you get scholarship money that accumulates and sits (in an account) until you pull it out to go (to college),” Stanford said.
“I’ve got kids that have been bowling since they were five or six years old that are sitting on a pretty good scholarship fund. It just builds up and most of those kids are in the 15-16 range ($15K-16K). We’re also really good contacts with a few college coaches, and if you want to move to the next level and bowl at the next level- we can put a good word in and you can do that pretty easily,” he shared.
“It’s something a lot of people don’t think about, but there’s a lot of opportunity there.We’re still taking sign-ups and I always have some kids that join late. There’s five or six sports going on at the same time and so sometimes they can’t make it every week, but that’s okay because I’m pretty lenient about it and we’re good about moving around to help other people’s schedules. I want everybody to participate, so I make it work for everybody with whatever else they have going on. That’s why we have it on Saturday afternoons right now,” Stanford explained.
Boston Beer League
The Boston Beer League is for adults and begins on October 1, 2023– it will be a ten-week league, skipping the week of Thanksgiving.
“It promotes Boston beers in that market like Samuel Adams, Twisted Tea, Truly, Dogfish Head, Angry Orchard and random beers like that. They aren’t mainstream beers,” Stanford said.
“You get to pick a brand of ball that you’d want, which has been a pretty cool thing.”
“Sign-ups are still going, we’re hoping to get eight to ten leagues just to have fun on a Sunday afternoon. We’ll probably take sign ups all the way up to that day and probably for a week after if someone wants to join after and catch up, that’s fine.We’re doing four to a team, but if you can’t make the four it’s just a fun league, nothing too serious– so if you don’t have that, it’s fine,” Stanford said.
If the league gains interest, Stanford says that he can schedule more throughout the year.
“If it goes well, we can do another one. There’s really no cap and how many times we can do that,” he said.
The Zone Bowling is located at 1401 S. Hobart in Pampa and is open Monday through Thursday from 3 p.m. until 10 p.m., Fridays 3 p.m. until 11 p.m., Saturdays 2 p.m. until 12 a.m. and Sundays from 1 p.m. until 9 p.m. For questions or to sign up for one of the leagues running this fall, call 806-665-5181.
