Their signature use of technology and design to turn traditional sports into casual games has enabled their brands to reach around the world: Topgolf has 96 venues in the US and Puttshack 19. The brothers and their partner in Puttshack, Adam Breeden, founder of the darts chain Flight Club and F1 Arcade, made the UK the industry\u2019s global innovation hub.<\/p>\n
The 67-year-old brothers are now back with their \u201cthird and final venture\u201d, a chain called Poolhouse, which this year raised<\/a> $34mn of seed capital from investors including the Daily Mail\u2019s investment arm and Sharp Alpha, a New York venture fund. The first outlet, a 21,000 square foot, 20-table restaurant next to Liverpool Street station in London, opens next year.<\/p>\n The Jolliffes have kept a low profile over three decades, rarely giving interviews, and Poolhouse\u2019s technology has stayed under wraps apart from demonstrations for investors. But they both came to Shots to play their new pool game with the FT and discuss their story. \u201cIf we\u2019d been born in America, I think it would have started there,\u201d Steve said of competitive socialising.<\/p>\n At first glance, the Poolhouse table looked no different from any other, but it turned out to have their touch. Cameras, sensors and light projectors were hung above the table and will be concealed in chandeliers at venues. The technology lets beginners play with experts by assessing the skill of each player during the game and handicapping them.<\/p>\n AI software calculated the difficulty of each shot from the position of the balls. It held back better players (Dave Jolliffe) by projecting on to the table playful obstacles such as banana skins they would lose points for crossing. The low-skilled ones (me) gained extra shots, bonuses or the right to move the cue ball before shooting.<\/p>\n The contest thus became exciting for a mixed ability group. \u201c[The Jolliffes] have always targeted the non-player by making games easy, welcoming and warm,\u201d said Andrew O\u2019Brien, Poolhouse chief executive. This widens the market and has another financial advantage: more people can play (and pay) at once on each table.<\/p>\n Recommended<\/p>\n The appeal of competitive socialising for the hospitality industry is that it adds a third revenue stream with a very high profit margin to serving food and drink. Poolhouse has invested about \u00a312mn in the technology, and the same sum again to fit out the Liverpool Street venue. Once the tables are installed, they will cost little to run.<\/p>\n But Poolhouse is entering a crowded field: Savills estimated that the UK will have 800 competitive socialising outlets by 2029, with the Guinness World Records exploring one in London<\/a>. Topgolf sales have fallen<\/a> in the US after players were put off by its high prices, and Callaway plans to spin off the brand. Even the Jolliffes\u2019 name and expertise no longer guarantees success.<\/p>\n New ventures must offer more to stand out: \u201cPeople want to walk into better venues and they expect the gameplay to be more sophisticated,\u201d O\u2019Brien said. Poolhouse wants to license the technology and design to other operators to build branded venues around the world, rather than investing all the capital itself. It also intends to sell versions of its tables for home use.<\/p>\n In Watford, not far from the first Topgolf outlet, we discussed the number of countries where pool is played in halls, bars and homes. \u201cWe think they\u2019re all there for the taking,\u201d O\u2019Brien said. The Jolliffes have not lost their sense of ambition.<\/p>\n john.gapper@ft.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":229711,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[554,733,4308,86,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-229710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229710\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Illustrated](\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/__origami\/service\/image\/v2\/images\/raw\/https%3A%2F%2Fimages.ft.com%2Fv3%2Fimage%2Fraw%2Fhttps%253A%252F%252Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%252Fproduction%252F1ed3b7fb-7707-4e16-9d14-69897c4ee5d5.jpg%3Fsource%3Dnext-article%26fit%3Dscale-down%26quality%3Dhighest%26width%3D700%26dpr%3D1?source=next&fit=scale-down&dpr=2&width=240\")
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